The whale mount is up on Mogstation

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Originally Posted by Stormfur

They should play this when you mount it.

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Honestly, I was thinking of the Futurama song instead "We're Whalers on the Moon~"

Why would anyone want such a gaudy mount if they get their best buddy for free during the MSQ? You can dress you chocobo, colour it and even fight alongside it.

Not going to buy this one. The last time I invested a lot in a mount was for the Managorm and it ended up being like a snack-sized Fenrir. It was disappointing :(

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Originally Posted by Rymm

I KNOW RIGHT?! How dare a company in China develop a mount for FF14 and implement it on their servers months ago and then, ON TOP OF THAT, SE has the freaking nerve to license it and make it available to the rest of the playerbase! Especially when they KNEW that they were going to be DDoSed weeks or even months after putting this in motion! The gall of them! You should just unsub right now, that'll show them. :mad:

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My apologies for bursting your sarcasm, but this isn't a Chinese exclusive mount. China got this mount in their cash shop at the same time as we did (today), this is a global release like all the other cash shop mounts (moogle / carby)

I wish more people could sit on the boxes on the whale's back. Would have been fun to ferry a light party to a hunt or rp event on a humongous mount lol

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Originally Posted by Deceptus

A whale for the whales indeed.

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This killed me.

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Originally Posted by DuskTS

so SE can invest the profits back into FFXIV.

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https://media.giphy.com/media/O5NyCibf93upy/giphy.gif

It's a cool looking mount, but I probably wouldn't pick it up unless it was on sale. I'd be far more likely to buy the Red Hare at full price.

Them new house walls are nice though, I will give them that.

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Originally Posted by SenorPatty

Can I at least beach this whale on the shores of Costa del Sol and RP an Eorzean activist looking into the suspicious deaths of beached whales, only to find myself mired deep into a conspiracy created by the Monetarists, who promptly try to have me silenced only to be given a bridal rescue by none other than Hildibrand?




What, I gotta milk my money's worth outta that whale.

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This. This is the quality that I come to the forms for. This truly is the epitome of General discussion. mild sarcasm, I really did enjoy this. I really wish this was a quest line now!,

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Originally Posted by Theodric

WoW charges a much higher price for basic services such as name changes and race changes than FFXIV does. You also can't play every class on a single character like you can in FFXIV so if you have multiple characters that you wish to shift over to a different faction/server then you're set back by quite a bit.

Other MMO's launched with a subscription fee initially but then dropped it in favour of being F2P - but typically made it appealing to subscribe to an optional fee in exchange for advantageous in-game bonuses. I believe ESO does that? I haven't played that since launch, admittedly.



It's public by default. Nor is it being a 'condescending jerk' to make an observation.

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WoW doesn't make you go through the most mind numbing gate to entry into their game that is the MSQ either. You just hop on a character and level it, which is especially nice when you want to try different race/class combos. For FF14, if you wanna try other race/class combos you have to pay 10 dollars every time, or go through the mind numbing grind that is MSQ all over again, or pay 60 dollars to dodge the grind/get a char up. Not to mention, gearing an alt class very high is nigh impossible on the same character due to weekly restrictions. If you want to gear alts in WoW you just do it, your tank, your healer, your dps can all be around the same item level.

Mind you, not calling WoW better, it's even mildly a dumpster fire right now, but both games have their pros/cons to look at

Other games moved to the F2P model because they know they can't make it on a sub model. Terrible games cannot last on a traditional sub model, which is why so few games attempt it anymore. Whereas a free to play model allows them to milk those few whales willing to spend and get little bits and pieces here from the cheaper players.

Squeenix knows they can milk the players, they won't get it from everyone, but each player who buys this mount is effectively two months of sub per player. Why add interesting content and reward players for playing the game when you can get that kind of dough? Instead, lets focus on pushing out stuff like eureka , possibly one of the most boring, grindy and annoying pieces of content that probably took one of their developers a whole 30 minutes to think up.

( Keep in mind, the MSQ isn't /bad/, but so much of it is obnoxiously dull running halfway across the world over and over to speak to someone for two minutes, just to run back. Rinse and repeat for a huge chunk of ARR It's killed the game for a lot of my friends trying to get up to play with friends )

While I can totally see the desire to have more things made available as rewards in game, there's still an awful lot of cosmetic stuff, emotes, minions and mounts, etc. just given away during MSQ and side quests. There isn't anything in the mog station that you have to have to participate in any part of the content - no keys for lockboxes, no xp buffs, no damage/stat buffs, no potions. Even the job/story jumps only take up up to the current content, you have to go through the most recent expansion no matter what - and you don't have to pay for the right to get into the content, short of buying the expansion like everyone in the game. It's not like having to spend $ or currency to unlock each zone, etc. In SWtOR, 99% of cosmetics, mounts, minions, emotes, and toys are from the Cartel Shop. When I stopped playing LotRO a thousand years ago, you could pay real money to get guaranteed legendary weapon upgrades, which had an actual affect on your gameplay. So, yes. Other subscription games do the same thing and worse.

Honestly, IMHO, it's like a burger. You pay your $5.95 for the burger itself, which comes with a few toppings. You want extra toppings, like bacon or avocado or egg or onion strings or whatever, you pay for those extras. You don't want the extras, don't pay for them.

Do I wish everything was available freely in game without any cash shop? Of course I do. I remember playing MMOs before cash shops became a thing. But I also don't feel like it's the "death of the game", and in a game culture where every game has a cash shop now, stripping it from XIV would probably actually cause the game to die. Even if the money it generates isn't going back into the game, if it's not generating money for other franchises, then its likely to be culled as "not worth their time". Especially if they're already spending money to fight DDOSs, which apparently people on these forums want them to fight, imagine that.

Hmm, is it just me or is the whales blowhole covered up? Poor whale can't even breathe properly, shame on all you being mean to that poor creature like that.

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Originally Posted by Alestorm

One could argue the Star Wars mmo, since they have a sub option and still encurage you to buy things from the cash shop. Heck, it's the only way to get a mount that I could ever find.

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Umm they have speeder vendors all over the place in the game that sell'em for in-game currency...

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Originally Posted by InkstainedGwyn

Do I wish everything was available freely in game without any cash shop? Of course I do. I remember playing MMOs before cash shops became a thing.

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I remember playing this MMO before the cash shop became a thing.

Good times.

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Originally Posted by InkstainedGwyn

Honestly, IMHO, it's like a burger. You pay your $5.95 for the burger itself, which comes with a few toppings. You want extra toppings, like bacon or avocado or egg or onion strings or whatever, you pay for those extras. You don't want the extras, don't pay for them.

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The entire "burger" is half done in this case, and the few "toppings" we receive aren't very good. This game's cash shop puts some f2p ones to shame.

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Originally Posted by Areic

For FF14, if you wanna try other race/class combos you have to pay 10 dollars every time

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I do understand where most of your comment is coming from but I have to say that I feel like this is actually one of the few things that's less a problem in XIV than other places - given that you can play all classes on one character, needing to make a new character to get "different classes and race combos" is purely for folks who want alts. There's nothing wrong with alts - I have a handful here and I won't talk about the 66 alts I had in SWtOR - but you're not being deprived of the chance to play new classes "unless you make a new char", which is the issue everywhere else. And as for the race comment, I do know that a lot of games have finally started allowing race/gender changes, but that's still a relatively new thing. Even in SWtOR (at the time of my leaving), you had to unlock the race you wanted to go before you could change to it, and it would still cost every time. And some races you had to buy on the Cartel store (or with obscene game currency based off the market price), you couldn't unlock them through play.

So, I get a lot of what you're saying, but I feel like this is less a problem here than it is elsewhere. Especially since a lot of games (SWtOR, LotRO, etc - I can't speak for WoW because it's been a thousand years) still require you to get through certain main story points before you can progress into other content.

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Originally Posted by Vahlnir

The entire "burger" is half done in this case, and the few "toppings" we receive aren't very good. This game's cash shop puts some f2p ones to shame.

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According to you. I enjoy it. I'm not saying you have to, but I'm saying that a lot of people tend to take very objective opinions and pose them as "facts".

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Originally Posted by InkstainedGwyn

According to you. I enjoy it. I'm not saying you have to, but I'm saying that a lot of people tend to take very objective opinions and pose them as "facts".

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Oh, I enjoy the game. But it's got some glaring flaws. If you can't see that then...well...

I'm critical of things that are put up on the Mogstation such as single character, undyable, gender-locked glam for a high price, but the whale... It's a large, new model (the biggest thing), two-seater, account mount. Worth it. And apparently a bunch of other people think so as well. I logged into my housing ward and saw about 5 of them immediately.

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Originally Posted by InkstainedGwyn

Honestly, IMHO, it's like a burger. You pay your $5.95 for the burger itself, which comes with a few toppings. You want extra toppings, like bacon or avocado or egg or onion strings or whatever, you pay for those extras. You don't want the extras, don't pay for them.

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There's a big difference when another fast food chain is selling a similar burger for 6$ with a choice of 4 toppings.

Other subscription MMO's like WoW include mobile app, inventory space, alts and far smaller cash shop free with the basic sub. FF's cash shop is far from the death of the game, I enjoy ff14, but it's still rather excessive.

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Originally Posted by Vahlnir

The entire "burger" is half done in this case, and the few "toppings" we receive aren't very good.

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That's completely subjective.

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Originally Posted by Vahlnir

This game's cash shop puts some f2p ones to shame.

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Such as...?

Last I checked, the vast majority of F2P MMO's were seeking to squeeze as much money as possible out of their players through business practices more nefarious than those that FFXIV embraces.

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Originally Posted by Liam_Harper

There's a big difference when another fast food chain is selling a similar burger for 6$ with a choice of 4 toppings.

Other subscription MMO's like WoW include mobile app, inventory space, alts and far smaller cash shop free with the basic sub. FF's cash shop is far from the death of the game, I enjoy ff14, but it's still rather excessive.

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I may be mistaking you for another poster, yet didn't you recently claim to have felt tempted to go back and embrace WoW only to find it lacking? If so, it's probably not the best comparison to make. Especially when it ignores the nuances of WoW's cash shop being far more expensive on average than FFXIV's equivalent.

Flying whale mount? Yeah not going to buy it even if it was for free.

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Originally Posted by Vahlnir

The entire "burger" is half done in this case, and the few "toppings" we receive aren't very good. This game's cash shop puts some f2p ones to shame.

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This "burger" is being sold at a $30 and while it may use "premium" ingredients, it still looks, tastes and "sounds" like a $12.95 burger. This game's cash shop business model puts Apple to shame.

Honestly I don't mind the cash shop itself. What I mind are the prices and the sheer lack of variety on top of being forced to log into a secondary site to even access it. Lower the prices, give us more items, and put a launcher into the game and I'd have no issue with it so long as it wasn't obtrusive or constantly calling attention to itself. Right now though the prices for most items border on absurd.

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Originally Posted by Sigma-Astra

So, don't buy the whale. Problem solved. You're getting angry over what other people do with their money when it's none of your business.

A lot of people in this thread need to stop worrying about what other people do with their money. It is literally none of your business.

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What the user you quote says is completely true and it's all the consumer's (players) complacency that keeps this game mediocre, this game looks really cheap in this age of awesome graphics and there's no telling how players can expend money in optional items but cannot instead upgrade their computers and demand better graphics!...


I think $30 for a mount is a real steal, it's half the price of a whole new game and you know what happens when players buy such expensive things!?... SE will just keep increasing the prices without returning a single cent to improve the game, they will just milk their players until there is none left and that's when they'll come out with the notice that the game is too old and is about to be retired!...

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Originally Posted by SigmaOZ

What the user you quote says is completely true and it's all the consumer's (players) complacency that keeps this game mediocre, this game looks really cheap in this age of awesome graphics and there's no telling how players can expend money in optional items but cannot instead upgrade their computers and demand better graphics!...

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For what its worth, the graphics are more Square's decision to make sure this game can be played on lower end PC systems than where funding is going. Increasing the baseline graphics would risk losing more of their playerbase unless they wanted to make it all optional. Most you can expect is a completely optional high-res texture pack, if they think maintaining two sets of textures for this game would be worth it for them.

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Originally Posted by Areic

WoW doesn't make you go through the most mind numbing gate to entry into their game that is the MSQ either. You just hop on a character and level it, which is especially nice when you want to try different race/class combos. For FF14, if you wanna try other race/class combos you have to pay 10 dollars every time, or go through the mind numbing grind that is MSQ all over again, or pay 60 dollars to dodge the grind/get a char up. Not to mention, gearing an alt class very high is nigh impossible on the same character due to weekly restrictions. If you want to gear alts in WoW you just do it, your tank, your healer, your dps can all be around the same item level.

Mind you, not calling WoW better, it's even mildly a dumpster fire right now, but both games have their pros/cons to look at

Other games moved to the F2P model because they know they can't make it on a sub model. Terrible games cannot last on a traditional sub model, which is why so few games attempt it anymore. Whereas a free to play model allows them to milk those few whales willing to spend and get little bits and pieces here from the cheaper players.

Squeenix knows they can milk the players, they won't get it from everyone, but each player who buys this mount is effectively two months of sub per player. Why add interesting content and reward players for playing the game when you can get that kind of dough? Instead, lets focus on pushing out stuff like eureka , possibly one of the most boring, grindy and annoying pieces of content that probably took one of their developers a whole 30 minutes to think up.

( Keep in mind, the MSQ isn't /bad/, but so much of it is obnoxiously dull running halfway across the world over and over to speak to someone for two minutes, just to run back. Rinse and repeat for a huge chunk of ARR It's killed the game for a lot of my friends trying to get up to play with friends )

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That isn't an issue with the cash shop, though - that is an issue with their design ambitions for the game itself.

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Originally Posted by Daeriion_Aeradiir

For what its worth, the graphics are more Square's decision to make sure this game can be played on lower end PC systems than where funding is going. Increasing the baseline graphics would risk losing more of their playerbase unless they wanted to make it all optional. Most you can expect is a completely optional high-res texture pack, if they think maintaining two sets of textures for this game would be worth it for them.

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Agreed, but that's the poster's point, IMO. That SE is building the game around people who'd rather spend their money on such items than ensuring they have a PC that is not subpar when compared even to the basic PS4.

Still, there's plenty of non-MMOs out there that make the decision to go for higher end specs and are able to attract high numbers of players and also retain them - so are they saying they can only mostly attract people with weaker systems? Seems like a sad state for a genre to be in. I just don't get why MMOs are the go-to of people with bad computers, because it doesn't seem like we're talking about players on the margins here but significant enough numbers for it to not be worth the risk. Purely speculation on my part as I don't have access to the same info the devs do.

However, I view the cash shop as a symptom and not a cause of any issues the game is facing as such. If it provides them with more income, great; I hope some of it is reinvested in 14.

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Originally Posted by SigmaOZ

What the user you quote says is completely true and it's all the consumer's (players) complacency that keeps this game mediocre, this game looks really cheap in this age of awesome graphics and there's no telling how players can expend money in optional items but cannot instead upgrade their computers and demand better graphics!...


I think $30 for a mount is a real steal, it's half the price of a whole new game and you know what happens when players buy such expensive things!?... SE will just keep increasing the prices without returning a single cent to improve the game, they will just milk their players until there is none left and that's when they'll come out with the notice that the game is too old and is about to be retired!...

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The players buying things from the cash shop have, and I'll repeat, have nothing to do with the "cheap" graphics. THAT is an executive order and game designer issue and less of anything to deal with the player's themselves. Stop being an armchair game designer and executive director. Orders to enhance or upgrade the graphical quality of the game's engine comes from not only the controller (financial director) of XIV's department and budgeting, but from the CEO's themselves in regards towards what the designers can actually do.

You are completely flying off the handle with hyperbole after hyperbole without fully understanding exactly how it's feasible to upgrade an entire MMO's graphical engine.

Seriously, causing fear-mongering and misinformation for no other reason than pure exaggeration and placing blame in other people spending their money as they please because you don't want to is absurd.

It'll be a while until we see graphical enhancements, if their recent interviews are anything to go by - as far into the future as the PS5's release. If that takes us to 6.0, I am somewhat sceptical that we'll see anything other than optional texture upgrades.

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Originally Posted by DevonEllwood

It's a little underwhaleming so I'll wait for it to go on sale.

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Yeah, I think I'm baleen on this one for now.

I find the mount being a whale is kindda on the nose for the cash shop.

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Originally Posted by Daeriion_Aeradiir

For what its worth, the graphics are more Square's decision to make sure this game can be played on lower end PC systems than where funding is going. Increasing the baseline graphics would risk losing more of their playerbase unless they wanted to make it all optional. Most you can expect is a completely optional high-res texture pack, if they think maintaining two sets of textures for this game would be worth it for them.

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The graphics quality of the game is fine imo...it's what lies beneath that needs to be fixed. Server infrastructure is sort of the back bone of the game. Since they blame any and all issues on that, maybe they should fix it instead of saying "we can't do x because the servers will die horribly".

wish it could seat more ppl :( could use it as an fc minivan

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Originally Posted by Jandor

I remember playing this MMO before the cash shop became a thing.

Good times.

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I've played games where people didn't think they own everything in the game just because they pay a sub.

Good times.

I see the wallet shaming fad has returned.

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Originally Posted by Lihtleita

wish it could seat more ppl :( could use it as an fc minivan

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SE after the next patch:

"For an extra $2 a month per slot, you can have multiple slots for players on your whale mount!"

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Originally Posted by JohnSpawnVFX

I see the wallet shaming fad has returned.

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Personally, I don't care. People can do as they wish with their money. Heck, I straight up admitted I'd probably buy the Red Hare mount. I just don't like it when SE continues to prey on their player base while letting the game stagnate in some ways. So yeah, I'm gonna say something when they make larger additions to the Mogstation.

On a sidenote, does anyone else think the golden upholstered walls that came out with the mount today feel straight out of Goldfinger? I saw them and I can't unsee.

I started this thread, but I really don't care what people do with their money. I didn't want this to devolve into a cash shop vs no cash shop thread...

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Originally Posted by Cincierta

On a sidenote, does anyone else think the golden upholstered walls that came out with the mount today feel straight out of Goldfinger? I saw them and I can't unsee.

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Idk about that, but I like the look of the Kasamatsu walls. A lot.

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Originally Posted by Stormfur

I started this thread, but I really don't care what people do with their money. I didn't want this to devolve into a cash shop vs no cash shop thread...

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You should've known that people will start to complain, as they always do, when something new is in the mogstation.

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Originally Posted by ChewieFlakes

So they put a $30 mount on the Mogstation and yet their archaic servers can't even keep the game online for over a month and every event this year has been garbage with mediocre rewards? How the hell are their priorities so messed up.

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Because people can't stop themselves. Just because WoW's derpy playerbase allowed Blizzard to get away with it, doesn't make it alright here.