I played Elder Scrolls Online for just under 2,000 hours & eventually the monetization just broke it for me in recent months prior to Gold Road releasing & my only other MMO that I played seriously was Old School Runescape. I (for better or for worse) did not get into World of Warcraft or Path of Exile both for being late to the party on.

Final Fantasy XIV has been surprisingly enjoyable for a player that knows nothing about the lore or story minus what's been given at the start of playing. Sure, I would prefer a more darker tone to a fantasy MMO but that's entirely personal preference. Out of all the MMO's I've ever tried, this has been the most enjoyable for casual play. I really respect the fact Square Enix puts an emphasis on your character being able to do everything while other games may limit one class per character. I like the breath of fresh air to truly feel free to hunt any achievement, mount, transmog or anything collectable knowing that the cash shop really only sells more "casual" clothes.

One thing I should add is the cash shop is, surprisingly, not included directly in the game. You have to go to their website to purchase any in-game items, including their required subscription but I'd gladly take that over being constantly fed and shoved new sales on mounts that cost as much as the game.

A Realm Reborn Review and first experiences with FFXIV

A year or two ago, I jumped into Final Fantasy XIV for the first time. As my first proper MMORPG experience outside of a small bit of World of Warcraft years back, there was a lot to soak in. Ultimately, whilst I enjoyed my time with it, I didn't make too much progress and ended up not playing too much. Returning just recently however, I played for much longer, not only breaking through and surpassing level 50, but also completing the main A Realm Reborn storyline introduced in the game's overhauled 2.0 version released way back in 2013. Whilst I'm still somewhat overwhelmed at the sheer amount of content, features and systems on offer, I'm much better entwined with how the game works, heightening my enjoyment and enticing me to play more going forward.

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For those curious, I picked the Gladiator class and have since graduated to the Paladin, where I'm learning the ways of the Tank role and all the associated systems and keybinds that go along with it.

I'm playing on console, which means at least for now, I'm using a controller but with such functionality baked in so well, it's honestly become one of the most astonishing aspects of this game. Of course, primarily I'm learning what abilities do, how to build Enmity, where to stand when fighting bosses, what order to apply defence buffs and attack enemies, and more, but simultaneously, I'm getting to grips with how well translated the MMO experience is on controller.

The core of this when it comes to combat or any kind of assigned action is within the Cross Hotbar - a curated hotbar designed for use with controllers. As is the case with all elements of the user interface, it's incredibly customisable with an array of options as to how it looks, where it's placed on your screen, and the amount of actions you can have access to at any time, as well as the order and keybinds they're assigned. This has meant much tweaking around in the settings to achieve a desired setup, but with such complex functionality, it's allowed me to tweak the game's menus and on-screen information to my liking. There's still a lot to understand, but this customisation has helped a lot!

Speaking about the Cross Hotbar specifically, I recently discovered options where you can have even more actions available on demand. For example, normally you have 16 actions accessible - 8 can be selected when holding down L2, and the other half accessible with R2. On top of this, you can also double tap either trigger for another two sets of 8, or hold down one then the other for yet another two sets. This means you have 48 possible actions available more or less anytime you'd like, and if you'd rather just swap to another page of assigned actions, it's as simple as holding R1, then picking one of the 8 options - with 8 pages of 16, that's 128 actions you can essentially rotate through, should you need them.

Furthermore, additional functionality for controllers comes via the touchpad that doubles up as a mouse cursor that can also be pressed to jump between specific on-screen elements quickly. You can enable a analog-stick-controlled mouse cursor if you'd like too.

Outside of those controller functions, there's also a metric ton of other options like being able to pin certain menus to your screen, resize pop-up boxes, close the text chat, turn the larger map menu transparent so you can navigate and still see the game screen at the same time, and so much more.

All in all, even if the game can get confusing with so much going on at times, it works almost flawlessly on controller with only a few minor gripes here and there. It's a very impressive translation of an MMO to a console experience and once I got into the flow of things, I found it fairly intuitive, and I've begun to settle into rhythms for both combat and general world and menu navigation.

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As I knew going in - and what has only been emphasised the more I've played - this game is huge. It's vast, with much to do, tons of items to learn about and understand, quests to complete, activities and bosses to best, and so much more. It's most definitely a longform game, and to alleviate the amount there is to do, I've been trying to take my time and not rush through anything.

To achieve that goal, my current plan has been to try and follow each of the game's post-launch patches, not only playing their respective story quests, but also any side and post-story content and activities before moving on to the next story beats. Right now, I'm still early on in the post-2.0/ARR space, on the quest for the Paladin's Relic weapon and completing other 2.0 dungeons and Trials.

Once I've run through all of that and completed any of the content from A Realm Reborn I'd like to check out, I'll then move on and continue with A Realm Awoken's (AKA patch 2.1) chain of quests and whatever else that release offers. Thanks to the various information online, such as the game's own patch notes and release pages, I'm able to track what was added in each release, letting me follow that more specifically, and see the game's offerings in the order they were released that should let me parse through what was added later or not.

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As for the actual content of A Realm Reborn, I'd heard in a few places that it wasn't as interesting as later expansions, but I actually enjoyed it quite a bit and thought the story was fairly engaging - even if I think some of it might've been a bit lost on me. There's something really enjoyable about playing new games like this where you understand them to have a deep history, or even a long-running series of expansions and releases after, and you're seeing the genesis of these characters and locations. You get to see where they start, and you know there's so much more to come. To know their names and origins, and to be the 'Warrior of Light' in many ways at the centre of this journey, it's gotten me more interested to know what's yet to come.

It's also really fun to know that the story was written sort of relating to the big narrative events that occurred at the end of the original FF14's lifecycle, with returning characters and more. Looking back into some of this, it's honestly super impressive how they wrapped up and shut down the original game before building on and referring to it further in the re-launched A Realm Reborn.

That's in part why I want to make sure I'm soaking the game up in a fairly chronological way - so I don't run through the entire story and then have tons of past content to play that all feels disjointed. Maybe that'll change the more I play, but taking my time and knocking things out slowly feels like probably the best way to experience the game, and even if I ignore a few things here and there, I'm hoping this will give me a decent grasp of the game's evolution over time. Of course, Dawntrail releases soon, but I know it's going to be a pretty extended amount of time before I get there, and I'm okay with that, especially when there's so much else I'm curious about.

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There's much I really like about Final Fantasy XIV so far, and it's a game that didn't take me long to see how people could essentially live in this world. It's been satisfying and almost kind of heart-warming when travelling to capitals of various cities in the game and seeing the numerous players stood there, whether AFKing, emoting with nearby players, or running from point-to-point as they go about their business. The world feels alive, and you very easily get the sense of this is a place where thousands of players go hang out with their friends, engage with the game's virtual economy, and more, and I've felt like I too really am an inhabitant of this world.

You can get deeper with it all when you consider the plethora of other systems ongoing too like housing, PVP, the Gold Saucer (!!), and so much more. For as overwhelming as it can be though, it's also been fairly easy to understand that in this world, maybe you don't need to do everything, and maybe it's more about just being yourself and doing whatever is most important to you at any given moment - whatever appeals to you, that's what you should do.

Sure, the story is important and ultimately the main thing everyone should probably do, but everything else is ancillary and optional in a lot of ways. Completionists will of course aim to do as much as they can, but that doesn't have to be you, and when there's so many expressive ways to play or exist in the world, it really is up to you how you play. Perhaps over time that might change, and I'll end up feeling a greater sense of FOMO, but after around 100 hours, it's not really felt like that just yet.

As for those social aspects I mentioned a moment ago, I've already had a few fun experiences, whether that be ending up in conversations with a player who was also new and at the same point in the story as me, or simply asking another nearby player where they got a really cool FF7 Cloud minion that was following them around (spoilers: it was a store purchase I'm going to find hard to resist buying myself, sorry Torgal).

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On the whole, Final Fantasy XIV is a game that's kind of blown me away. There's so much to talk about and I honestly could spend a while running through it all, but I think the biggest aspects that stand out to me are the social systems and overall translation of such a complex, keyboard-and-mouse-oriented game to console and controller. Whilst it may be better played with another control input, I've not felt at much of a disadvantage on controller, and it plays really well.

I've not been able to play FF14 as much since I finished ARR, but it's one I'm thinking about quite a lot still, checking in every couple of days or so. I've got the desire for this to be another game I continue to invest in over time, and so hopefully one day, I'll be caught up to the most recently released patches and expansion, and am able to give a much more overall view on it. For now though, it's been a big surprise, and honestly a blast to play. One of my favourite gaming experiences this year for sure.