Should Zone-To-Zone Loading Screens Be Removed?

[mario710]

This game needs to remove that shit. It's fucking 2019.

[Katchii]

They won't be removed, it's not something they'll be able to do at this point, the whole game is structured around having them. Deal with it or don't play are really your only options.

[CerealLord]

Without them they would need to completely redesign flying as well as how they block off areas for you to access, since in some cases, quests open up the new area. It isn't feasible and is, like 5-10 seconds out of your life.

[dope_danny]

Why would they? its a staple of the series that allows them to create winding paths and large vistas without having to resort to just 'mmo bowls' like so many games where every zone feels like a reskin of WoWs ungoro crater. You may as well get mad they used a similar concept of no go areas in the Goblin Starting Areas in WoW to add a sense of scale there.

That and in game things may be like going from one room to another ala monster hunter but they aren't really like right next to each other, some of them are a very long distance apart for the sake of mixing things up. The shroud zones around Gridania for example are small cross sections of this massive, country sized forest and to physically get from Gridania to the most outer areas in thanalan would take a lot of real estate with a whole lot of nothing in it.

Plus the flipside of course is that it allows them to add new things later. Part of the issue with an open world is its open. Its mapped already. The devs can rarely go "oh actually this was here and nobody noticed before". The standouts being things like Gilneas in WoW because it was, kind of ironically in this case, behind a wall. Theres been times in FFXIV's past where the players get called back to areas they vastly out levelled because something new has been found. An obvious example being the sealed ruins of Amdapor in the shroud where we first fight Diablos. That was max level patch content which gave us a reason even once to revisit the area for something new rather than it being left behind forever like almost every mmo on the market has done with a zone once you outlevel it. Don't get me wrong XIV doesn't take advantage of this enough but the current system allows for the map to never be full until the devs decide it is which is better than an area being open but stagnant and mapped forever.

[Muajin76]

This game needs to remove that shit. It's fucking 2019.

Reminds me of EQ days. I'm cool with temp loading screens. After playing wow for 15yrs, it's a throwback for me.

[TriHard]

This game needs to remove that shit. It's fucking 2019.

It's all about game optimization, wow doesn't need to do this because it doesn't have to run on consoles, this game needs to run on the PS4 therefore it's important that it has good optimization.

[Deus Mortis]

This game needs to remove that shit. It's fucking 2019.

Buy an SSD, the loading screens take like 4-5 seconds.

[Puremallace]

Simple answer is yes. There is nothing that stops them from doing it on a separate expansion. They could have done it with Norvandt but I assume that is how they control flying not being locked continent wide like Blizzard.

Despite what you might see it is a weakness of FF14 but I assume there are valid reasons.

[Swnem]

Old stuff will not change. But if they want to make a whole new seamless continent, i'm sure they could.

Sure, i would like for there not to be any loading screens, but all mmo's have them, including WoW. So, it really isn't a big deal. Honestly, it's more of a problem in WoW where they ground you for half of the expansions and force you to go through this portal network that just wastes your time.

GW2, SWTOR, FFXIV, they all have teleport systems that makes traveling fast and convenient. So, you're not gonna convince me the loading screens of a few seconds are more of a bother than having to go to a specific place manually and going through a portal room emerging in a non convenient place where you will have to fly to where you want to be. WoW is actually more callous with your time. You just get fooled easily.

[mario710]

Old stuff will not change. But if they want to make a whole new seamless continent, i'm sure they could.

Sure, i would like for there not to be any loading screens, but all mmo's have them, including WoW. So, it really isn't a big deal. Honestly, it's more of a problem in WoW where they ground you for half of the expansions and force you to go through this portal network that just wastes your time.

GW2, SWTOR, FFXIV, they all have teleport systems that makes traveling fast and convenient. So, you're not gonna convince me the loading screens of a few seconds are more of a bother than having to go to a specific place manually and going through a portal room emerging in a non convenient place where you will have to fly to where you want to be. WoW is actually more callous with your time. You just get fooled easily.

Ok, buddy.

Pray go to the Waking Sands and continue to eat Yoshi P's ass.

[Swnem]

Ok, buddy.

Pray go to the Waking Sands and continue to eat Yoshi P's ass.

Well... someone's is certainly sore.

[Gutler]

This game needs to remove that shit. It's fucking 2019.

They tried no zone lines in 1.0 and we saw how that ended.

[shadowmatrix]

They tried no zone lines in 1.0 and we saw how that ended.

Of all the reasons 1.0 sucked I'm pretty sure lack of loading screens isn't one of them.

[Qoning]

I don't know why people cry so much about loading screens. I wasn't very disturbed by them back when they took 30 seconds, I don't mind them now that they are generally <5 seconds or 1 second with desktop.

Like Star Citizen is developing entire convoluted loading and unloading systems in order to achieve planetary landing without a loading screen. Coming up with a clever way to mask a loading screen would have been so much easier and probably just as good.

[Super Kami Dende]

tbh it's never really bothered me, since even on my old PC it was at most a few seconds of loading.

[lucred]

Not to mention, you usually just TELEPORT between areas after the first time you go there, so you would have loading screens ANYWAYS the same way WoW does when you hearth/take a portal.

[gutnbrg]

does anyone really care about this?

[Byleth]

does anyone really care about this?

No, not at all.

[leviathonlx]

My only issue with games that instance each zone individually tends to just be the unnatural zone boundaries. FF14 is at least not as bad as GW2's rectangle zones especially with ShB but they still go a bit overboard with the weird mountains at times and every zone boundary being a tiny pathway/cave. Overall it's not a huge deal for me in the end since unlike WoW there isn't much to do in the outside world in FF14 anyway.

[Gibblewink]

I rather hope they keep them. In FFXIV it feels like I am in the pertinent parts of a larger whole which to me contributes to making the world feel bigger. In WoW I can fly the length of a continent in a minutes seeing just how small the world actually is.