Development Team Downsizing and Justification Makes no Sense

[Pixela]

Cringe npc thing aside, promotion is crass and should be beneath you.

[Sp1cyryan]

Cringe npc thing aside, promotion is crass and should be beneath you.

Why is that? When did I get so high and mighty all of a sudden?

[Alhanelem]

I generally disapprove of all unofficial servers because most people are just doing it to play for free. Yeah, like you said some people do keep their subs but for the most part, using private servers is detrimental to the game's continued existence. And sometimes I wonder if that's maybe the goal.

[Zehira]

lol HorizonXI reminded me a lot what Vana'diel is all about.

[Sp1cyryan]

lol HorizonXI reminded me a lot what Vana'diel is all about.

I don't doubt that at all. Good for you.

Privates can't replicate the experience retail has or had. Retail can't replicate the experience and community of a private server. This is a good dichotomy.

What needs to be understood is the true scope of financial opportunity for retail. Are the segment of players who wouldn't pay for either retail or a private server really some detriment to retail and it's longevity? No.
Is there a meaningful group of players who are not subbing to retail because of private servers? Maybe, but that missed the point of if that matters by leading the question the wrong direction. These players enjoyed something else more. It just so happened to be a different XI experience. This means that retail either wasn't going to continue occupying their attention and moot point. Or, players want to continue having that retail experience while subbed and the unique one of a private server.
Players like Pixela understandably put their hopes and dreams of continuing XI for as long as possible on others, but that is wrong to do. I can continue, but I think the point was made.

[Monsuta_Man]

SE's new FF title always take precedent over anything else; as XIV fans are finding out while getting a piece of that XI humble pie Uriah served out.

XI is a relic to them.

Been trying to get people to abandon XI for XIV for years, but many stick with XI or plain out quit to go play GTA, god of war, Elden ring or Sonic the Hedgehog.... or something.

[Alhanelem]

Been trying to get people to abandon XI for XIV for years, but many stick with XI or plain out quit to go play GTA, god of war, Elden ring or Sonic the Hedgehog.... or something.

That's simply not true, as the producer of FFXIV himself stepped in to keep the game going when its future was being debated.

[Sirmarki]

Smany stick with XI or plain out quit to go play GTA, god of war, Elden ring or Sonic the Hedgehog.... or something.

Maybe because they actually like playing it still, just maybe?

[Pixela]

The "new producer letter" was one of the most idiotic and demoralizing things I've read for a while, it was so bad and so disrespectful I wonder if that was the intent.

They aren't even promoting the content they have been working on for years that still has to come out to keep peoples morale up.

Players like Pixela understandably put their hopes and dreams of continuing XI for as long as possible on others, but that is wrong to do. I can continue, but I think the point was made.

I know how this goes, because I've been involved in these things for other games I cared about in the past. A lot of people don't understand the issues that await.

First of all the people running them have very limited ability to fix problems and add new things, they are vastly inferior to a proper experience at a core level because they are effectively a frankenstein monster. I know the "new car smell" can carry these issues short term, they start to grate long term.

Secondly a lot of the outside infrastructure is reliant on the proper service running, once the proper service stops you will see video card drivers no longer need to support many of the features it needs and fps and crash issues will run rampant, windows updates no longer need to support many features these 10-20 year old games need to run and the game that worked fine this morning will no longer start at all following a forced microsoft update. For tech heads this is less of a problem because they can block updates on drivers and windows but most people aren't tech heads. I could go on but you get the idea.

[Pixela]

That's simply not true, as the producer of FFXIV himself stepped in to keep the game going when its future was being debated.

There is an institutional problem at Square Enix.

The same mindset that lead to the letter from the XI producer last month, is already to be seen in the XIV studios. Which is why almost all the people working on XIV have been working on XVI and whatever follows that. Do you know how bad a sign it is for a large and successful team to suddenly start work on a AAA single player game instead of put all their attention into some new EXP or engine update?

The future for XIV is going along the same path XI took, they are no longer happy updating that 10 year old game. They want to work on new things. Working on a 10 year old engine is bad for their careers.

SE isn't run like other companies, where a success story is latched upon. They constantly want to re-invent the wheel, even if doing so makes no financial sense.