Been seeing a lot of doomsaying in forums/in-game lately

[KizuyaKatogami]

The only boycott that has guaranteed results in large enough numbers is closing one's wallet. I will be depriving them of mine in a few days, though it will admittedly be a symbolic gesture and likely a temporary stoppage unless they do something else to irritate me between now and then. But I'm committed to my principles, so I am going forward with my plan. I'm not foolish enough to think that it will make a difference, but perhaps if enough people take part, even temporarily, SE could potentially rethink a thing or two. Probably not, but anything is possible. Twitter is probably the most direct way to communicate with them, but I wouldn't wish that platform on anyone. They tell us to come here to give feedback, so I think that's what most people do who want to voice their opinions and concerns.

If it makes you feel any better you aren’t the only one. Myself and about 9-10 of my friends are also going to be quitting. It may start off small but when you see long lasting veterans leaving like this it’s a bad sign. I just hope it’s one that helps SE get their head out of their no no zone and start actually giving the proper time and money this game deserves. It’s beyond ridiculous that after 10 years there are still only 4 people on the job design team.Even F2P games have more than that and this is a billion dollar company.

[Havenchild]

Do we have exact figures on the population? I’ve heard that EW had the biggest drop off in history after the main surge came.

Well you have the fact that as of Feb 2022, over 800k characters completed the MSQ at least. That's up from previous expansion numbers, which were about 560k for SHB and 616k in SB in the same timeframe.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme..._2022_release/

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...tails_are_out/


You have a more accurate comparison that Lucky Bancho's site offers every few months:

Heres the report from Janurary: https://luckybancho.ldblog.jp/archives/56364034.html

Heres the report from April: https://luckybancho.ldblog.jp/archives/56584369.html

Jan 2022: https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/luckyban...3/e3af7fb0.png
April 2022: https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/luckyban...2/d20b09dd.png

Rough Translation of the numbers:

The number of active characters is about 1.7 million, an increase of 350,000 from the previous (1.35 million).
The number of new characters increased by about 250,000 from the previous 180,000 to 430,000.
The last time inactive was 160,000 returning characters that were active this time, up 40,000 from the previous 120,000.
The number of active (return?) characters since the last time has increased from 1.04 million, up 60,000 to about 1.1 million.
The moon started at 1.33 million (up 300,000). The Dawning Level Cap reached 970,000 (up 330,000). The moon clear is 880,000 (up 310,000).


So game is definitely growing. They are mostly parsing data from lodestone against hitting certain quest milestones in MSQ, some side quests, Job levels, etcetc. There's a GitHub that explains how they classify the data a bit more and how they weed out and account for bots.

[Nethereal]

Can't speak for anyone else, but my discontent comes from the state of healers. It's hard to feel excited for anything when faced with the reality that what I want to play is going to remain boring 1 button spam for another 2 years at least, and will likely remain that way far beyond that.

Tried SMN yesterday. Think I found a new main. It's like healer, brain dead but I have rotation.

[IdowhatIwant]

Well you have the fact that as of Feb 2022, over 800k characters completed the MSQ at least. That's up from previous expansion numbers, which were about 560k for SHB and 616k in SB in the same timeframe.

https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...tails_are_out/


You have a more accurate comparison that Lucky Bancho's site offers every few months:

Heres the report from Janurary: https://luckybancho.ldblog.jp/archives/56364034.html

Heres the report from April: https://luckybancho.ldblog.jp/archives/56584369.html

Jan 2022: https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/luckyban...3/e3af7fb0.png
April 2022: https://livedoor.blogimg.jp/luckyban...2/d20b09dd.png

Rough Translation of the numbers:

The number of active characters is about 1.7 million, an increase of 350,000 from the previous (1.35 million).
The number of new characters increased by about 250,000 from the previous 180,000 to 430,000.
The last time inactive was 160,000 returning characters that were active this time, up 40,000 from the previous 120,000.
The number of active (return?) characters since the last time has increased from 1.04 million, up 60,000 to about 1.1 million.
The moon started at 1.33 million (up 300,000). The Dawning Level Cap reached 970,000 (up 330,000). The moon clear is 880,000 (up 310,000).


So game is definitely growing. They are mostly parsing data from lodestone against hitting certain quest milestones in MSQ, some side quests, Job levels, etcetc. There's a GitHub that explains how they classify the data a bit more and how they weed out and account for bots.

I think a lot of these number hikes are also spill over from the launch issue. You have to remember that there are a lot of people that just quit and opted to try the game out later during the launch due to the queue times. There were players that purchased the game that were not even able to create a character due to servers being full. It would be interesting as well to see how many of those new characters are also just alts, as it seems making alts is far more popular that I would have expected it to be in this game.

Tried SMN yesterday. Think I found a new main. It's like healer, brain dead but I have rotation.

Ironic you would complain about healer being a one button dps, to pick a dps that is also one button. Maybe I missed a joke but I typically assume most people are stupid.

[Thaciscokidd]

Snip

This is one reason why i wish they would officially release numbers because from the same article you see a rise from last summer then a drop off after EW launch and returning to nearly pre summer numbers on steam.

[Havenchild]

This is one reason why i wish they would officially release numbers because from the same article you see a rise from last summer then a drop off after EW launch and returning to nearly pre summer numbers on steam.

The article is still more accurate as it's parsing numbers from all realms & platforms, directly from lodestone. So sure steam is reflecting a drop maybe, but that also doesn't account from players who stopped playing on the steam version. Even if at least it purely means steam players are leaving, that's also all its measuring; players who use the steam client. Which we know is a relatively small base against the overall playerbase. Yeah the rise and drop off are standard and has been more or less the same every expansion release. The more critical fact is that over time, the numbers steadily grow. It peaks during expansion -> levels out -> steadily grows more concurrently. That's a positive growth rate and something every game aspires to get towards.

I think a lot of these number hikes are also spill over from the launch issue. You have to remember that there are a lot of people that just quit and opted to try the game out later during the launch due to the queue times. There were players that purchased the game that were not even able to create a character due to servers being full. It would be interesting as well to see how many of those new characters are also just alts, as it seems making alts is far more popular that I would have expected it to be in this game.

Well that's why I linked Jan 2022 and April 2022. All login issues were resolved by Jan 2022. I would assume the number will increase when they do the summer analysis because 6.1 was just released to a successful PVP revamp, new MSQ, Alliance Raid, and a new Ultimate (which should engage players for some time).

[IdowhatIwant]

The article is still more accurate as it's parsing numbers from all realms, directly from lodestone. So sure steam is reflecting a drop maybe, but that also doesn't account from players who stopped playing on the steam version. Even if at least it purely means steam players are leaving, that's also all its measuring; players who use the steam client. Which we know is a relatively small base against the overall playerbase. Yeah the rise and drop off are standard and has been more or less the same every expansion release. The more critical fact is that over time, the numbers steadily grow. It peaks during expansion -> levels out -> steadily grows more concurrently. That's a positive growth rate and something every game aspires to get towards.

If you were to compare the steam charts, to the entire player base, you would likely see similar trends on the graph. If your point is to prove positive growth though, the game has been growing slightly with each expansion. That does not mean though that decisions the developers make could immediately cause a downward spiral.

The game is likely never going to die, until SE decides they are going to pull the plug. How ever, the player base can certainly plummet if they continue to cater to niche player groups, as that is all they would be left with is that niche group. The more and more you caters to specific groups the more and more you subtly shave off players from other groups.

[Jeeqbit]

The game is likely never going to die, until SE decides they are going to pull the plug. How ever, the player base can certainly plummet if they continue to cater to niche player groups, as that is all they would be left with is that niche group. The more and more you caters to specific groups the more and more you subtly shave off players from other groups.

Simplifying classes is not catering to niche groups. It's catering to the majority, because the easier things are to play, the more people can play them. A niche group is the people who want classes to be so extremely difficult to play that they go back to being the least played classes that are hardly seen in casual content or even high-end pugs. I'm not saying that some classes shouldn't be hard and cater to that niche group, but statistics show it's a niche group because the easiest classes are the most popular classes.

[Havenchild]

If you were to compare the steam charts, to the entire player base, you would likely see similar trends on the graph. If your point is to prove positive growth though, the game has been growing slightly with each expansion. That does not mean though that decisions the developers make could immediately cause a downward spiral.

The game is likely never going to die, until SE decides they are going to pull the plug. How ever, the player base can certainly plummet if they continue to cater to niche player groups, as that is all they would be left with is that niche group. The more and more you caters to specific groups the more and more you subtly shave off players from other groups.

Highly depends on you and what you consider specifically catering. 6.1 is a patch that had a little for everyone. MSQ ( Everyone), Crafting Gear + New Items (Everyone), Alliance Raids (Everyone benefits), New EX Trial (Midcore?), Ultimate Raid (Hardcore Players) , PVP Revamp (Everyone). Hell you could argue, the hardcore playerbase might have benefitted more exclusively from 6.1 (so far). If you count pre 6.1, you include Savage Raiding as well for Hardcore players. SE hasn't notoriously catered to one group in FF and the situation is more contrary than these forums would have you believe. There is alot of challenging content to do in game, but not everyone engages the same content.

Palace and HoH titles are hard to get for example. I would say that's a harder challenge than beating most savage tier fights purely because the RNG of it all can mess you up bad, not to mention floor 180 in Palace, which essentially needs to be played perfectly with no errors.

[Thaciscokidd]

Well that's why I linked Jan 2022 and April 2022. All login issues were resolved by Jan 2022. I would assume the number will increase when they do the summer analysis because 6.1 was just released to a successful PVP revamp, new MSQ and Alliance Raid.

True enough. But besides the 6.1 stuff you listed you also have the Housing lotto fallout that people have claimed to be the last straw for them. And by then we should know more about what 6.2 will have in it(Island Sanctuary, Criterion Dungeons, Pandemonium p2, and more). And I do worry that people are over-hyping the Island Sanctuaries to the point where it might be a problem out of the dev teams hands.