Rest In Piss Mobile XI

This would probably be the worst single player RPG of all time. There is 0 point in making this an offline experience. The entire world has had like 19 years to play FFXI if they wanted to. It would absolutely bomb.

It comes down to marketing. My friend just now showed me an ad for Final Fantasy XIV's sale. Final Fantasy XI is also doing a sale, but its only announcement was on their own website.

I think we're making the same points here. Final Fantasy XI is not very popular. But is it not popular because the game and story are awful, or is it not popular because Square-Enix have been trying to kill it off for 10 years and because its gameplay is almost two decades old?

What I'm trying to say is that if they updated it to modern standards and gave it a fresh coat of paint, it would sell. They don't even have to invest a ton of money into it, they just need to say "Hey, you want to play FFXI without all the aggravating online stuff? Now's your chance for a one-time payment of only $79.99!"

No way to know. XI "the story" might sell to the people disgusted by the subscription/mmo title but would've played the story out.

You are assuming the game would be similar in gameplay experience tho. They could easily just take FFXI story and make whole game as different from FFXI online as FFVII remake was from FFVII classic. Also there would be nothing similar to "online" grind. It would be like in every single player FF, you would be bis geared in 50-200 hours and that bis gear would mostly be for your own achievement and/or to fight few op additional bosses (offline version of Master Trials). Also you would have no trusts system, but rather chars that are normally only in cutscenes or few selected fights, would be fighting/traveling with you all the time during specific missions.

It would be generally whole different gameplay experience, only with the same story/characters and similar ideas like job system and skillchains/magic bursts for example.

EDIT: you could also use some existing engine/base for it and modify it to cut costs (like from FFXV or FFVII remake)

Not really because FFXI has good story already, cool characters that are known to wide public and could be used in marketing (Shantotto). Few cool ideas like skillchains and magic bursts. Good job system. Some good abilities etc. Offline version/Offline remake could also justify (from marketing point of view) to use some modified game engine from previous single player FF game instead of doing something completely new. It only wouldnt have sense from your point of view and point of view of some party of current FFXI active community. People who dropped this game 10 years ago or people who never bothered to try it because its MMORPG or simply people who wasnt even born 17 years ago, would have completely different pov.

Because Final Fantasy XI is honestly amazing. I'm serious-- the sheer amount of thought that went into pre-production alone makes it worth experiencing. The job system is unlike that found in any other game, the world feels lived-in and real, and the story (while a bit rough around the edges) is fantastic.

Rather than have the time capsule of the Final Fantasy franchise simply skip the number 11 (and further down the road, 14), they could preserve the world of Vana'diel and everything that makes it great in a new game.

EDIT: Most of what makes Final Fantasy XI great is mutually exclusive from that which makes it fail on the market. We're all still here for a reason. If the only thing that made this game worth playing was its online experience, we'd all have moved on to XIV by now. If we could capture that essence and bottle it in an offline game, it could easily attract fans of the entire franchise.

An offline mode where every NPC vendor would sell everything you can get from off of other people on the AH would be nice. So very many useless vendors in FFXI right now that sell like:
2 random BRD song scrolls
a tomato
a brass armor set (but it is 25x more expensive than off of AH)
a distilled water, but the shop only stocks water sometime if someone sells it to the NPC.

It could be replaced with a vendor that sells axes. Just axes. All axes. All HQ axes. Boom. Something useful in single-player mode.

Just spit-balling here, but that hot-take on the randomness of NPC vendors was probably one of the most spot-on exagarations that I've ever made about this game.

I know we're talking about just having an Offline XI at this point, but eh. I could definitely see how a Mobile XI would/Could have worked. (and this discussion is happening on BG so sorry if someones reading my opinion twice \o/)

Its a Mobile, so it never would have been a 1/1 in size or scope, but think of it like the Mobile FFXV where you get the gist of the story, just compacted, with elements and themes but on a smaller scale.

With games like Genshin Impact and FF: Crystal Chronicles operating just fine on the Mobile Devices, its easy to see how it wouldn't be limited to just an old-school RPG feel, and it could easily be an ARPG or even very close to classic XI in terms of combat.

As for monetization, they could have simply made it a character Gacha in the same way Genshin is. FFXI has enough NPCs that they have a large pool to grab from, as well as being able to pull from other Final Fantasy Titles for broader appeal. You can create your own starter PC and have a broader party system for any solo content, and choose 1 rep for party stuff (again, like Genshin Impact or many other SP/MP games). They could have double dipped with Equipment too but I think Equipment would probably be better handled like FFBE:WOTV Handles it, crafting and from Events, or in the Mobile XI Case, Events and BCNMS/etc like in Grandmasters.

For gameplay, and how Character Gacha's would work out... It'd probably be a lot like playing as a Trust NPC or Monster in Monstrosity, with having access to certain abilities and Weaponskills based on the hero you were playing as, with the MC/Your Character probably selecting a job and learning things as you level up.

I think Monetization is probably where the game died though, especially since they were experimenting with TCG mechanics, it means they were looking hard for a way to monetize the ***out of it and they couldn't think of anything and TCG's are an easy sell.

I agree. I still held a bit of optimism that it was going to be good. If they did it like you just described it could have been great. But given all the things against it (the developer, the publisher, the market, the popularity of XI) I think the odds just weren't in its favor.

I wish we could have seen what they did with it so we could know for sure if this cancellation would warrant an uproar or a sigh of relief.

Yall are being way too pessimistic. Just because a game isn't going to be super profitable and popular, doesn't mean it won't or shouldn't get made or adjusted. Look at FF crystal chronicles, barely anyone was asking for a remaster of that game and SE did it. Look at Chocobo's Dungeon, barely anyone asking for a remaster of that and I loved that game, and yet SE did it.

They don't always do what is the most profitable, I'm not sure why but there is already evidence to support that. If that was the case most companies would just copy fortnite or amungus and all the dumb games the tiktok/twitch thumpers are following these days. SE still cares somewhat about the brand of FFXI and they will do something for it. I wish they would do a rehaul and put it on consoles again like the Switch, would be neat.

No matter how hard I try, I cannot get into the battle system for 14. Just watching people "progress" by spending 5 hours fighting the same boss smashing a jump rope game and rotation into their head, it just isn't fun for me. Not many classic FF elements like the elemental weaknesses and there is not much weight in your actions, in XI you can feel like you made a difference while in 14 it just feels like you aren't barely doing anything.

How strict are the forum rules about derailing a thread? I'd be 100% OK with us just turning this into a "Why FFXIV sucks" topic XD

My friend tried to get me into that game, but I couldn't stand it. It just made me long for FFXI and I didn't know why. When I rejoined XI (like 3 months ago) I realized all the things that were wrong with its successor.

You guys keep mentioning the combat system. And yes, it's bad. But can we take a moment to point out there's only 3 jobs? Or how the entire game is a repetitive grind of the same quests and boss fights ad nauseam until you get to the level cap and then there's like nowhere to go so everyone just dresses up? Or how there's no immersion at all because everything is unrealistically stale and perfect and people drive around in flying cars?

Generally speaking I don't mind derails if they're reasonable and organic to the discussion that's been happening. I don't tap the sign until things start getting personal or enter the "wildly non-constructive" phase of the life-cycle. Everyone knows that when they see it.

I do keep an eye on the XI vs XIV stuff though. There's plenty of reasons to like and dislike both, but it turns every thread into a marsh, left unchecked. So, some of it's fine, because obviously we can discuss those games here, warts and all, but whole threads about "Game A roolz, game B droolz" are about five years too late.

That makes a lot of sense, especially since I'd assume a lot of people who like one like the other. Truthfully, I just need to rant every once in a while because the only acquaintances of mine who'd understand my distaste are the exact same people who play it XD

With that said, if you'd like to delete (or me to delete) the above post, I wholeheartedly understand. It has no place in this thread about the news surrounding the mobile app.

On one hand, the engine choice should have been the canary in the mineshaft since about five years later and we're just now reaching hardware that can run it on Android at 60 FPS, with Fortnite just barely reaching 90 FPS the last I recall with actual support for the Tab S7+, meaning SE fell into the usual trapping of "FF must be beautiful!" that doomed XIV 1.x and other titles of that time frame. On the other hand, I feel sad that it's actually dead and some of the teases we had from Matsui himself will not likely come to pass unless the skeleton team has really shaped up some nifty hardware to act like PS2 dev kits. Things like organically releasing the expansions with RoV available with all its busted KIs from the onset, the possibility of new expansions and perhaps a new job or few died along with imagination with this announcement.

The remaining legacy of FFXI Mobile is probably stuff like how they retooled XI into a more modern title in the sense of teles everywhere, the trust system, as well as login points to encourage daily engagement through Gob Dial & that newer system that builds over the months with various rewards like a JP potion or increased merit WS points. Even RoV felt more like the team was handing us the keys to the place with all the things they allowed and broke in the process, with RoV KI's being tooled for mobile player in mind from the way Matsui spoke of them early on and how they would initially work with the mobile port. I just find those design changes interesting within XI during the past 5-7 years and the bigger picture behind them from a game that basically prided itself on being as archaic in design as possible to preserve it's image of a tough as nails game that heavily time gated things.

The good news is that now I'm suddenly spared from needing a higher end tablet that costs almost as much as both next gen consoles combined just to play XI R comfortably, but the bad news is that I'm playing Rockman X DiVE on the side and this is a call for help since I finally found a game with worse drop rates than XI in Voidwatch Era. When I'm rolling for characters with the same drop rate as Kaggen's breast plate or even worse on some banners and they expect real money to be potentially involved, I don't know if I've found a new home or Hell in this case because of the gacha rates.

Its sadly dead for around 6 months now :(

Yup. Super sad they couldnt find a way to just make an offline version work somehow. That game was quite enjoyable and woulda worked well as a hand-held title/single player experience if they coulda figured out how to work out the Gacha.

Story was fun and I miss Wol :(

I honestly am not surprised on this. Covid or not. When some games take far too long in development, the hype fatigue has already set in and you know it's not top priority.

if you want to play XIV might as well play WOW Classic its class designed is better, it feels like an RPG, the world too, There is a sense of Class/Job fantasy, but xiv is just TANK, Heal ,DPS with different animations its garbage the story is garbage too its cliche anime. ON THE OTHER HAND XIV FEELS LIKE A LOBBY QUEUE ONLINE RPG

You...obviously did not play FFXIV if you say the story is garbage.

Either that or you quit well before level 35.

https://eu.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/character/1049936/

i was on yesterday for 20 mins. its garbage it has worse itemization than korean mmo's. i will say it again the class is all the same with different animation and names

And you didn't like the story?

What's wrong with it?

arr story was pretty bad, even for an mmo. thankfully it's gotten a lot better since then.

I SAID its cliche, and the music just over hypes Cutscenes and battles to make it look cooler lol, when in reality its all the same. with different Red circle dances, or its just not for me i guess :(

i swear i find the dungeons in realm reborn much better than future dungeons, well launch dungeons were not as linear

I personally feel that it was on equal terms as FFXV, at least storywise.

If you can call FFXV having an actual story. If you cut out all of the filler, you can probably finish the game in a sitting. FFI has almost as much of a storyline as FFXV in my opinion.

I don't see it that way.

But you have your opinion and I have mine. Let's just agree to disagree on this then.