My initial free month of Final Fantasy XIV has run out and somehow I'm only level 60.
MMOs are a huge time commitment and although I enjoy this game a lot it's become a little overwhelming to consider just how much time I've invested just to barely scratch the surface of the game's content. The amount of story just in the period of time between the base game and Heavensward came out is staggering by itself. Once I'm done with Heavensward, I'll still have the content between it and the following expansion, Stormblood, to play. As eager as I am to reach the endgame, it's easy to see how this amount of play time could leave me feeling burned out. A cursory inspection of that playtime reveals it's about 330 hours of time overall that I've spent on the game, although that does include my original 1-50 on dragoon the first time I played in 2014.
I think what makes the most sense at this point is to dial back the amount of the game I'm playing. After all, the past couple of weekends have been almost entirely consumed with playing the game, and I'm starting to really feel the itch to play other games, chief among them Fire Emblem: Three Houses, on which I've only logged a few hours. This is unusual for me since I tend to invest pretty heavily in any new Fire Emblem game when it comes out, Echoes included.
There's also a couple of "abandoned" games to consider that I'd really like to get back to--and I imagine I will, in time. Persona Q2 got sidelined by the 1-2 punch of Final Fantasy XIV and Fire Emblem, but I know I'll get back to that some day. Of course, I said that about Dragon Quest VIII and that still hasn't happened. I'm pretty good about playing through games that are part of series, though. I can't envision a world in which those games don't eventually get played, even if it's years down the line. There are many examples of games I returned to well after initially playing them. It's actually a pretty fun thing to do from time to time.
I've discussed in the past the possibility of not playing "live" games at all precisely because they are such time sinks. I consider the dark period of time in my life where I obsessively played Final Fantasy Record Keeper and I have to admit there are some parallels here with Final Fantasy XIV--same franchise notwithstanding--because I'm spending a lot of time essentially just grinding. I think what's different here is that there is an end goal in sight. There's a coherent, overarching narrative that is extremely well-written and engaging. It just happens to be very, very long, and in experiencing this story, a ton of combat, exploration, and grinding occur. By comparison, gacha games like Record Keeper have a much less satisfying loop and little to no narrative to speak of.
I'm playing Final Fantasy XIV because it's really fun. Sure, part of the motivation to keep playing is to see numbers increase, to get loot, and to get new abilities, but unlike something like a mobile game or something like Diablo or even World of Warcraft, there's much more there for me. Final Fantasy XIV lured me in for a lot of the same reasons as Record Keeper--because it plays on my nostalgia for Final Fantasy. However, it makes me want to keep playing because it is consistently engaging and continues to add new things, both narratively and mechanically, that keep the experience fresh. It's not just about the gear, the combat, or even my character. There's a living, breathing story there, and a cast of characters you can care about. It's hard to say that about other constantly evolving games.
