Graphics are not all that makes up games. There are still lots of people who play MUDs, D&D or retro games. If someone thinks a game is better just because of the graphics, I'd love to meet them. I would make a fortune selling them some lakefront property in New Mexico.
Right? As long as the game conveys enough visual information to fill in the rest of the blanks yourself, who actually cares? And games that try to go for hyper-realism and look great the day they come out always wind up being the ones that look the worst by the time the next generation comes out.
Like, I remember Perfect Dark 64 coming out and thinking we were barely a step away from having photorealism in video games. By the next console generation it was garbage. But that doesn't mean every N64 game looks awful: the more cartoony and stylized stuff like Banjo-Kazooie still holds up visually.
This game does such a ***job with new players.
If they did give FFXI an overhaul, there are a lot of things I'd want to see tweaked, especially for the game's startup.
- Make the installation process easier
- Remove PlayOnline
- Change the default settings so you don't need to spend an hour messing around with them
- Make configuration settings available in-game
- Get rid of that awful character-creator and just show what your character looks like in-game
In there, I also would include making the "New Adventurer" content a lot clearer. They do get a few things right: making the tutorial NPCs stand out, making the tutorial optional, etc. But they fail in clarity.
They could add a quick camera zoom to the Adventurer Coupon recipient and even add their location to the quest log. They could maybe even make it a Records of Eminence quest and spend an extra line of dialogue to explain how to get to that menu. And then they could consolidate all of the "New Adventurer" NPCs into that same coupon recipient. That way, the tutorial is still fully optional, but it's clear for new players where to go if they're lost.