Square Enix Crysta Tohoku Earthquake Relief Fund

[Foxclon]

In order to aid the victims of the March 11th, 2011, Tohoku earthquake, Square Enix is now accepting donations of Square Enix Crysta. Please refer to the news post for further details:
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/4152 (NA)
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/4153 (EU)

[Hiromichi_Tanaka]

We would like to thank all players who have expressed a desire to donate to the victims of the recent Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. Today, we are pleased to announce the establishment of the Crysta Relief Fund, which will allow you to do just that via your Square Enix Account.

At first, we considered the idea of an in-game item charity auction, as suggested by some of you. In the end, though, we felt it best to unify donations under one system that would allow everyone to contribute whatever amount they wished.

We are planning a special in-game present that will be offered to all donating players, regardless of the amount contributed. This present will be made available in the next major version update at the earliest, but players donating as early as today will be eligible to receive it.

With your support, we believe the Crysta Relief Fund will be a great success, and the generosity of FINAL FANTASY XI players a source of great comfort to the victims of this terrible disaster. Thank you.

[Rambus]

do we HAVE to donate though crysta? I dislike the crysta setup in how there is leftovers to pay for FFXIV, I guess I could just donate all the money I put into crysta but i would prefer something more direct.

Be easier for me just to go though PoL select account management and hit amount to be charged to my credit card.

Yeah I am having trouble with this click and buy and such, why can't i just do it though my credit card directly -.-

[viion]

Yay! Good job SE :) - I feel bad that I'm only donating for the ingame item, but then relaxed because I donated a lot of money a week ago directly. So not so bad :D

[Emerican]

Awesome, I'm glad to see SE taking part in donations =D.

[Unaisis]

i wish i could have donated more.. but at the moment i am unemployed and have only $55ish in the bank ; ; so $10 is all i can muster atm~ but it seems this option will be up to august so i should have more opportunities to donate!

[Kagato]

I had 3000 Crysta left over from when FFXIV first came out, so I decided to donate all of it.

That's about...$30?

[Randwolf]

Thank you. It makes me happy to be able to donate through a company that gives me a more direct connection to Japan.

[Nidhogg]

I purchased 500 Crysta to donate to the cause through ClickandBuy and it hasn't appeared on my account :( what's with that?

[ShadowHeart]

my 3000 crysta has been donated may it help the people of Japan get back on their feet and stand tall again soon :)

a small video released helps to show the perseverance of a great nation and the people affected :)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-qhj3sJ5qs

[Kagato]

I don't listen to japanese music unless there's an anime I'm watching, but that wasn't bad as far as melody and vocals. Don't know what on earth was being said, though.

[Miiyo]

Thank you. It makes me happy to be able to donate through a company that gives me a more direct connection to Japan.

Agreed. So many ugly people using this "opportunity" to take people's money.

[Selzak]

a small video released helps to show the perseverance of a great nation and the people affected :)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=r-qhj3sJ5qs
Hmm, it seems like my opinion of Japanese music has been too narrow. That almost sounds like a Japanese Deathcab or Owl City. A bit heavy on the auto tune though.

Video is amazing...


I (and I'm sure a lot of other Americans) was very impressed with Japan's reluctance to take donations. They weren't being rude, and they said they'd accept whatever was offered...but they let us know that they would be able to handle things themselves. Such a respectable people.

[Crawlerbasher]

I've donated everything 3,500 crystia

[Seyrr]

I (and I'm sure a lot of other Americans) was very impressed with Japan's reluctance to take donations. They weren't being rude, and they said they'd accept whatever was offered...but they let us know that they would be able to handle things themselves. Such a respectable people.

Well, one thing to keep in mind is that unlike a lot of other areas that have experienced major natural disasters recently (various countries during the Indian Ocean tsunami, the Haitian earthquake, Louisiana during Hurricane Katrina), Japan was far better prepared in terms of disaster response and recovery. We're not seeing the humanitarian crisis that we saw in all of those other places, the kind that comes as a result of having a lot of people who have no idea how they're going to eat tomorrow or if there's somewhere safe to sleep tonight. There are plenty of people who have been displaced and have lost some or all of what they own, but they're not dealing with the immediate worry of starving to death in the streets.

So to a certain extent, Japan doesn't NEED the help that a lot of other places did in similar circumstances because they were much better prepared. That said, I've been told that for people who want to support Japan's recovery, the Japanese Red Cross is probably one of your best options. That, and continuing to buy products from Japanese companies. ;)

By the way, if you have extra money to donate afterwards and want to help places that are in really bad shape, the ones that are having humanitarian crises, I'd suggest Doctors Without Borders. They help out in areas that don't have those basic support systems, and they're one of the few charities I've seen that isn't using Japan's troubles as an opportunity to raise money, which actually makes them look better in my eyes.

[Lushipur]

i totally hate crysta cause i have to use webmoney due to jp pol account, but i suppose this was the best support for gathering all money under one system ^^

[svengalis]

I used the money I was going to pay for XIV subscription 2k crysta.

But yeah the system sucks. I don't know why they didn't use paypal.

[Lisotte]

Donated :)

[Spamtastic]

shouldn't this topic be stickied or at the very least in the important notices section?

[Didgist]

Thank you for recognizing that the players have expressed an interest in something like this.

[Keyln]

I have donated 1000 crysta for the help to the people of Japan.

I hope it helps, and I wish them the best.

[Sinder]

Im having problems too buying crysta with the Square Enix account. I keep getting an error.

[Xanaduu]

heh... i been trying to buy crysta for the past hour... gotta make an account? have 1, enter correct card info? did that 2.... oddly all im getting is "card info is invalid"... even though its all correct >.> is SE having probs w/ this crysta crap? would be easier to to give them money directly and get a confermation email like u do when u order from thier online store >.> but that might be waaaaay 2 easy XD

[Nermie]

Just donated. I was looking for the best to make a donation and I'm happy SE set this up.

[Shadowkrusha]

Can someone please add Australia to the list of countries that can purchase Crysta, I'd really like to donate through SE.

[Alhanelem]

do we HAVE to donate though crysta? I dislike the crysta setup in how there is leftovers to pay for FFXIV, I guess I could just donate all the money I put into crysta but i would prefer something more direct.Actually, this is an oppertunity to get rid of any odd amount of crysta in the unlikely event you have any odd amount (since FFXIV players have yet to actually be charged anything). It says any amount of crysta from 1 to 10000 can be donated (Each 1 crysta = $0.01; 100 crysta = $1 etc)

Whatever amount of crysta you have or might get can be donated. Using Crysta allows them to get donations from anyone with an SE account, not just people who specifically play one of SE's online games.

On SQUARE ENIX Holding's corporate site, they announced that several of its other divisions, such as TAITO and others would have some kind of donation offer in place. Some of their free online games will have an item for sale in the cash shop the proceeds of which will go to the fund.

[Nidhogg]

Will we be given any sneak peak as to what special in game item we will be receiving for donating?

[Rambus]

Sad to get no replay to this issue when I was the the first comment on this thread.

I do not know how to use crystra. I tried to get it to work but I couldn't can we have other methods of donating PLEAE! I would like to have some way in just doing it from my credit card directly. Like though playonline or something.

[Genoxd]

You know I would love to donate, but you have made it impossible for me to do so. I have a Japanese FFXI account but I live in the USA. I can't buy Crysta because that requires you to register using a Japanese name (that I don't have and had to fake to play FFXI) and address (again I had to fake because I don't have one.) I bought FFXI in Japan and started playing it in the US before it was released, yet after all these years I still can't change to a US account or access my account info from a NA POL client. I'm paying 20$ a month for my character because you have blocked all foreign credit cards so every 3 months I have to deposit money into an online bank and use that to purchase webmoney (overpriced) from a 3rd party site then charge my webmoney account (where i lose some of the money again) and use that to pay for my character. Now I am unable to link my FFXI account to a NA SE account and have been forced to use a japanese SE account so again, I am unable to purchase Crysta or donate. Please fix this.

P.S. I know many people in my same situation and many I have met on forums with this issue. Many have lost their FFXI accounts because when their credit cards got declined you would not let them change payment info and required people to fly to japan and pay in person. Thankfully those people came forward and warned the rest of us to change payment type before this happened to us.

[Furukawa]

Donated 500 Crysta. i hope it helps out a bit and wish everyone in Japan the best! <3 Japan!

[Lushipur]

You know I would love to donate, but you have made it impossible for me to do so. I have a Japanese FFXI account but I live in the USA. I can't buy Crysta because that requires you to register using a Japanese name (that I don't have and had to fake to play FFXI) and address (again I had to fake because I don't have one.) I bought FFXI in Japan and started playing it in the US before it was released, yet after all these years I still can't change to a US account or access my account info from a NA POL client. I'm paying 20$ a month for my character because you have blocked all foreign credit cards so every 3 months I have to deposit money into an online bank and use that to purchase webmoney (overpriced) from a 3rd party site then charge my webmoney account (where i lose some of the money again) and use that to pay for my character. Now I am unable to link my FFXI account to a NA SE account and have been forced to use a japanese SE account so again, I am unable to purchase Crysta or donate. Please fix this.

P.S. I know many people in my same situation and many I have met on forums with this issue. Many have lost their FFXI accounts because when their credit cards got declined you would not let them change payment info and required people to fly to japan and pay in person. Thankfully those people came forward and warned the rest of us to change payment type before this happened to us.

i use a jp pol account and to use crysta i had to fake my addres again. then i used webmoney to donate. was really easy to do it.

for the webmoney things, i buy webmoney from futocorps and i found the price not really inflated (or at least not so much) .
futocorps use paypal so its really easy to use.
then i put the code they send me on webmoney and this way i have no account on some bank and i have just 1 site to pay.

i hope i dont broke some tos putting the site name here but for ppl like us its that or close the account (and SE losing money) ^^

[Genoxd]

i use a jp pol account and to use crysta i had to fake my addres again. then i used webmoney to donate. was really easy to do it.

for the webmoney things, i buy webmoney from futocorps and i found the price not really inflated (or at least not so much) .
futocorps use paypal so its really easy to use.
then i put the code they send me on webmoney and this way i have no account on some bank and i have just 1 site to pay.

i hope i dont broke some tos putting the site name here but for ppl like us its that or close the account (and SE losing money) ^^

I refuse to use paypal, they're a pain in the ass...I've had nothing but trouble dealing with them. I use Kanetrade and the prices are the same as Sutocorp. I have 2 characters so it should be $10.80 though I use to pay 12-13$ after conversion rate on credit card. Now I pay 67$ for 3 months, so $22.33~

I don't want to add another fake address to my account. SE's service center is a nightmare, and I'm dreading the day I have to replace/remove my security token or need to contact them. I speak basically no Japanese and the US support can't handle any foreign accounts. So if anything goes wrong with my account at all ever I'm probably screwed and will lose my character of 8+ years.

I was honestly so happy when they announced the SE account system. I thought this was their chance to fix everything, I'd be able to link my account then use a credit card to buy crysta and pay for FFXI. Instead it's the same crap all over again.

I'm sorry this thread has gone off track so much. I guess I'll fake my address again if it comes down to it...

[Rambus]

I refuse to use paypal, they're a pain in the ass...I've had nothing but trouble dealing with them. I use Kanetrade and the prices are the same as Sutocorp. I have 2 characters so it should be $10.80 though I use to pay 12-13$ after conversion rate on credit card. Now I pay 67$ for 3 months, so $22.33~

I don't want to add another fake address to my account. SE's service center is a nightmare, and I'm dreading the day I have to replace/remove my security token or need to contact them. I speak basically no Japanese and the US support can't handle any foreign accounts. So if anything goes wrong with my account at all ever I'm probably screwed and will lose my character of 8+ years.

I was honestly so happy when they announced the SE account system. I thought this was their chance to fix everything, I'd be able to link my account then use a credit card to buy crysta and pay for FFXI. Instead it's the same crap all over again.

I'm sorry this thread has gone off track so much. I guess I'll fake my address again if it comes down to it...

yep same problems.

soooooooo how do i get around this? can some rep clue me in? I do not know how to use crysta it wont let me.

Why do you have this crysta system? its a pain why can't i just pay with CC directly?

[Camate]

Producer Hiromichi Tanaka posted a follow-up regarding the special thank you gift for Crysta donations on the Japanese forum, here is the translation:


I would like to express my gratitude to everyone who contributed to the Square Enix Tohoku Earthquake Crysta Relief Fund.

After taking all the feedback in this thread into consideration, we prepared a special thank you gift.
The details can be found here: http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/topics/special/110427.html

After our initial donation tally takes place on 5/12, we plan to distribute the thank you item on 5/13. We will continue tallying donations periodically and sending items after the initial delivery period, so please feel free to donate after 5/13.

More information on the Square Enix Tohoku Earthquake Crysta Relief Fund can be found by going to the site below:
https://secure.square-enix.com/enqt/jsp/run/CRYSTADONATIONN/HTML/

[Kagato]

Since it doesn't really do anything, it'll end up collecting dust in my moghouse. ^_^;

Still, I'm glad I donated.

[Rambus]

finally let me though , i still do not like crystra system though, why can't it be done to CC directly?

[Psion]

Since it doesn't really do anything, it'll end up collecting dust in my moghouse. ^_^;

Still, I'm glad I donated.

I'm going to laugh if after the donations are all over they patch in "Enhances Treasure Hunter II" effect or some such onto it. You know, give unto others and get gifts in return? <_<;

Still, it is a moogle hat, and I like silly hats. :O

[Rambus]

I'm going to laugh if after the donations are all over they patch in "Enhances Treasure Hunter II" effect or some such onto it. You know, give unto others and get gifts in return? <_<;

Still, it is a moogle hat, and I like silly hats. :O

the idea is to help not to get w/e gift they are giving as a thank you

[Athanios]

I've already donated; I donated my April fees back as soon as my internet came back up after the Earthquake. I did want that spiffy hat, so I tried to donate again.

Crysta is the worst payment system ever. Really, I have to use a payment service to use a payment service to play SE games? I hope this never takes off or replaces POL, as backwards as POL is sometimes, at least I can put my CC in and it takes my money directly.

We all know SE can take our CC payments directly. FFXi takes our Visa and MasterCard payments directly. SE has a retail store in Tokyo, they even take AMEX. Even SE's Facebook games take Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover and PayPal. I don't know why SE gives better payment options to a couple crappy flash games than they do their headliner games.

I don't have to register for a 3rd party payment service to use Xbox Live or the Sony store, both of which use a 'wallet' or point system similar to Crysta. And when there is a security problem (as with the Sony store currently), I know where to go to remove my personal information.

This is less about my donation to the Earthquake/Tsunami fund. I've donated money, volunteered to cleanup in Hachinohe and supported the rescue effort and cleanup in Sendai. There are other options available (like giving to the Red Cross directly) if I just wanted to give money to the relief. This is about the future of SE's games and my continued ability to carry my friends around the world with me in a box. Because if Crysta becomes the primary payment method to pay for FFXi, I'll have to leave a lot of friends behind.

[Alhanelem]

I have to use a payment service to use a payment service to play SE games?You have to "use a payment service to use a payment service" to buy microsoft points or wii points or any other game's points and no one had a problem with it for those....

All they need to do is replace clickandbuy with a direct credit card payment system and everything's peachy. Crysta is fine because you can pay without a credit card.

[Rage]

How do I actually purchase Crysta if my SE account isnt US or JP Regions, my account is Eurpe or Other Regions, tried so many times it just doesnt have the "Add Crysta" option in the left menu like US or JP accounts has, Does SE only allow ppl with US and JP Regions Account to be able to donate money?? people like me and others with accounts that is ineligible to purchase Crysta can not be donate, why do you have to make the donation thru Crysta only..:(