Cash shop pricing is getting a bit much...

The clothes don't really tickle my fancy but the mount on the other hand does because the lore nerd in me likes the Wind Fire Wheels in almost any form that media uses them in. Now to just wait for a sale...just like I'm still waiting for Shantotto and the Carbuncle mount to go on sale. Yay penny pinching? Lol

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Originally Posted by Sekkei

The clothes don't really tickle my fancy but the mount on the other hand does because the lore nerd in me likes the Wind Fire Wheels in almost any form that media uses them in. Now to just wait for a sale...just like I'm still waiting for Shantotto and the Carbuncle mount to go on sale. Yay penny pinching? Lol

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Wishful thinking, but if they could somehow release an emote for Shantotto's laugh, and let it be usable and visible on that mount...oh, but wishful thinking o.0

Technically most of the game is optional. Even choosing to play is optional. I'm not sure why this justifies putting a cash price on things. Basically we play to enjoy lots of different optional things and aspects of the game, we play because we enjoy glamour and collecting mounts and pets and making our own characters special to us and enjoying the story and different features of FF. All optional.

What the cash shop does it take countless items that we'd enjoy and stick them behind an additional paywall. There's a limit to how many things you can restrict before the quality of the base game is affected. I mean, imagine how much more enjoyable the game would be if 75% of the cashshop was available ingame? That's a significant number of amazing looking mounts, pets, glamour, emotes and other things to chase, farm for and acquire. Imagine too how much more enjoyable the game was if we all had, say 4 retainers default and double saddlebag space free, it would make the game feel so much better.

The cash shop has passed that limit. It's absolutely massive now and they keep stuffing more and more into it. Which means the basic game (which costs money too) suffers for it.

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Originally Posted by Krotoan

You can.. not buy things? Look I get you WANT the things kinda. Like enough to pay 10 bucks for them. But complaining that they're too expensive while other people gladly pony up for them is pointless.

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I'm not asking for price changes now. I think they just need to be careful with how much they release and at what price points. I mean, even now you can only afford these things on one character; just the past event stuff alone I earned on my main probably would cost me a couple hundred dollars to get for my alt. If I were to buy matching outfits for me and my friend, that's $36. I don't want to wake up and find they release mounts account wide for $35 one day, or that the only time we get season event glamour is in the mogstation.

I think it's fair to question this. The longer the game goes on, the more gear gets locked behind there and the harder it can be to catch up.

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Originally Posted by Liam_Harper

What the cash shop does it take countless items that we'd enjoy and stick them behind an additional paywall. There's a limit to how many things you can restrict before the quality of the base game is affected. I mean, imagine how much more enjoyable the game would be if 75% of the cashshop was available ingame? That's a significant number of amazing looking mounts, pets, glamour, emotes and other things to chase, farm for and acquire. Imagine too how much more enjoyable the game was if we all had, say 4 retainers default and double saddlebag space free, it would make the game feel so much better.

The cash shop has passed that limit. It's absolutely massive now and they keep stuffing more and more into it. Which means the basic game (which costs money too) suffers for it.

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Come'on now. That's a gross exaggeration. It's not that difficult to count the number of items on the Mog Station, calling it "countless" is drama whoring. Comparing the number of items on the Mog Station to the number of items in-game, makes the Mog Station miniscule in it's impact at best. I'd be surprised if it broke 1% of the total items.

Meh, the prices are pretty much the same as always, so in order to conserve I decided to get the fashion first and will wait for another sale to get the mount, it looks cool but I really need to pay bills first before getting it. :p

On that note, how often does SE have sales? I know in the past year I think i've seen 2 sales go up, knocking anywhere from 25-40% off mounts and possibly some glam that ties into either a particular event or holiday. Do you think they will have a "summer sale" akin to steam's summer sale? Would be a good time to pick up some discounted merch!

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Originally Posted by Avatre

I would say a percentage goes to other projects, probably 5-10%, while the rest is used to pay for everything else that goes into the costs of keeping FFXIV running(all the overhead, plus bringing on more people to do additional items). I could be wrong, but that's what I would hope is the worst case. It could likely be 40% goes to other projects(or even more), but we won't know unless they actually release all the data regarding their budgeting and costs.

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Using the conservative estimate of 500,000 subs (the number is likely higher but we don't know for sure) and the minimum single character account price of $13/month, SE is getting at least $78 million in subscription money a year. That doesn't include buying the game, additional services, mog station items, merchandise, the idiotic app once it comes out, people who were subbed and cancelled, etc.

For comparison, the entire reported production & marketing budget of Skyrim was $85 million, and that took four years to make. You have games like Blade & Soul which don't have the subscription but need server resources just like XIV. You have games like Destiny that cost an absolute fortune to make but sell expansions to pay for servers instead of subs *and* expansions *and* cash shop *and* etc...

For what is being delivered, XIV is highly profitable. The only way it's not with that much revenue is if SE is overspending, which is entirely possible when it comes to server capacity due to how inefficient the game is. At some point, it's impossible to conclude that SE is investing a fraction of the profit the game makes back into it given how limited and rationed everything is except for the cash shop, where they have constant releases, and now a new app to also try and syphon money from people. They seemed to find budget to build that easily enough?

Meanwhile the VII remake is already years in, and years away. Something's gotta pay for that. And at the end of the day, that's how games are made. Something paid for XIV initially, and then again to make ARR (because 1.0 sure didn't turn a profit). A certain amount of that is inevitable to keep the release pipeline going. Some more budget is going to pay to 5.0's development. But it looks like it's too much, and XIV itself is being starved for resources. The landry list of things they say they can't do and also can't fix is three miles long, but hey here's a new app with another sub and here's a bunch more items you can buy that don't fit into the world at all (god that "mount" is ridiculous)!

That speaks to their priorities quite clearly.

Square, can you at least do some better sales on items as they get older if you're going to price people out of them? $18 when they're new, 30% off after a few months and then maybe a 70%+ off sale when they're a year old or something? I'd really like a lot of the mogstation items, but I'm not spending that much on a single digital item.

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Originally Posted by Remyogic

Come'on now. That's a gross exaggeration. It's not that difficult to count the number of items on the Mog Station, calling it "countless" is drama whoring. Comparing the number of items on the Mog Station to the number of items in-game, makes the Mog Station miniscule in it's impact at best. I'd be surprised if it broke 1% of the total items.

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World of Warcraft: Much older game. Cash shop contents: 15 minions, 12 mounts, 3 glamour and 9 paid services. Total 39. Bank space, marketboard app, alts all included free in your sub.

Final Fantasy XIV Mogstation: Cash shop contents: "Displaying 1-40 of 368". Extra bank space, bag space, full marketboard app and alts, premium features in addtion to sub.

Sorry, what?

Daily reminder: The outfit is only $18 because of Square's excuse that it gives an exp boost.

Even Lyse's outfit, which was heavily requested, was only $12 and didn't come with the exp boost (Or Dyable, but then again neither was Minfilia's and that was $8) so they're gonna pull any excuse they can.

In fact, just look at the butler outfits. $18 per character. Remember when they were account wide with like a bunch of other stuff for $20? (Or even basically free if you bought game time with Amazon?)