Is 1.18 the final straw?

[Mireille]

But if it fails (I mean miserably not troll whine fail) For how many of you is this the final straw?

I played since open beta, and I got Goldsmith to 24 I think before I got fed up, and went back to FFXI for 6 months. I came back to XIV to find that the things that really bothered me had mostly been resolved. I found myself thinking that if the game had launched in its current state as of 1.16 it might have gone a bit better. There are some still things that frustrate me, but based on producer letter X those things are being addressed as well. I managed to get goldsmith to 37, and on a second char I got carpenter to 32 as well as Archer to 27. Before the battle system was so non functional I just stoped leveling combat jobs before I had gotten past level 7. I can empathize with how you feel right now since I spend an hour crafting, and then 2 - 3 hours running 8 craft leve all the way from bloodshore to emerald moss. Since I have to craft in ul'dah for synthesis support I end up starting in the middle and backtracking part of the way too. Anima doesn't regen fast enough to be a viable transport mechanism for this on a daily basis. Producer level X mentions a mount system soon to be in development so that will be resolved too, I just have to be patient.

I want to make two observations here.

In my personal opinion the game launched with minimal content with the expectation that there would be a few months of tweaking, and then they would go into full content production mode. That didn't pan out, so the game returned to development while at the same time remaining open in a quasi-beta mode. Oh and the first leadership team resigned to save face for the company, so now you have a new team with its own artistic vision, and that means prior planned content will change or be scraped. Implementing a new job system/game mechanics are more critical than new content, and the jobs system will impact all the new content that will be released so jobs and major mechanics changes will probably be in place before you see major content updates.

Secondly this is the first major content update since the new team took charge so this will be our first chance to see what this teams creative vision for the game really is. Yoshi-P did a good job revitalizing XI in just a few short months, and from what I have seen so far he is making improvements in XIV on a monthly basis. I think Yoshi-P wants to wow us with the new content, but I also think to a degree it is being put in because they recognize players are at a breaking point in terms of boredom. Bottom line though you are playing an extended beta for free. If you don't like the minimal content that is available then take a long break and come back. It worked well for me.

When I look at the effort put into the models its clear SE had some very dedicated artists working on this game. When I look in the guild halls I see items that may be released at some point in the future like furnishings for mog houses, and luggage of some sort. These are things that I bet are coming down the pipe once the game is viable, and I'd bet SE is willing to invest a lot in that since MMO are a major part of its corporate strategy. This game failing would be a huge blow to their rep, and might well end that strategy, so don't bet on them throwing in the towel anytime soon. Take a break and come back with a fresh outlook and see if things are more to your liking in a few months. This game won't be ready for judgement until the PS3 release. When that happens SE will be saying take it or leave it as it is. Until then its in development and anything can change.

All of this is rumor, speculation, hypothesis, and innuendo on my part. Don't yell at SE for anything I have said, or repost it as verified fact :P

[Sovereign]

I kind of think Mireille hit it on the head. There is certainly potential, and the next patch may start to realize that... but I think we have been patient enough, and it's time to either get some solid content, or move on. We also know that a number of new MMORPGs are going to be released in the near future, and there are some further out on the horizon to watch for (Square Enix's next MMO, and Blizzard's 'Titan' to name a few). My point is that we eventually have to get past the 'We will add content, just give us time' phase, and I think most of the players are at that point. It's now or never!

[Rowyne]

...however if this fails we may never see another FF MMO. Players will have that lil memory in the back of their head of xiv. I really hope that this game gets turned around.

Oddly, my husband and I were talking about the game tonight and said this very same thing. If FFXIV fails, I doubt we'll ever see another FF MMO.

There is a lot more riding on pulling this game back from the brink than just a single title.

[Synthesis]

1.18 will surely bring more than other "hotfix" patches. We could see new content (proper) for first time.
However I am not of opinion that 1.18 is success or fail. Moreless it is patch which will start era of different patches, which will add (but hotfixes) new content to game everytime. Thats what I hope for.

[Lilith]

Uhh, highly unlikely.
Yeah, a negative 4.5 billion yen cash flow is pretty nice, sure.

The sale of the game (physically) didn't give them a negative 4.5 Billion. It's the cost to make the game. The release didn't compensate all of the costs thus a negative.
I don't know about the costs of keeping servers up and such, hard to make a balance.

I worry a bit about people getting a bit too hyped up for 1.18. I mean, once again, do we actually KNOW what will all be in it? From what I could tell, it'll be auto-attack (maybe?), a couple tweaks to battle system, some dungeons and Ifrit. Oh and the encampments. I'm not saying those aren't all great things! I'm definitely looking forward to it!... It just seems that some people expect 1.18 to be the MAJOR patch that will completely overhaul the game and add jobs and such. To call Patch 1.18 FFXIV's last chance to redeem itself is a bit crazy in my opinion. There's still TONS of things they have planned out that will not be in 1.18 from what I can tell.

I mean maybe I'm wrong! I dunno! I'd LOVE to see a bunch of stuff added... I just don't want to get my hopes up. I like to be optimistic, but I think you can go a bit too far.

I'm, personally, not expecting the holy grail to be in this patch (well, I do have my coconuts ready until the chocobo's are out). What I do think is that this patch and the one(s) before the end of the summer will matter!

[Rentahamster]

The sale of the game (physically) didn't give them a negative 4.5 Billion. It's the cost to make the game. The release didn't compensate all of the costs thus a negative.
I don't know about the costs of keeping servers up and such, hard to make a balance.

Having a botched launch like Final Fantasy 14 cost them dearly. Part of their earnings forecast was anticipating the extra revenue that FF14 would bring in, when that didn't materialize, they had to drop their earnings forecast back in December last year.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2010/...6BF11H20101216

(Reuters) - Japanese video game maker Square Enix on Thursday slashed its full-year net profit forecast by more than 90 percent to far below the market consensus and said it will postpone the launch of two key game titles.
Square Enix said in a statement it is delaying the rollout of the latest installment in its "Deus Ex" game series until the financial year starting in April. It had initially planned the launch for the January-March quarter.
The company is also postponing the launch of "Final Fantasy 14" for Sony's PlayStation3 game console for an unknown period. The game was originally slated to hit store shelves in March in Japan.


Square Enix, known for its blockbuster "Dragon Quest" franchise, cut its net profit forecast to 1 billion yen ($11.9 million) for the year ending March 31 from 12 billion yen previously. That is far below the average forecast for an 11.3 billion yen net profit in a poll of 20 analysts by Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
It chopped its operating profit forecast to 8 billion yen, from 20 billion yen previously and below market expectations for 20.4 billion yen.

There's no way they're going to knowingly release an unfinished game to try to recoup sales. The damage to their reputation has been tremendous. Instead of getting the revenue from player subs, they have to make the game free to play, plus pump more resources back into development.


THEN, we have the big news in May that, oh wait a sec, instead of the 1 billion yen profit we thought we were gonna get, we're actually gonna have a 12 billion loss.

http://www.andriasang.com/e/blog/201...ings_revision/

Square Enix announced revised earnings expectations today. The company says that it will incur a net loss of 12,000 million yen for the previous fiscal year. Its previous forecast from February 3 listed a modest net profit of 1,000 million yen.
The revision is due to extraordinary losses, in part from a "tightened selection standard" for games. This will result in 4.5 billion yen in losses related to development cancellations. A press release announcing the revision did not share specifics beyond this.

That totally invalidates that other person's theory that they released it on purpose to generate cash flow. If they had just delayed the game, they wouldn't have lost so much money.

[Malakhim]

This whole thing reminds me of Windows Vista. MS gets comfortable, releases an OS that many consider to be beyond sub-par, and they try to rectify it with Win7.

I won't lie though. The tenth letter from the producer pretty much set my timetable in stone. If the game isn't up to speed by the end of summer, then I'll probably stop following it.

[Greencactaur]

I can't believe some people are still expecting the game to become entertaining overnight...

They're not they expected it to be entertaining 5 months ago, but its been 9 months in total and still nothing has been added to the game other then some new leves, a few UI changes, and mob size changes other then that really nothing in the pass year.

[Shikyo]

Oddly, my husband and I were talking about the game tonight and said this very same thing. If FFXIV fails, I doubt we'll ever see another FF MMO.

There is a lot more riding on pulling this game back from the brink than just a single title.

Thats crazy get mad if you want but i bet that if they did make this "ffxi-2" all this crap and forums and arguing wouldnt be here, ppl loved that game and they would have flocked to a updated version of it and many more as well.

End this crap and give the xi team the funds and support to create a master piece in the vision of xi and I bet they would turn out a game far more successful then this, even in the begining with their exp i bet it would be solid, the fundamentals would be there at least and xiv didnt even get that right.

[Kiara]

Hi All,

I think for some, the amount of pent-up frustration at what happened with the launch of this game until now is so great that if Patch 1.18 is nothing short of the second coming of Chrono Trigger (or Final Fantasy IV or VI), it will be a "failure."

I don't blame people who have that much frustration, I sometimes wonder how I've stuck it out until now.

For myself, as long as Patch 1.18 lays the foundation of great things to come (long term content, larger / overarching goals (e.g., stuff like Grand Companies, High Level Raid Dungeons, things to work towards), and delivers some *meaningful* new content, then I'll be happy (for a while).

Yoshida-san has stated in his Letter from the Producer that we can expect a Rank 30 and Rank 50 Raid Dungeon (brand-new, meaningful content), new Frontier Quest Hubs (which look pretty cool), and the first of the New Battle System changes. So 1.18 should be nice (fingers crossed).

If they deliver on that, and by End of Summer complete most of the big changes on Yoshida's List from his last Letter, then I think FF XIV is on the road to a good recovery.

If we see 1.18 = "Adjusted the number of Fish Hooks from 10 to 8" or "Altered the Targetmode Method Z so that now you can target Gathering Points using Up or Down" :P well... we have a problem. (^_~)

But I don't think it'll be just bug fixes.