John Smith

As someone who grew up with games like Everquest, Anarchy Online, and Dark Age of Camelot I find myself rather disappointed with FF14. First of all it's not a true MMO. 99% of your time will be spent solo running quests with zero possibility of death and watching (mostly) unvoiced cinematics for a storyline that quickly wears out it's welcome. You will find yourself skipping hundreds of dialogues as your ESC key slowly begins to plot it's revenge. The vast majority of quests in this game are things you simply MUST do alone. The only way to quest together with a friend is to be on the EXACT same quest in a neverendingly progress story line chain that is hundreds and hundreds of quests long. Unless you are playing with your wife and ALWAYS play at the exact same time expect to play though 200-300 hours of purely solo content. It's a lonely world out there. While I am nowhere near end game I am close to 150 hours into a character and I must say I've seen zero content that could be regarded as remotely challenging. I believe in all of the 150 hours of play time I have died exactly 4 times. Once to a disconnection. Once to an AFK healer. Once to fall damage. Once to an actual boss mechanic. in 140 hours of solo content my only death involved being half asleep and riding off a cliff while in combat. Half asleep is how you will play much of this game and it's essentially impossible to die in 95% of the content. While doing one story quest I went to go answer the door while the cinematic was playing. Got lost in conversation with a neighbor and came back a good 20 minutes later. The cinematic was finished and my character was just standing there being attacked by two NPCs. I still had half of my HP remaining. Those NPCs took me a grand total of 15 seconds to kill. Even going afk while under attack isn't a realistic path to failure in this game. Long story short the game has a charming atmosphere, better than average graphics, and lots of content. However don't expect any content with the least bit of challenge before the bleeding edge of end game raid content (or so I've been told, we'll see about that.) The game is perfect if you are looking for something to play together exclusively by yourself or with a family member, but not the kind of game you'll enjoy with friends. In my 150 hours I don't think I've had a single person say a single word to me that wasn't "Hi guys" at the start of a dungeon or "GGWP" at the end of one. It's not a true MMO, and it's certainly not a social experience. Overall I give the game a 3/5 as an RPG. If I had to review it purely on it's merits as an MMO I honestly couldn't give it more than a 2/5. I can't stress this enough, if you are looking for a true MMO experience look elsewhere. If you liked World of Warcraft but found it too challenging and too much of a social experience... then this might be up your alley or if you are just a HUGE FF fan. Otherwise I'd pass.