Another Housing Idea...well Apartments

{ I apologize if this has been mentioned before. I'm not always on social media to speak about a problem.}

As awesome as it is to bid on a new home. I lost my small house to a line of 40 people in bid for it. The odds were slim but none the less I've tried. I can't use this outside decor I've gathered up from previous holiday events, as well as gifts that I have now collected for this moment.

I have an apartment though!! The only thing that bothers me so is that I can't even get an apartment upgrade like...can't we have the option of "upgrading" it from Apartment to Condo or something? Expand the square so that we are allowed to give ourselves more room to make a home out of it instead of living in a small studio apartments that's literally almost the same size as my bed room in the fc. (I don't know the actual size okay) There are subtle differences from owning a home and owning an apt. Houses you have access to gardening, airships, not to mention you get to choose a SIZE and all sorts of unique housing glamours that make your home stand out, but what about our apartments? They deserve love and a similar treatment. If we going to keep getting housing items for events, patches or whatever the cause may be. I believe we deserve at least that much. Yes some of us may not get a home but if you made apartments more interesting I believe it will lessen the dissatisfaction players have at requiring a home.

SquareEnix doesn't care; they're too busy selling off their properties for blockchain gaming.

It's almost comical at this point how everyone and their lalafell want to make apartments more appealing while also failing to address that they already are cheaper and permanent. So sure, you want apartments to be bigger. Potentially the size of a medium or a large house. What's the tradeoff here because frankly, throwing out more gil isn't it.

Square Enix will not make the additional hardware they have purchased for wards become obsolete just so that apartments can be supposedly more appealing. So how do you bonify apartments while also keeping houses relevant? How do you prevent the outrage from house owners when they suddenly have a better housing option than current apartments? Do you pull a patch 2.3 and tell them **** you and whatever gil or money you have spent?

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

It's almost comical at this point how everyone and their lalafell want to make apartments more appealing while also failing to address that they already are cheaper and permanent. So sure, you want apartments to be bigger. Potentially the size of a medium or a large house. What's the tradeoff here because frankly, throwing out more gil isn't it.

Square Enix will not make the additional hardware they have purchased for wards become obsolete just so that apartments can be supposedly more appealing. So how do you bonify apartments while also keeping houses relevant? How do you prevent the outrage from house owners when they suddenly have a better housing option than current apartments? Do you pull a patch 2.3 and tell them **** you and whatever gil or money you have spent?

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Can use the same excuse SE has been using for 8 years. Its in a ward and not instanced on its own. You get the neighborhood feeling for living in a house vice living in an apartment. There is nothing preventing home owners from also buying an apartment if they are so inclined as well, it's not like we are deleting everyone's house and forcing them to go into an apartment.

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Originally Posted by xazzy_flower

{ I apologize if this has been mentioned before. I'm not always on social media to speak about a problem.}

As awesome as it is to bid on a new home. I lost my small house to a line of 40 people in bid for it. The odds were slim but none the less I've tried. I can't use this outside decor I've gathered up from previous holiday events, as well as gifts that I have now collected for this moment.

I have an apartment though!! The only thing that bothers me so is that I can't even get an apartment upgrade like...can't we have the option of "upgrading" it from Apartment to Condo or something? Expand the square so that we are allowed to give ourselves more room to make a home out of it instead of living in a small studio apartments that's literally almost the same size as my bed room in the fc. (I don't know the actual size okay) There are subtle differences from owning a home and owning an apt. Houses you have access to gardening, airships, not to mention you get to choose a SIZE and all sorts of unique housing glamours that make your home stand out, but what about our apartments? They deserve love and a similar treatment. If we going to keep getting housing items for events, patches or whatever the cause may be. I believe we deserve at least that much. Yes some of us may not get a home but if you made apartments more interesting I believe it will lessen the dissatisfaction players have at requiring a home.

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YoshiP has said the housing system memory won't allow direct upgrades to apartments.

On the other hand, he also mentioned back in Stormblood they were discussing the possibility of adding in apartment sizes. Similar to how you would choose a plot size for your house, you would choose an apartment size when you purchase. If you wanted a different size, you would give up your old apartments and purchase a new one in the size you want. Unfortunately, nothing has been said about this since so we don't know if the idea was abandoned or still being considered.

Certainly such a system would satisfy at least part of the existing demand fueled by a desire for more interior space even if it doesn't satisfy demand created by the desire to have outdoor decoration or a garden.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

YoshiP has said the housing system memory won't allow direct upgrades to apartments.

On the other hand, he also mentioned back in Stormblood they were discussing the possibility of adding in apartment sizes. Similar to how you would choose a plot size for your house, you would choose an apartment size when you purchase. If you wanted a different size, you would give up your old apartments and purchase a new one in the size you want. Unfortunately, nothing has been said about this since so we don't know if the idea was abandoned or still being considered.

Certainly such a system would satisfy at least part of the existing demand fueled by a desire for more interior space even if it doesn't satisfy demand created by the desire to have outdoor decoration or a garden.

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It would certainly satisfy me if they did this. I would buy a large apartment and never take another look at a house plot. Outdoor fixtures are nice but I am primarily concerned with having enough indoor space to be able to decorate the way I want.

Yeah dude, making apartments better would be fantastic. I've been saying for a while that they should just up the furniture cap on everything. For me personally, if my apartment had a doubled furniture capacity and some kind of genuine gardening element, I'd be a lot happier with the decorating side of things. Also, unrelated, but letting all property owners save their furniture loadouts like one saves glam plates, would be phenomenal. In this way, you could decorate to your heart's content, save it to a housing plate, and then tear everything down and decorate again without losing anything; you could go back to your first setup with one click. Or you could have general living arrangements, save those, and then swap to a halloween theme in October with one click. etc. I'm getting into pipe dream stuff, so I'll stop. But yeah I agree! Make apartments better, and less people will want a house.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

It's almost comical at this point how everyone and their lalafell want to make apartments more appealing while also failing to address that they already are cheaper and permanent. So sure, you want apartments to be bigger. Potentially the size of a medium or a large house. What's the tradeoff here because frankly, throwing out more gil isn't it.

Square Enix will not make the additional hardware they have purchased for wards become obsolete just so that apartments can be supposedly more appealing. So how do you bonify apartments while also keeping houses relevant? How do you prevent the outrage from house owners when they suddenly have a better housing option than current apartments? Do you pull a patch 2.3 and tell them **** you and whatever gil or money you have spent?

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This whole post reads like the only reason you bought a house was to lord some false sense of superiority over other people who didn't luck their way into one. Someone suggests improving apartments so more players can enjoy decorating, and you're malding because now they'll finally have a feature that you've enjoyed for years.

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Originally Posted by Amenara

Can use the same excuse SE has been using for 8 years. Its in a ward and not instanced on its own. You get the neighborhood feeling for living in a house vice living in an apartment. There is nothing preventing home owners from also buying an apartment if they are so inclined as well, it's not like we are deleting everyone's house and forcing them to go into an apartment.

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Congrats, you didn't read.

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Originally Posted by Avoidy

This whole post reads like the only reason you bought a house was to lord some false sense of superiority over other people who didn't luck their way into one. Someone suggests improving apartments so more players can enjoy decorating, and you're malding because now they'll finally have a feature that you've enjoyed for years.

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I own a house for workshop purposes. I don't care about your pseudo analysis of why I have a house. OP is suggesting improving apartments, cool. Anybody can make any kind of suggestion. You've made that suggestion, but they're all meaningless unless they have been thought through. To my knowledge, this hasn't been the case and nobody, who's made that suggestion before, including yourself, has addressed the problem that comes along with said suggestion. So please, keep your projections to yourself next time or at the very least, make some sort of intellectual effort to support the OP... I'm sure you're capable.

My point still stands, you can't have a permanent system working alongside a non-permanent one when the two are equal in other aspects. Maybe that works out in your head, but that's exactly where it's gonna stay.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

Congrats, you didn't read.

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That or I think your complaint is a non-issue, just like you seem to think our complaints about apartments are a non-issue. Houses are still there, wards are still there. I am not advocating for any of their removals. Just because you improve apartments doesn't mean anything negative has to happen to houses. In fact it just gives further opportunity for home owners to do different things in a new location with an apartment. If you are worried about demolishing of houses, that can be a valid issue on its own, however, who knows if or when they will start demolishing houses again. The uncertainty of house demolishing is probably my biggest problem with the entire idea since no one can plan around it, on top of it being such a short timer at 45 days.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

My point still stands, you can't have a permanent system working alongside a non-permanent one when the two are equal in other aspects. Maybe that works out in your head, but that's exactly where it's gonna stay.

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Yes, you can. You're right, there would likely be some outrage because someone has to be outraged at everything just to pitch a fit. However, I highly doubt it would be a meaningful portion of the player population, with the vast majority being VERY happy for the addition. An easy resolution when adding upgraded apartments would simply be to shut off the demolition timer and -poof- you've got permanent ward housing with no loss of investment.

I have a house and two apartments. If we were given the option to upgrade the apartments to a permanent space using current house floor plans (with or without a garden plot), I'd blow all my gil doing it without any hard feelings about needing to continue interacting with my ward house. Landscaping and hanging out in my yard is equally important to me as interior decorating and hosting RP events, so I consider having to maintain my sub a fair price to pay for the ability to do those activities.

Even if we had to maintain our sub to keep a ward house, considering we have the ability to relocate, I wouldn't be surprised if a fair portion of the people who currently have a ward house would relocate to an apartment of the same size in short order.


All that's to say, having ward housing and upgraded apartments aren't at all incompatible and having both would only benefit the player base.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

It's almost comical at this point how everyone and their lalafell want to make apartments more appealing while also failing to address that they already are cheaper and permanent. So sure, you want apartments to be bigger. Potentially the size of a medium or a large house. What's the tradeoff here because frankly, throwing out more gil isn't it.

Square Enix will not make the additional hardware they have purchased for wards become obsolete just so that apartments can be supposedly more appealing. So how do you bonify apartments while also keeping houses relevant? How do you prevent the outrage from house owners when they suddenly have a better housing option than current apartments? Do you pull a patch 2.3 and tell them **** you and whatever gil or money you have spent?

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Right, we shouldn't make apartments better because the lucky 10% (or less) of the players who managed to get a house might feel bad about it, even though they are also completely free to avail of an improved apartment on top of already having a house.

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Originally Posted by Pablomaldito

Right, we shouldn't make apartments better because the lucky 10% (or less) of the players who managed to get a house might feel bad about it, even though they are also completely free to avail of an improved apartment on top of already having a house.

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Will somebody please think of the poor FFXIV homeowners?

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Originally Posted by Amenara

That or I think your complaint is a non-issue, just like you seem to think our complaints about apartments are a non-issue. Houses are still there, wards are still there. I am not advocating for any of their removals. Just because you improve apartments doesn't mean anything negative has to happen to houses. In fact it just gives further opportunity for home owners to do different things in a new location with an apartment. If you are worried about demolishing of houses, that can be a valid issue on its own, however, who knows if or when they will start demolishing houses again. The uncertainty of house demolishing is probably my biggest problem with the entire idea since no one can plan around it, on top of it being such a short timer at 45 days.

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Where is my complaint? All I'm saying is that you people ask for all sorts of things without ever thinking about how it might affect other portions of the game. So you're right, my non-existing complaint is a non-issue given that I don't have a complaint to begin with. Sure, you're not advocating for their removal, but that's precisely the point you're failing to understand. I'm repeating myself, but you can't have a permanent system working alongside one that isn't when both are nearly identical in other aspects while also expecting the whole thing to just work without tossing a bone to the players who are tied to a subscription. What do you do with the partially empty wards when most personal houses would be traded for an apartment? How do you bonify houses to prevent a mass exodus?

I have 0 concerns about houses being demolished. If it came down to me, I'd nuke all personal housing due to its inferiority and its contribution to the problem since its introduction and hand over free apartments to whoever wants one. Provide generous incentives to Free Companies to either relocate or demolish their estate in order to shrink the amount of wards and call it a day.

You are delusional if you believe Square Enix will gladly accept to make the housing wards irrelevant in favor of apartments. Don't believe me? When was the last time apartments were upgraded?

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Originally Posted by Illmaeran

Yes, you can. You're right, there would likely be some outrage because someone has to be outraged at everything just to pitch a fit. However, I highly doubt it would be a meaningful portion of the player population, with the vast majority being VERY happy for the addition. An easy resolution when adding upgraded apartments would simply be to shut off the demolition timer and -poof- you've got permanent ward housing with no loss of investment.

I have a house and two apartments. If we were given the option to upgrade the apartments to a permanent space using current house floor plans (with or without a garden plot), I'd blow all my gil doing it without any hard feelings about needing to continue interacting with my ward house. Landscaping and hanging out in my yard is equally important to me as interior decorating and hosting RP events, so I consider having to maintain my sub a fair price to pay for the ability to do those activities.

Even if we had to maintain our sub to keep a ward house, considering we have the ability to relocate, I wouldn't be surprised if a fair portion of the people who currently have a ward house would relocate to an apartment of the same size in short order.


All that's to say, having ward housing and upgraded apartments aren't at all incompatible and having both would only benefit the player base.

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No more auto-demolition is your solution? Really? Do you want to make the situation worse than it currently is and go back to how things were in 2015? It's not entirely about losing an investment. It's relegating a whole system that we've repeatedly been told costs a lot of money to run and operate to the backseat. A company will not take that L. Especially not a Japanese company that has a track record of doubling down on every occasion.

By the way, you have never addressed the following statement you've made:

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Originally Posted by Illmaeran

Because, being Japanese, they expect people to follow the letter of the rules, the spirit of the rules, be considerate of others, and not try to game the system. For the great percent of people on JP servers, this is exactly how they behave. Things are different in NA, and in general, the West, where more people will find any loophole they can to get what they want even at the expense of others. This is a fundamental difference between Japanese and Western cultures; Japan is very communally-oriented whereas the West is heavily individual-oriented. There are similar trends on the Elemental DC, though to a much lesser extent than NA/EU/OCE, and wouldn't you know it, Elemental's where the vast majority of non-Japanese players from that side of the world play/played prior to Materia opening.

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Originally Posted by Pablomaldito

Right, we shouldn't make apartments better because the lucky 10% (or less) of the players who managed to get a house might feel bad about it, even though they are also completely free to avail of an improved apartment on top of already having a house.

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Starting to think the inability to think critically is something that plagues Balmung players. 0 out of 2 in this very thread so far! I've never stated that apartments shouldn't be "better". There's always room for improvement, but how do you do so without impeding on houses? The advantages and disadvantages are very well balanced between houses and apartments at the moment. You want something that's the same size as the original small houses for a fraction of the price and has the benefit of being permanent? You buy an apartment.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

Where is my complaint? All I'm saying is that you people ask for all sorts of things without ever thinking about how it might affect other portions of the game. So you're right, my non-existing complaint is a non-issue given that I don't have a complaint to begin with. Sure, you're not advocating for their removal, but that's precisely the point you're failing to understand. I'm repeating myself, but you can't have a permanent system working alongside one that isn't when both are nearly identical in other aspects while also expecting the whole thing to just work without tossing a bone to the players who are tied to a subscription. What do you do with the partially empty wards when most personal houses would be traded for an apartment? How do you bonify houses to prevent a mass exodus?

I have 0 concerns about houses being demolished. If it came down to me, I'd nuke all personal housing due to its inferiority and its contribution to the problem since its introduction and hand over free apartments to whoever wants one. Provide generous incentives to Free Companies to either relocate or demolish their estate in order to shrink the amount of wards and call it a day.

You are delusional if you believe Square Enix will gladly accept to make the housing wards irrelevant in favor of apartments. Don't believe me? When was the last time apartments were upgraded?

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I'm not delusional to think they will do anything because they won't do anything to fix housing. Housing and Apartments aren't a one or another situation. If apartments get upgraded, great, you can own one as well and still keep your house. I think you are overblowing how many people will be mad and torching the forums when they add a real option to the large portion of the playerbase who has no real ability to get a house because of SE's artificially imposed supply limitations. They created an issue years ago when they decided on wards and then continued to double down on them instead of accepting they are wrong and fixing the core issue. If your concern is permanency then get rid of demolitions with the addition of apartment expansions. Now players with houses can keep their house permanently and still have access to their new system. Do I think that is the right answer? No, I think that they need to announce many months in advance when they are going to resume demolitions as well as increase the timer from 45 days to maybe 6 months or a year. That way players that take a break can feel ok with that and players that legitimately quit will eventually lose the house.


This reminds me of all the blowback from people saying it wasn't fair that a whole bunch of players got their houses for free from the first lottery, their argument was that the players that won and got their house immediately didn't have to wait a month to get their house. Why do we need to give even more perks to players that have had access to a system that a whole lot haven't had if SE decides to finally give parity to everyone's subscription and allow everyone the ability to have access to the full housing system via apartments.

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Originally Posted by Amenara

I'm not delusional to think they will do anything because they won't do anything to fix housing.

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I was actually gonna write you a lengthy reply, but after second reading, I noticed I didn't have to because of the above. So great, you have nothing to offer to this conversation. Pretty short-sighted and dare I say, ignorant, of you to even suggest they get rid of auto-demolition. It really goes to demonstrate that you are new to this game because otherwise, you would know what happened when auto-demolition was not around. Do me a favor and do some research on here. Come back when you've come to your senses.

Who's next?

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

I was actually gonna write you a lengthy reply, but after second reading, I noticed I didn't have to because of the above. So great, you have nothing to offer to this conversation. Pretty short-sighted and dare I say, ignorant, of you to even suggest they get rid of auto-demolition. It really goes to demonstrate that you are new to this game because otherwise, you would know what happened when auto-demolition was not around. Do me a favor and do some research on here. Come back when you've come to your senses.

Who's next?

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Originally Posted by Amenara

If your concern is permanency then get rid of demolitions with the addition of apartment expansions. Now players with houses can keep their house permanently and still have access to their new system. Do I think that is the right answer? No, I think that they need to announce many months in advance when they are going to resume demolitions as well as increase the timer from 45 days to maybe 6 months or a year. That way players that take a break can feel ok with that and players that legitimately quit will eventually lose the house.

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It's really fun when you say I didn't read what you said then you do the exact same then belittle my opinion and make yourself look like an entitled troll. K.

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

YoshiP has said the housing system memory won't allow direct upgrades to apartments.

On the other hand, he also mentioned back in Stormblood they were discussing the possibility of adding in apartment sizes. Similar to how you would choose a plot size for your house, you would choose an apartment size when you purchase. If you wanted a different size, you would give up your old apartments and purchase a new one in the size you want. Unfortunately, nothing has been said about this since so we don't know if the idea was abandoned or still being considered.

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If I'm remembering correctly he did get back to this in one of the live streams they did where the answer was no for larger sizes on apartments. The reason was that if they offered an apartment the same size as a small house then it would need to come at the expense of a real small house.

It seems to me that the instancing they have isn't nearly as scaleable as people assume it is and that the "wards" themselves aren't 100% the problem or limiting factor.

Hopefully the delay in island sanctuary stuff is because they are dealing with issues that are directly or indirectly going to help housing limitations. Only time will tell. Just wish SE would give us more detailed explanations on exactly what the issues are.

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Originally Posted by Bladehawk

If I'm remembering correctly he did get back to this in one of the live streams they did where the answer was no for larger sizes on apartments. The reason was that if they offered an apartment the same size as a small house then it would need to come at the expense of a real small house.

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Which would be a crazy excuse for not doing it if that's what he said. Many players would happily give up having an outdoor area in exchange for a larger apartment that would never demo.

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Originally Posted by Bladehawk

It seems to me that the instancing they have isn't nearly as scaleable as people assume it is and that the "wards" themselves aren't 100% the problem or limiting factor.

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A possibility but that's all still a matter of design decisions. We've seen the instanced housing in other games so we know it's possible. Can they not creating a new instancing system that would address the issues?

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Originally Posted by Bladehawk

Hopefully the delay in island sanctuary stuff is because they are dealing with issues that are directly or indirectly going to help housing limitations. Only time will tell. Just wish SE would give us more detailed explanations on exactly what the issues are.

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I really wish people would give up on believing that Island Sanctuary delays are because they're adding housing to it. YoshiP already told us the delay was because the developers working on it came up with a few last minute ideas they wanted to incorporate but that we still need to lower our expectations because it's not what players have expressed they think it is.

There is going to be so much crushing disappointment when the Island Sanctuary details are finally released.

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Originally Posted by Yshtola_Cat

It's almost comical at this point how everyone and their lalafell want to make apartments more appealing while also failing to address that they already are cheaper and permanent. So sure, you want apartments to be bigger. Potentially the size of a medium or a large house. What's the tradeoff here because frankly, throwing out more gil isn't it.

Square Enix will not make the additional hardware they have purchased for wards become obsolete just so that apartments can be supposedly more appealing. So how do you bonify apartments while also keeping houses relevant? How do you prevent the outrage from house owners when they suddenly have a better housing option than current apartments? Do you pull a patch 2.3 and tell them **** you and whatever gil or money you have spent?

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I don't think anyone except maybe you would be upset if apartments would be improved. In fact, you can own an apartment on top of your personal and FC house and FC room, so instead of complaining just get your own.

Also, an instanced Apartment will never be as desirable as a house in a neighborhood by virtue of that house being in a neighborhood where you can get foot traffic .

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Originally Posted by Jojoya

YoshiP has said the housing system memory won't allow direct upgrades to apartments.

On the other hand, he also mentioned back in Stormblood they were discussing the possibility of adding in apartment sizes. Similar to how you would choose a plot size for your house, you would choose an apartment size when you purchase. If you wanted a different size, you would give up your old apartments and purchase a new one in the size you want. Unfortunately, nothing has been said about this since so we don't know if the idea was abandoned or still being considered.

Certainly such a system would satisfy at least part of the existing demand fueled by a desire for more interior space even if it doesn't satisfy demand created by the desire to have outdoor decoration or a garden.

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That would be great if he really said that. Just because it hasn't been implemented doesn't mean it's not on the roadmap. They may have just had other priorities and kept delaying it to "next year."