What if (PS4 and PC become seperated)

[Kirsten_Rev]

What you think would happen to the game?
This mostly couple of stuff i been talking about with friends. Wanted to hear you guys opinion.

My is the game will become "meh".

Communities would fracture, the PS4 version would likely die off outside of Japan, and the PC version would likely die off in Japan.

If the game survived these immediate short-term consequences, I don't really think there would be much of an impact. My personal 'Top 10 Things I'd Like to Change' list for FFXIV doesn't feature anything that would be somehow limited, or even influenced by, multi-platform support. I mean, sure, I'd love HD textures, no loading zones, and some bigger maps, but none of those factors are pushing me away from the game, nor would changing them lessen the feeling of 'bleh' I have surrounding the next expansion cycle.

I will, however, put forward one caveat: if splitting the game across platforms meant Yoshi-P stepped down from his role for one or both platforms, I think we'd see potentially tremendous improvement for the version under a fresh set of eyes. I cannot recall any supposedly-premium MMO with less ambition than FFXIV has featured for the past four years or so. It feels to me like Yoshi-P and team brought the game back from the brink of death, only to turn it into a virtual bubble boy. Not that I think a split would be good even under this scenario, but in this case, I could see an upside if it survived the inevitable community fracturing.

Yoshida and the XIV team refuse to separate the community by platform. That's the main roadblock to getting the game onto more consoles since they need Sony and Microsoft to agree on allowing PS4 and Xbox players to play together. The console guys aren't relaxing their policies and S-E will not compromise to make Xbox Live-only worlds disconnected from other players.

Fixed it for you Sony has been the primary roadblock for years in terms of cross-platform play (see: Minecraft, Fortnight, etc.). It's arguable that's understandable given their status in the console world, but cross-platform play definitely isn't a Microsoft problem right now.

[LauraAdalena]

snip

I don't get this thing that people have been doing where they say "If Yoshi-P steps down it'll improve." God no. Changing out major roles is far more likely to lead to catastrophic failure. Only reason it was successful with FFXIV was because Yoshi-P generally had a vague idea of what players wanted and was able to rally the team and get them all to see his vision. Doing that again right now from one person to an unknown is far more likely to start causing miscommunications between departments like there was during 1.0 pre-Yoshi. The FFXIV change of head was a miraculous recovery, one that is rare to replicate or even come close to the stability afterward. Especially given how rigorous they want their release schedule to be.

If anything, they need to slow down or take a break from developing the game. They need to stop right now and give more time between SB and the next expansion. Only reason I say this is because they're working themselves into a corner with the rigorous patch cycle they want.

[Kirsten_Rev]

I don't get this thing that people have been doing where they say "If Yoshi-P steps down it'll improve." God no. Changing out major roles is far more likely to lead to catastrophic failure. Only reason it was successful with FFXIV was because Yoshi-P generally had a vague idea of what players wanted and was able to rally the team and get them all to see his vision. Doing that again right now from one person to an unknown is far more likely to start causing miscommunications between departments like there was during 1.0 pre-Yoshi. The FFXIV change of head was a miraculous recovery, one that is rare to replicate or even come close to the stability afterward. Especially given how rigorous they want their release schedule to be.

If anything, they need to slow down or take a break from developing the game. They need to stop right now and give more time between SB and the next expansion. Only reason I say this is because they're working themselves into a corner with the rigorous patch cycle they want.

From my perspective, the pace they've set is also Yoshi-P's responsibility. He's the director, after all - it's his call whether or not they slow down the pace of content releases.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know the full picture. All I do know is that the game is no longer grabbing at me, personally, nor is it appealing really to most of my friends. I and my friends are all hungry for something fresh, but nothing has been delivered - for years now. While it's certainly possible that Yoshi-P is not at fault here, all available evidence - and his position as both Director of the game and an Executive Officer at SE - suggests he's at the root of what I feel is bland, unambitious development.

As to the risk of things getting worse... well, yeah, it's certainly possible. But again, speaking personally, I don't feel I have much to lose. I'm not planning on continuing into 5.0 unless I see major changes, and once my house gets demolished, I'll have precious little reason to ever return again down the road.

I can't speak for others on the forums, but that's why I'd welcome a change at the top. I'd happily suffer through a period of chaos if it meant I had hope for the game to meaningfully evolve.

[Rhysati]

From my perspective, the pace they've set is also Yoshi-P's responsibility. He's the director, after all - it's his call whether or not they slow down the pace of content releases.

I'll be the first to admit that I don't know the full picture. All I do know is that the game is no longer grabbing at me, personally, nor is it appealing really to most of my friends. I and my friends are all hungry for something fresh, but nothing has been delivered - for years now. While it's certainly possible that Yoshi-P is not at fault here, all available evidence - and his position as both Director of the game and an Executive Officer at SE - suggests he's at the root of what I feel is bland, unambitious development.

As to the risk of things getting worse... well, yeah, it's certainly possible. But again, speaking personally, I don't feel I have much to lose. I'm not planning on continuing into 5.0 unless I see major changes, and once my house gets demolished, I'll have precious little reason to ever return again down the road.

I can't speak for others on the forums, but that's why I'd welcome a change at the top. I'd happily suffer through a period of chaos if it meant I had hope for the game to meaningfully evolve.

I pretty much fully agree with you here. The game has stagnated badly. I can't get invested in logging in to grind through leveling up yet another class for no reason. I can't be bothered to care about the story that is fed to us bit by bit. The dungeons are so easy that you can easily 1-shot them on the day of release without a wipe and then just turn into speed-run things that are boring as can be. And the only reason to do the dungeons is to get tomes to buy gear so you can run more dungeons.

The game needs a shake-up. It needs harder content, it needs a different progression system. It needs anything that gives it a fresh coat of paint right now. I truly believe that the only reason it is continuing to do well is because there are no other options out there besides WoW at the moment if you want a truly complete AAA mmorpg. The environment is ripe for a well-constructed and fresh MMORPG to swing in full-force and steal the populations of both games.

[Dzian]

Fixed it for you Sony has been the primary roadblock for years in terms of cross-platform play (see: Minecraft, Fortnight, etc.). It's arguable that's understandable given their status in the console world, but cross-platform play definitely isn't a Microsoft problem right now.

admitedly i'm a little out of touch with the absolute latest info on cross play but..

It's All of them. not just one. if you look beneath the surface hype at least. one of the issues preventing cross play is developers on ps4 aren't required to gate there game behind psn plus for online play even though many choose to (for various reasons) which is why many of the indie titles out there don't need it. nor does 14.

on the microsoft side online play has to be locked behind xbox gold it's a mandatory requirement of there t&cs and also one of the big things that stops ffxiv going to xbox

a big part of the underlying disagreement between them is (or was maybe its changed) Sony won't make PS+ mandatory and Microsodt won't make Gold optional...

[jameseoakes]

Fixed it for you Sony has been the primary roadblock for years in terms of cross-platform play (see: Minecraft, Fortnight, etc.). It's arguable that's understandable given their status in the console world, but cross-platform play definitely isn't a Microsoft problem right now.

This isn't true in this instance, one of the main issues with the XBOX in addition to the gold requirement was Microsofts demand the xbox live (or whatever they call it) players have the option to only play with other xbox live players. From what we have been told they haven't even got to stage where they are involving Sony. People really need to stop bring this game in to issues with other games.

If they split the games I'd stop playing, too main of my friends are on the PC and I am very social in this game and it is the main thing that keeps me playing.