Smaller subscription fees for smaller dev team

[autobot]

Anyone who has paid attention to the dev team responses has noticed a response bringing up their small development team as an excuse for how and why things are done in updates now a days. My response to this is a smaller subscription fee. It's only fair.

Why should players pay the same price for a subscription for a well staffed, high content delivery via updates if the staff is under manned and the content updates are lack luster? Everyone is well aware that FFXIV was not charging a subscription fee for their terrible release yet they were running with a larger staff than FFXI and were getting much better and more frequent updates (before someone argues that FFXI subscription fee's were paying for FFXIV development that's a moot point and is not a valid excuse). Not only that but there is much more (and detailed) communication from the FFXIV team regarding current and future plans unlike here in these forums where we don't hear anything for days and when we do it either provides vague, un-descriptive information or completely misses the point of the topic (and sometimes is the complete opposite). Not only is communication poor, but the updates are too few.

Veteran players are running out of things to do due to lack of content in these updates. The meat of the update usually comes from either Voidwatch (which requires a full alliance and has horrible drop rates), WoE (which dies out eventually and cant be done low man in most cases) and Merit Points. Any abilities gained through these updates are just renamed abilities from other jobs. I would mention Abyssea but most people are done with that and only really use it for Exp/Merits. Even with these options the additions are small and the only reason people continue to do them for as long as they do is because the drop rates are ridiculously low.

Maybe a compromise could be to lower subscription costs to veteran players who have played for X amount of time, but then again as quickly as things can be accomplished these days with Abyssea exp gain, it doesn't take long to get to the level of a veteran player.

Smaller subscription costs may even get a few of the players to stick around a bit longer or to come back to the game. Many cant justify spending the money when the urge to log in isnt there.

Any way you slice it the players are getting the short end of the stick. It would be a nice gesture from SE to reduce their cost of playing the game if they intend to continue to provide such mediocre service to their customers.

[Anewie]

I support this.

I'm happy with the game for the most part, but man do I miss lengthy content days.

At least back in the day it wasn't so apparent we were being trolled.

[Runespider]

Everything you wrote it true and it still isn't going to change, addicted players = sheep.

[Cahlum]

I support this, our subs are for development updates not to keep Square Enix afloat while their over ventures flop.

[Insaniac]

I'm sure when FFXIV becomes a huge success we will get a year of free service to make up for the time we supported that game. So never.

[wish12oz]

This is a fun and cleaver way of telling SE they're doing a bad job, I like it.

[autobot]

If they read the forums they will know they are doing a bad job. You cant go to a thread and not see complaints about everything and anything.

But this is not about them doing a bad job (sorta), it's about them charging us for the same level of service we were getting 5 years ago when we were getting actual expansions, new jobs to level, new abilities that weren't just renamed existing abilities and events that were worth doing.

If they want to put all their efforts into a new game that failed and give minimal attention to this one then we should be compensated with minimal fee's.

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

Everything you wrote it true and it still isn't going to change, addicted players = sheep.

Addiction requires something to actually be addicting, and FFXI hasn't seen that kind of content in a very long time.

This isn't addiction, it's just momentum. And looking at my linkshell, it's running out.

[Kaisha]

If they read the forums they will know they are doing a bad job. You cant go to a thread and not see complaints about everything and anything.

To be fair, this is always the case on the official forums for EVERY MMO.

[Unleashhell]

This game is 10 years old. Why does everyone think it should be on SE top priority list where in 10 years updates in hardware and software have taken leaps.

Release date(s) PlayStation 2
JP May 16, 2002
NA March 23, 2004

Windows (PC)
JP November 7, 2002
NA October 28, 2003
PAL September 17, 2004

Xbox 360
NA April 18, 2006
JP April 20, 2006
PAL April 20, 2006

Rise of the Zilart
JP 2003
NA 2003
PAL 2004

Chains of Promathia
JP 2004
NA 2004
PAL 2004

Treasures of Aht Urhgan
JP 2006
NA 2006
PAL 2006

Wings of the Goddess
JP 2007
NA 2007
PAL 2007

A Crystalline Prophecy: Ode of Life Bestowing (Release date: March 22, 2009).
A Moogle Kupo d'Etat: Evil in Small Doses (Release date: July 6, 2009).
A Shantotto Ascension: The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born (Release date: November 9, 2009)

Vision of Abyssea (Release date: June 21, 2010).
Scars of Abyssea (Release date: September 8, 2010).
Heroes of Abyssea (Release date: December 6, 2010)

I dunno why people are having so many issues there are alot of updates and I would rather have more smaller updates per year then 1 big update every year or 2.