Would a FFXI kickstarter be considered by the developers?

[Castanica]

I keep hearing in interviews and from the AMA, that the main problem XI has is a lack of funds (above and beyond what it makes) for an engine rewrite to move away from consoles and make it a pure PC game. They can't do proper updates because of PS2 dev kits for example, an expensive engine rewrite would be required.

I know the game is profitable but that it doesn't make enough money to warrant such an expensive amount of programming work. Is there any chance the community reps could ask the devs if they would consider an engine rewrite kick-starter or something? There are a lot of players who really love this game and have disposable income to put into a project to fix the issues that currently plague it.

I'm not asking for a graphics overall or a new graphics engine (that would bloat the cost to extremes), just rewriting it as a pc exclusive so that new content can be made away from the ps2 dev kits.

I'm not sure what the main stumbling block is here or how much we are actually talking about but this game still has a fairly large amount of fans that would put money into a kickstarter if it would help the problems the devs currently have that are stopping them making proper new content additions.

There are plenty of low quality mmorpg titles made form sratch on kickstarter that raise millions, I'm sure a game such as this with a very passionate fanbase could equal or better that.

[Spectreman]

I keep hearing in interviews and from the AMA, that the main problem XI has is a lack of funds (above and beyond what it makes) for an engine rewrite to move away from consoles and make it a pure PC game. They can't do proper updates because of PS2 dev kits for example, an expensive engine rewrite would be required.

I know the game is profitable but that it doesn't make enough money to warrant such an expensive amount of programming work. Is there any chance the community reps could ask the devs if they would consider an engine rewrite kick-starter or something? There are a lot of players who really love this game and have disposable income to put into a project to fix the issues that currently plague it.

I'm not asking for a graphics overall or a new graphics engine (that would bloat the cost to extremes), just rewriting it as a pc exclusive so that new content can be made away from the ps2 dev kits.

I'm not sure what the main stumbling block is here or how much we are actually talking about but this game still has a fairly large amount of fans that would put money into a kickstarter if it would help the problems the devs currently have that are stopping them making proper new content additions.

There are plenty of low quality mmorpg titles made form sratch on kickstarter that raise millions, I'm sure a game such as this with a very passionate fanbase could equal or better that.


Yea lets do it like Star Citizen and give all the best items in the future to players who donate more! Lets make this game a true P2W model!!

Castanica, it seems that you have too much money in your pockets, why not just sign a check with millions of dollars on it, that im sure you have it, and send it to SE? Problem solved!!!

[Castanica]

Yea lets do it like Star Citizen and give all the best items in the future to players who donate more! Lets make this game a true P2W model!!

Castanica, it seems that you have too much money in your pockets, why not just sign a check with millions of dollars on it, that im sure you have it, and send it to SE? Problem solved!!!

Where did I say any of that? Please read the posts you reply to. Nowhere did I say anyone had to do this or that they would get anything out of it over those who don't.

[Raydeus]

They won't do this for many reasons.

Sad but true. (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/42637-SquareEnix-Kickstarter-campaign-to-get-a-graphic-upgrade)



PS > I'd go into detail about what stuff I'd like to see if this ever happened, but there is a very high chance I'm going to suspend my sub for a while unless something really interesting happens in the next update.

Lately I just don't feel like playing the game anymore.

[Castanica]

Sad but true. (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/42637-SquareEnix-Kickstarter-campaign-to-get-a-graphic-upgrade)



PS > I'd go into detail about what stuff I'd like to see if this ever happened, but there is a very high chance I'm going to suspend my sub for a while unless something really interesting happens in the next update.

Lately I just don't feel like playing the game anymore.

As I mentioned this isn't talking about a graphic update, this is an engine update so that they can make updates again. Right now the game engine is based on ps2 tech which is why they can't update it anymore. The basic game would look the same.

[Sirmarki]

Sad but true. (http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxi/threads/42637-SquareEnix-Kickstarter-campaign-to-get-a-graphic-upgrade)

(Referring to Graphics)..

I still think the graphics in the game, despite the age of it, are more than viable. To rework all the landscapes, models and animation would be an insane amount of work.

It does seem that the code is the limitation. It seems that SE are limited on what they can do at the moment, and can only work with what it allows them to work with.

[Zeldar]

Yea lets do it like Star Citizen and give all the best items in the future to players who donate more! Lets make this game a true P2W model!!

Castanica, it seems that you have too much money in your pockets, why not just sign a check with millions of dollars on it, that im sure you have it, and send it to SE? Problem solved!!!

Obviously you don't know how it works. I don't see anywhere where Castanica suggested that you would be REQUIRED to donate anything towards this. It also wasn't suggested that anyone get preferrential treatment for donations, though a nice cosmetic item would be a nice gesture. And if Castanica DOES have millions and donates it to SE, I'd hope you'd show a lot more gratitude !

[Zeldar]

I'm not so sure Stompa... look at the age of those programmers.....in their what, 40's or 50's? They are still around, and while they may be working on other projects, I'm sure they could be persuaded to join the team, even if its just for a 1-time project. The graphics are fine to me, but I would love to see an end to PS2 limitations when it comes to adding new content.

[Seiowan]

More money isn't always the solution. It's time, staff and resources that will be the deciding factor.

[Castanica]

More money isn't always the solution. It's time, staff and resources that will be the deciding factor.

It's mainly been money. If you read and watch the interviews they have given over the years, the only reason they decided to go ahead with XIV was because XI was limited to the PS2 written engine, the ps2 dev kits were a serious limiting factor. Re-writing the XI engine for PC would cost as much as making a new game so they decided to make a new game instead. They thought they could just make a new one and we would all migrate over happily, didn't work out in the same way it didn't with Lineage 1 and 2.

Most of the developers we have working on XI right now aren't really developers as you would think of them on other games, they are content creators using development engines that the first dev team made for them to make content in. That's why they are limited in what they can make for us now, best case scenario is the base engine is converted away from ps2 and they get new development suites to make content in. Sadly that will probably never happen, once the ps2 dev kits conk out there won't be anymore content at all.

[Zeldar]

More money isn't always the solution. It's time, staff and resources that will be the deciding factor.

Well, the point in collecting more money would be to hire more staff, who could take the time to pool together their resources and update the game. My point is, its money that makes all the things you mentioned happen. I'm sure there are many, many, MANY yound men and ladies looking for positions in this field. SE just needs the money to pay them! And yes, I am being prejudice against old people like me whose first foray into video games was Pac-Man !

[Castanica]

Things to keep in mind:
Severe lack of funding, with a lot of what is put into this game being funneled into other games (assets we pay to be made from out sub being given to other games for free etc..almost every update to XIV features assets from xi)
Lack of developers working on XI, most of our best devs were taken to work on other stuff.
Core engine limited to ps2 dev kit updates, a whole engine re-write is needed.
The head of the online gaming division of square (it' the same person who runs XIV) not wanting other games to steal players from xiv.
Every additional piece of content needs good gear as rewards or people won't do it, there are only so many pieces of gear you can add that people will want.
The importance of long-term retention (players getting gear faster isn't going to help with that), nor is all jobs being equal (XI and almost every mmo works on bandwagon players leveling new jobs based on current trending "best")
You can't have fully balanced classes unless you want everything the same and nobody being situationally good (also see above about bandwagon players).
That a shared sub would vastly decrease income to this game (this idea that 30k+ XIV players would come play XI in large numbers long-term is completely silly)
They won't add a cash shop for the same reason they won't add character / race changes, because they don't want to pay for programmers to make the in-game changes / cash shop integration and secure backend payment system.

The game needs a huge chunk of money to upgrade it, money that the person running the online division really doesn't want to go into XI.

[Dazusu]

but this game still has a fairly large amount of fans that would put money into a kickstarter

This is nothing but conjecture. I already contribute to the development of this game. It's called a monthly subscription.

Any type of re-imagining of this game or its engine for massive improvements has already been done and that is called Final Fantasy XIV.

FFXI being alive right now is pretty much fan service. Asking for more is looking a gift horse in the mouth.

Someone has to release the common sense in this thread. I don't expect it to be taken well, though.

[Castanica]

This is nothing but conjecture. I already contribute to the development of this game. It's called a monthly subscription.

So you're happy to pay $12, but not happy to OPTIONALLY pay more to make it better? There is nothing else like FFXI on the market and it has a fairly small budget, not like we can go play another mmo like this because it doesn't exist. I put huge amounts of my free time into this game, I can't understand how people would be unwilling to spend more (if they are able to) to make their own playtime better. This is, in your own interest.

Paying $12 means you're just going to get more of the same, you read that the main content until march 2017 is more ambuscade every month right? I don't think they are interested anyway though so the whole post was pointless anyway.

[Dazusu]

So you're happy to pay $12, but not happy to OPTIONALLY pay more to make it better? There is nothing else like FFXI on the market and it has a fairly small budget, not like we can go play another mmo like this because it doesn't exist. I put huge amounts of my free time into this game, I can't understand how people would be unwilling to spend more (if they are able to) to make their own playtime better. This is, in your own interest.

Paying $12 means you're just going to get more of the same, you read that the main content until march 2017 is more ambuscade every month right? I don't think they are interested anyway though so the whole post was pointless anyway.

SE are a corporation; a Japanese one at that. Can you imagine the shame of needing a Kick Starter to improve a "Final Fantasy" numbered title? Logically, it will *never* happen. If it was going to happen - this forum is not the place to post about it. The developers can't consider anything. They have absolutely zero control over the financing of the game. It's the suits that probably don't even know this forum exists you need to take such a proposal to.

I could sit here and wishfully exclaim "sure, I'd toss them $200/mo if it got an engine rewrite and texture overhaul" - but I know it's never going to happen. The only way this game will see new expansions and major content again is if all the people who have quit since 2010 come flooding back.

Not to mention that I've been away since 2013, and only just got back to the game - so I have a crap load of content to catch up on. If Ambuscade is all that will be released for the next 12 months, then I probably won't stick around long after I'm caught up.

[Diavolo]

I could sit here and wishfully exclaim "sure, I'd toss them $200/mo if it got an engine rewrite and texture overhaul" - but I know it's never going to happen.

Not with that attitude.

Many had resigned themselves to the same conclusion for a FFVII Remake. "That market grew out of it," "No one plays JRPGs anymore," but the demand for it kept coming. If you want it then keep pushing for it and convince others to do the same because that's the only way it's ever going to happen.

[Dazusu]

Not with that attitude.

I'm just a realist. You can't compare this to the FFVII Remake. It's a completely different situation. I would presume that Square Enix gauge the demand for Final Fantasy XI by the number of people playing it. Given they've had to reduce the development team to decrease costs - there obviously isn't that many people playing. Not many people = no more major content (and certainly no engine re-write).

TL;DR The game population is a 1:1 indicator of demand for FFXI. Same scale cannot be used for FFVII.

[Diavolo]

I'm just a realist.

So am I. You're not going going to get something by telling everyone it's never going to happen. If you want it, fight for it. If you don't, well, continue doing what you're doing. ;)

[Dazusu]

So am I. You're not going going to get something by telling everyone it's never going to happen. If you want it, fight for it. If you don't, well, continue doing what you're doing. ;)

That makes you an optimist, not a realist. I admire the persistence of your argument, though (and I too hope the revival of the game could happen... but the realist in me knows it won't)

[Castanica]

I'm just a realist. You can't compare this to the FFVII Remake. It's a completely different situation. I would presume that Square Enix gauge the demand for Final Fantasy XI by the number of people playing it. Given they've had to reduce the development team to decrease costs - there obviously isn't that many people playing. Not many people = no more major content (and certainly no engine re-write).

TL;DR The game population is a 1:1 indicator of demand for FFXI. Same scale cannot be used for FFVII.

It has nothing to do with how many people are playing, it's to do with the fact the engine is written for the PS2 and the update suite they use to make content is using the ps2 dev kits. That was the point of the thread, that was why they originally made ffxiv since they thought XI had a shelf life.
They just didn't understand that mmo players stay loyal to their games, the exact same mistake waas made with lineage 1 and 2.

[Zeldar]

And have we forgotten what this thread was originally about? A kickstarter program, where the COMMUNITY would fund the overhaul. We aren't asking "would you consider spending a ton of YOUR money to remake it?" We are asking "would you spend a ton of OUR money to remake it?"

[Seiowan]

It's great that there's so much love for the game, but I just don't see them doing it. What people need to realise is that this is a long running game with 14 or so years of content! There isn't some quick-fix that will make it new and shiny. They would have to look at redoing all of the characters, the armor, the locations and the items. It's essentially asking them to make a brand new game!

People vastly underestimate how much time that will take to finish, and how much money it would take to make. Firstly, the original game without the expansions cost them around $25 million to make (2-3bn Yen) so just imagine how much more would need to be done to accommodate the expansions as well. You probably wouldn't even see the remade game for another 3-5 years due to the mammoth amount of work that needs to be done. To respond to that quip about just hiring new staff -- the bigger the team, the higher the management costs since all that work needs to be well coordinated. It brings a whole new set of issues into play as well.

I know some of us have deep pockets, but unless you have a few million to spare, I don't think Kickstarter is going to cut it.

[Dazusu]

It has nothing to do with how many people are playing, it's to do with the fact the engine is written for the PS2 and the update suite they use to make content is using the ps2 dev kits. That was the point of the thread, that was why they originally made ffxiv since they thought XI had a shelf life.
They just didn't understand that mmo players stay loyal to their games, the exact same mistake waas made with lineage 1 and 2.

Except in this case, FFXIV:ARR is doing a lot better than FFXI. In almost every respect.

The number of people currently subscribed to Final Fantasy XI is a direct gauge for the amount of interest in Final Fantasy XI (at least for SE). The point of my previous post in reply to Diavolo was that the same gauge cannot be used for FFVII and its remake.

XI has a shelf life as determined by SE, not by us.

[Castanica]

Except in this case, FFXIV:ARR is doing a lot better than FFXI. In almost every respect.

The number of people currently subscribed to Final Fantasy XI is a direct gauge for the amount of interest in Final Fantasy XI (at least for SE). The point of my previous post in reply to Diavolo was that the same gauge cannot be used for FFVII and its remake.

XI has a shelf life as determined by SE, not by us.

Nobody knows how many people are subscribed to either, they refuse to tell anyone. Does it have more subs now? sure, it has comparable subs to what XI had when it was it's age (although much lower from what I've been reading from lodestone scanning when you take away china and korea). This is mainly because it's new and pretty (90% of whta XIV players care about is pretty dresses / cat butts and breath effects).

Again, I'll tell you that (since you are a new returnee and probably haven't taken notice of what they have said) the reason is because the game requires a huge re-write in order to be able to make large scale content. The reason they probably won't make more expansions, the reason they have cut back (but not stopped) updates is because of the PS2 dev kit situation and not because of lack of players. The game has comparable player numbers as when the last expansion came out.

I'm not sure why you're arguing about this, it's not a player number issue it's an engine issue. The game still has more than enough players paying money for them to make expansions and big updates, they just cannot because of the ps2 dev kit situation. If a million players came back to XI tomorow they would still not be able to do it because the ps2 dev kit situation would still be there.

[Dazusu]

Again, I'll tell you that (since you are a new returnee and probably haven't taken notice of what they have said) the reason is because the game requires a huge re-write in order to be able to make large scale content. The reason they probably won't make more expansions, the reason they have cut back (but not stopped) updates is because of the PS2 dev kit situation and not because of lack of players. The game has comparable player numbers as when the last expansion came out.

I may not have played for a few years; but that doesn't mean I haven't followed the game and announcements from the development team. Of course, we don't have solid numbers or facts because they don't release that kind of information - but it doesn't take a genius to make an educated guess by logging in at any time of the day or night and finding <1K on most servers, and 300~600 on the majority.

I'm pretty sure that is a lot less than at the time of Adoulin's release. At least that's a fact for Leviathan.

There was an announcement that stated they had to decrease the size of the development team to reduce costs to enable the game to keep running. How does that not directly correlate with the size/scale/quality of updates they are able to produce with now more limited resources? This isn't just about PS2 dev kits (though I don't disagree that might be a substantial factor in it). Can you really argue that this isn't about the money, and by extension the player base size? If the game was large enough (ie, a million plus subs as you suggested), had the income - they might fund an engine rewrite. As it stands - it's not worth it.

'Course, I'm open to the fact I could be entirely wrong. We'll never know unless they tell us though :-)

[Castanica]

I may not have played for a few years; but that doesn't mean I haven't followed the game and announcements from the development team. Of course, we don't have solid numbers or facts because they don't release that kind of information - but it doesn't take a genius to make an educated guess by logging in at any time of the day or night and finding <1K on most servers, and 300~600 on the majority.

I'm pretty sure that is a lot less than at the time of Adoulin's release. At least that's a fact for Leviathan.

There was an announcement that stated they had to decrease the size of the development team to reduce costs to enable the game to keep running. How does that not directly correlate with the size/scale/quality of updates they are able to produce with now more limited resources? This isn't just about PS2 dev kits (though I don't disagree that might be a substantial factor in it). Can you really argue that this isn't about the money, and by extension the player base size? If the game was large enough (ie, a million plus subs as you suggested), had the income - they might fund an engine rewrite. As it stands - it's not worth it.

'Course, I'm open to the fact I could be entirely wrong. We'll never know unless they tell us though :-)

Again, it has less to do with player numbers (because it has enough to sustain a development team) and more to do with the base engine being ps2 restricted and them only having a few of the dev units left (go watch the recent interview and they say all this). There is a decent sized dev team to put out monthly updates, they are just limited with what they can make. That's the main reason many were moved off XI, because it was pointless them working on it due to not having enough dev units to make content on.

The thread was about a kickstarter to help fix that issue, you're posts have little to do with the topic.

However to respond to your points, I will say that XIV isn't doing all that well either in terms of player numbers. They went form monthly updates to having an update every 3, it's known they have reduced the staff working on the game. They also heavily subsidise it will the cash shop, implying the dropping subscriptions aren't enough for an expensive to run and update game. XI is a far cheaper game to update.

However as I've said player numbers wasn't the point of the thread, it has enough to sustain a dev team which is all that matters. If you want to discuss player numbers make a thread about that.

[Diavolo]

The dwindling population size is a result of a great many factors, but the development team's inability to provide more changes/updates sooner in the game's market life due to the limitations of the engine has played a significant role, and it continues to hurt the game going forward. Saying the membership size today is too small to convince SE a new engine is worth the investment is a catch 22. How do you increase the player base/interest when you're struggling to provide the bare basics in terms of updates? A kickstarter's an interesting way of approaching it as it could attract former fans that might be tempted to return with the promise of bigger/better things in the game's future, but you'd have to know they were open to the idea first.



That makes you an optimist, not a realist. I admire the persistence of your argument, though (and I too hope the revival of the game could happen... but the realist in me knows it won't)

Fighting for what you want isn't what I'd call optimism, it's about as practical as it gets. We're all aware of the situation, some more than others, but it won't change unless we push for it and telling people it'll never happen isn't going to do much to encourage people to fight for that change. "Vote Dazusu for president... even though it'll never happen!" :p