Make FFXI Free to play!

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

S-E doesn't have the money to do so, and it doesn't have the capacity to make F2P appealing other than re-establishing the grind for F2P- which is about the only way I'd appreciate it. Let them sweat it out the old-fashioned way and we'd actually have a low-level game again. No books, no Abyssea exp bonus effects, having to 6-man it in the fields and dungeons.

I recall another thread that suggested the (little-known) 14-day free trial be extended indefinitely. It's hobbled to prevent RMT's by only including core game (i.e. pre-Zilart) content, a level cap of 30, and no shouting/trading/bazaaring/auction. Find a way to get these people into a linkshell in spite of the "no trading" restriction, and that's pretty much what you've just described.

[Demon6324236]

I recall another thread that suggested the (little-known) 14-day free trial be extended indefinitely. It's hobbled to prevent RMT's by only including core game (i.e. pre-Zilart) content, a level cap of 30, and no shouting/trading/bazaaring/auction. Find a way to get these people into a linkshell in spite of the "no trading" restriction, and that's pretty much what you've just described.

Don't forget you cant invite people to parties either, you have to be invited to a party... wonderfully stupid.

[Makenshi]

I find a monthly fee is like a filter for all those 12 year olds. I tried Tera a while back after it went F2P and it was like being on x box live all over again.

[Mirage]

No, do not do this.

[Jaall]

I moved on from this game a while ago and now play Guild Wars because it's free to play, but if this game became free to play I wouldn't come back. I don't think it matters whether people have to pay or not, it's the direction the game's taken and the content that has driven people away, and although some might argue that it's not worth the subscription, the content isn't designed for money shops. There are a lot of factors that come into it such as age and mechanics etc that just mean that no matter what they do to this game it will still fade away because times changed and people expect different from mmo's now than they did 11 years ago.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVED FFXI. Favourite mmo by far and definitely the game I played for the longest time, but it has lost a lot of what it was. The game's a little bit stuck because all these new competing mmo's are being released without subscription fees and completely different mechanics with fantastic graphics and the typical UI's, and to keep people playing it wouldn't be a case of making it free, but bringing new and exciting things to the table. FFXI has such a unique style and mechanics that it's virtually impossible to appeal to this whole new market. FFXIV however looks very promising as a recreation of FFXI, but up to date with recent trends. I don't think it'll appeal to everyone and there will always be die hard XI fans who want just another remake but that just can't happen for it to be successful unfortunately.

[Vivik]

The only way I would ever touch this game again is if it were to go ftp and it would be to just fish and craft. The development direction has been utter shit over the past couple months. I guess that's what you get when you let a level 40 player develop content for your game.

[Anjou]

Making it FTP after 11 years of service is a slap in the face to the people who've played for so long. Just because some people want it to be FTP, doesn't mean that it is the right course of action. For 11 long years FFXI has been in service, even today with their servers catering to 2000+ people on each server, that's roughly 2-3 million US dollars a month. Now into account that back in the day the game was much more active, you have to fathom the profits that they've made. Do you seriously think that even now SE will make it FTP with all of that potential money going poof just like that?

It's straight up bad business, and only when FFXI is neck-deep in the grave will they -ever- consider making it FTP. It's PTP and it'll stay PTP, no ifs ands or buts to it. Sorry for being so blunt but people who think that it should go FTP need to realize all of the money people have spent, and how going FTP will make all of that mean nothing to dedicated FFXI players.

[Runespider]

Making it FTP after 11 years of service is a slap in the face to the people who've played for so long. Just because some people want it to be FTP, doesn't mean that it is the right course of action. For 11 long years FFXI has been in service, even today with their servers catering to 2000+ people on each server, that's roughly 2-3 million US dollars a month. Now into account that back in the day the game was much more active, you have to fathom the profits that they've made. Do you seriously think that even now SE will make it FTP with all of that potential money going poof just like that?

It's straight up bad business, and only when FFXI is neck-deep in the grave will they -ever- consider making it FTP. It's PTP and it'll stay PTP, no ifs ands or buts to it. Sorry for being so blunt but people who think that it should go FTP need to realize all of the money people have spent, and how going FTP will make all of that mean nothing to dedicated FFXI players.

Would you prefer to see it stagnate further, losing more and more players? Genuine question because the game is depressing with how few people actually play it now. The current player loss is unsustainable and the game won't be here in a couple of years the way it's going.

There are a lot of ex players that would come back for f2p, there are a lot of players that main other mmos that would come back to XI part time if it was f2p. This is not something you can turn your nose up at, this game is very unhealthy and quite why you don't want the world to be alive with people is beyond me.

The content they are adding is horrible and it keeps getting worse, that's what you get for putting a part timer to run it that works full time on another game. All kinds of problems there, conflict of interest, lack of care about the game they are working on etc..

[Vil]

Would you prefer to see it stagnate further, losing more and more players? Genuine question because the game is depressing with how few people actually play it now. The current player loss is unsustainable and the game won't be here in a couple of years the way it's going.

There are a lot of ex players that would come back for f2p, there are a lot of players that main other mmos that would come back to XI part time if it was f2p. This is not something you can turn your nose up at, this game is very unhealthy and quite why you don't want the world to be alive with people is beyond me.

The content they are adding is horrible and it keeps getting worse, that's what you get for putting a part timer to run it that works full time on another game. All kinds of problems there, conflict of interest, lack of care about the game they are working on etc..

what the hell are you basing all this off of? LOL

The game is what it is...a dated 10 year old game. Naturally, it'd be harder for newer people to come in to it because the foundational mechanics are different from today's MMO standards, as are the graphics. Making it F2P wouldn't bring in a flood of people...the interest would be the same.

The old "the game won't be here in a couple of years" doomsday scenario has been tossed around since the Chains of Promathia days..like really. Maybe FFXI doesn't have the numbers WoW does...but then again, does it NEED to be mainstream and hot with 2mil+ subs to be successful? No. It is successful enough that it continually turns a profit for SE, especially in this generation where their console titles have not been performing as they had expected.

As with all other RL scenarios "free" doesn't really mean "free". It really means "pay to win". If you do a study of this model, you will find that it is actually more of a detriment to the life of a game than a sub fee is. When your income is dependant on impulsive sales, you never know if next month will net enough or not.

And that's not to mention the quality of the game would go down even further with F2P. If you say the development is garbage right now, then go ahead and insist on F2P and see how fast this game would die off with lack of balancing, content, and support.

F2P isn't the magical solution for FFXI, a reworking of game mechanics is.

[Anjou]

Would you prefer to see it stagnate further, losing more and more players?

No I don't, but I don't want cheap people swooping in on the game like a pack of angry vultures because they can't afford to pay for their monthly WoW subscription.

Genuine question because the game is depressing with how few people actually play it now. The current player loss is unsustainable and the game won't be here in a couple of years the way it's going.

The second they make it FTP, that's going to accelerate the death-rate of this game. The older players who put their money in will be offended and leave the game, leaving a 'dumbed down' community who knows next to nothing of the game.

There are a lot of ex players that would come back for f2p, there are a lot of players that main other mmos that would come back to XI part time if it was f2p.

Let me stop you right there and tell you something. If you mean to tell me that you can't pay $12 dollars a MONTH on something, how in the hell do you expect to pay for utilities? If you want an FTP MMO so bad, go look at Runescape and tell me what you think of it. The quality will literally drop so fast that people will think FFXI's quality dropped off a cliff if it was charted on a line.

This is not something you can turn your nose up at, this game is very unhealthy and quite why you don't want the world to be alive with people is beyond me.

I'd love to see FFXI alive again, but not with FTP people who will ruin the game. You don't have things for free, all good things come at a price. If you can't pay for it, then that is just tough.

The content they are adding is horrible and it keeps getting worse, that's what you get for putting a part timer to run it that works full time on another game.

Would you like to submit your own work then? Because I highly doubt you can make things like the people working at SE can. Put up or shut up.

All kinds of problems there, conflict of interest, lack of care about the game they are working on etc..

Lack of care? If they stopped caring do you think FFXI would have lasted for 11 long years? There's a fine line between being ignorant and flat out foolish, and right now you're one side of the line that you shouldn't be right now.