The FFXIV Cash Shop is greedy

[Edax]

All shops are greedy by design.

No they aren't. I go to my local butcher and I don't see an intense desire for wealth, just a passion for high quality meat.

greed·y
/ˈɡrēdē/

adjective
having or showing an intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth or power.

[Catwho]

This just sounds way too convenient.. pay to have access, but to actually support the game you need to pay for additional items.. right.

In the unlikely event that this is actually true, they're much better off never saying this. It's imo terrible PR and makes SE look very scummy (and disingenuous).

It's straight from Yoshi P. Cash shop funded the EU data center (they used to have to cross the Atlantic to play in Montreal) and later on the upgrade to the NA data center and its move to California.

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...from-EU-Stream

The XIV division remits all its profits to SE, who then handles their HR, payroll, facilities costs, etc, because they are a mega corp and that is how mega corps handle that kind of thing.

I used to work for a timber company. The division I supported as an IT analyst was in charge of collecting hunting leases from various parcels of land which were otherwise just growing trees. A team of ten people usually collected $20 million of revenue for the company. Did they split that 20 mil amongst themselves? Absolutely not. They got paid well, but not 2 mil a year well. Not even the director made that much - try maybe 10% of that. The value that they brought to the company was used to fund other operations, including my department, IT, which was considered an internal cost center since we didn't make any revenue for the organization.

[SamRF]

Why? Money any company makes from 1 service is going to be used to fund all projects a company has. They don't generally segregate funds other than via budget.

WoW funded most blizzard titles. All the cash shop stuff from over watch funds wow. Etc.

I don't doubt that money FFXIV makes will go to other projects (as it should, only makes sense). It's the distinction that Sub money mainly goes to other projects while Cash Shop mainly goes into supporting the game. This makes no sense, why make such distinction between revenue streams? Sounds like a way too convenient way of promoting Cash Shop sales. Even if it does make sense in some way I'm not aware of and it's actually true, we have no way of knowing it for sure so all it does for me is make SE look like cheap Cash Shop promoters while also taking away their credibility.

[Enla]

This just sounds way too convenient.. pay to have access, but to actually support the game you need to pay for additional items.. right.

In the unlikely event that this is actually true, they're much better off never saying this. It's imo terrible PR and makes SE look very scummy (and disingenuous).

If you look back and consider SE's financial situation back when A Realm Reborn first launched versus how it is now, you'll see why they leech so heavily from this game. FFXIV 2.0 legitimately was their biggest source of income in the gaming department for a long time after several botched and severely financially draining choices made across the board. There was a point when the original 2013 Tomb Raider reboot was considered a financial failure after selling 3.4 million copies because of the severe financial bloat SE was encouraging in all it's gaming projects. For some comparison, 3.4 million copies back in 2013 was insane for a single player game and while I can't find any articles right now to verify the number, I do remember that when this news broke back then there were ideas being tossed around that their desired sales target was something only games like Call of Duty were reaching at the time. It took them a year to make back all the money they spent making that game, and it wasn't the only game of theirs to underperform their expectations either. It was just the one they were the most vocal about and that the gaming community latched onto the hardest.

They've gotten 'better' about budget bloat since then (minus FFXV but that monster was never going to make back nearly 10 years of wasted development) but FFXIV remains their main cookie jar as of right now in part due to those past mistakes. They're never going to give it up, nor really should they. What they should do is take a little less money from the pot so Yoshi-P doesn't end up in situations where he's begging for server upgrades like the last time, but that's a discussion for another day.

[EtherRose]

Wait, what?

I bought the base game, I bought all expansion and I'm paying monthly like everbody else. I 'already' paid for it, let's be real here.

Right, no. Just like any other MMO you pay for the content given within the expansions and patches/updates that follow. Also monthly sub is paying for servers/maintenance/future expansions/content/paying employees, etc. So no, you did not "Pay" for everything in the mogstation. That's just your self entitlement speaking.

Explain to me then. Why doesn't WoW offer such an expansive Cash Shop as FFXIV? You're telling me blizzard/Activision won't jump at any opportunity to milk their fans?

They don't do it because they don't want to drive players away from their heavily critical playerbase that is know to complain over the slightest issues. It's business.

They already do. That's why WoW is still going. Also Blizzard is a bigger company with a lot more net worth compared to SE.

[SamRF]

I used to work for a timber company. The division I supported as an IT analyst was in charge of collecting hunting leases from various parcels of land which were otherwise just growing trees. A team of ten people usually collected $20 million of revenue for the company. Did they split that 20 mil amongst themselves? Absolutely not. They got paid well, but not 2 mil a year well. Not even the director made that much - try maybe 10% of that. The value that they brought to the company was used to fund other operations, including my department, IT, which was considered an internal cost center since we didn't make any revenue for the organization.

If you look back and consider SE's financial situation back when A Realm Reborn first launched versus how it is now, you'll see why they leech so heavily from this game. FFXIV 2.0 legitimately was their biggest source of income in the gaming department for a long time after several botched and severely financially draining choices made across the board. There was a point when the original 2013 Tomb Raider reboot was considered a financial failure after selling 3.4 million copies because of the severe financial bloat SE was encouraging in all it's gaming projects. For some comparison, 3.4 million copies back in 2013 was insane for a single player game and while I can't find any articles right now to verify the number, I do remember that when this news broke back then there were ideas being tossed around that their desired sales target was something only games like Call of Duty were reaching at the time. It took them a year to make back all the money they spent making that game, and it wasn't the only game of theirs to underperform their expectations either. It was just the one they were the most vocal about and that the gaming community latched onto the hardest.

Interesting stories and I've genuinely enjoyed reading them, but you seem to have misunderstood what I meant in that post. I never doubted the fact that SE uses FFXIV money to fund other projects (I've even defended this practice in another thread), all I'm skeptical about is the the distinction that Cash Shop money goes to the game while sub money goes to other projects. This to me sounds like a way too convenient PR message, to the point it sounds disingenuous.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

Interesting stories and I've genuinely enjoyed reading them, but you seem to have misunderstood what I meant in that post. I never doubted the fact that SE uses FFXIV money to fund other projects (I've even defended this practice in another thread), all I'm skeptical about is the the distinction that Cash Shop money goes to the game while sub money goes to other projects. This to me sounds like a way too convenient PR message, to the point it sounds disingenuous.

And nothing anyone says will change your mind. You've already determined that its just them being scummy.

[DBriggs304]

The real evil here, imagine, you can buy your game time with the gold you have and gold buyers will buy gold directly from the company and not some shady gold sellers. In our game we dont support those devilish actions and directly use our fellow friend Sjfksdf Jhdsjds for getting some gils. Its not like they couldn't do same thing as Blizz and support their project with money people giving for gold, instead of shoving dozens of new clothes that you can't obtain in game as years go by.
Dont forget folks, wow bad, ff xiv good.

Or, you could just not buy gold at all and earn it the way you're supposed which negates the issue entirely. And yet, they are still making more money with that model regardless.

And yes, "WoW bad" for that scheme. Now that IS a slimy move. One of many they have done to screw over their playerbase. You need only look to what has been going on at Blizzard the last year and a half to see that they are all about the money. Period.

In that respect, yes, "ff xiv good" cause I dont get the same money hungry and nefarious vibes to purposely get their customers here.

[Goji1639]

No they aren't. I go to my local butcher and I don't see an intense desire for wealth, just a passion for high quality meat.

greed·y
/ˈɡrēdē/

adjective
having or showing an intense and selfish desire for something, especially wealth or power.

The desire for wealth is there, and whether or not it's suitably "intense" is just speculative. Nobody opens a shop without a legitimate desire for wealth; greed is the cornerstone of capitalism.

[yukiiyuki]

Or, you could just not buy gold at all and earn it the way you're supposed which negates the issue entirely. And yet, they are still making more money with that model regardless.

What fairy world you're living in? We have gold sellers here, it exists because people use it. The people who earning gold the way they suppose — bying subs for that gold, and filthy casuals who dont want to grind — help them to get that sub with them bying gold from blizz, everyone is happy, even the company that can buy new car for Bobby Kotick.