FFXIV survey questionaries

I've seen a lot of games that send surveys to the players regularly or at least annually to know what they would like to see in the game, it would be interesting if they did one in ffxiv

They have done. If any constantly-expanding game isn't doing market research then it would be a bit strange.

In all those games where they have such surveys i have the idea the information isnt being used. And the plain problem is that those surveys are often too basic to realy contain any good information. Only for the major issues those surveys can do something, but in most cases, the information is just too much cluttered to realy tell anything useful.

Good, we know people are not satisfied with healers... and now? Oh wait, its only 30% not being satisfied (50% of players said neutral and 10% showd satisfaction while not even playing healer). And then that value is higher than the 15% for other jobs. This makes it even more obscured. You need depth, which means players need to type their opinion, and this takes a lot of work to parse. Yet the main issues are already widely posted on the forums.

The forums already give enough information. You dont need more. If someone types here, he already took the hurdle of effort. So any issue in here, is an actual issue. How large scale it is you cant tell, but thats what you can at least investigate. Rather than relying on a random survey that tries to cover all, yet fails at it every single time.

The last large scale survey they did was near the end of 1.0.
And even then the most requested stuff took a backend to what they wanted to implement first.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

They have done. If any constantly-expanding game isn't doing market research then it would be a bit strange.

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when? i've been playing this a long time and never saw any, even inputting "ffxiv questionarie" on search doesnt show anything

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Originally Posted by Canadane

The last large scale survey they did was near the end of 1.0.
And even then the most requested stuff took a backend to what they wanted to implement first.

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You say large-scale, but the population of the game probably wasn't nearly as big as it is now. There have been ones even within the last few years that are probably bigger just because of the size of the community now.

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Originally Posted by AmpelioB

when? i've been playing this a long time and never saw any, even inputting "ffxiv questionarie" on search doesnt show anything

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They have emailed them to random samples of players. I received one addressed to subscribed veteran players from Square Enix directly (not their usual marketing/PR addresses which probably can't tell if you are subscribed) and a lot of people on these forums said they did too. I've seen one mentioned that I didn't get recently. SE has also talked about surveys they did in live letters that informed their change of direction to make the MSQ work solo with trusts.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

You say large-scale, but the population of the game probably wasn't nearly as big as it is now. There have been ones even within the last few years that are probably bigger just because of the size of the community now.

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Of course not, but 100% of players is 100% regardless of total population.
(not that 100% answered, but it was polled to every player)

Imo they should just post public surveys every quarter or half a year. Only polling random samples of people has a chance for problems to not even hit dev awareness. Everyone should have a chance to voice their concerns and give an opinion on the state of the game. I've been here for over two years and have never seen a survey.

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Originally Posted by AmpelioB

I've seen a lot of games that send surveys to the players regularly or at least annually to know what they would like to see in the game, it would be interesting if they did one in ffxiv

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I recall the MMO I used to play (and played for over a decade) doing this a few times. The problem was, they were, basically, useless.

The MMO in question ran a poll in 2017 asking if players wanted A, B, C or D. B won with a 2% majority. Mostly because 'B' was something players had been asking for for about six years at that point.
Nothing came of it - at least not beyond angry feedback on that game's forums for a little while.

They ran pretty much the same poll again late 2020. Results were much the same, with B winning again, with a 4% majority.
Nothing came of it.

However, a bit more fuss was made on the forum, and the matter was raised during one of the Livestreams that the CM of that game broadcast. The CM (who was about as much use as an ejector seat in a helicopter) outright said that, regardless of the result, the game's metrics were showing them that player's spending trends indicated that 'B' - despite winning the same poll twice - wouldn't sell well. He also made it clear that the game's community's feedback was more a curiosity than anything else and explained (what we already knew) that since the community represents such a small percentile of the playerbase, the feedback wasn't really worth much.
Which did beg the question - 'why bother'. The only reasonable answer was that the CM of that game was an utter moron.

They did put 'B' in the game a year later - but it had little to nothing to do with community feedback and it, ironically, came after A, C and D.