Potential Sub Price Decrease

You don't pay for content you pay to be able to log in on the servers, that's literally it.

So no. Be happy they haven't increased the price due to inflation.

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引用元：Thurmnmurmn

I was just about to comment this.
The cost of making a game nowadays is massive when compared to before. Physical copies didn't even come close to matching the difference.
Also there's a lot more money that goes into advertising now.

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That's a good point. But why is that? It's because the industry has conditioned their customers to always expect shinier graphics because that's easier marketable in a trailer or picture. Too bad that stuff is expensive but good luck being AAA and not at least looking the part.

So games are made so risk-averse and broad along with ridiculous advertising budgets that dwarf the production costs of the literal game itself so enough people buy it. That is just crazy.

And also happening in a world where indies exist that time and again prove how creatively bankrupt AAA is.
Kinda like Hollywood but with a controller.

Again, it's only a matter of time before the whole thing collapses in on itself. I mean nowadays it's expected of a game to not even work after a day one patch. Look no further than FFXV and XIV 1.0.

As I said in the beginning, at least FF under YoshiP is polished. So that's something. lol

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引用元：Orinori

When you pay a subscription in an MMO, you are directly paying for patch content, not Expansion content. You already paid your $60 for the expansion. If Square Enix does not have plans to ever increase the amount of patch content delivered I think it would be reasonable to entertain the idea of a subscription price reduction as spending power for the average person is falling globally.

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Just need to point out - the sub fee pays for maintenance and ongoing upkeep of the server infrastructure (and staff who run it), not for patch content. That would be the recurring cost associated with making servers available.

personally, despite some gripes with the game, I think I get more than my.. 50 cents a day worth.

if they increase the cost, maybe it'll be 60 cents... considering more people spend more than that a day on one coffee, doesnt seem like its enough to go mental over

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引用元：Orinori

It is clear throughout Endwalker that the budget and planning for patch content has not increased since Heavensward.

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Have fun failing to prove that.

Costs go up annually. Budgets will increase if only to cover those increased costs. Not all game revenue is generated through the subscription and expansion "box price" though the increasing number of subscriptions expansion over expansion picks up a lot of those increased costs.

As for patch content, planning for new content types takes a lot more effort than planning for new additions to existing content.

The last thing you want is for the subscription price to be lowered so they're forced into monetization through microtransactions, lootboxes and other usually predatory designs. Unless maybe you're a whale that enjoys showing off how much money you spend.

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引用元：Kes13a

personally, despite some gripes with the game, I think I get more than my.. 50 cents a day worth.

if they increase the cost, maybe it'll be 60 cents... considering more people spend more than that a day on one coffee, doesnt seem like its enough to go mental over

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The sub could go up to €100 per month and it would still be less then a coffee a day. Your analogy doesn't make sense. lol Everything gets more expensive and yet I'm not sure XIV got more enticing. That's the point that's being discussed.

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引用元：Kes13a

personally, despite some gripes with the game, I think I get more than my.. 50 cents a day worth.

if they increase the cost, maybe it'll be 60 cents... considering more people spend more than that a day on one coffee, doesnt seem like its enough to go mental over

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all those “ just 1 coffee a day” keep adding up.

Also, SE doesn’t use local pricing for different countries. Except for a few countries, players are tied to a vast region, cannot change that region and for many that means being tied to USD or another foreign currency and being at the mercy of currency fluctuation (plus bad exchange rates + fees). Atm due to that, my sub went up from under $16 to almost $22 (+ fees and tax). For some other countries, it is much worse and the price, when converted to local currency, has more than doubled. For a few lucky ones it has decreased. I wish I could at least change my region to UK as I would still pay about $16 given that the subprice remains at £8.99 (about $11USD). Atm, the US sub price is the most expensive.

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引用元：Orinori

I think it would be reasonable to entertain the idea of a subscription price reduction

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Currencies have become more diluted and mean less. So to not increase the subscription price has been interesting. It is reasonable to think they are losing money by not increasing it as currencies get diluted. Perhaps it is made up for by the increase in the people playing the game. In conclusion, it should not reduce.

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as spending power for the average person is falling globally.

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If someone can't find the money for a subscription fee then they may need to focus on real life because otherwise how are they paying for food?

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Do you think that $60 is a fair price for a half hour of MSQ, 1 dungeon, and 1 trial?

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1 extreme trial that is farmed, things such as Island Sanctuary, Variant, Criterion, Savage, Ultimate, Alliance Raids, custom deliveries, 3 beast tribes, PvP rewards. Yes.

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$60 is a reasonable price per patch?

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What? Subscription fees are nowhere close to that for 1 month.

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引用元：Orinori

It is clear throughout Endwalker that the budget and planning for patch content has not increased since Heavensward.

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Are you just not seeing the advancements the game has done, or did you willingly choose to not mention them?

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引用元：Orinori

Before I start I sadly have to preface, no I am not someone's alt I just don't post here a lot. No this is not a hate thread, if you disagree feel free to discuss. No I do not hate FFXIV just because I am criticizing it. Yes you are entitled to a different opinion. I know this is pointless to ask but hopefully we can keep this thread at least mildly civil.


With Dawntrail less than a year away and my excitement high for it, I was thinking about the game and what plans Square-Enix may have for the future. It is clear throughout Endwalker that the budget and planning for patch content has not increased since Heavensward. Never have we gotten a "more and more" scenario for patches like we do with Expansions where each one has grown in scope and size as the income of the game has increased.

When you pay a subscription in an MMO, you are directly paying for patch content, not Expansion content. You already paid your $60 for the expansion. If Square Enix does not have plans to ever increase the amount of patch content delivered I think it would be reasonable to entertain the idea of a subscription price reduction as spending power for the average person is falling globally.

To put it in perspective, at nearly $15 a month you are paying the entire box price of the game or an expansion *per patch* at their 4 month patch cycle. Do you think that $60 is a fair price for a half hour of MSQ, 1 dungeon, and 1 trial?

This could all be moot as well however, as they've stated that the 7.X series will have the most content of any previous expansion, which is quite different than saying that Dawntrail specifically will have the most, so they may already have plans to ship an expanded patch content pipeline.

What are your thoughts? Do you think that $60 is a reasonable price per patch? Do you think they'll improve patch content in Dawntrail? Am I a big stinky idiot? Will Green Mage have dots?

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I think the $15 sub fee is fine. But what they should lower is the cost of having retainers. It's a fun and essential part of the game that just most people get to miss out on because they're limited to two. I think they should just give you four free, and then max it out if you want to pay $20 a month.

Also they need to make everything (but the boosts) on the mogstore accountwide. Period. End of story. I'd get more stuff if that was the case. Say how useless alts are all you want. It is actually essential if you want to join more than one FC, or be able to be competitive and BiS in more than one job at a time. Hell even if you just want to RP as a different race or just play the game more casually on a different identity so stalkers can't harass you. If you buy it, on your account... it should be useable... on your account. Not tied to the character.

Unless you're playing 40 characters, I recommend swapping to the Entry Level version of the sub.

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引用元：Stasya

The amount of content devs put for every major patch (~4 months) does not justify sub pricing model at all. You know where all the money go aswell .... to side projects ....

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Something a lot of people seems to forget when talking about subs, is that servers are a thing that need to be maintained. I'm talking about the actual, physical servers.

That's what the sub fee goes to. You get access to log in, and in return, the servers are kept in good conditions.

Also, OP, you're ignoring the budget increase it's noticeable. You can see it on more elaborated cutscenes and visuals in general (like the upcoming graphics update). You hear it in the gradual increase in voiced cutscenes from HW to EW.

The budget doesn't go to development alone, it goes to a lot of things.

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引用元：Midare

That's what the sub fee goes to. You get access to log in, and in return, the servers are kept in good conditions.

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So F2P games don't have servers? Ah, I see that's why they have a cash shop. Okay, so why does XIV have a cash shop and a sub and expansion costs? Because they are greedy. It is what it is. But at least people should be honest about it.

Due to inflation, we have already had a price decrease in the equivalent of $4.50 as what was $15.00 back then is now the equivalent of $19.50 in today's money but were still paying $15.00.

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引用元：Hyperia

Due to inflation, we have already had a price decrease in the equivalent of $4.50 as what was $15.00 back then is now the equivalent of $19.50 in today's money but were still paying $15.00.

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And I'm sure every player's salary/purchasing power has increased at the same rate as inflation...

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引用元：Midare

That's what the sub fee goes to. You get access to log in, and in return, the servers are kept in good conditions.

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All the NA servers were in poor condition a few nights ago actually...


Just a shot from a big thread that was up on the main FFXIV subreddit before anyone decides to call me a liar.
https://i.imgur.com/aetVmfw.png

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引用元：Payadopa

So F2P games don't have servers? Ah, I see that's why they have a cash shop. Okay, so why does XIV have a cash shop and a sub and expansion costs? Because they are greedy. It is what it is. But at least people should be honest about it.

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The FFXIV cash shop is essentially cosmetic. When you get a sub, you get full access to the game features. I abandoned all the f2p games I tried to play as you are practically forced to purchase several items, some regularly, to make the game playable. It’s f2p only in name unless you don’t mind a seriously gimped gaming experience. I prefer to pay a fixed amount and not have to bother with micro transactions.

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引用元：Hyperia

Due to inflation, we have already had a price decrease in the equivalent of $4.50 as what was $15.00 back then is now the equivalent of $19.50 in today's money but were still payingt $15.00.

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That doesn’t take into account currency fluctuations for all the non US players forced to pay in USD. In my case, because of that, I pay way more than what it would be with just inflation.

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引用元：NekoMataMata

All the NA servers were in poor condition a few nights ago actually...


Just a shot from a big thread that was up on the main FFXIV subreddit before anyone decides to call me a liar.
https://i.imgur.com/aetVmfw.png

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That's not the servers though, that's the network outside them lol.


That is XIV up website is also not a great indicator because it just pings the servers from where it's located. If the bad network node is in its path, it's going to show problems. Meanwhile, people who's path doesn't take that node will have zero issues.





We had raid the night those issues were reported, and no one in my group had issues. I have someone in Orlando, 2 in Ohio, 1 near Chicago, one near Detroit, one in Oklahoma, and I'm near Seattle.

with the amount and quality of content we got in endwalker the game should have been sub free.

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引用元：Payadopa

So F2P games don't have servers? Ah, I see that's why they have a cash shop. Okay, so why does XIV have a cash shop and a sub and expansion costs? Because they are greedy. It is what it is. But at least people should be honest about it.

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Cash Shop is almost all cosmetics with a few story and job skips (which doesnt serve much anyway). There's no purchase in-game premium currency which is why they're allowed to sell mostly cosmetics in a sub model. F2P means Pay to Win.

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引用元：LioJen

No, they were $50 until about 2006. And that was when almost every developer made their own custom engines for every game. Today they all use a standard licensed premade engine like Unreal, which means they don't have to train anyone in its use since every programmer and graphic artist already knows it. The industry being much larger as a whole means the pool of potential employees is much larger, meaning the cost of labor has been decreased with the increase in worker competition. Many games now use a whole host of pre-made stock assets, as seen even in FFXV where they used Chinese-bought enemy assets, saving on man-hours. Average computing power is also much higher than before, which nullifies any increase in cost you may assume due to "HD graphics" being resource intensive.

Logically the cost of development should be down, and likely is. The bloated budgets probably come from inflated executive pay and marketing agencies. Keep in mind that any increase in sticker price will NOT result in a pay raise for the actual programmers, artists, and real workers on these games. It will only result in a bigger check for the guy in the suit who did nothing but sign his name, and larger dividends for the stockholders who would gladly tear the company into pieces for the same result.

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nice to see a normal and informed take in a ff14 discussion which usually tend to be filled with fanatics shilling. big ups to our anti-capitalist king of these here comments :D

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引用元：Valkyrie_Lenneth

That's not the servers though, that's the network outside them lol.


That is XIV up website is also not a great indicator because it just pings the servers from where it's located. If the bad network node is in its path, it's going to show problems. Meanwhile, people who's path doesn't take that node will have zero issues.





We had raid the night those issues were reported, and no one in my group had issues. I have someone in Orlando, 2 in Ohio, 1 near Chicago, one near Detroit, one in Oklahoma, and I'm near Seattle.

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Still an issue isn't it? I'm willing to admit that they don't have control over the nodes, but they do have influence over them that they refuse to exert because they don't care about those of us outside of JP.

Anyways, a lot of people did have issues. There's 89 replies on the thread I snipped. I had issues, as well as most everyone in Eureka with me at the time.

But that's just a whole thread of individuals' words against you and your static. It's kind of silly to reach into individual experiences as a means of disproving/proving something. It's not like we can't tell from your post history that you love SE with all your heart and that you'll defend them regardless of the situation.

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引用元：Nizzi

Why can't my sub run out and I can still have the same access that a free trial player has? I've already bought and paid for ARR, Heavensward and Stormblood in the past, yet I'm still forced to pay the monthly sub if I want to do POTD? It's a bit annoying to me. If it's because SE is afraid all of the idlers will unsub and just use /say to chat in Limsa, perhaps that means there's not much worth actually paying for this expansion?

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I think SW:ToR does something similar to this and I wish FFXIV did it too. But then again SW:ToR has instanced housing that doesn't hold your subscription hostage so I can see why FFXIV wouldn't do the same.

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引用元：Metalface_Villain

with the amount and quality of content we got in endwalker the game should have been sub free.

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This seems like a hot take but I have to agree, and I haven't played the game even close to 10 years. It's not that people are playing the game for a long time and getting used to the formula. The formula is stale because it's 2023 and devs either don't know how to change it up or don't want to. My point being it is clearly growing increasingly irritating for some players to pay the sub...whether it's the content or the servers.

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引用元：mana-burner

I think SW:ToR does something similar to this and I wish FFXIV did it too. But then again SW:ToR has instanced housing that doesn't hold your subscription hostage so I can see why FFXIV wouldn't do the same.

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SWtoR ftp is dreadful. I consider it unplayable: can't raid , can't get artifact armor, limited inventory and credits plus other inconveniences. And housing on swtor is boring and uninspiring: you can only place certain items on predetermined plates with little to no room for creativity. They could get rid of all my strongholds there I wouldn't even notice.

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引用元：Toutatis

SWtoR ftp is dreadful. I consider it unplayable: can't raid , can't get artifact armor, limited inventory and credits plus other inconveniences. And housing on swtor is boring and uninspiring: you can only place certain items on predetermined plates with little to no room for creativity. They could get rid of all my strongholds there I wouldn't even notice.

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Well yeah, the point is to at least let us have access to the same stuff free trial players have when we aren't currently subscribed.

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引用元：mana-burner

Well yeah, the point is to at least let us have access to the same stuff free trial players have when we aren't currently subscribed.

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And what I am saying is swtor ftp is so bad, I wouldn’t even play it.

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引用元：Atelier-Bagur

Cash Shop is almost all cosmetics with a few story and job skips (which doesnt serve much anyway). There's no purchase in-game premium currency which is why they're allowed to sell mostly cosmetics in a sub model. F2P means Pay to Win.

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In a game that even has glam as endgame it's not optional. It's manipulative. Plain and simple.

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引用元：Orinori

To put it in perspective, at nearly $15 a month you are paying the entire box price of the game or an expansion *per patch* at their 4 month patch cycle. Do you think that $60 is a fair price for a half hour of MSQ, 1 dungeon, and 1 trial?

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The price was grandfathered in back when FFXIV used to be touted as a competitor to WoW, which has the same price. Square Enix has changed directions, though, and instead of being a competitor, it's more like an add-on. FFXIV in 2023 just fills in the missing social aspect that's missing from other games, without adding gameplay content to compete with them. So you can raid in WoW then go clubbing in FFXIV and so on. It's not meant to provide additional gameplay burden for players. And in that aspect, it should likely be priced accordingly. Much like add-ons on your movie streaming subscriptions never double the price of your sub, but only add a small extra fee, otherwise people wouldn't buy it.

Also, FFXIV is a completely different genre than what it used to be. It's more like Second Life than WoW. Seriously, most of the new content added to the game is player-generated. If you know, you know. Sticking to the stock content in 2023 is like playing Gmod on gm_flatgrass. So what is the sub even used for?

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引用元：NekoMataMata

Still an issue isn't it? I'm willing to admit that they don't have control over the nodes, but they do have influence over them that they refuse to exert because they don't care about those of us outside of JP.

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And an East Coast Data Center would help, how? Cross-datacenter play is a thing. Your East Coast Data Center has issues because of Internet provider. It's your raid night, and everyone has travelled to a West Coast Data Center in order to raid. Too bad NTT/Comcast/<insert your own Internet Provider here> screwed up.

The truth of the matter is that multiple data centers in a region are just as susceptible to outside networking problems as single data centers in a region. Most of the "89 replies" you mentioned (yeah, I read through them) were along the line of "it's problematic" and "what the heck NTT?", not "this could be resolved by SE, they don't care because <mumble mumble> Japan".

"It's not like we can't tell from your post history that you love SE with all your heart and that you'll defend them regardless of the situation."

Don't have anything useful to say? Just said "it's kind of silly to reach into individual experiences" after providing "89 replies" that do exactly that? Slander the poster. Classic.

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引用元：DPZ2

And an East Coast Data Center would help, how? Cross-datacenter play is a thing. Your East Coast Data Center has issues because of Internet provider. It's your raid night, and everyone has travelled to a West Coast Data Center in order to raid. Too bad NTT/Comcast/<insert your own Internet Provider here> screwed up.

The truth of the matter is that multiple data centers in a region are just as susceptible to outside networking problems as single data centers in a region. Most of the "89 replies" you mentioned (yeah, I read through them) were along the line of "it's problematic" and "what the heck NTT?", not "this could be resolved by SE, they don't care because <mumble mumble> Japan".

"It's not like we can't tell from your post history that you love SE with all your heart and that you'll defend them regardless of the situation."

Don't have anything useful to say? Just said "it's kind of silly to reach into individual experiences" after providing "89 replies" that do exactly that? Slander the poster. Classic.

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You don't know the meaning of the world slander. My point when I said it's silly to reach into individual experiences was that I too could reference other people's experiences with an issue that someone claimed didn't exist, and that neither should be considered more valid than the other as it always comes down to a case of, "he said, she said" or conflicting statements. As for my comment on their post history, what do you want me to say? It wasn't meant to hurt their feelings, merely to point out their bias.

As for the rest, no one mentioned it, but it's always been an issue from what I've heard during the major times there's been a good portion of the playerbase having connection issues with the game. Every year there seems to be some moment in time where some portion of the playerbase has connection issues due to whatever is going on between NTT and their ISP. It's consistently always NTT that's the issue, regardless of the other ISPs involved. SE has a partnership with NTT, so they have some degree of influence there. I'm not an expert on the situation and I'll admit it, but I feel like you can come to this conclusion with a bit of logic.

Anyways, fix your attitude. Again, you talk about slander, but you got aggressive, mocked me and even went as far as to make claims that I made statements that I had not. At least I'm somewhat civil with my replies.

Take FFXI as an example. They are done with content. Their sub hasn't gone down. They've been pretty much done with content for years.