Free Login Event completely undermines inactive housing

[Saint_Angeles]

Funny how no one is mentioning the other side of things, where it's a nice (and most than likely unintentional) thing for those of us who do have houses, and may be between subs. They'll be able to continue holding on to their houses a little longer during the holiday season.

[EthanParcival]

Really SE?! just effin really?

Resetting the house timers during a free month? Making those who actually pay and WANT a house wait another 45 days starting January 1st?

You sure want many of your active players to just drop out and take our dollars elsewhere don't cha?

*Yeah I'm annoyed by yet another foul play*

[saberchic]

I'm not sure just exactly how many plots people think were going to be free on Christmas Day, but it's not like there was going to be this huge mass release of housing becoming available. I swear it's like people think entire residential districts are going to open up with how some of them talk on here.

Look, I'm a little disappointed that my search for a house might be prolonged even more, but there is no use getting worked up over this. All this means is that maybe a few houses get back on the market a bit later.

[dejiko_san]

Look at this situation from a different view.

1. Wait until the free log in period starts, look if you see anyone near the areas where you are scoping out houses.

There might be more people or it could just be as dead as ever. You can also look up the player that owns the house on Lodestone. If they haven't changed look or gear, they're probably not coming back.

If they do change look, that means they're still interested in the game somewhat and would of eventually come back anyway.

Right now, getting angry about it won't change much as it's impossible to know how many people will come back.

[Beckett]

Previously, everyone with an inactive house would get an email, and each person would have to decide whether it was worth it to spend $10-15 to preserve their house. We would have had some people who would go for it, but we definitely would have people who wouldn't want to go through the bother.

Now, every person who has even the slightest inkling that they might want to come back to FFXIV someday will log on for the Free Login Campaign. The only houses that will open up now are the ones from people that are 100% certain they will never play the game again, or might play the game again but can't be bothered to take two minutes to log in for free.

If it wasn't obvious before that the Housing Reclamation System is really just a ploy to bring back old subs, it certainly is now. Good for SE for getting more subs, I guess, but I find it disingenuous to market this as a fix for the lack of housing when that's clearly a distant secondary goal, at best.

[Beckett]

it's impossible to know how many people will come back.

More than before.
It's impossible to know an exact number, but it's easy to see that much more people will come back now than would have before the Free Login Campaign.

[Ryuko]

OP does have a point. Anyone with a registered account will probably receive both an email about the free login period and an email about their house's pending demolition within a few days or weeks of each other. All it takes is a little bit of paying attention to take advantage of this offer... and who wouldn't? It gives you plenty of time to finish the most recent story advancements.

It's kind of a weird thing to think about, because if the free login weekend is successful (and SE operates under the assumption that it will be successful), they really should have considered the effect the free login weekend would have on houses pending demolition and release to the public. If SE thinks it will not be very good, then this is irrelevant... so it makes me wonder the origins of their choice. I'm sure someone, somewhere in the company would have thought about this scenario... so it's just curious to me why they made this decision. I'm hoping we'll get an official response. For all we know, they WILL restrict the housing demolitions to only people with *active* accounts, and are hoping that people having a free login opportunity will hook them in and make them want to renew their actual subscription and come back to the game. Obviously, this is always the aim of these free login periods, but the fact that the timing coincides with the housing demolitions makes it even more tempting to renew when you have your house's pending demolition literally dangling in front of you. If I was part of SE's marketing team, this would sound like a great idea. It's also interesting that this should happen in December... the last month of the year. Or is it because they anticipate the 3.15 patch being REALLY good?

That said, I don't really care either way because I bought my FC's house by staying up when 2.3 was about to launch, and then grabbing it... and I've never canceled my sub. At the same time, I can understand why active, loyal fans would be upset that people who aren't active or loyal can just come back and keep these houses in place. I really think most of the houses that will be auto-demolished will belong to individuals, not FCs. At the same time, it might be better if houses being released are a bit more staggered (that way, it won't be a specific date when a lot of houses are just miraculously released, and the repurchase process would be a bit more 'natural' and less timed).

[Sakuraluna]

If they do change look, that means they're still interested in the game somewhat and would of eventually come back anyway.

Thing is, if they just log in, teleport to the residential area, enter the house and run around a bit before logging back out again their lodestone probably won't change at all.

As far as looks, there are also those who are happy and settled into a certain look for their character and won't change much at all if anything. If they're a level 60 and wearing fairly updated gear there's always a chance they could come back. If there's nothing indicating that they've logged in within the last year though, then they've most probably moved on to another game, or just moved on with their lives by now.

[Jinxie]

With the housing reclamation announced there was a spark of hope for those wanting houses to get a christmas miracle!

....with the announcement of free logins which are emailed to inactive accounts, as well as the inactive email for 'we're destroying your house' they've very effectively killed hope.

Merry Christmas folks.

[crc0427]

I believe if you don't have a paid subscription, the free log-in campaign won't "refresh" your 45 days. I hope I'm right anyway.