Why the housing system makes people quit and possibly not come back

[EchoingPulse]

This is why I stick with the apartment system. I don't have the time, will, or money to RNG gamble with players for a single house that will shackle me to the game.

[genuine_stranger]

Been there, done that. One of the many reasons I quit in EW was that I couldn't get the house I wanted and upgrade from a small to a medium plot.

I came back 2 weeks before DT release to finish the EW patches and got my old plot back. Cool right? No. I don't even want to decorate it so that I don't have to do it in case I might get lucky and obtain my desired house, or before I quit again.
Now I hold a pretty nice plot for an FC house hostage, without the opportunity of a possible upgrade.

Island Sanctuary could have been more than a spreadsheet simulator, but here we are, having an instanced area of our own that's dead and without purpose.

[Hallarem]

I think the game should keep wards as a novelty luxury item and make instanced housing for people who don't want to be held hostage via sub if we want to keep our houses.

So we can indeed "Just play other games" as Yoshi P supposedly intended. But I am preeeeetty sure the housing is meant to keep you in game and subbing.

[Khryseis_Astra]

Hell if they do actually implement instance personal housing one day, you know there is no way they are going to pull an Oprah with houses and go "AND YOU GET A HOUSE! AND YOU GET A HOUSE! EVERYONE GETS A HOUSE!" They absolutely WILL make it so instanced housing requires a separate monthly fee of like 5-15+ bucks a month depending on what and how they choose to implement it because they KNOW people will do it and it'll make them a ton of money.

Honestly I know some people who would be fine with that after going through years of lotto losses. It doesn’t have to be that way though. First instanced house? Free. The ward owners aren’t paying extra for their one personal house per account after all. Want more? Charge a retainer-like fee of $1-2 a month for extra houses. These would be basic instanced plots that operate the same as ward houses. Choose your size and city-state and get that area’s housing district environment as a generic background scenery, minus all the other houses cluttering up your view.

But it also opens up the possibility of eventually getting other areas to use as background scenery in the future, as well as creating new housing skins and themed furnishings to match. And maybe some of them would be “premium” cash shop things, but there’s no reason for that to be the only option. If part of the planned “housing mirage” is like suspected, and they are planning to create interior layouts that “remove the pillars,” then houses wouldn’t have to be tied to a particular neighborhood anymore. All those places you love that don’t have a housing district, and probably never will because they’re not main cities? Instanced makes it possible to have a plot there. And as we’ve seen with IS, instanced areas also allow things like furnishing “glamour” so you only need one physical item to use as many times as wanted, open air houses (they just need to let you place furnishings!), ability to change the ground and walkways independently of the buildings, etc.

I have a ward plot, but if I had the opportunity to have an instanced plot with the same (or more!) functionality, and the ability to change my background scenery? I’d definitely make the trade. And it could be done… other MMOs that don’t even require subscriptions have many instanced housing options, both free and cash shop.

[Tatiana]

I've been saying for years they should add instanced housing which is the hill I'm willing to die on for this subject, and they don't have to get rid of the ward system to do that. I really like Elder Scrolls Online's housing system where there are instanced houses placed around the game world with a unique design that matches the zone it's in that you can go purchase, and everyone can purchase it if they want. They can keep the ward system relevant by having FC houses relegated to the ward system and players can choose to use that system for their personal house if they want to. I think a lot of players would simply like to be able to have a house they can decorate and furnish how they want and don't have to worry about being demolished because they aren't subscribed.

Another option would be to expand the apartment system exponentially by letting players buy additional rooms and spaces for their apartments for gil.

[Xuled]

Yeah it is predatory but you'll have white knights defend this new lottery system as "better" than the old placard clicking. Both are bad in their owns but one is worse by a long shot

[Rueby]

Yeah it is predatory but you'll have white knights defend this new lottery system as "better" than the old placard clicking. Both are bad in their owns but one is worse by a long shot

So much this. My first house I had to nurse a placard for 14hrs nonstop and near the end I had 6-7 people show up, I was lucky to get mine. The placard spam was inhumane because you can just miss it at any moment. Go bio? Well pray no one shows up and clicks the thing. In that system, getting a house was a 'relief' now you can relocate somewhere nicer if you want.
Now it's just up to luck, even relocation. You'll never get that ~dream plot~, sometimes you might not even get a house at all in really busy servers. Now, you can stay subbed, and try your luck again, surely you'll get lucky right?

When you get lucky, you're trapped by it because now you know that you may not get a house (even worse if it's a nice spot) if you lose it. Driving home the whole FOMO thing.

Upgradable apartments in my eyes is a nice alternative and it won't uproot the ward system, if anything it might motivate people to actually engage with the ward system by engaging with apartments.

[Kewitt]

The housing system should only require a sub, Not having to enter your house every 30 days. I like taking breaks from the game. Even Y-P thinks people should take breaks. But I can't because god forbid I don't enter my house every 30 days.
I love my house, I love having friends over and showing off my art house. But my 1st house I lost why because I was in the hospital for 16 months and couldn't play and had to find and hope for a new one. That whole time I was sub mainly because for the 1st 9 months on so many drugs I wouldn't know how to unsub.

Don't break both your legs people.

There are also a few lots owned by a few people on each server. These need to be dealt with by letting people keep only the very next house they enter after a patch.

[Themarvin]

housing system is ok, however grandfathering should be dealt with.

[ZXN]

-snipped

I definitely wouldn't mind if they did instanced housing. Limit it to one house per account for starters, and of course no submarine stuff, it's JUST a personal house. Then they could just have it be that the free house they give you is the interior size of the apartment, and kind of present it like a small "hermit's house" given it's in an instanced area, and only make it to where you can have 50 indoor items, 10 outdoor items, and store 50/10 of each of said item. Then you can choose to pay a monthly fee to "renovate" the house, aka upgrade it. Maybe like 2-4 dollars for a small cottage, and up to maybe 10 or so dollars for a mansion. They could even use some of the things that Island Sanctuary put in to make it better. Like being able to change the general floor of the area where your house is on from like dirt to stone or rock or bricks. They could put in landmarks that don't take up outdoor item space so you have a bit of variety. Along with that they could let you "glamour" the general background/location of where you are. Want a hermit house on the moon? Bam, house is glamoured to look like it's sitting on a cliff-side where your backyard is literally just Etheryis in the distance with space rocks flying around. Want to be beneath the Ocean like in Tamamizu? Bam, your house is now surrounded by one of those bubbles they have under the water and ocean life is swimming all around you.

Unfortunately, I just currently don't have enough faith in the dev team to deliver something like that without it being a potentially buggy mess, or something that is delivered with the absolute bare minimum each time they touch it like they did with Island Sanctuary during it's life. Not only that, I also wouldn't be surprised if the higher ups tried to dig their fangs into it all and try to charge WAY more then what some players would be comfortable paying for along with trying to make you pay for other small things as well since they KNOW it would make them some decent funds monthly/yearly given how many people want a house and have frustrations with the current system. Nobody would be happy if they tried to make it to where a mansion is 20 bucks a month: but it's ONLY for the mansion size, not the inventory, and then have them try to charge like another 10 bucks a month to be able to fully use the 400/40 limit mansions normally have. And the charge even more for the landmarks and glamour backgrounds and whatnot. Sure, it sounds like some super cringey doom poster conspiracy theory, but Square IS ultimately a business, and in-game instanced housing would absolutely make them some extra funds if they wanted to implement it and monetize it.

They really don't need to go crazy with anything if they ever do decide to finally implement instanced housing. Just make it cheap and functional and players will be happy.