How a f2p system could work on ffxi.

[Castanica]

I play a game called warframe,

On this game you can buy anything you can farm, as well as skins and cosmetics.

On FFXI they could make it so that you have to buy everything with crysta.

They could sell all farmable items like dynamis coins, alex, snowslit stones etc. This makes money off impatience but a f2p player can still easily farm all these items.

Cosmetics could be like the cosmetic suits that the dev team have already been making, the behemoth outfit, goblin suit and the other cosmetics.

Also xp and gil boosters.

This isn't p2w before someone says it, this is pay for convenience.

This system would turn a marginally profitable game that Square have little interest in into a much more profitable one with a very strong future, many f2p games don't have massive numbers of servers or players. They just give more options to make money.

[Seillan]

Did you really need to make another thread of the exact same topic?

I doubt seriously that going F2P would help the game -- at this point especially. If anything, it would piss off enough of the vet players to probably cause more harm than good in the long run. I also don't really see the people that typically play F2P titles clamoring for an old school mmo like FFXI in the first place. I guess we'll see how that plays out once the mobile version is released (assuming it's not a totally bastardized version of the game, anyway.)

I'd also argue that some of that sounds exactly like P2W. If you're able to buy all of those farmable items with real money, you're literally paying to "win" some of the achievements of the game in a sense, without any actual effort involved. How else can that be interpreted?

[Isal]

Did you really need to make another thread of the exact same topic? [...]

The free access period is over, how else are they gonna log back in?? I kid, I kid...

I feel like it'd be better to leave the cash shop as an option for cosmetics, if you're really going to do that. In my situation, paying the current monthly fee would be justified for a good while yet, seeing as I think I've only just gotten into the Zilart content for the first time since I picked the game up in 2003 (and I don't mean RoV, I mean the original Zilart content). Given the number of characters I've seen pop up in the cities with ?'s next to their names, I'm apparently not alone. Combine that with their plans to cut costs on running the game as well as their statement that they currently have no plans to change the monthly fee despite the end of service for PS2 and 360 (which isn't happening until March 2016), I'd imagine the subscription will likely stay the same for quite a while yet.

[kaerin]

No.
Thanks.

[Stompa]

They could sell all farmable items like dynamis coins, alex, snowslit stones etc. This makes money off impatience but a f2p player can still easily farm all these items.

So why not just farm them?

You're contradicting yourself, by saying that in a FTP version where "Player X" will get all of FFXI for free, in a game where RME materials are so easy to farm, and then you say that Player X will still hand over cold hard cash for those easy to get items.

Surely if the person is enjoying the truly awesome FFXI videogame for free, and is able to get these RME items easily, why would they stop enjoying their Free Ride by wasting cash money on those easy items.

It makes no sense, and it didn't in all the previous threads either.

[detlef]

It makes no sense, and it didn't in all the previous threads either.

Be patient. It will most assuredly make sense in the third thread. Please look forward to it.

[Stompa]

Be patient. It will most assuredly make sense in the third thread. Please look forward to it.

I'm counting these two titled threads, and the other threads which got off-topic Ftp advertisements posted in them too, and its already a lot more than three.

Its starting to feel a bit like a hostage-taking situation. "I am holding your beloved FFXI as my hostage, and if you don't let me buy game treasure with dollars, your beloved game will surely die soon."

[Castanica]

I'm counting these two titled threads, and the other threads which got off-topic Ftp advertisements posted in them too, and its already a lot more than three.

Its starting to feel a bit like a hostage-taking situation. "I am holding your beloved FFXI as my hostage, and if you don't let me buy game treasure with dollars, your beloved game will surely die soon."

Stopping console support, 1/3 of JP playes are on consoles.
They aren't offering free PC copies to these console players that have paid many hundreds or thousands of dollars.
They are having an official end to the story.
They are stopping support.

I'm not sure what you take from all that but to me it doesn't state the game has much of a future, the only way that will change is if the game becomes more profitable. Nothing short of a monetisation change is going to do that.

The only future ffxi seems to have is on mobile phones, being run by nexon. Nexon have a terrible reputation.

[Stompa]

Stopping console support, 1/3 of JP playes are on consoles.
They aren't offering free PC copies to these console players that have paid many hundreds or thousands of dollars.
They are having an official end to the story.
They are stopping support.

I'm not sure what you take from all that but to me it doesn't state the game has much of a future, the only way that will change is if the game becomes more profitable. Nothing short of a monetisation change is going to do that.

The only future ffxi seems to have is on mobile phones, being run by nexon. Nexon have a terrible reputation.

I'm not 100% sure of this, but aren't SE offering the full PC game as free download? I haven't really checked it because I'm still running my old install from ages ago, but I think I saw that somewhere.

I have JP friends on my mostly-JP linkshell, some of them are on PS2 and they will change to PC when the time comes. Its only a small sample of players obviously.

The problem I have with these "FtP-or-die" threads is that they are relentless and depressing. The first time it was raised as a topic we all discussed it, and I was like its cool that people are discussing their feelings on it. But its getting really overbearing now.

Also, I do VW with my static, they're all building Empys, they aren't talking about how the game is going to die for sure. They're just playing the game and paying subs for it, and trying to stay optimistic and happy and stuff.

Some people have been building Empys for like 5 years, doing a few hours after finishing work on occasional evenings. How do you think they will feel if some kid can buy the same Empy with $$$ in like a few seconds flat.

I pay subs and sometimes all I do is log-in to give cabbages to my mog-garden pet Karakul, and watch his little happy love-hearts going up. I'm happy paying subs just to mess around and pwn mobs with my friends, I don't think the subs are expensive, and I don't see the end of updates as any kind of killing blow to Vanadiel as an immersive and enjoyable virtual world online.

We don't know that FFXI would survive without subs, using only FtP cash-shop input from occasional players who don't want to play the game and kill mobs and get treasure <That way.> I think this particular game would implode really quickly under the FtP model.

I just think we don't know the future, how the game will manage when the updates stop, maybe there will be more than enough fans paying subs to keep it running for ages, we simply don't know. And in the meantime I would sooner not be bombarded with lots of "the game is going to die!" stuff all the time.

[Castanica]

It's not pay to win, because you can farm everything. It's called pay for convenience, impatience basically. P2w is when you can buy the item from the cash shop and that is the only way to get them.

The thing to keep in mind is that many titles use systems like this and are successful, you greatly under-estimate impatience.

Everquest 1 is an old game, has a cash shop and is free to play. There is no free to play market, everyone can play a f2p game. It's just the mental block people have about it, the mental block many here have is the same as everyquest 1 players had. They had to get past it to keep the game alive.

Here is the reality of FFXI:
It's an old game that can't attract young players.
The players the game has are not enough for Square Enix and we are about to lose a lot of them.
The only way to make a game in this position profitable again is to make more money from the players it has, like it or not.
So you offer them more things to be able to buy, most players would not mind spending more money if they get something from it.

As an intermediary point they could add a cosmetic cash shop while retaining a lower sub fee and see how much extra money they can make from that.

I understand many of you have issues with f2p, mainly because you have never played a f2p game that was any good. I have, I moved past the mental block I had and when the game starts really going into death mode and it becomes more obvious I think many of you will come around to the idea. F2p is better than a dead game.