Artificially increasing difficulty with visuals

So I was watching a video of a FFXIV raid and the sheer amount of visual clutter on screen during the fight is ridiculous. It gets to the point where you literally can't see either your boss or your character because of all the different spell effects. Here's a couple of examples so you know what I'm talking about:

Now, idk about you guys but this whole thing seems like artificially raising the difficulty of the fight just from messy visuals. The mechanics of this fight are not that hard - for the most part it's your basic "stand here to avoid the big aoe", and "stand in this puddle to stop an add spawning" but the way it's displayed on screen make it so so much harder.

What do you guys think about this? Do you think having visuals like this is a problem or not?

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Comments

Songcaller

It can be a big problem for Melee Classes because they can't see the mechanics except the bright blurs. For ranger classes it is less problematic but overall I dislike the effects. I hate BDO because of the spell effects too. I don't mind if I can turn them down or even off if I am Main Tank except you can't see boss particle effects so you're almost always stuck with too many particles.

tautau

I dislike all the effects. Some impact and spell effects are fine, and perhaps damage numbers floating up. But please not all that fighter screen junk!

Thanks for asking.

Maezriel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NbwizzxQ_s&vl=en

hiro

I totally understand how you feel. Fortunately, all you have to do is go to the options and turn off other players effects. You can even choose to turn your effects off as well. I am sure AOC will have a similar option for you to remove effects. Also, if you haven't played the game, its not really fair to say a fight is easy based off of 1 single video. There are probably over 100 bosses in that game, all with different ways to fight them. It presents a pretty eclectic challenge. Also will add that FFXIV is a very Japanese Style MMO and with that comes very flashy effects, weapons, and bright colors. If flashy bothers you, simply turn it off, but it is not a stand in to create difficulty. You should give the game a try. There are years before AOC afterall.

ThexBlackxKnight

Imagine for 250 v 250 will need to have toned down effects because visually it will be a chaotic mess.

Maezriel

ThexBlackxKnight wrote: »

Imagine for 250 v 250 will need to have toned down effects because visually it will be a chaotic mess.

100%

Steven has said that in the bigger fights will have default armors and lessened effects so we can concentrate on the fight

Dygz

I like my MMORPGs to feel like I'm in a fantasy movie or TV show, so I prefer minimalist UI and the least amount of numbers.
I tend not to mind the over-the-top combat sparklies the devs seem to love.
In the OP images, there's way to much going on in the middle of the screen and I would much prefer to actually see the characters in battle rather than all the symbols on top of them.

Cat Quiver

XIV has an option to turn them off. As long as there's that it's not an issue

Conrad

Maezriel wrote: »

ThexBlackxKnight wrote: »

Imagine for 250 v 250 will need to have toned down effects because visually it will be a chaotic mess.

100%

Steven has said that in the bigger fights will have default armors and lessened effects so we can concentrate on the fight

I am fine with that as long as your own model retains its appearance

Khronus

This is exactly how every mob looked prior to the change to the massive purple sword slashes.

These kinds of visuals are really bad and all decent players will turn them off if given the option.

Inixia

In raiding I feel like the devs sometimes have to make visually obvious cues to an extent.

Like I appreciate that everyone loves a more realistic approach (and to be clear I agree with that), but its not always possible (especially when we lack a good information method for determining some of the more technical boss mechanics, visual has to be relied on more). Now obviously FF takes this to a whole other level bc of its anime style though.

a big red circle on the ground won't feel immersive, but it does make understanding the fight a lot more clear.
I'm not saying I want that, just pointing out that there's sometimes a balance when it comes to raid design.

Sathrago

As pointed out before, the spell clutter is optional, and this is mainly because they are designing classes to look and perform awesome spells and all that during the solo experience. Unfortunately the comparison with ashes of creation will be difficult to use since you should not be able to turn off ally and enemy spell effects otherwise you miss put on important tactical information. The best thing they can do is have spells work in tandem with a dampening system. Basically aside from your own effects all other effects fade out, blur down, and minimalize their impact without losing the core mechanical visuals required for a player response.

Noaani

Wandering Mist wrote: »

What do you guys think about this? Do you think having visuals like this is a problem or not?

To me, it is just another form of attempting to make content harder through obfuscation of information.

As many would know, this is something I am not keen on - players should have easy access to all information and developers should back themselves to still be able to make difficult content.

However, Steven has demonstrated a willingness to obfuscate information for no real gain in the past.

Dygz

I want to be able to see other people's spell effects...I think.

Noaani

Dygz wrote: »

I want to be able to see other people's spell effects...I think.

If you are in a raid of 40, you dont - not all of them at least.

Let alone PvP with hundreds on each side.

Jamation

Ah I was just watching a video of that guy try and guess mechanics for certain raid bosses. I assumed he didn't know much about FFXIV since he was asking chat about basic things like what class guage's were. Since he was only watching videos of the gameplay and wasn't as informed it'd be near impossible to tell that most of that stuff is completely optional. While FFXIV is not a perfect game, they do a wonderful job providing UI customization and the ability to adjust your visuals to your playstyle.

I personally have spell effects off except my own because I like seeing myself. However, there is a girl in our Free Company who can't watch flashing lights, but she has her settings set so that she doesn't have a problem for 90% of the game (flashy cutscenes are what get her the most and sometimes those are mid battle).

So if this was just an example about how visuals could artificially inflate difficulty, I can agree to that as I've played plenty of games that have diarrea christmas lights (I've died so many times without realizing it because I'm just inside the chaos). But, otherwise it's up to the player to adjust their own settings and preferences, in this specific case. If the visuals cause unnecessary difficulty and the player can change it, that's just on them.

I see nothing wrong with having visuals like that so long as you can adjust it. I've said this on most UI/graphics threads, but as long as we can customize our preferred visual playstyle they can add in whatever they like.

Vhaeyne

I have to say I am both familiar with Titania EX and Preach's video.

Personally, I do play with all the visual effects on. The only thing in FFXIV that has ever annoyed me as far as too many visualizations is the awful Bahamut summon the summoner gets. That dumb thing just hovers right where any DPS would be looking. It is like a cat in the kitchen when you are trying to prepare dinner for guests that are on the way... you, get used to it, though.

That aside, this fights visuals never bugged me. What bugged me most about Titania EX was people not doing the knock back correctly and wiping the party 4-5mins into a pull like clockwork. Outside that, the fight is pretty brain-dead. As long as you have the DPS and don't mess up the simple mechanics.

Maybe I am just used to all the glowing, though. I don't think the visuals add or subtract any difficulty at all in that fight or any fight in FFXIV. If anything the visuals make it easier.

Asgerr

As an experienced FFXIV player, I only remove the spell effects from other players on alliance raids (24 man raids), cause I can never see the AOE markers.

On regular raids, it's perfectly fine to keep them, I've never missed anything, nor has it ever made it any harder.

Also people like Preach acting so overwhelmed is utterly hilarious to me. With all the visuals in FFXIV, I alway know what's going on and who is doing what. In WoW I have no idea what any effect is, why I'm suddenly bigger, or smaller etc.

So no. Visuals do not raise the difficulty unless you have absolutely no idea what you're doing. No matter how much people may meme on the Red Mage LB3

Wandering Mist

So, a lot of people are saying "it's not a problem, you can just get rid of the excessive visuals", which is fine I guess but then it begs the question - if everyone is choosing to get rid of the excessive visuals, why bother having the visuals there in the first place?

Maezriel

Wandering Mist wrote: »

So, a lot of people are saying "it's not a problem, you can just get rid of the excessive visuals", which is fine I guess but then it begs the question - if everyone is choosing to get rid of the excessive visuals, why bother having the visuals there in the first place?

Solo content.

I do the same in WoW where my graphics are maxed out while out in the world but I lower them as much as possible while in raids.

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