7 days of Free Game Time due to Congestion.

Everyone is getting 7 days free game time due to XIV's congestion issues during early access. More in the future if issues persist longer

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...9cad782363f25b

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Everyone is getting 7 days free game time due to XIV's congestion issues during early access. More in the future if issues persist longer

https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...9cad782363f25b

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This is reasonable.

I didn't see the other thread can let this one die.

It's actually good, yes people are going to be disappointed ATM of course because they did everything humanly possible to at least try and reduce the impact to people but are still struggling but they're more than willing to offset the impact of this on players by compensating them for playtime lost in this case. Sure it sucks being stuck in 3 hour queue times of course BUT by giving people extra sub time for nothing this at least means players arent being burned by this.

It should also be said that things will eventually improve over time as thing's settle down, alot of people are trying to play right now because of new classes and story content but once the initial surge passes things will settle down to a more acceptable level in the past. Give it a week or 2 and those massive queues will evaporate.

This is fair compensation, imo. You're losing play time, they give you free play time. You're not losing the expansion.

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Originally Posted by PredatoryCatgirl

This is fair compensation, imo. You're losing play time, they give you free play time. You're not losing the expansion.

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Agreed they even announced if need be will give more time I'm so disappointed with our community right now acting like the Karen at a fast food location demanding the workers serve her and not anyone else.

Want to thank you Yoshida-san and the whole Team :)

whats the point of giving another 7 days if sub you cant potentially use? IF you are office worker and work usual 9-5 you are out of options regardless, they can give you month compensation, would change a single thing, you just cant enter the game

That's actually unexpected and very welcomed. Thanks

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Originally Posted by Airforlife

whats the point of giving another 7 days if sub you cant potentially use? IF you are office worker and work usual 9-5 you are out of options regardless, they can give you month compensation, would change a single thing, you just cant enter the game

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The point is that they are expecting the major problems to be gone within 7 days of early access, therefore they are compensating you for the week you couldn't log in.

The white knighting in this thread and others makes me chuckle. The company had vast foresight on server issues before the surge of players even happened. The money they have now lost due to player compensation could have just been spent making actual servers. They would be less in the hole if they had simply done that. We dont know all the details, sure, but its a gross mishandling of a launch. Make any excuse or retort you want but the game wont even let you get in que or let new players make characters and they allow people who do get in to stay in. Its sad, the game being this good and unable to even play it. AND this is just early access, can you imagine how much worse it will be on actual launch date. Cant wait to see even more "Just give it another week, it will get better!!!" posts.

I doubt the queues will go down enough over the next 7 days for most people with normal work schedules to play any reasonable amount of time. Hope they stick to their word and extend if further if needed.

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

The white knighting in this thread and others makes me chuckle. The company had vast foresight on server issues before the surge of players even happened. The money they have now lost due to player compensation could have just been spent making actual servers. They would be less in the hole if they had simply done that. We dont know all the details, sure, but its a gross mishandling of a launch. Make any excuse or retort you want but the game wont even let you get in que or let new players make characters and they allow people who do get in to stay in. Its sad, the game being this good and unable to even play it. AND this is just early access, can you imagine how much worse it will be on actual launch date. Cant wait to see even more "Just give it another week, it will get better!!!" posts.

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Well, Just think about all the kids who got/get this game for x-mas, servers congested- can't create new characters. I predict a class action suite.

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Originally Posted by Naiw

Well, Just think about all the kids who got/get this game for x-mas, servers congested- can't create new characters. I predict a class action suite.

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All the people who free trail or god forbid buy the game to play with friends for the release as well!! Bro, how do you sell a game people cant even make a character for....
Whoever is on finance team, should be reviewed for sure. Don't give me this crap about server parts. You can still purchase them as of right now for a premium. That premium is significantly less than the money they squandered with compensation.

That isn't exactly true. There's a 6-month to a year long wait period for stuff that needs semiconductors due to a shortage.

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Originally Posted by Naiw

Well, Just think about all the kids who got/get this game for x-mas, servers congested- can't create new characters. I predict a class action suite.

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It's not Christmas yet so of course they can't make characters yet. Also where are ya getting that suite? Does it have enough armchairs for the actors playing lawyers?

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

All the people who free trail or god forbid buy the game to play with friends for the release as well!! Bro, how do you sell a game people cant even make a character for....
Whoever is on finance team, should be reviewed for sure. Don't give me this crap about server parts. You can still purchase them as of right now for a premium. That premium is significantly less than the money they squandered with compensation.

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Now I don't know about Square Enix but in general Japanese companies don't operate like companies in the western world do, every single decision has to go through each upper manager until it reaches the end boss, it could be anyone on any level who thought the purchase was "unnecessary", check the ringi decision system- I've dealt a lot with this through work. But I believe they probably realize they made a huge mistake by now question is what happens over x-mas but it's probably not unlikely that heads will roll.

I know you can't afford food now, but once you get a job, I will give you this free burger............................................

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Originally Posted by Raiya

It's actually good, yes people are going to be disappointed ATM of course because they did everything humanly possible to at least try and reduce the impact to people

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They didn't, though. They've known of this issue for years. It's happened with every expansion launch. Apparently it happened with ARR launch, too. This isn't something they haven't dealt with before. So no, they didn't do everything they could. By all evidence, they've done nothing about it except give out free game time. And while 7 days is very welcome and very generous, it's also less than a bandaid for a gaping wound that could have been prevented. As another person pointed out, for some people those 7 days don't matter since the hours they work (factoring in drive times to and from) basically means they don't get to play.

One of my FC mates, and a dear friend, works 9+ hours a day right now, with a 1 hour drive to work and 1 hour drive home. He logs on and spends about 5 minutes saying hi to everyone and then logs off because he needs to go to bed to get enough sleep for the next day. Because that's all the time he's able to squeeze in due to the login issues. He's been through long queues before, he knows to expect that. But that's not playing the game. For him, those extra 7 days means 35 minutes of being in game. across an entire week.

Some of my FC mates spent 6+ hours trying to get in.

I want to make it clear I appreciate the generous compensation. It's far more than pretty much any other dev team would give. But I also want to make it clear that this wouldn't even be necessary if they had dealt with this KNOWN ISSUE in an appropriate manner since it's happened numerous times already.

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Originally Posted by Naiw

Now I don't know about Square Enix but in general Japanese companies don't operate like companies in the western world do, every single decision has to go through each upper manager until it reaches the end boss, it could be anyone on any level who thought the purchase was "unnecessary", check the ringi decision system- I've dealt a lot with this through work. But I believe they probably realize they made a huge mistake by now question is what happens over x-mas but it's probably not unlikely that heads will roll.

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As long as one of those heads is NOT Yoshi's. I can't think of a better leader than that man. I'm sure he has his flaws, but I've rarely seen anyone take responsibility and show genuine, heartfelt sympathy for the plight of players like he has. The day he's gone from the FFXIV team is likely the day I bid Eorzea a sad and painful farewell.

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Originally Posted by MD5Ray01

That isn't exactly true. There's a 6-month to a year long wait period for stuff that needs semiconductors due to a shortage.

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Aaaaand there it is. There isnt that level of wait for business willing to spend a premium to secure them. Lets say in a random world each server to fully build costs a 6million premium. You pay 50 cents to play each day give or take. If ff has 12 million people (should be higher) playing each day, they make 6 million per day off subscriptions. Each day compensated could have just been another server they were willing to buy. I have no business degree and I can figure that out. How on earth do you have an entire finance department who cant figure that out!!!!

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Originally Posted by StayTuned

That's actually unexpected and very welcomed. Thanks

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I mean I assumed they would be doing free game time or other stuff as a counter measure since they already knew from like July that que time most likely will get worst when they have been struggling trying to get servers

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

Aaaaand there it is. There isnt that level of wait for business willing to spend a premium to secure them. Lets say in a random world each server to fully build costs a 6million premium. You pay 50 cents to play each day give or take. If ff has 12 million people (should be higher) playing each day, they make 6 million per day off subscriptions. Each day compensated could have just been another server they were willing to buy. I have no business degree and I can figure that out. How on earth do you have an entire finance department who cant figure that out!!!!

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Didi you miss the Dev messages from SE saying that they are struggling on getting servers due to the shortage? and they are willing to pay premium and a bit more to get a hold of them? Because if I am reading this correctly no.... no you did not read this since they stated this sometime ago and again recently

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Originally Posted by Minsue

Agreed they even announced if need be will give more time I'm so disappointed with our community right now acting like the Karen at a fast food location demanding the workers serve her and not anyone else.

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How stupid to assume the anger is solely based on losing play time. It's more the fact many people planned time off to play the game upon release due to limited schedules and SE has completely failed in every regard to manage expectations. How does ShB launch without a hiccup and EW has been nothing but garbage thus far.

Something needs to be done posthaste, especially for the EU datacenters. 6000-man strong, 4 hour queues with multiple disconnects/errors (that boot you into the end of the queue if you don't re-login within the minute) are the rule rather than the exceptions. Right now the game is unplayable and my finger is hovering over the chargeback button for my Endwalker purchase/subscription charge in frustration.

I propose a playtime limitation until the load subsides or server capacity is increased. A game every subscriber can play for 4 hours a day is a much more acceptable option than a game hogged by Limsa AFKers/botters/whatever, and all the other paying customers are stuck staring at a swirling blue screen with the prelude music.

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Originally Posted by CazzT

They didn't, though. They've known of this issue for years. It's happened with every expansion launch. Apparently it happened with ARR launch, too. This isn't something they haven't dealt with before. So no, they didn't do everything they could. By all evidence, they've done nothing about it except give out free game time. And while 7 days is very welcome and very generous, it's also less than a bandaid for a gaping wound that could have been prevented. As another person pointed out, for some people those 7 days don't matter since the hours they work (factoring in drive times to and from) basically means they don't get to play.

One of my FC mates, and a dear friend, works 9+ hours a day right now, with a 1 hour drive to work and 1 hour drive home. He logs on and spends about 5 minutes saying hi to everyone and then logs off because he needs to go to bed to get enough sleep for the next day. Because that's all the time he's able to squeeze in due to the login issues. He's been through long queues before, he knows to expect that. But that's not playing the game. For him, those extra 7 days means 35 minutes of being in game. across an entire week.

Some of my FC mates spent 6+ hours trying to get in.

I want to make it clear I appreciate the generous compensation. It's far more than pretty much any other dev team would give. But I also want to make it clear that this wouldn't even be necessary if they had dealt with this KNOWN ISSUE in an appropriate manner since it's happened numerous times already.

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Erm...... No there has not been this big of an issue at each expansion lol but try again please........ When the pandemic shut everything down thats when they stated to see que times stick however, they wernt anything like this and they have made couple announcements before and still making the same announcements before EW launch that they are struggling to get a hold of more servers as the que times started to climb and also stated the que times will be horrible however they are still working on trying to fix the issue.

Also yeah the free 7 days is a band-aid so not sure why pointing that out since its called a compensation and sorry but cant please everyone so if they dont like having free days they dont have to pay for a new sub thats on them and the devs already said they can increase more free game time if things still are bad.

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

Aaaaand there it is. There isnt that level of wait for business willing to spend a premium to secure them. Lets say in a random world each server to fully build costs a 6million premium. You pay 50 cents to play each day give or take. If ff has 12 million people (should be higher) playing each day, they make 6 million per day off subscriptions. Each day compensated could have just been another server they were willing to buy. I have no business degree and I can figure that out. How on earth do you have an entire finance department who cant figure that out!!!!

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and there it is..

faulty numbers and math.

this is not the WoW you came from. FFxiv does not have 6 million concurrent active users.

if you were around earlier in all this, you would have seen a letter in which they stated they were unable to get hardware even ABOVE MARKET VALUE.

I know you are just venting, but gathering information and knowing what happened before you joined us, would be helpful in not making you look.... uninformed. in case you are not aware, there is a pandemic as well thats going on, it has impacted some things in the world... just in case you were off planet somewhere.

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Originally Posted by Kaseus

How stupid to assume the anger is solely based on losing play time. It's more the fact many people planned time off to play the game upon release due to limited schedules and SE has completely failed in every regard to manage expectations. How does ShB launch without a hiccup and EW has been nothing but garbage thus far.

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However you might have missed and so did the ones complaining that the Devs been upfront and stated when they tried and been trying to get more servers couldn't and this been a known issue for some time and also stated that there will be horrible que times most likely during SW release.

So people can blame the Devs all they want however the Devs have been releasing information its up to the Karens to read and plan

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Originally Posted by Zileth

Erm...... No there has not been this big of an issue at each expansion lol but try again please........ When the pandemic shut everything down thats when they stated to see que times stick however, they wernt anything like this and they have made couple announcements before and still making the same announcements before EW launch that they are struggling to get a hold of more servers as the que times started to climb and also stated the que times will be horrible however they are still working on trying to fix the issue.

Also yeah the free 7 days is a band-aid so not sure why pointing that out since its called a compensation and sorry but cant please everyone so if they dont like having free days they dont have to pay for a new sub thats on them and the devs already said they can increase more free game time if things still are bad.

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Yes there was an issue with the early releases, so try again "lol". ShB was about the only launch that had little to no issues from the time the servers came up until the game went steady state again. Keep trying to copy what others are saying about the lack of servers and how they've oh so desperately attempted to find more, but just can't... such a cop out.

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Originally Posted by Zileth

Erm...... No there has not been this big of an issue at each expansion lol but try again please........

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Yes the issue was on EU datacenter at each and every expension release. I can testify for the release of ARR, SB and ShB.
Also, there have been queue issues at major patch release, 5.2 and 5.4 on EU datacenters. Queue were 600-1000 for weeks before thinning. It was hell to raid in those conditions (one dc in the roster meant a mandatory 20min break for him to fend off the queue). Instances were laggy, raiding on reset felt horrible.
The issue was there, it was reported properly by the player-base and it was not addressed properly by Square Enix.
So please, try again.

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Originally Posted by Zileth

However you might have missed and so did the ones complaining that the Devs been upfront and stated when they tried and been trying to get more servers couldn't and this been a known issue for some time and also stated that there will be horrible que times most likely during SW release.

So people can blame the Devs all they want however the Devs have been releasing information its up to the Karens to read and plan

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Lol. Yoshi said, a dev said, another dev said... lol

FFXIV Forum Brigade says "Baaa"

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

and there it is..

faulty numbers and math.

this is not the WoW you came from. FFxiv does not have 6 million concurrent active users.

if you were around earlier in all this, you would have seen a letter in which they stated they were unable to get hardware even ABOVE MARKET VALUE.

I know you are just venting, but gathering information and knowing what happened before you joined us, would be helpful in not making you look.... uninformed. in case you are not aware, there is a pandemic as well thats going on, it has impacted some things in the world... just in case you were off planet somewhere.

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Yeah just not believing them at all about not being able to purchase something. Money can and will be able to secure any product. Havent cared about wow since Mists of pandaria, but good try.

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Originally Posted by Naiw

I predict a class action suite.

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Oh, do you now. I can tell you already that wouldn't go very far, since game been online and available for everyone, there just been queues during peak hours.

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Originally Posted by Kaseus

Lol. Yoshi said, a dev said, another dev said... lol

FFXIV Forum Brigade says "Baaa"

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And it get so productive when we insult eachother, implying someone having a different opinion from yourself being a "white knight" or "sheep" hence the baa reference.

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

Yeah just not believing them at all about not being able to purchase something. Money can and will be able to secure any product. Havent cared about wow since Mists of pandaria, but good try.

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Sure but to what end, we don't know how much they were willing to pay above market value but i'm willing to bed it was a lot of money. It might just not been worth it from a business perspective, especially if it's only going to last a couple weeks if that.

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Originally Posted by Kaseus

Yes there was an issue with the early releases, so try again "lol". ShB was about the only launch that had little to no issues from the time the servers came up until the game went steady state again. Keep trying to copy what others are saying about the lack of servers and how they've oh so desperately attempted to find more, but just can't... such a cop out.

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Okay Karen...... Getting servers is something thats a real-world issue since the company I work for has still on a waiting list from who we order our stuff from and its been like going on 7 months now.

The stuff you and others are whining about is not new information its information that has been posted many times over the last year and recently with the announcement of the EW release the Devs been talking about how que times will be horrible along with they wernt expecting Blizzard dirty laundry to get aired and a huge influx of WoW players to come over which did not really cause that much of an issue but still didnt help

But hey go be angry and waste your time..... ill be enjoying the game and living my life not being a Karen

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

and there it is..

faulty numbers and math.

this is not the WoW you came from. FFxiv does not have 6 million concurrent active users.

if you were around earlier in all this, you would have seen a letter in which they stated they were unable to get hardware even ABOVE MARKET VALUE.

I know you are just venting, but gathering information and knowing what happened before you joined us, would be helpful in not making you look.... uninformed. in case you are not aware, there is a pandemic as well thats going on, it has impacted some things in the world... just in case you were off planet somewhere.

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It was a scenario and simplistic math that you couldn't seem to grasp. WoW has no context in the post he made, nor would it matter if they did play WoW. The vast majority of FFXIV players have all dabbled in WoW previously or even continue to at times, so that statement was just pure ignorance on your part. Maybe the company did try, but a letter means absolutely nothing. So continue sheeping along if you insist, but a letter from a dev holds very little face value in any game.

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Originally Posted by Zileth

Okay Karen...... Getting servers is something thats a real-world issue since the company I work for has still on a waiting list from who we order our stuff from and its been like going on 7 months now

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Yeah the multi-billion dollar gaming conglomerate you work for can't get any servers?

Zileth says baaaaaaaaaaaa.

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Originally Posted by Greenshaw

Yeah just not believing them at all about not being able to purchase something. Money can and will be able to secure any product. Havent cared about wow since Mists of pandaria, but good try.

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Not really true lol. but hey keep going at it

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Originally Posted by Kaseus

Yeah the multi-billion dollar gaming conglomerate you work for can't get any servers?

Zileth says baaaaaaaaaaaa.

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You do know how funds work right? Clearly not.

Also never said I work for a large company I am stating that there is a server shortage and the ones they use/ need most likely have a backorder on them. But keep going at it Karen lol I like seeing people like you pop and get all upset

If your sub is under recurring payment these 7 days don't mean anything. But it's a nice gesture nonetheless, and at least it's more than just a "please understand".

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Originally Posted by Zileth

You do know how funds work right? Clearly not.

Also never said I work for a large company I am stating that there is a server shortage and the ones they use/ need most likely have a backorder on them. But keep going at it Karen lol I like seeing people like you pop and get all upset

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I think it's you who doesn't understand how funds work, lol. You think I'm upset because I made fun of how silly your comments are? This is just killing some time for me. The fact you can't even form real sentences says enough.

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Originally Posted by Sotaris

Oh, do you now. I can tell you already that wouldn't go very far, since game been online and available for everyone, there just been queues during peak hours.

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And you obviously know nothing about the legislation in some countries I see, something being online or not doesn't matter; it's the _service agreement_ between the _paying customer_ and the _service provider_ that matters, neither does it matter it's "just a game", a service should be available to those who purchase- no where in the contract does it state that the game is only available at off hours if that was the case it should have been written in the contract we all agreed to when we signed up.

This is equivalent with running a dinner restaurant and selling food coupons, you can't say "unfortunately due to current circumstances we're out of food" when you have a line of paying customers, neither can you say that "come back at 3am and we might have some for ya" if it's not announced upfront it's void.