Patch 8.0 - How long is too long to wait?

With rumors about the release date being discussed, how long is too long for all of you to wait for 8.0? Some people are saying it will be 2.5 years from 7.0 release and others are saying 3 years.

For me, if patch 7.5 lands in April of 2026 and then they wait until summer of 2027, that’s my red line. They must get 8.0 out on or before December of 2026 or there will be mass “retirements” in my opinion.

For me personally it doesn't matter when exactly 8.0 comes out. It could be late 2026, early 2027 or even the end of this year for all I care.

Its still 3 expansions late imo.

My expectation is simply 2.5 years because that has been the case for the last 2 expansions. I'm expecting it in early 2027. Might be off slightly due to national holidays, but:

7.4 is probably Dec 23rd 2025
7.5 is probably May 5th 2026
8.0 is probably Jan 26th 2027

Which about aligns with the Fanfest timing we got before Dawntrail, where the NA Fanfest was roughly 11 months prior to release. Expecting the Fanfest around 27th February - 2nd March 2026

I think it would be unworkable to delay it until July 2027. That would be a patch gap of over a year between 7.5 and 8.0. I mean they could and people would just return then but it wouldn't make sense when they pride themselves on their consistent schedule.

If the normal process is followed, it will be around October sometime the next expansion is first revealed, the final main content patch (in this case, 7.55) will go live around March next year, and sometime mid next year the expansion will actually launch; probably June or July (EW was an exception due to the chaos and delays caused by COVID). This is how things have usually been handled, and because DT stuck to that too, I see no reason 8.0 will not be the same.

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Originally Posted by Enkidoh

If the normal process is followed, it will be around October sometime the next expansion is first revealed, the final main content patch (in this case, 7.55) will go live around March next year, and sometime mid next year the expansion will actually launch; probably June or July (EW was an exception due to the chaos and delays caused by COVID). This is how things have usually been handled, and because DT stuck to that too, I see no reason 8.0 will not be the same.

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Dawntrail didn't return to normal at all. Dawntrail also had around an 8-9 month gap between the .5 patch and the expansion, just like Endwalker did. They repeated the long delay that Endwalker release had.

The precedent for two expansions running is 2.5 years between expansions, whereas it used to be 2 years.

• Shadowbringers released June 2019.
• Endwalker released December 2021, 2.5 years later.
• Dawntrail released July 2024, 2.5 years later.
• Logic is thus 8.0 is around December 2026 or January 2027.

It wouldn't be like that. I think most have already gotten accustomed to the long patch cycles. There will still be people clutching onto subs for their houses, raids, and many other activities.

Pushing it into 2027 would be too long, period.

Precedent, current patch cycle length, history of the wait getting longer and longer, “Yoshi-P said blah-blah-blah” doesn’t change that.

the moment the director started selling 8.0 as the job adjustment expac, it was too late. also feel like im getting gaslit every time someone starts raving about the so called "enhanced encounter design" shown so far during this expac too. if mechanics coming out slightly faster is all it takes to impress someone then small wonder this game is so cooked.

Anything beyond October 2026 will be an inexcusable failing.

Whilst company execs and investors are blind to the quality issues and sentiments plaguing Dawntrail they will always defer to good old reliable lines on a graph, which will not look too great considering 2027 would be at least an extra 4 months compared to pre-dawntrail numbers.

Ten years would be too long.

A lot of players are already fed up with Dawntrail, they just want this expansion to be over with and hopefully get a new clean slate with whatever 8.0 brings.
If 8.0 comes with the year "2027" it will 100% be too long and test the patience and will of the remaining "up to date" players (those that finished DT MSQ, DT raids, etc). :(
The only ones that wouldn't be affected by such a long wait time would be those that just started or are going through the old expansion MSQ since they got a long while till they catch up anyway.

It better release mid 2026, late 2026 at worst. Any longer and it'll just be an insult. Wow's moving much faster with more content, and it's an adequate comparison.

I feel with the temperament surrounding things, Yoshi P and team are going to have to bite the bullet and do a Holiday 2026 release. Pushing to Spring 2027 won't go over well.

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Originally Posted by DynnDiablos

I feel with the temperament surrounding things, Yoshi P and team are going to have to bite the bullet and do a Holiday 2026 release. Pushing to Spring 2027 won't go over well.

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YoshiPR's lip service aside, they seem to firmly be in their "They will unconditionally eat slop and beg us for more" phase and just assume that players will put up with any kind of quality or schedule and just stay subbed forever. I'm not expecting anything before Q2 2027.

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Originally Posted by Daralii

YoshiPR's lip service aside, they seem to firmly be in their "They will unconditionally eat slop and beg us for more" phase and just assume that players will put up with any kind of quality or schedule and just stay subbed forever. I'm not expecting anything before Q2 2027.

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I will give up my house and quit then because I am not going to stick around 10-12 months with absolutely NO content happening.

I am ok with waiting longer than usual if it means the end product is a bit more polished and juicier for just semi-casual stuff.
If i means they can add stuff to the open world exploration aspects I'm 100% for it to take 6-8months longer to release than usual.

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Originally Posted by DynnDiablos

I will give up my house and quit then because I am not going to stick around 10-12 months with absolutely NO content happening.

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Truth be told it's responses like this that make zero sense to me. If youre that willing to drop a videogame the moment it goes silent for a bit longer, then maybe it's time to actually just move on from the game in general.
If it's not for you it's not for you. They'll still be doing moogle events and other crossover stuff during "hiatus". and if you feel like it's not enough, then just quit.

I took a 6month break from the game and it was all for the better. Now I have stuff to do.

They should just throw the current schedule out the window and push for an 8.0 release in summer 2026. Most people are already exhausted by Dawntrail. We need that feeling that something new is finally coming, that DT is over. I can’t even imagine staying in Dawntrail for another year and a half...
If they keep dragging it out, I’m sure a lot of people will just drop off.

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Originally Posted by Teno

It better release mid 2026, late 2026 at worst. Any longer and it'll just be an insult. Wow's moving much faster with more content, and it's an adequate comparison.

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I remember that WoW only managed that because they bought out a nearby studio with 100 developers whose game had collapsed, and before that they were struggling to recruit and had far longer patch gaps than FFXIV.

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Originally Posted by Kirutsuki

I took a 6month break from the game and it was all for the better. Now I have stuff to do.

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Spoken like someone who definitely doesn't own a house.
A lot more players would gladly take a break from FFXIV if we were able to keep our house and items if we unsub for extended period of times, but then SE wouldn't be collecting its rent money from us.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

I remember that WoW only managed that because they bought out a nearby studio with 100 developers whose game had collapsed, and before that they were struggling to recruit and had far longer patch gaps than FFXIV.

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So if Blizzard needed fewer than 100 new employees from a dying company to fix WoW's cadence, what's stopping SE?

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Originally Posted by Daralii

So if Blizzard needed fewer than 100 new employees from a dying company to fix WoW's cadence, what's stopping SE?

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Just like Blizzard was struggling to recruit, SE has said the same in the Famitsu interview recently.

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Originally Posted by Wyssahtyn

the moment the director started selling 8.0 as the job adjustment expac, it was too late. also feel like im getting gaslit every time someone starts raving about the so called "enhanced encounter design" shown so far during this expac too. if mechanics coming out slightly faster is all it takes to impress someone then small wonder this game is so cooked.

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I've said before that all their "improved encounter design" amounts to is just "make fight go faster". Because that's all they know how to do. So they ruined BLM for... this George Lucas-tier "faster and with more intensity" slop. I'm not really surprised that all it takes to impress most players is "make fight go faster" though. DON'T THINK JUST DO MECHANIC AND GET HYPE FOR NEXT MECHANIC! If you want to just make this a damn twitch-reflexes game just get off the fence and do it. Oh wait, your shit netcode doesn't allow for snappy gameplay. I'm so done with this dev team.

EDIT: I mean, seriously, I just watched the new Trial on Youtube. There's literally nothing in that fight that warrants what they did to BLM. Nothing. I predicted and could have tapdanced around every mechanic in that trial without even breaking a sweat with the tools BLM had before the senseless job changes. Hell, I'd argue things like Hades Normal/EX were harder than [REDACTED, but c'mon you all know who it is]. I can't imagine that the EX is SO much harder that it would require the ability to tapdance around for 5 minutes as a caster. Seriously, this dev team sucks.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

Just like Blizzard was struggling to recruit, SE has said the same in the Famitsu interview recently.

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Yes, and as bad as it was for Blizzard, they at least conduct business in what is the de facto lingua franca, English. SE also piles on the ridiculous secondary expectation of "also be a fluent Japanese speaker".

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Originally Posted by Auro_Seldaris

I've said before that all their "improved encounter design" amounts to is just "make fight go faster". Because that's all they know how to do. So they ruined BLM for... this George Lucas-tier "faster and with more intensity" slop. I'm not really surprised that all it takes to impress most players is "make fight go faster" though. DON'T THINK JUST DO MECHANIC AND GET HYPE FOR NEXT MECHANIC! If you want to just make this a damn twitch-reflexes game just get off the fence and do it. Oh wait, your shit netcode doesn't allow for snappy gameplay. I'm so done with this dev team.

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The Lucas quote is "Louder, faster, more intense", which SE transformed into "Brighter, faster, more intense".

And then people wonder why no one outside you forum users take you seriously.

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Originally Posted by Shialan

And then people wonder why no one outside you forum users take you seriously.

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Nice ad hominem, you really added to the discussion, there.

Doesn't really matter to me. I still have plenty of things to do in FFXIV (mainly getting into crafting/gathering and tribes/allied society things), and if I ever run out, I'll just take a break and come back. I'm currently playing FFII and C&C 3 alongside FFXIV, so I'm in no hurry.

8.0 will be make or break for a lot of people. It needs to be good and it needs to bring significant changes.

I would rather wait until 2027 for 8.0 than for them to re-release Stormblood for the 4th time.

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Originally Posted by Daralii

YoshiPR's lip service aside, they seem to firmly be in their "They will unconditionally eat slop and beg us for more" phase and just assume that players will put up with any kind of quality or schedule and just stay subbed forever. I'm not expecting anything before Q2 2027.

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Yeah WoW went through that phase, too. It damn near killed the game. Difference between Blizz and CSIII is Blizz actually pulled their heads out of their asses and started to fix their game. Yoshida is still in the "rockstar who can do no wrong" phase.

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Originally Posted by Kirutsuki

I am ok with waiting longer than usual if it means the end product is a bit more polished and juicier for just semi-casual stuff.
If i means they can add stuff to the open world exploration aspects I'm 100% for it to take 6-8months longer to release than usual.

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Problem is, things just keep taking longer, and longer, and longer.... and we dont actually get better content.

Id rather see it delayed IF they work on improving the game. Maaaajor new gameplay and QoL features. If not? 8.0 was and still is my limit.

If they try to gaslight us for a 2nd time with "its coming in the patches" or the same formula again Im out. This game needs a shakeup. Im not gonna keep paying a sub for bare minimum dev effort

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Originally Posted by Kunzite_Lockhart

They should just throw the current schedule out the window and push for an 8.0 release in summer 2026. Most people are already exhausted by Dawntrail. We need that feeling that something new is finally coming, that DT is over. I can’t even imagine staying in Dawntrail for another year and a half...
If they keep dragging it out, I’m sure a lot of people will just drop off.

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Funny thing is, I and a I think a lot of other people, thought Dawntrail was the perfect time for a fresh start, in terms of both story and gameplay, and it just.. was more of the same.

Now we need a "fresh start" from the "fresh start"....

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Originally Posted by Auro_Seldaris

Yeah WoW went through that phase, too. It damn near killed the game. Difference between Blizz and CSIII is Blizz actually pulled their heads out of their asses and started to fix their game. Yoshida is still in the "rockstar who can do no wrong" phase.

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Considering Dawntrail (7.0) is the most poorly reviewed FFXIV release since 1.0, the number of active players has fallen off a cliff, and the fact that Kiryu was directly questioned about it at a shareholders meeting; I think we can officially declare Yoshida-san's "rockstar who can do no wrong" "suffering from success" phase over.

8.0 is gonna be a make or break release, like 2.0

If the ball is dropped with 8.0, I'm almost 100% sure they be finding a new director and producer. I'm sure Tanaka thought he was indispensable at one point too, and look what happened there (same with Tabata, after XV failed to meet expectations, even though it was one of the highest selling SE games of all time). Yoshi-P isn't invincible.

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Originally Posted by Jeeqbit

Dawntrail didn't return to normal at all. Dawntrail also had around an 8-9 month gap between the .5 patch and the expansion, just like Endwalker did. They repeated the long delay that Endwalker release had.

The precedent for two expansions running is 2.5 years between expansions, whereas it used to be 2 years.

• Shadowbringers released June 2019.
• Endwalker released December 2021, 2.5 years later.
• Dawntrail released July 2024, 2.5 years later.
• Logic is thus 8.0 is around December 2026 or January 2027.

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That's my estimate as well. I'll be surprised if it wasn't released during the holiday season of 2026 in order to increase sales.

It takes time to break up the studio and wind down operations to maintenance mode only (you can tell by the QA issues today in this patch that they're not developing the game anymore). So it's best to assume that sometime in 2027 is when we'll get the final expansion for FF14

2027 would be unacceptable imo.

They can and should put it out sooner, but that would require a few things:
- Sit down the entire team and work on 8.0 from the get go, no lending manpower to other projects
- Demand an allocation of funds that befit FFXIV and make SE clear that is FFXIV falls SE may do so as well when the project responsible for half their revenue crashes.

So... the basics for developing important content like the expansion of your golden goose.
I would even say the bare minimum to deliver quality content and... I don't think things are dire enough for them to do just that.

Any extended extra time to get 8.0 out has to be clearly communicated and due to important reworks, content and additions, not
"we need more time cause reasons, lol, aren't you idiots used to it by now?"

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Originally Posted by All_Nonsense

It takes time to break up the studio and wind down operations to maintenance mode only (you can tell by the QA issues today in this patch that they're not developing the game anymore). So it's best to assume that sometime in 2027 is when we'll get the final expansion for FF14

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Oh, you cheeky thing. Have an updoot. :p

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Originally Posted by ViinaS

- Demand an allocation of funds that befit FFXIV and make SE clear that is FFXIV falls SE may do so as well when the project responsible for half their revenue crashes.

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Remember in the Endwalker Media Tour when SE said they would "Spare No Expense" on FFXIV's development going forward?

Ha
Ha
Ha

Why the rush, though?

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Originally Posted by Auro_Seldaris

Remember in the Endwalker Media Tour when SE said they would "Spare No Expense" on FFXIV's development going forward?

Ha
Ha
Ha

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Yoshi P and their studio are masters of weaselwords and blatant lies. I have no idea how people can trust them anymore. They need to earn back that trust, but only seem to be digging a deeper hole. They keep SAYING what they need to do, but where are the actions?

it's insane that i took an entire year off from playing and (for me) it just feels like there is literally nothing to do. i really hope 8.0 comes with a shakeup as well.

something i am really itching for is more use of the zones. i really really want to work on something in zones either by myself or with groups of people that isn't hunts or fates. or at least the current iterations of those hunts or fates. i want the game to feel like an MMO.

back in ARR i swear to god the game felt more MMO-y. i really miss it. completely unrelated but i think a big issue with the game is that we got flying because it makes the world feel so dead and hollow, thats just my opinion though.