Final Fantasy XI 2.0

[Mirage]

ITT: Lag and framerate is the same.

[scaevola]

No, they aren't and no they shouldn't.

They've already done half the work they need to get to their goal, to abandon it now would be even more of a colossal waste than if they never made the attempt in the first place.

It's throwing good money after bad. If people give FFXIV another chance it will be out of the desire to see a once-beloved game company produce something memorable after floundering for a decade, not because they are once again going to be willing to put up with the glacial pace of SE's content release schedule.

It's actually really fortunate for FFXI players that SE's been releasing a steady chain of turds in connection with the FF brand for the past 10 years, because otherwise they would not be so dependent on the revenue from an MMO whose reception was lukewarm at absolute best even at launch outside of a strong core following.

There are MULTIPLE other games out there that didn't launch great and later reinvented themselves and gained new players. It can and has been done. And in this case, enough time will have passed that marketing the game a second time can work.

Name one.

There are games that launched reasonably well and reinvented after subscriptions dwindled, but there's never been an MMO that's been able to recover after this much bad press. Warhammer would have more than 4 servers left if this were the case, and that game's bad press was world-of-mouth (critics/press loved it) only.

One thing I can tell you, because I know you and the other people hating on FFXIV are thinking the same thing: Cancelling the project and cutting their losses doesn't suddenly mean a better chance for a revamped FFXI. They would most likely devote the freed resources to a new or other project.

This is probably true. Obviously everyone would like to see an EverQuest situation where we get a new expansion every few years so long as people are still willing to pay for it, but the way for SE to rehabilitate the FF brand is to make games that people want to play, not revamp an old game people got over close to a decade ago.


Insert joke about another FF4 remake here, which has done way more to undermine their credibility than making a bad MMO.

[kewitt]

Name one.

The closest one I can think of is DnD online. It never got a good launch. They changed to a 3 tier payment system. Free to play, Pay for item, and subscriptions.

Each tier get you more of the game enjoyment.

They also fixed up the graphic engine.

[Alhanelem]

Which if you read back, I already named. They were down to three or four servers a while after the launch. They revamped the tutorials, added a solo difficulty, revamped the graphics engine with DX 10/11 support, added a ton of new content, new classes, and rebranded the game "DDO Unlimited" and re-marketed it, along with the F2P model. They've more than doubled the number of servers and then added one more German server later after integrating the Europe version of the game and going international as FFXI has (Oddly, there's a fair few players from Korea who have a rather big guild on the server I played on).

[scaevola]

My understanding was DDO launched with modest hype followed by general ambivalence that basically killed the game when the more dedicated Turbine fans left for the vastly superior LotRO; DDO sort of stagnated but it was never to my knowledge pegged as a straight up bad game. This is a really important distinction, because your main target is attracting returning players and their friends, and ambivalence is much easier to overcome than outright dislike.

Not for nothing, Turbine has a history of really smartly marketing their games (they make their ad blitzes when the pricing schemes change, and trust the community itself to sell the content via the online communities built around the games), whereas I haven't seen an ad for FFXI since 2003. Hopes are not especially high that SE will be able to recreate the publicity that made the revitalization of games like EVE, DDO, and LotRO successful.

[Alhanelem]

I've played DDO at many points throughout its existence and I can tell you for sure that it didn't have anything to do with LOTRO (which also got a similar rebranding and rebuilding and F2P transition almost around the same time as DDO).

One thing you're right about though is marketing. I think I saw one ad for FFXIII, for FFXIV it was only in-store media (like the inserts that go over store security checkpoints, and posters and magazines) and the rest was E3 and word of mouth.

[Razziel]

EVE Online has proven that a good game with periodic technology updates can continue to increase it's subscribers over the years.

This... that game still holds up today visually and it's just as old (if not older) than ffxi.

Just for the record... me and a few friends came back to this game after a 4 year hiatus. This game does and could draw back old players.

[Alhanelem]

EVE is a really strange beast. I heard about a new FPS-styled game based in the EVE universe that, while a seperate game, actually interacts with EVE Online in some way.

[Byrth]

Just for the record... me and a few friends came back to this game after a 4 year hiatus. This game does and could draw back old players.

FFXI was the "first MMO" for a lot of FF fanboys/girls. It popped their MMO cherries, so to speak. I think the nostalgia value of the game is huge for these people, and they'd flock back to it if an update were released, and FFXIV would summarily die from the loss of players.

[Asymptotic]

FFXI does seem to be hiring for their development team, based on a post in the Japanese forums a few days ago. So maybe there's hope?