Reclamation of Inactive Housing announced

[OfTheWhitewind]

The question (which is far more important in the grand scheme of things than any bickering over housing space) is why a game that's such a huge success, both critically and commercially, isn't getting the appropriate resources to support and take advantage of that success.

Just because a game is successful doesn't mean they have infinite resources. New space or servers for housing means more manpower, more time to upkeep them, more money, etc. It isn't really as simple as you seem to think it is. Not to mention how much of that is going into patches and expansions which should definitely take priority over housing. Housing is in high demand now more than ever so they had to find a solution sooner rather than later. Perhaps a better one will come along. We just don't know yet. For now this is fair and faulting Yoshi-P for something he said over two years ago when housing shortage wasn't an issue seems silly.

[Yshnal]

In other games it's limited and expensive plus it has a monthly rent. Free is nothing.

I still remember the old days of paying the weekly rent on L2, for instance, and as I remember it, getting the money for the auction (yes, an actual auction) wasn't nearly as hard as it was getting gil here when housing was introduced, especially in some servers. And that game was a lot more grindy than FFXIV, as almost every MMO back then.

Community here asked for this and they got it. After that they said new housing areas and plots are coming. I guess we have to wait to judge don't we?

However we can judge it now based on the fact that you can lose your plot even if you're still paying (something that I'll never support), and that the same player can still have multiple plots by using alts, to name two flaws. The consequences of those two issues will persist, no matter what they do after this, unless they make further changes before applying it.

If you read my previous posts I agree that something needs to be done, and I'm more than fine with some parts of the housing reclamation rules. However, I'm not that blind to not notice that some parts of it can be improved before applying them, or are plainly wrong. If they're simply going to fix one problem while letting two new emerge, then it's better to wait until they can fix it properly and fairly for everyone, instead of getting it done "NOWNOWNOWNOW" without giving it any second thoughts.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Just throwing this out there for general purpose



-Live Letter IX

This has been "thrown out there" a zillion times lol

[Avidria]

It's old, but I think most people would say their original intention was clear.

To my mind, it seems more telling that Yoshi-P's specifically referred to such systems as "a thing of the past". To me (and here's a case where I can't really argue with someone who wants to say I'm reading too much into it), that sounds pretty derisive of such a system.

The intention was clear, yes, but he was also referring specifically to a system that (at the time) didn't even exist yet. That article is part of a Q&A from before housing had actually been implemented. At the time, they may indeed have seen it as a thing of the past. But housing in this game was new, and its evident that some people (in this thread, even) actually wanted some sort of house relinquishment system and are glad that it's being implemented even if that implementation isn't ideal. Maybe they didn't want to do it initially, but evidently 2 years of having the current housing system in place and receiving feedback on it has changed that.

Extrapolating from there (and, again, I can't argue with someone who wants to say this is an unreasonable extrapolation), it feels like this isn't a decision that they're being forced to make, rather than finding an alternative solution.

The question (which is far more important in the grand scheme of things than any bickering over housing space) is why a game that's such a huge success, both critically and commercially, isn't getting the appropriate resources to support and take advantage of that success.

This decision seems to be based on player feedback and the things that people were asking for for a while now. This was announced a while back as well, wasn't it? I doubt that this will be the only step they take to try to fix the housing system (at least I hope so, anyway). Heck, this might not even be a permanent implementation, either - they could very well change aspects of it going forward. It hasn't actually been added yet, after all.

[Kyonika]

I love how we players are upon each other's throats, while the ones actually at fault of this flawed system get away with it. It's lovely, really.

Ain't it? It's just the usual banter between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots':

haves: "I was lucky enough to make tons of money early in the game, so I bought my house and 5 more plots, just to squat on them, so no one else can get them, 'cuz maybe I'll use them someday, or maybe I'll sell them at a super inflated price. But who cares, I'm not even logging in anymore anyway. trolololololz"

have-nots: "But that's not fair. My FC needs a house so we can deploy airships, train chocobos, do gardening, some crafting, decorating, and socialize."

haves: "Not my problem. You snooze you lose noob."

Square Enix: "Now it's your problem: you snooze you lose."

haves: "Wait...what?! ... Nooooo!!!11!one!!" <rage mode activated>

...And, here we are today.

P.S.: Just to make it clear, I know that there's many players that did the effort to save gil for their house, yet they couldn't buy one due to the limited suply. What I'm pointing out is how the whole system is extremely poorly planned.

... "flawed system?" ... "poorly planned?" ... That's very true. Personal housing that shared the same areas as FC housing should never had been a thing to start out with. It should've been FC housing the way it is now, and instanced personal housing that is kept completely separate and away from FC housing. SE effed that up then, and now this move is a way to try to un-eff it up. It's a band-aid fix at best, but a necessary one with the resources with which we have.

Can SE invest in more servers and expand the ward counts in each district to accommodate everyone? Sure they can. It'll probably cost them some stupid amount like $147,000,000 in servers and server-room expansion projects. The result? Crazy convoluted amount of wards that would be near impossible to find someone's specific home in, and be more like instanced housing anyways. So, what's the point then? There is none. So, yes, it is a very flawed system, but unfortunately, we are stuck with it now.

So, with what we have, they do need to sweep out the inactives. That said, they should return all the furniture and all the Gil of the plot's and house's worth to the evicted.

Ideally, they should do a one-time stealth eviction of accounts that've been inactive 6 months or more, while returning all of the furnishings and Gil. While, just a few days prior to that, launching affordable instanced player housing. We still keep the same FC and player housing system in place, and, hopefully with the clean up and instanced housing, it sorts itself out. Then SE reviews in about 6 to 9 months down the road and sees if it's still good, and, if not, they could implement this current band-aid fix we have coming up.

Regardless, I still stand by my earlier posts: if you have a house, then you added something that alters the geometry of the landscape, and used up a finite resource, so you have a responsibility to that. And that responsibility is being active. It's a privilege; not a right.

So you sunk crazy Gil into it? Great. So, own it, and use it frequently enough to be worth the price. It's like owning a pet, you can't just completely ignore it for months and months and expect it to still be alive when you are ready to play with it. And it's also the same way IRL too. It's not like we can just up and quit life for like six months, and then come back to life as zombie people and continue on where we left off, right? It just doesn't work that way.

[Xerius]

I didnt say they didnt deserve a house. I said they dont need one

Nobody needs a house. All of the content up until 3.0 could have been done outside of a housing district (and probably should have been). As for 3.0 all of the content added for housing is being added outside of housing in 3.1.

[Nadirah]

What I want to know is why they couldn't just oh, say, use EQ2's system, which *doesn't* need house wiping(I can log in now, 4 years after I quit, and pay rent on my 7 houses and they'll be right where I left them), instead of this that's only going to piss people off?

[Malevicton]

The intention was clear, yes, but he was also referring specifically to a system that (at the time) didn't even exist yet. That article is part of a Q&A from before housing had actually been implemented. At the time, they may indeed have seen it as a thing of the past. But housing in this game was new, and its evident that some people (in this thread, even) actually wanted some sort of house relinquishment system and are glad that it's being implemented even if that implementation isn't ideal. Maybe they didn't want to do it initially, but evidently 2 years of having the current housing system in place and receiving feedback on it has changed that.

Honestly I feel like that kind of makes it worse. They knew it was a possibility and were trying to actively avoid it before the system was ever in place. It was designed with the intent of avoiding this exact situation, and yet here we are.

This decision seems to be based on player feedback and the things that people were asking for for a while now. This was announced a while back as well, wasn't it? I doubt that this will be the only step they take to try to fix the housing system (at least I hope so, anyway). Heck, this might not even be a permanent implementation, either - they could very well change aspects of it going forward. It hasn't actually been added yet, after all.

It was announced around April 2014 and scrapped due to a lot of negative feedback. :P Also doesn't make them look good. Makes em look desperate and disorganized.

[Ibi]

Just because a game is successful doesn't mean they have infinite resources. New space or servers for housing means more manpower, more time to upkeep them, more money, etc. It isn't really as simple as you seem to think it is. Not to mention how much of that is going into patches and expansions which should definitely take priority over housing. Housing is in high demand now more than ever so they had to find a solution sooner rather than later. Perhaps a better one will come along. We just don't know yet. For now this is fair and faulting Yoshi-P for something he said over two years ago when housing shortage wasn't an issue seems silly.

No one's faulting him for say it. People are trying to explain why they're shocked and disappointed at the announcement of this system, based on the expectations that were set initially.

If the system had been launched with this restriction, people would have been afforded the opportunity to factor it into their decision to purchase (or not purchase) a house, but adding it on as a new factor after people have invested large sums of gil and time into their houses is a tough pill for some to swallow.

I'm also not sure it's fair to say that the housing shortage wasn't an issue. It might not have be voiced by the customers, but they've known from even before they first added housing that they weren't adding enough plots even to allow for every FC that wanted a house to purchase one.

[Welsper59]

No one's faulting him for say it. People are trying to explain why they're shocked and disappointed at the announcement of this system, based on the expectations that were set initially.

If the system had been launched with this restriction, people would have been afforded the opportunity to factor it into their decision to purchase (or not purchase) a house, but adding it on as a new factor after people have invested large sums of gil and time into their houses is a tough pill for some to swallow.

I'm also not sure it's fair to say that the housing shortage wasn't an issue. It might not have be voiced by the customers, but they've known from even before they first added housing that they weren't adding enough plots even to allow for every FC that wanted a house to purchase one.

Speaking as someone who owns an L personal house, I seriously have zero problems with the system. I get there's a demand, and with my RL work that I do, I get how much bullshit goes on in terms of higher ups not allocating appropriate funding to departments that do the most work (but bend over for ones that don't because of public opinion). Logically, it doesn't make sense... but consumer logic has very little to do with the world of business and how a companies funds are allocated. Having said this, I own up to accountability in light of the situation that we players are in.

If I'm inactive for 45 days, I know what I'm getting in to and what results of this (due to limitations and demand by the players, our peers). I'm more amazed that there's the 80% cost recovery for the plot. Speaking from my own situation, if I quit for 45+ days, it's because I'm done. I'm willing to bet an overwhelming majority of players would be in the same standing on the matter, where they are not in a situation that sub cost means going homeless sort of thing. In light of the problems players face now, the solution is simply one that you take into account for your actions. If you're done with a game, why the hell would you give a damn about something not being there if you have no foreseeable intentions of returning? SE, and thus the players, hardly need to think about such fickle consumers. Great if they come back, but they're not going to bank on that over already existing subscribers.

Mind you, I'm not saying this system is perfect, but it's just something they want to try. And again, from my own standing... I'd say I have more to lose on the matter than most players, in terms of costs spent and time investment for the housing situation.