Skipping MSQ

[Violyre]

Seeing a lot of threads about level jumping potions and one of the excuses thrown about a lot is new players. Thought I'd offer an alternative, buying the game and expansion(s) would automatically unlock the following:

Character select - create new character - select to start at 'A Realm Reborn' lv.1, 'Heavensward' lv.50 and eventually 'Stormblood' lv.60.

Problem solved right?

Why would anyone start at level one if they had the immediate and free option of starting at 50/60? Why don't we just cut ARR, and eventually Heavensward, out completely? Removing all of those old zones would do a lot to help their profits, not to mention no longer needing to make things work between expansion zones.

Terrible idea, both level jump and yours. Your method just makes less sense.

[SenorPatty]

So if the budget increase isn't due to cash shop sales, where did the money come from? Did it come from their asses?

Oh I don't know...maybe from basically SE's overall revenue from virtually every other game/merchandise they sell, which then gets re-allocated to whatever team needs it?

Just a wild guess o.O

[Jandor]

So if the budget increase isn't due to cash shop sales, where did the money come from? Did it come from their asses?

Probably the millions and millions of dollars the game brings in from sales and subs. This is the game credited with saving SE as a company after all, saving it way before it had a cash shop as well.

Why would anyone start at level one if they had the immediate and free option of starting at 50/60? Why don't we just cut ARR, and eventually Heavensward, out completely? Removing all of those old zones would do a lot to help their profits, not to mention no longer needing to make things work between expansion zones.

Terrible idea, both level jump and yours. Your method just makes less sense.

No, the terrible idea is introducing tangible progress in exchange for money.

Treating 'A realm reborn/Heavensward/Stormblood' as a trilogy and letting weird people start with the 3rd one if for some reason they want to isn't something I particularly want, but considering the push for it (oh please won't someone think of the newbies!) it's by far the better option.

As for why anyone would play it, I've argued for a 'new game+' option before. I'd actually quite like to go back through the story on my character, if I'd started with 4.0 and never done it before it'd be great doing it the first time and getting xp for a 2nd or 3rd class at the same time.

E: In fact, typing this out has made me come around to the idea a bit more, new guy hears about FFXIV from his friends, dives straight into the latest expansion with them, and then can unlock 2.0 and 3.0 from the Wandering Minstrel and play them to level alt classes. New guy is happy, the old MSQ stuff is still useful, cash shop is kept in check, everyone's happy?

Still... this idea is dead in the water anyway. Topic basically opens up with "this shouldn't be in the cash shop" and the first reply is "but then how would SE make money from it?"

[Stanelis]

So if the budget increase isn't due to cash shop sales, where did the money come from? Did it come from their asses?

Basically yes, or the bank, or the subs, or the flat sales on the boxes. But the last financial report didn't point in the direction of increased investment in FFXIV despite increased incomes from online operations. The fact that profits increase doesn't mean the investment increases.

We used to have 3 dungeons, yes. We also didn't have Aquapolis, Lord of Verminion (Bad at the start but they fixed it by putting it in the DF), the GS TT Battlehall, Chocobo Race challenges, SSS dummies, Diadem (it was actually popular when it was new), The Feast, etc. Let's just act as if nothing new was introduced to XIV through 3.0 to 3.5, shall we?

That's typically what I was talking about when I mentioned content below the industry standards. Aside from PoTD (which is content based on FFXI design), every piece of content you mentioned has been abandoned very quickly by the player base due to very low quality standards.

Despite all the efforts the dev team did put in FFXIV's pvp, it's still a part of FFXIV which is being forsaken by the gaming community.

Also, I m glad you talked about chocobo races. Back in 2015 I had the opportunity to let a potential new player interested in FFXIV partake in a chocobo race. Do you know what he told me when I asked me if he wanted to do another race ? He replied "No, I had a good memory of FFVII's races, but this piece of content totally ruin them".

Cop out answer, you'd need hard subscription numbers as well as potential income from said subscribers. If the profits of 2.0-2.5 are higher than 3.0-3.5 come June, then I'll be glad to accept that I am wrong, otherwise, I'm sure XIV is doing just fine.

Please note I m talking about the number of players. Not the income from FFXIV.

[Lunafreya]

It should. You want to skip content others had to level through. The trade off to that is having to pay extra.



More money for Square Enix translates into more content for FFXIV or other titles they produce I happen to like.

I can't hear you over all the money that was put into FFXV.

[Felis]

Oh I don't know...maybe from basically SE's overall revenue from virtually every other game/merchandise they sell, which then gets re-allocated to whatever team needs it?

Just a wild guess o.O

So it come still from cash shop (because it is part of the overall income of SE)

[LineageRazor]

I know the white knighting is strong in those forums (because you can't post if you didn't log into the game for 15 days) but I can assure you FFXIV isn't doing that well in the west (maybe things are different in japan).

Cynical black knighting with little or no hard evidence to support your claims is hardly more admirable.

So, if you laugh at the thought that SE invests cash shop money back into the game, but admit that they ARE putting additional money into the game but don't know for sure where it came from... Just what makes you so sure none of that money comes from the cash shop?

More likely, I think, that the profits from ALL SE's sources - cash shop, other games, what have you - gets pooled, and then distributed where it is needed. Cash shop may not funnel directly back into the game, but by increasing SE's overall revenue you can bet that it helps, nonetheless.

[Daranion]

Actually yes I WOULD like proof of this 3x the budget claim. I too fell for this story once, but noone has ever proven anything. The only budget related information I can find is "We're reinvesting money into the servers for the first time. This is a monumental event yadda yadda"

[SenorPatty]

So it come still from cash shop (because it is part of the overall income of SE)

True but Violyre's post implied that stormblood's budget came strictly from cash shop.

Which if it actually did, I'd be amazed. Like, meme-level amazed.

[Khubla_Kha]

Snip

Why would any company seeking profit do this? The potions are obviously the better option in SE's eyes as it is additional cash on top of the people already having to pay for the game + expansions. No company is going to make this choice over the alternative they have already put in motion. Regardless of people's opinion on the matter SE is not going to choose to give away free what they've already decided they will charge for.

These potions are only going to positively effect their bottom line no matter how much pissing and moaning goes on here at the forums.