The Balmung Apartment Issue

[Rin_Sato]

Demolition is not the answer. especially when SE assured the player base when apartments were added that they would not be subject to demolition. Nor is there need when apartments are instanced. The load on the servers is generated when a player enters, not when it is purchased.

I absolutely agree that they must increase the amount of apartments.
There is also the issue there are players who don't even have a level 60+ job who certainly will not be playing again who have had their apartments untouched for literal years. I feel like those players losing their apartment, especially if given forewarning, would be warranted.
I know the 45 day one is awful, but a 1-5 year timer (only starting if the apartments are all occupied) I think makes sense and isn't very harsh. If they don't resub for literal years, chances are they won't be very sad if they get a warning that says they have to play for 1 minute to enter their apartment to stop the demo. Especially if there's free game time during that period and they don't make use of it.

Ultimately it comes down to a failure to expand the available apartments in time as you said though.

[Jojoya]

There is also the issue there are players who don't even have a level 60+ job who certainly will not be playing again who have had their apartments untouched for literal years. I feel like those players losing their apartment, especially if given forewarning, would be warranted.

I can't agree with this since SE stressed when apartments were added to the game that they would never be subject to demolition. That players could take long breaks from the game and return to find their apartments with everything stored inside of them intact. Players made their purchases in good faith and placed their items in them in the belief they would never lose them.

I especially can't agree with it when I can return to a game like RIFT 4 years after I stopped playing and find all my housing there still intact (which I did just before EW release). If a game like RiFT that is now owned by a company fairly notorious for its practices of stripping games to get every last cent of profit retains instanced housing for it's long time inactive players, then it would look really bad if a much larger and more successful game like FFXIV won't. Not can't - clearly it is possible when other games have no problem doing it - but won't.

I don't see SE going down the demolition path.

SE needs to fix their supply problem not just with apartments but with houses. It's partly the fear of missing out that drives up demand. "I may not want this now but if I don't get it it won't be available when I want it later." It's greed for profit that drives up demand. "I'll be able to resell for more than I paid to someone desperate when they're not otherwise able to get one."

If players were able to get what they wanted on demand, demand itself would die down because there would be no FOMO, no opportunity for profit.