As it's Valentione's Day, I ask do we even need in-game marriage; period!

[Tahldon]

I'm trying to figure out how it comes to this every single time? At this point, I'm more on the side of the just-scrap-everything-and-save-yourselves-the-headache-SE side of things.

This is just going to turn out to be an ordeal either way. I don't think that the FFXIV team wants to be the ones to take a stance for the entire company. As the article says, they will monitor player requests, of which Yoshi-P can probably appeal to higher ups to move forward with the decision to do so, but either way, it hasn't even started yet and I'm worn out on it.

[Naunet]

I'm trying to figure out how it comes to this every single time? At this point, I'm more on the side of the just-scrap-everything-and-save-yourselves-the-headache-SE side of things.

There would be no headache and no ordeal if they didn't treat it like it was an issue - because it's not. Trion implemented marriage without gender restrictions, and it was never even a question. Not a single ripple was felt. Not one. I actually rather enjoy the marriage system in Rift - fun dimension items and stuff abound!

So again: It's only an issue, because Squeenix decided to pretend it was.

[Tahldon]

Trion implemented marriage without gender restrictions, and it was never even a question.

So again: It's only an issue, because Squeenix decided to pretend it was.

I'm not saying that they even treat it as an issue. As far as we're aware, Yoshi-P and the other FFXIV staff very well may not mind adding it in; however, they are a smaller portion of a larger company. I'm sure that the tiny FFXIV team don't want to be the ones leading the charge against the very high upper management as well as board members in molding Square-Enix's stance on where they fall in the political debate of Same-sex marriage.

For one, in the corporate world, things of this nature is a straight-up slippery slope. It's an issue that most companies try to stay out of the media about whether it's good or bad for their media presence. If there just so happened to be a public announcement by the company on their stance as it rides on the coat-tails of the in-game marriage system if they happen to implement it in a traditional sense, then they have to consider their shareholders and what happens on that end too. Keep in mind that SE, as a company, has been in the red for a while now and they're finally seeing revenue come back in with this game. They don't want to mess that up in the slightest.

Media presence has been back and forth so far, from what I've read, but I've seen several Destructoid articles letting their subscribers know what's new and going on in the game. It would be naive of us to think that coverage of same-sex in-game marriage wouldn't be covered too, which would lead to a number of different ways it could go for the company. It's almost easier for Yoshi-P and his team to just keep doing their work on the game and avoid any sort of stances for the sake of not jeopardizing anything financially.

So in a sense, it's a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation. If another company was firm enough on their stance to just toss it out there, then that's awesome, but not every company's situation is the same.