FFXIV has lost it's magic

[Aegis]

500k as a peak, 2-300K as average?
yeah, your argument is indeed invalid but thanks for participating

Just think about what you are saying. 2-300k subscribers, paying their $12.99 (or whatever it is) every month. For 12 years.

You think XIV will be around in another 9 years? Or SWTOR? Or Rift?

That player retention is incredible. There are so few other games that can match or exceed it. WoW and EvE can. It made FFXI the most profitable game in SE's history, bar none.

[Malekith]

Just think about what you are saying. 2-300k subscribers, paying their $12.99 (or whatever it is) every month. For 12 years.

You think XIV will be around in another 9 years? Or SWTOR? Or Rift?

That player retention is incredible. There are so few other games that can match or exceed it. WoW and EvE can. It made FFXI the most profitable game in SE's history, bar none.

Today's market has changed. All people want is THAT kind of game. It doesn't matter if they only play 2-3 months and then leave. It is still what the market is dictating, unfortunately. Trying to change it by whining in a forum is pointless, though it did work well for wowtards in GW2 with their gear grind crusade

Ah, to the poster saying he/she had more fun in XI, so did you level dunno how many classes to 50 because you weren't having fun? XI is still running (sort of), why don't you play that? I really don't understand why people can't just respect that not everyone has the same tastes or needs. I personally don't like many things in XIV and hope they get fixed/changed but importing concepts from a relic of teh past is not the way

[Aegis]

Today's market has changed. All people want is THAT kind of game. It doesn't matter if they only play 2-3 months and then leave. It is still what the market is dictating, unfortunately. Trying to change it by whining in a forum is pointless, though it did work well for wowtards in GW2 with their gear grind crusade

See, this argument I can understand (though calling the OP 'whining' is off the mark and insulting). And in a F2P game, sure, it doesn't matter if people aren't actively logging in as long as they buy their tat from the cash shop, make the investors back their money and the game can limp on with minimal updates of significance (hey! more shiny stuff on the cash shop!) until the crowd wanders on.

Subbed MMOs need people to be actively engaged with the game to justify maintaining their subs. OP's point is that the game is missing out on a compelling feature by being restricted to a case of log in, select dungeon, wait, raid, repeat, log out which is ultimately not very engaging.

Whether you feel he is accurate in his assessment or not is something valid to argue. "Hurr, this isn't XI-2 you guys don't matter' is just derp.

[Reslin]

Just think about what you are saying. 2-300k subscribers, paying their $12.99 (or whatever it is) every month. For 12 years.

You think XIV will be around in another 9 years? Or SWTOR? Or Rift?

That player retention is incredible. There are so few other games that can match or exceed it. WoW and EvE can. It made FFXI the most profitable game in SE's history, bar none.

Considering that SWG managed to last 8 years after crippling itself, alienating it's own fanbase, and continued to make mistake after mistake? Yes I do believe FF14 can last 9+ years and I do believe SWTOR will be around for awhile as well (considering it's been gaining players recently rather than losing them ever since it's gone F2P not that I play it anymore.) FF14 is the first mmo in a long time to raise in population a few months after launch rather than decrease. Also "Barely beat an 11 year old game." Not a valid argument, why? Most mmos these days have trouble getting 500k subs. Most fall around 130,000 and only go down from there so 600k subs is doing really well in the current market. It's too early to claim that FF14 isn't going to last 10 years this early in it's life. Especially considering that there's still parts in the world that FF14 hasn't launched in yet that can boost it's player base even further.

WoW is an anomaly and not the norm. Just as in the past is the same now. The best mmo's aside from WoW get around 500k subs. Most mmo's fall somewhere between 90,000-250,000. You try to do an old school mmo in the modern market and you end up going the route of Vanguard. 30,000 players within a few months.