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.

[Aarahs]

The big updates came with the expansions anyways if I remember correctly. A new full one would be nice to get. It's not there isn't potential for one storywise anyways.

[autobot]

Yes the game is 10 years old, but we are talking about service we are paying for. It would be one thing if this game were getting the same attention but its not which is my point exactly.

And there are no more updates now as there were years ago. I agree i do not want one BIG update and would prefer more smaller updates but when you look at it we aren't getting any more than MAYBE 6 updates a year. The test server gets a lot of updates but the game doesn't and what really doesn't make sense is why things on the server work but on game don't.

And what are we really getting with these updates? At least with the large updates we got huge amounts of changes, spells, abilities, etc. Now we get few smaller updates with the majority of the update being synths and armor.

Point is less service = less fee's. I'm not going to go to a restaurant and give a good tip if i don't see my waitress.

[Unleashhell]

Thats like saying you should pay less for a car payment the longer you pay off your loan. Your car is getting older and isnt worth as much why should you have to pay the same loan amount as you did from the beginning.

[FrankReynolds]

Thats like saying you should pay less for a car payment the longer you pay off your loan. Your car is getting older and isnt worth as much why should you have to pay the same loan amount as you did from the beginning.

Oh, I didn't know this was like a car payment. I should have it paid off by now then, so they probably won't charge me anymore right? How much is gap insurance on this bucket? Hey, would you mind if your cellphone service stopped working, and verizon said "Sorry, your service sucks because we sent all our techs to go work on our cable TV service."?

[Unleashhell]

You realize there is more to it don't you? There are servers to pay for, electric to keep them on, techs to maintain them that get paid hourly or a salary right? Or do you just think everything is life is free cause mommy and daddy pays for it all for you? You are renting time on their servers bottom line.

If you are going to take my example and make dumb ass replies to it maybe you should read up one post first and see that example.

[Ophannus]

The price hasn't changed in 10years, if anything it should have gone up due to cost of living increases, cost of heat and electric etc.

[Vitus]

Thats like saying you should pay less for a car payment the longer you pay off your loan. Your car is getting older and isnt worth as much why should you have to pay the same loan amount as you did from the beginning.

Bad analogy. Products and Services are two different things.
And asking premium price for sub par services is just bad business model.

[Dragoy]

Mmm, I'd go as far as half the current price would be more than enough for it these days.

Would be crazy if that ever happened.
I'm probably not completely against the idea, that they would at some point lower it a bit at least, but it's probably a really low probability, but hey, anything is probably possible!

Yes for lower service fees！
はい！
それいいです！

[autobot]

If they really don't want to lower their cost they should at least make additional characters on the same account free since they are making it so u can send gear to mules that you cant store since they aren't giving us better storage options. That would still save people money and would give people the choice to make mules for gear to help with inventory issues (sorta). It might even boost crafting since people could make crafting mules.

If they aren't going to put the same amount of funds for this game why should we? they have already reduced their cost by lowering man power, reducing servers, and reusing zones, abilities and character models.

[FrankReynolds]

You realize there is more to it don't you? There are servers to pay for, electric to keep them on, techs to maintain them that get paid hourly or a salary right? Or do you just think everything is life is free cause mommy and daddy pays for it all for you? You are renting time on their servers bottom line.

If you are going to take my example and make dumb ass replies to it maybe you should read up one post first and see that example.

LOL @ mommy and daddy comment. I seriously doubt there are very many people still playing this game under the age of 20.

Anyways....Yes. I manage an IT department which includes several racks of servers, several more offsite servers, 10+ websites, multiple cloud applications, 50+ desktops, backup equipment, network equipment, cooling equipment and all the other BS that comes with it. I make the budget, and I know exactly what the costs are.

Guess what my customers would say if I told them that I was keeping prices the same, but lowering the quality of service.

They wouldn't say anything. They would just leave.

I pay $20 month for HBO and I never complain. Know why? Because HBO keeps putting up new entertaining crap for me to watch. They never go "Oh hey, sorry but we are showing nothing but black and white reruns of curb your enthusiasm this month because we sent all our people to work on the Oprah channel." If they did, I would just stop paying. I wouldn't take the time to tell them what they did wrong, and allow them time to fix it (again and again). SE should feel lucky that their customers care enough about the product to go on forums and tell them what they need to fix. Most companies have to pay people to research this shit for them.

[RAIST]

also....the cost of a server doesn't rise.....you bought/financed all that hardware 10 years ago. Now....if you've recently replaced that hardware, that could be another story. But even then, that's still a one-shot investment that you work into your budget and it remains static and doesn't go up from that point on.

What has happened here is they have taken significant steps to REDUCE the expense of their operations in relation to FFXI, but have NOT reduced the cost to the consumer and pocketed the profits to pay for the extra effort to fix FFXIV. So, in essence....we are paying for services that (for a large number of subscribers not also playing FFXIV) are not being rendered.

[Eric]

The reason they're keeping the development team small is because FFXI is still bringing them in a nice big profit, and adding more developers to the team would decrease the profit margin since there are not many new players joining.

Everything that I just said is nothing but pure speculation, and I have no real evidence that this is the case, but it's really the only thing I can imagine.

[Unleashhell]

LOL @ mommy and daddy comment. I seriously doubt there are very many people still playing this game under the age of 20.

Anyways....Yes. I manage an IT department which includes several racks of servers, several more offsite servers, 10+ websites, multiple cloud applications, 50+ desktops, backup equipment, network equipment, cooling equipment and all the other BS that comes with it. I make the budget, and I know exactly what the costs are.

Guess what my customers would say if I told them that I was keeping prices the same, but lowering the quality of service.

They wouldn't say anything. They would just leave.

I pay $20 month for HBO and I never complain. Know why? Because HBO keeps putting up new entertaining crap for me to watch. They never go "Oh hey, sorry but we are showing nothing but black and white reruns of curb your enthusiasm this month because we sent all our people to work on the Oprah channel." If they did, I would just stop paying. I wouldn't take the time to tell them what they did wrong, and allow them time to fix it (again and again). SE should feel lucky that their customers care enough about the product to go on forums and tell them what they need to fix. Most companies have to pay people to research this shit for them.

Meanwhile you pay the electric bill every month, is your electric getting any better? is it getting any cheaper? Doubt it.

There is already tons if stuff to do in the game. I cant see how people are that bored. I agree to some extent with your last paragraph.

[Ravenmore]

Meanwhile you pay the electric bill every month, is your electric getting any better? is it getting any cheaper? Doubt it.

There is already tons if stuff to do in the game. I cant see how people are that bored. I agree to some extent with your last paragraph.

There really isn't that much to do in the game, far less then any other MMO of the same age that is still going. Crafting is boring content that was great when you had to sit around and wait all day to do other content that no longer tha case now its just a waste of gil. Leveling even all 20 jobs will get you nothing new to do still the same old crap you been doing with a differant prefix. Kill the same NM for differant gear, yeah still the same predictable NM that you kill a hundred time before.

Missions are only there if you didn't stay on top of them as they were released or haven't done then at all, Few story lines are worth redoing CoP kinda sucks when you get to push though it in one good go start to finish with no time to forget the corny over used mess. Doing the same content for just differant rewards is not new still is the same content you all ready proved you could beat now its just grinding for the sake of grinding cause you have nothing else to do.

[zagam]

JFC would you whiners just quit already? don't want to pay 12.95 a month for a sub par sub standard service ? QUIT.
you pay 20 for a one time ticket to a movie to be entertained, and 12.95 for as many hours a month you want.

[FrankReynolds]

JFC would you whiners just quit already? don't want to pay 12.95 a month for a sub par sub standard service ? QUIT.
you pay 20 for a one time ticket to a movie to be entertained, and 12.95 for as many hours a month you want.

Whining about whining FTW.

[Crysten]

There really isn't that much to do in the game, far less then any other MMO of the same age that is still going. Crafting is boring content that was great when you had to sit around and wait all day to do other content that no longer tha case now its just a waste of gil. Leveling even all 20 jobs will get you nothing new to do still the same old crap you been doing with a differant prefix. Kill the same NM for differant gear, yeah still the same predictable NM that you kill a hundred time before.

Missions are only there if you didn't stay on top of them as they were released or haven't done then at all, Few story lines are worth redoing CoP kinda sucks when you get to push though it in one good go start to finish with no time to forget the corny over used mess. Doing the same content for just differant rewards is not new still is the same content you all ready proved you could beat now its just grinding for the sake of grinding cause you have nothing else to do.

This. The latest incoming content update (Legion being a cut and paste of Einherjar, only with bosses in your boss chamber and Nyzul being...Nyzul) is basically so half assed development wise it's almost impossible not to see the amount of corners they're cutting at the moment.

I often wonder why they raised the level cap to 99 when most of the content we're going to get at 99 is basically revamped versions of the crap we've been doing for years at level 75 anyway. Limbus/Salvage/Dynamis/Einherjar with higher level mobs? Whoop de friggin' do.

I would kill for new storylines, unique battle systems or even a new expansion, but due to XIV's rebirth I don't think that's ever going to happen. Our money is going toward that and not the game we currently play, that's for sure, and won't do unless XIV miraculously succeeds.

[RAIST]

that's my biggest gripe with the whole situation....14 getting all the love from our subscription fees

I did a /sea all the other day and we had almost 2700 people on our server mid-day. I've seen it break 3k at times. Can easily conservatively estimate that at upwards of 27k a month in subscriptions from our server alone for ACTIVE players(good chunk of mules could be in the mix, so hard to say for sure, but it could be considerably higher). Then there's the sideline revenues from inactive players that still pay subscriptions, software sales, and other things tied the franchise itself.

That's a lot of money to basically just keep the lights on....at least that's more the impression of how they're treating FFXI these days.

Since everyone is chiming in with their analogies, consider this: car insurance routinely goes up year for year due to quantifiable increases in risk assesment and operational costs, yet....routinely when our insurance company comes up with high profits at the end of the fiscal year, they mail us all a rebate check as a kickback. Granted, sometimes it's only 50-60 bucks... but still....it's the thought that counts.

[Unleashhell]

I would rather them fix alot of the game mechanics then worry about new content. You got Voidwatch out now, Relic+2 for those THF hands and other crap you might consider using for a macro piece and now we got Legion otw. Then Limbus and Salvage revamps along with those updates in equipment. But still there are alot of fixes that need to be done for the game to work properly. More content that comes out I feel will just carry over the bugs and game mechanics that do not work correctly now and just make all that new content not as enjoyable.

[autobot]

fix game mechanics? the game has been the way it is for the last eleventy billion years and everyone has played it with all the things wrong with it. Would it be nice for them to fix it? yes, but with their small staff, and their inability to do what the windower group has done u might as well throw it out the window.

and VW is LOL its a friggin boss fight, thats hardly content and you need specific jobs to even do them. as far as relic +2 as i said in a post before the majority of the updates tend to be gear, more gear we dont have room for and mainly just macro pieces for lacking macros. i dont need more macro pieces, im already running around with 76/80 inventory because of macro pieces.

give us Sub, Sub jobs, new jobs, new missions, something that takes more than a game day (or week) to accomplish without mindless grinding, something that adds new flavor to the game, something that isnt the same ol same ol. It's the same ol same ol thats killing the game, people get tired of doing the same song and dance that they have been doing.

[fxp7]

I'll be on FFXI while I think it's worth playing. However, I decided I'm not gong to play FFXIV or any other SE MMORPG game after this - no matter how good they turn out to be.

Trick me once, shame on you. Trick me twice, shame on me.

[Concerned4FFxi]

As for the 99 cap, there had better have been a better reason to have increased the level cap then just as a way to keep people around, because unbalancing the game and deading a majority of zones to have a 99 cap novelity is stupid. There better be a an add-on in the future, that makes the 99 cap make sense, and the last stand does count.

[Unleashhell]

fix game mechanics? the game has been the way it is for the last eleventy billion years and everyone has played it with all the things wrong with it. Would it be nice for them to fix it? yes, but with their small staff, and their inability to do what the windower group has done u might as well throw it out the window.

and VW is LOL its a friggin boss fight, thats hardly content and you need specific jobs to even do them. as far as relic +2 as i said in a post before the majority of the updates tend to be gear, more gear we dont have room for and mainly just macro pieces for lacking macros. i dont need more macro pieces, im already running around with 76/80 inventory because of macro pieces.

give us Sub, Sub jobs, new jobs, new missions, something that takes more than a game day (or week) to accomplish without mindless grinding, something that adds new flavor to the game, something that isnt the same ol same ol. It's the same ol same ol thats killing the game, people get tired of doing the same song and dance that they have been doing.

And when your done with the new content you will all be back here complaining again about having nothing to do. If all of you hate the game so much why do you even play? If everyone's outlook is the game is dead, the game sucks, the game will never have new content, the game costs too much... then why play? There are thousands of other games out there to play, if they are so much better go play them.

[autobot]

And when your done with the new content you will all be back here complaining again about having nothing to do. If all of you hate the game so much why do you even play? If everyone's outlook is the game is dead, the game sucks, the game will never have new content, the game costs too much... then why play? There are thousands of other games out there to play, if they are so much better go play them.

Actually I've already canceled one character, and this one expires at the end of the month. Had the price been lowered perhaps i would stick around on the days where i have nothing better to do but i cant justify spending $14 (or $27 with both characters) a month to not log on until they decide to add something fun to the game.

And ur damn right everyone will be complaining when there is nothing to do after new content is old and played out. When you pay a monthly subscription to an ONLINE game that is and can be forever changing/added upon and those changes and additions aren't there then what are u paying for? Servers? Electricity? FFXIV?

And if you want to agrue that we are paying for servers, electricity, etc to keep the hardware going, consider Starcraft, a game that's been out since 1998 and the battle.net servers are still running FREE of charge to play on. All the while starcraft has received updates/bug fixes/etc all without a monthly cost. The only thing you pay for is expansions.

And seriously why are people complaining about saving themselves money? All like "omg i don't like saving money why would i want to do that?".

[Mageoholic]

Maybe 11 will go FTP for a year after they fix and charge for 14.......ha ha ha one can dream (no one is going to play 14 anyway. It failed hard and should have been abandoned.)

[Rewyen]

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.

Level does not equal Veteran. I know a few level 99s that have been playing for like a month that couldn't tell you how to get to Carpenters Landing without a quick trip to wiki. It cannot be assumed that just because a player has a few high level jobs, that makes him or her eligible for a fee reduction because that is just a load of crap. I've played this game a total of six years, but had to restart my character, which is currently only @55, so how would it be fair for a newer player to get a fee reduction but not players like myself and hundreds of others who have restarted and could run circles around pretty much anyone wearing one of those ridiculous Destrier Berets?

It's $12 bucks. Deal with it or go play Guild Wars.

[RAIST]

actually, it's 12.95 every 30 days, technically now ~13.13 per month versus the previous 12.95 per month. So, actually the price has gone UP while the quality of service has stagnated, or in some cases gone DOWN.

[Dragoy]

I pay about 100€ more for two accounts per year now, actually, but that's more related to the fact that I used to be able to pay in USD instead of EUR, which I am forced to use now.
Might have been a bit of a cheat, but they made it possible back when, and so, the price for some people went up quite a bit while the content... yeah.

I did imagine I would likely be paying until the end, even if I would not actually play much if at all due to friends quitting, but I don't know... As of late, I've been leaning towards at least taking a break for a few due to the 'new' content and whatnot being non-attractive to the maximum.

I'm still carefully optimistic, and the game can still be fun fersure, if you have the friends to play it with (having more fun with the old content actually, than the newer).

Perhaps when FFXIV2.0 will hit off, and becomes a massive success, FFXI could see a smaller fee-tag under it. ^^;

[Akutenshi]

I honestly don't think using Starcraft is good example. Granted, you are right, game has been out for ages and it's free, but the people still releasing updates and whatnot is from a company that I feel is probably 5 times better than SE and more than often makes more than enough money to actually do that and do those updates, keep servers running etc. Keeping their player base happy keeps them coming back and playing more of their games so it's just a smart move on their part (besides that the games are fun and popular).

I don't see why people think that just because a game was developed 10 years ago means they are still using the same technology and server architecture. It's not that hard to shut the game down say during a maintenance and upgrade hardware and start everything back up. Granted, they don't do that all the time but I highly doubt they are still using equipment from when the game was released when servers and hardware have gotten so much better that not upgrading them would be stupid and less efficient.

I don't think that releasing new jobs would make a difference in a dying game. If a new job is released, how many of you actually think that with the state of the game now, people are going to actually slowly leveling a new job to get the satisfaction of leveling a job like back in the day? Now you could power level a job in like a day and then be done with it and back to square one. It would probably alleviate and add some freshness to a stale game, but not for long with the state of leveling and whatnot. I don't think they could do anything else that hey haven't done with the other jobs already.

What they need to do is add better, more engaging content. Not that stupid weakness targeting nonsense, or just a higher level rehash of old content, and add new areas. They said they can and PS2 isn't holding them back. While revisiting old content can be nice with rewards and nostalgia, it's still the same old same old for those of us that did it to the ground when they first was introduced. I feel they need to add new city missions, regular quests (with cutscenes not just text when you complete it), and new areas. SE had good story writers in the past, is it so hard to use them for new content to make people happy? I'm sure most people will agree that reusing old areas in whatever sense is just getting old.

I don't agree with lowering the price of the game, yet. If FFXIV can get where it should be, I think the smart move would be to get people to play that, then lower the cost of FFXI by like half or more. If their new game is going good, why would people play an old game that they don't really add much too? For now I'd rather pay them monthly to make whatever content and updates they can with their resources till they either a) get something better going with FFXIV or b) actually make FFXI a bit more enjoying to play again to make all this amount of time playing the game worth something again. If they slash costs of FFXI, I don't that will ever happen.

[Rewyen]

I hate to be the "I told ya so" dick, but....

About six years ago or so (can't remember when exactly, but it was right around the time we all found out about ToAU), the buzz was high about how awesome it was going to be, and when it did come out, it was amazing to be able to see new places. The problem was that everyone I knew was in such a rush to unlock BLU, PUP and COR, level them as fast as humanly possible (which back then was still a chore we all dreaded) and do as many of the missions as they could. I tried to tell these people that rushing through it would only bite them in the ass. The ones who typically quit this game first are the players who had crap like CoP done before half the server even knew what it was. Always in a rush, I see people. How many lv. 99s were there less than five hours after the update? And now what I see is the majority of players AFK in Port Jeuno waiting for Abyssea, and you know who the bored ones are?

They are the ones who actually get excited and jump at the idea of helping a random player get a Damslfly Worm just to do something besides wait.

My point is that I think this game would still be enjoyable to most players if they actually took their time. Better yet... start over. I know it sounds like an "omgwtflolbbq" thing to think about, but I did, and lemme tell you that it was a great decision. I took a big chunk of time away and came back and started from scratch and this time I actually paid attention to the storyline and took some time to just wander around and explore. It's so much better the second time around, plus you'll have plenty to keep you busy, and you'll always have something to do besides wait and get pissed about farming. Just a thought.

[FrankReynolds]

My point is that I think this game would still be enjoyable to most players if they actually took their time. Better yet... start over.

Do you really think that people aren't out there doing exactly that on mule accounts right now, and hating it?

[autobot]

Do you really think that people aren't out there doing exactly that on mule accounts right now, and hating it?

Amen. I can say, while leveling my second account, i saw a ton of whm mules all over the place. To be honest to get through the game now even with a new character its only about 2-3 months worth of effort. In 1 month i was able to get lvl 99, have 2 subs (which was plenty) and have just about all the gear i needed (AF, magian, etc). I managed to get half way through the windy missions and i got to the last fight of shantotto. Had i not sat around doing nothing shuddering at the thought of doing missions (which i read the first time) i probably would have finished more of them. Most of this i did solo.

Second time around no thanks. It was fun (besides the endless traveling back and forth) the first time. The rewards then were actually worth it.

As far as taking time to complete things you have to ask yourself why people rush to get things done. First and foremost its because of the reward. People want the reward because its usually better than they have. And second people get stuff done because its new and we are always looking for something new to do. Which is the whole point that we have nothing new to do, and what is released that is new can be completed very quickly.

[Rewyen]

Keep in mind that I took two years off. When I left, their was no FoV/GoV, Abyssea, Dual Wielding DNCs, etc., so coming back and started from scratch for me has been enjoyable because I had been away long enough to forget some of the storyline and the world and play dynamics have changed so drastically that it's an entirely new experience for me. I'm sure had I kept playing (I'd be on like year eight now), I'd wanna gouge my eyes out.

[autobot]

Even with a 2 year break you will quickly come up to speed with everything. With how fast we can level and the lack of any endgame stuff to do besides VW and WoE everything else will get old fast. There is only so many times you will want to repeat the same thing before you get burned out. For those of us who played without long term breaks we are already burned out.

At least if the subscription fee was cheaper i might not feel like its a complete waste of money to keep my character activated for nothing in hopes of something better in the future. And since we really don't know what exactly is in the future because they don't tell us anything but vague responses like "we have big plans" that doesn't tell us anything. An updated road map would have been nice, maybe even a "hey we have an expansion in the works" or something other than "we want to adjust merits". All that says to me is I'll be spending the next year re-meriting my jobs because 8 years ago when they first created the merit categories they didn't realize they sucked for a lot of jobs. Most people are already burned out on meriting with all the limit quests and WS quests requiring merits.

[FrankReynolds]

Even with a 2 year break you will quickly come up to speed with everything. With how fast we can level and the lack of any endgame stuff to do besides VW and WoE everything else will get old fast. There is only so many times you will want to repeat the same thing before you get burned out. For those of us who played without long term breaks we are already burned out.

At least if the subscription fee was cheaper i might not feel like its a complete waste of money to keep my character activated for nothing in hopes of something better in the future. And since we really don't know what exactly is in the future because they don't tell us anything but vague responses like "we have big plans" that doesn't tell us anything. An updated road map would have been nice, maybe even a "hey we have an expansion in the works" or something other than "we want to adjust merits". All that says to me is I'll be spending the next year re-meriting my jobs because 8 years ago when they first created the merit categories they didn't realize they sucked for a lot of jobs. Most people are already burned out on meriting with all the limit quests and WS quests requiring merits.

also bear in mind, that the people with the "big plans" are the same ones that think splitting steal from aura steal timer would make thief over powered.

[autobot]

also bear in mind, that the people with the "big plans" are the same ones that think splitting steal from aura steal timer would make thief over powered.

They also said they had a lot of new stuff in the pipeline in the deceiving road map. We got boss battles in VW and a few more WoE walks which die out after a few weeks. Whoopdee doo! Now their next new content seems to be Einerjar 2 and nyzle 2. I would mention the 99 cap but it still feels like we are playing at 75 with the lack of actual power/spells/abilities/stats/content for gaining an extra 24 levels. Nothing like rolling through kuftal tunnel where the crabs are 30+ levels lower than you and still getting aggro. I think they should make mobs in the Dunes aggro 99 too.

[Seriha]

I've been on board for a subscription fee drop for a while. If SE went on to make it $5/mo with up to 16 characters for no extra cost, I would even consider buying a year in advance. It doesn't mean I would be playing for the entirety of that year during content lulls, but it would still be something to come back to from time to time when other ventures aren't succeeding in keeping my interest. The alternative, as I'd recently done with Rift, is to just cancel sub for 3 months while I played there.

But yes, I'm of the mind money generated by FFXI should go toward FFXI first.

[jeffanddane]

Ok seriously population of 2012 (Characters Per Account) 2,253,084 Accounts (Active) 284,052

So 284,052 X 11.95 =3394421.40 C_C 2,243,084 - 284,052=1,959,032 X 1.00= 1959032.00
Grand Total 3,394,421+ 1959032.00 = 5353453.40. . . . And if you wanna add in Yearly 5,353,453.40 X12= 64,241,440.80
<333 i think ffxi is also paying for FFXIV . . . .

I think they could afford to give us some updates . . . .

[Rewyen]

That's not even including how much they make annually from game sales and stock trades. SE started as a failing company and is now this massive (irony alert) Midgar. STop holding out on the Mako, guys....

In this scenario, Mako is content.

Since we all pay for your kids braces and private school educations, I think adding a map or two wouldn't kill ya, amiright? ;)

[Runespider]

Ok seriously population of 2012 (Characters Per Account) 2,253,084 Accounts (Active) 284,052

So 284,052 X 11.95 =3394421.40 C_C 2,243,084 - 284,052=1,959,032 X 1.00= 1959032.00
Grand Total 3,394,421+ 1959032.00 = 5353453.40. . . . And if you wanna add in Yearly 5,353,453.40 X12= 64,241,440.80
<333 i think ffxi is also paying for FFXIV . . . .

I think they could afford to give us some updates . . . .

FFXI pays for the massive development team and costs of FFXIV, sad to think that if not for that game we would have team that size on here.