Gender locked race?

[Ashyra]

There's no profit in adding a new race, it's purely to give us more ways to express ourselves.
I don't foresee them changing anything personally. The western English speakers have a loud minority on this forum but the other OFs don't care nearly as much and by large most people don't feel strongly about this.

New races bring players in, so there is definitely profit in that. More players, more profit. It also helps to prevent lost subs from those who get bored with the same thing and need a change.

I'm not arguing the fact because I don't know, but I am curious... how do you know "by large most people don't feel strongly about this"? I think most gamers only want to play their games and not involve themselves in forum discussions and ultimately it's very hard to know what they want or don't want until the numbers come in after the expansion is released. I am hoping the expansion will be a huge success for Square Enix and for us who play it but I think the gender lock issue is a bigger issue than they projected and will reflect in those numbers after it's release.

[reivaxe]

New races bring players in, so there is definitely profit in that. More players, more profit. It also helps to prevent lost subs from those who get bored with the same thing and need a change.

I'm not arguing the fact because I don't know, but I am curious... how do you know "by large most people don't feel strongly about this"? I think most gamers only want to play their games and not involve themselves in forum discussions and ultimately it's very hard to know what they want or don't want until the numbers come in after the expansion is released. I am hoping the expansion will be a huge success for Square Enix and for us who play it but I think the gender lock issue is a bigger issue than they projected and will reflect in those numbers after it's release.

No, content brings players and keep players. Content means things you play or do. New Jobs/ DNGs/ Raids/ events/ MSQ keep players from being bored and help make this game a quality choice for fans of MMOs. I'd like to know how you think people go about getting into this game. Think people are holding off on playing until they add "just the right new race"? Think players are going "ya know, I'm not bored with the jobs or dngs or raids or story ... but I AM tired of these races and my character! I wanna be something different than the 6 races we have, Imma unsub until they add new races I may or may not like"?

As for "How you know" you answer it in the next sentence. Unless they're banned any active player can sign up to the OF to voice their opinion. If you're an active player chances are you follow some news about this game and know about it. If someone feels strongly about this they have paths to express those feelings. Truth of the matter is that only a small % of the player base bother to come to this forum. On these very forums the Jpn side's thread on the matter is far FAR smaller clocking in at 25pages. In other, less censored spaces to talk about this game people don't bring it up nearly as much and actively buck against this whining more openly (like how Male Viera threads on reddit get down voted to hell because people who don't care have had it with this topic and the whining). Many of the same few people flood the topics for this to bump those topics and keep it visible.

This has all the makings of "vocal minority".

[BillyKaplan]

I'd like to know how you think people go about getting into this game. Think people are holding off on playing until they add "just the right new race"?

It's funny you say that, because we've seen various posts through the various threads on the matter of people who have, in fact, picked up the game after the announcement of playable Viera (and were subsequently disappointed by the locking of males).
It might not be why you specifically pick up a game, but it's more than a valid reason for others.

[Melichoir]

snip

Hmm, its more accurate to say that Content in the game keeps players busy, but if the aesthetics are limiting, content is irrelevant.

If everyone was teh exact same player model, there would be far fewer players. Part of MMOs and their appeal is that part that we tend to leave off. You know, the RPG part. This entails broadly an aspect of role playing, and races fill that necessity. It actually is a turn on or off for some players if they dotn find any of the playable races aesthetically appealing. As an example, I never played the original GW cause the race aspect didnt appeal to me. Game couldve been fine, but I liked WoW for that character diversity.

And yeah, if people unsub over the gender thing (which some people have already) that is their choice. You can think its stupid, but if SE isnt providing the player what they want, why should the player continue paying for it. Lastly, it's threads like this or the Viera threads or what not that got Male Miqotes and Fem Roes/Highlanders in the game in the first place. So its a bit rich to dismiss these boards as being insignificant. What you also fail to understand is that a silent majority doesnt inherently mean they disagree with the vocal minority (nor are in favor of it). Theyre just silent. However, If you could poll most players, most would probably side along the idea of "Yeah, Id be cool with those in the game." Also, as a point, the 'whales' tend to be also pretty vocal, so this vocal minority is probably people who are willing to dish out money for SE.

[reivaxe]

It's funny you say that, because we've seen various posts through the various threads on the matter of people who have, in fact, picked up the game after the announcement of playable Viera (and were subsequently disappointed by the locking of males).
It might not be why you specifically pick up a game, but it's more than a valid reason for others.

I'm sure all 3 or w/e of them are so very disappointed that a game they paid money to play months before Viera would even been available got only what the race was shown as up to this point ...

Hmm, its more accurate to say that Content in the game keeps players busy, but if the aesthetics are limiting, content is irrelevant.

I'mma break my rule of ignoring "snip' quoters cause I find that much issue with this.

Content is key. It doesn't just keep people "busy", it gives them new and exciting ways to experience the game. It's where players get their enjoyment ... seeing how even cosmetic rewards for us Casuals who see Fashion as the "true endgame" is indeed content.

Content is legit anything added to the game that can be played, used or earned and this game is huge because it has a ton of it. Even if the only reason you sub for a month is to do a seasonal event (not for story or puzzles but because you want the glam or house items or mounts) you came back for content ...

From what I can tell of the most popular WW MMOs right now are WoW, FF and GW2. Of these the only one that constantly adds races is WoW because it's a game that can be played on a toaster. And they're losing players all over the place because people do not like the direction they're taking the game play, the Content... adding a new race isn't gonna fix that. On the other hand GW2 will never add more races and it's doing just fine.

If everyone was teh exact same player model, there would be far fewer players.

Point isn't and has never been that this game would be just as popular if we only had 1 character model, that's strew man non-sense you made up and shows why I ignore post that delete what they're quoting.

As an example, I never played the original GW cause the race aspect didnt appeal to me. Game couldve been fine, but I liked WoW for that character diversity.

Find that example funny because you don't bring up playing GW2, the sequel that adds a wonderfully diverse line up of races. Almost like more goes into sticking with an MMO ... like content.

And yeah, if people unsub over the gender thing (which some people have already) that is their choice. You can think its stupid, but if SE isnt providing the player what they want, why should the player continue paying for it.

1- I DO think it's stupid to leave the game over that (I never said that in my post but ya know, you seem to like strew maning it up so w/e). It's something you never had and seeing as it's not in the game you're playing NOW you seem to clearly find reason to play anyway.
2- People can do it, their sub wont be messed seeing as someone willing to do that prob wasn't invested in the game to begin with and would find some other reason to leave. Like how people threaten to leave because of Eureka ... Ok, sure, either you're gonna throw away everything you enjoy about this game because of that OR you're buffin, I don't care.

3- This has nothing to do with my post lmao

Lastly, it's threads like this or the Viera threads or what not that got Male Miqotes and Fem Roes/Highlanders in the game in the first place. So its a bit rich to dismiss these boards as being insignificant.

They did it because Yoshi wanted to. The situation is NOT the same here (and even when he did that he didn't seem to have a problem with the concept of no male Viera back then according to that comment of his that people ignored).

"The timing of the game launch, the races needed to have each gender counterpart for ARR. When I took over for ARR, I wanted to fill the missing gender to make those races seem complete. What is different now compared to then. After multiple expansions, the situation isn’t the same as when we released the base game. …"

When they made those genders for those races they were trying to save this game by any means at a time when it was far FAR smaller. Now they're successful af and the game is much MUCH larger.

"When we create one gear, we have to make adjustments so it fits all these different races. So when we add new races, we have to adjust how to approach this process. The development cost for making a new race is very intense because of how much work we put into the graphics of the game. We also have to make sure these things all work properly. That's why we are saying these may be the last races because of how taxing it is on the development team."

They knew there would get blow back but did it anyway cause it's the best path towards pleasing the most people.

"We did expect strong feedback on the gender lock. It was a tough decision, but we decided to do our best to meet both the player feedback and our development team’s vision. It will be very costly to add a new race or genders. So I won’t say no, but I would not like to set expectations high. "

You can say "But this worked before!" but you would be ignoring the fact that the man in charge was the one who decided to do it because he wanted to ... he's not beholden to your wishes and that man is also OK with things being the way they are now.

[MrKimper]

You can say "But this worked before!" but you would be ignoring the fact that the man in charge was the one who decided to do it because he wanted to ... he's not beholden to your wishes and that man is also OK with things being the way they are now.

They literally reworked WAR and tanks within the span of the expansion because people complained so much about gauges being halved for stance switching/WAR inner release and unchained sharing a CD.
I mean this is the same man who said MCH/Wanderer's Minuet on release was fine and players just needed to get good only to buff it in almost every patch during HW because they didn't account for how much auto-attacks counted for DPS and Wander's minuet effectively was a DPS loss to have up at any time. MCH was it's own grab bag of low potencies.
They even removed cast times on ranged stances altogether because of how much people hated them. I mean they COMPLETELY re-worked diadem because of how poorly it was received on launch.

Implying the developers ignore feedback/feedback can't effect their stance on content is a really really ignorant stance to have, not only that why would you want to play a game where a development team literally doesn't listen to it's community feedback both positive and negative?
You can argue that this is just whining but you can make that same argument about literally any complaint about anything in the game. It's a disingenuous mentality to have.
Saying "Your feedback won't change anything" isn't a stance you should have when addressing any complaint.

[Crushnight]

Snip

This is a big post so bear with me

Small bit of wisdom for you Aesthetics is the bait Content is the hook one is more valuable than the other but you do need both to draw new people in, discounting one is not good design in my opinion full Hrothgar race would've been better than the current implementation, it feels like they have spread themselves too thin as they gave themselves more work than had they stuck with a single race.

The way they went about giving us this information also was incredibly poorly handled by SE and people can and probably have quit due to how things have gone it is not stupid to do so saying it is IS stupid how dare you tell people how they feel about a game is stupid you can think it but don't say it yeesh. People are invested into the same game for different reasons no reason is more valid than another just like the reasons to leave a game are all valid, again you can think it is stupid just don't say it or at least not on OF. Also never be happy people are leaving for whatever reason unless they are a known '(insert whatever nasty word you can think here)'.

Something else to consider is SE didn't NEED to do things this way they CHOOSE to they made a decision and they are dealing with the consequences this thread is one of those and it is trying to give feedback to the devs that they expressly wanted to know.

Stop using JP forums as a counter argument they have lower threads because they keep things consolidated into a single thread, they also interact with each other differently someone like you or me wouldn't be in a JP thread we are too confrontational so threads do not get bloated due to arguments between users. We also have far far more forum users than JP we are about 5x bigger overall and that is mostly due to how English is a more universal language for people so we attract a wider audience and a wider audience brings in more opinions as well as differences in opinions.
JP forums =/= EN forums we function too differently to accurately compare so stop trying to compare us.

You really need to stop down playing aesthetic value people care far more than you seem to think but we also need to fully accept we are a vocal minority that does not speak for the silent majority, but since SE does not seem to send out any type of survey the only way they can get feedback is data and the vocal minority, and sorry to say that it is the aesthetic requests that have received the most support these forums have ever seen from the vocal minority.

snip

I use gender lock in this way, i do not like that we are locked in to playing female characters for Viera and male characters for Hrothgar. This is perfectly valid use of the term gender lock so i'm going to ask do not bring the semantics of the term gender lock back into this thread when there is a full thread already available discussing it.

[BillyKaplan]

I'm sure all 3 or w/e of them are so very disappointed that a game they paid money to play months before Viera would even been available got only what the race was shown as up to this point ...

This forum isn't 100% of the population - it's a sample. For every post you see here there are dozens to hundreds to maybe thousands of players who share those views, they simply didn't come to the forums to say it. That means your opinion too, yes. But that still doesn't change the fact that people like that exist, that Viera as a playable race was a grab for some people, especially ones who have fantasized about playing Viera in general and Viera males in particular since their introduction into the FF universe.
It's very easy to say in hindsight that people shouldn't have bothered until after ShB was out and we saw exactly what we were getting. And believe you me, I know a lot of people who aren't going to preorder the next expansion following this fiasco. But the irony of the situation is that people preordered and hoped on because of faith placed in the devs. Faith in the team that removed the Miqo'te, Highlander, and Roe genderlocks to not repeat mistakes they themselves fixed. Faith that they won't pull the rug under our feet at the very last fanfest, faith that they'd be more honest about no male Viera if that was the case before the Tokyo FanFest .
They could've said at any point male Viera wasn't coming but we were getting something else. They didn't have to directly asked about it, only to give the single most elusive, avoiding answer that still gave people hope they could've given. They knew exactly what they were doing every step of the way.

And I think that's a big part of what gets people riled up about this, more so than the genderlocking itself - it's how SE went about it, it's how dishonest they were about it, and people can bring lore in-game and out of game or what not all they want. They were asked about male Viera and repeatedly kept quiet about them not being introduced, only leading the players on because "we still have the Tokyo FanFest". That's just poor form on itself, then you remember players could lose the right for a refund on their preorder and it just looks bad.

[Beki_Bayaqad]

But the irony of the situation is that people preordered and hoped on because of faith placed in the devs. Faith in the team that removed the Miqo'te, Highlander, and Roe genderlocks to not repeat mistakes they themselves fixed. Faith that they won't pull the rug under our feet at the very last fanfest, faith that they'd be more honest about no male Viera if that was the case before the Tokyo FanFest .

They never promised to never gender lock. That was people assuming their motives. People need to stop doing that.

And I think that's a big part of what gets people riled up about this, more so than the genderlocking itself - it's how SE went about it, it's how dishonest they were about it, and people can bring lore in-game and out of game or what not all they want. They were asked about male Viera and repeatedly kept quiet about them not being introduced, only leading the players on because "we still have the Tokyo FanFest". That's just poor form on itself, then you remember players could lose the right for a refund on their preorder and it just looks bad.

A lack of information is not lying. It's simply omission, calling them not saying anything dishonesty is just showing your lack of confidence in the team from the onset. You know they're very very busy about this update, the fact they had to spend two whole fanfests to introduce these races and just the whole expansion's trailer shows just how against the wire they are.

[BillyKaplan]

A lack of information is not lying. It's simply omission

Except there is such a thing as lie by omission. They were asked about male Viera and said to look forward to the Tokyo FanFest. They decided to say that instead of "they're not coming, see what we have instead in Tokyo". And they said that in a time pre-orders were high and the longer they stalled, the more people would lose eligibility for refund.
They could've shown the Viera race information stating it was genderlocked in Paris, as there was no reason not to do that. They chose not to.
Did players assume things? Yes, absolutely.
Did SE play on that as much as humanly possible? Also yes.

calling them not saying anything dishonesty is just showing your lack of confidence in the team from the onset.

Reread my post. If people didn't have faith in the dev team they wouldn't be so disappointed now. I can't see how that's the conclusion you reached, feel free to explain the logical chain.

You know they're very very busy about this update, the fact they had to spend two whole fanfests to introduce these races and just the whole expansion's trailer shows just how against the wire they are.

...and? So? What does that have anything to do with anything?