How do you feel about them talking about divided servers?

[Syrous]

I'm all for multiculturalism. I don't want separate servers, and I've never had alot of problems with the "JP only" mentality. I have encountered it once or twice in my FFXI career (7 years) but most of my encounters with japanese players have been pleasant ones.

[Fensfield]

I've said it a few times, I really dislike the idea of language specific servers. It takes something away from the 'ideal' splitting everyone by language, and I know I'd feel the difference; I always find myself a bit gladdened seeing another language being spoken and trying to divine a bit from the little I know, even moreso the few times I've managed to hold a conversation, if only a small one, without using the auto-translator. Not to mention the servers always feel alive because there's near always someone, from somewhere, playing. It doesn't matter if there'd be global ones, too, it just.. it feels so cynical and disappointing, even before we get into the economy implications and so forth, and the fact that the global servers will always suffer beside the language-specific ones.

A lot could probably be done to help with lag.. .. but making servers language specific's not going to help with that. Sticking a language tag by the server name does not equate to moving it to a different part of the world or optimising its data transfer architecture.

Anyway, no, I was so immensely disappointed .. and a little bit sickened, when Yoshida announced the intent for language specific servers. Not up to a full blown argument on the matter, though. I'll dig up my old posts on it if necessary but just stick me vehemently in the 'Don't' column, for now.

[Madruk]

What's the problem? Freedom of choice.

...Or are you afraid the majority will pick a server you don't prefer?

[Zumi]

I rather play on a English only server. So hope we get the option of picking one when V2.0 comes out.

[Fensfield]

Actually, you know what, I'm just going to put this here, if only because of the poster above (Madruk):

The people who want to be on a specific regional server aren't doing anything with you now anyways. You'll not even notice them missing.

Except.. you know, being there.

The beauty of this genre is the fact that everyone, everyone is a part of your experience.. even if the only role they play in your experience is to make your backdrop all the more alive. Given the majority will, likely, choose not to be on the global servers, I think that benefit will be impacted - unless, perhaps, there are proportionally less global ones I suppose.

Sure, having the choice to only play with people can understand you might outweigh that benefit.. but all the same, I think I'd notice they were missing, for my part and were I to go to a segregated server, especially if I opted to play during off-peak hours.

... Now, if they were to link day-night cycles to the server's language's native region's, that might result in the world getting quieter during its night. Which.. might actually be kind of cool. Of course as much as I favour a 23 hour day/night cycle (so the time in game is always different but the sun doesn't rocket through the sky like it does now), that's probably really, really unlikely.

[Fensfield]

And then my response to the two subsequent replies to the above-quoted post..

I guess they should only have one server. You know, so that way everyone is there and you aren't missing out on their presence.

... Yes?

Ideally speaking, they should. Sharding isn't a feature; it's a consequence of the limitations of modern server technology. Being able to dedicate blade servers to individual star systems and subsequently have everyone on the same 'world' is one of the things makes EVE Online so special (and something CCP tout regularly and enthusiastically, and consider one of the game's a big selling points).

I'd consider a working, single-shard fantasy MMO on Final Fantasy XIV's intended scale an amazing, wonderful feat in and of itself and a draw in its own right - although for everyone's sanity it would require realistically sized cities and spaces between them, probably. Then again by the time server tech's on a level could make a standard-form fantasy MMORPG work with a shard-less setup, that probably won't be terribly difficult.

Sarcasm aside, that would be pretty nice. Assuming the lag wouldn't be so thick you could taste it and the game would run just as smooth, I'd be all for this.

That being said, it's not gonna happen for many years to come, and probably not in this game.

Exactly, thank you.

There, that should sum up my feelings on the matter nicely. Sorry I don't feel like getting into another debate about it / re-stating all that in different words, especially given the likelihood the usual amounts of spite will accompany.

[Forerunner]

Hardly. With properly optimized servers your lag would be reduced to around 0.2-0.3 seconds at worst. Right now even the Japanese with 0.002 second lag are experiencing the same delays as you are.

In some other games 0.3 seconds is a huge number, but in this game they could easily lock everyone to 200ms and nobody would notice.

For personal reasons I will be disappointed if regional servers make it in. I always felt that I couldn't reach FFXI's full potential because I could only speak English, and I was excited that this time it wouldn't be the case, but that won't happen if regional servers are included.

So say you turn they key in the ignition of your car, and 2 seconds laters the engine turns over.

You wouldn't notice?

The delay we have now is freaking terrible.

Back on topic: I love playing with people worldwide.

[Tibian]

Language based servers are a great choice to have for those who want it.

If you wan't to be on a server where your primary language only constitutes 20% of the player base; feel free to.

I however, would like the choice to transfer to an english speaking server because that is my primary language. It isn't about cultural bashing, misunderstandings, or even racism as I've seen discussed. The simple fact is, we play and communicate best in our primary language.

Stop being huge debby-downers because there will be both international and region specific servers. If you want to play on the international servers using auto-translate to speak to your 'friends' in another language, nobody is stopping you.

Don't ruin it for those of us who want to actually speak and have an engaging conversation with other people though.

Furthermore, I think there is a misconception in this thread about "regional servers" and "language based" servers. I consider them the same, though I have a feeling some people think regional servers might be US/EU/Asia.

However if a server happens to get region-locked via NA IP's only... I'd definitely go to that server for reduced lag and the bonus of english primary speakers. With that being said, I don't want them to lock servers based on IP because I do have some EU friends (who speak english) and I'd hate for them to be locked out.

[Chardrizard]

I don't mind either way, but if they are going to do it, cross-server member search should be already around for people that plays at odd hour.

[Lakefingers]

Everyone plays in NA timezones so they all want to see the pretty "multiculturalism" while everyone else has to stay up till 4am just to do some decent content with other players. Fail.