FF14 player count reached the lowest point in 4 years. We lost 75% of the playerbase.

[RedLolly]

You and I have very, VERY different experiences of the playerbase in FF14. I see even more toxicity just passively watching a chat on an average day than I see in WoW in a week. It's not to say nobodys Toxic in WoW. Just open Trade chat and you immediately have 30 reportable posts right away. But when most of FF14 playerbase is showing toxicity as soon as they open their metaphorical mouth it's not a good look to those of us who actually see it.

Ignoring it, or pretending it doesn't happen because most of the reasonable or, perhaps, smarter players just don't talk generally doesn't mean it isn't there.

I've played for 12 years and can count reports I've made on one hand, and I've never been confronted by a GM. This always concerns me when another player mentions their experience has been this bad when so many of us never see that. I send random tells all the time if I see a sick glamour or some such. It's never an issue. Ever.

But I've also never touched WoW. For years it was the fear of it being vile towards me, a woman, but nowadays it's just genuinely that it doesn't look as enjoyable to me since I care way more about lore and story and Blizzard is all over the place with that. I got annoyed by it in early Overwatch (which was supposed to be an MMO) being so messy and disjointed and that's just gotten worse over the years.

[Kohashi]

Long story short - they were never going to stay, and it's actually quite impressive that a sizable portion of them stayed as long as they did. FFXIV would have had to radically and fundamentally change the game if it wanted any hope of keeping them long-term, and even then it may not have worked (while simultaneously crashing its own game). From my view, FFXIV made the right call in staying true to what makes FFXIV what it is.

A great portion of the people complaining nonstop in these forums are past WOW players. You will very often see them also mentioning how WoW is the superior choice in every single aspect, especially class design, yet they are still here playing FF14.

[Supersnow845]

Let’s just ignore players who never played WOW but also acknowledge WOW turned itself around and that FF could have learnt a thing or two and maybe learned it before all the WOW players vanished. I’d like to see some sweeping changes in this game and if those sweeping changes were also there to attempt to hold the WOW players then that in my eyes is a good thing

The notion of “purity of the 14 experience” that people seem to have is just stupid. If you have a large playerbase change you work to incorporate the new playerbase, that’s part of the evolution of a game. You don’t dig in your heels and go “put up or shut up”

Nor is the older 14 playerbase remotely unified on the idea that 14 shouldn’t change and that only WOW players wanted it changed

[Daralii]

Let’s just ignore players who never played WOW but also acknowledge WOW turned itself around and that FF could have learnt a thing or two and maybe learned it before all the WOW players vanished. I’d like to see some sweeping changes in this game and if those sweeping changes were also there to attempt to hold the WOW players then that in my eyes is a good thing

The notion of “purity of the 14 experience” that people seem to have is just stupid. If you have a large playerbase change you work to incorporate the new playerbase, that’s part of the evolution of a game. You don’t dig in your heels and go “put up or shut up”

Nor is the older 14 playerbase remotely unified on the idea that 14 shouldn’t change and that only WOW players wanted it changed

The ideal XIV experience is one where only a single person hasn't unsubscribed. That way there's no worrying about toxicity or the people that had their souls irreparably poisoned from contact with WoW, and no fear of their complaints reaching the developers and ruining the flawless state of job design.

[syldon]

SE really just needs to just talk to the players who have quit early. There is a lot of guestimation going on here. Why not get a response from the horses mouth instead.

[Exinias]

you can really feel in endwalker that they hamfisted everything to try to conclude in one expansion. we were supposed to get a garlemald expansion, but apparently it is better to rush and cobble together all plot threads at once when your game is very successful. i am very bitter about this still. why rush greatness.

Not even remotely true.

[Striker44]

I've played for 12 years and can count reports I've made on one hand, and I've never been confronted by a GM. This always concerns me when another player mentions their experience has been this bad when so many of us never see that. I send random tells all the time if I see a sick glamour or some such. It's never an issue. Ever.

But I've also never touched WoW. For years it was the fear of it being vile towards me, a woman, but nowadays it's just genuinely that it doesn't look as enjoyable to me since I care way more about lore and story and Blizzard is all over the place with that. I got annoyed by it in early Overwatch (which was supposed to be an MMO) being so messy and disjointed and that's just gotten worse over the years.

I have to second this. I've likewise played FFXIV on-and-off from 2015 until around 2021, then as my main MMO since then. I can still probably count on one hand the number of "toxic" people I've encountered in-game, compared to seeing it on a near-daily basis my last few years in WoW.

[Daralii]

Not even remotely true.

"We planned to use 5.0 till 7.0 to end our decade-long Hydaelyn and Zodiark arc and bring everything to its climax. Originally, 6.0 was meant to focus on the Garlean Empire. However, 5.0's reception exceeded our expectations, so we decided to condense the Empire's storyline to allow for greater developments."

https://reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscussion...n_taiwan_2025/
Posting a Reddit link with a translation because the actual transcript is obviously in Chinese.

[Infindox]

it's also unrealistic to assume players are going to stay subbed when there's very little to do for people in the end game at this time. the long term content wont be here until 7.35, and a lot of people choose to take a break between major expansions because they dont care about raids and such. WoW has also been doing better with their game so more people want to go play that atm.

we shouldn't start doomsaying when the game has a history of low activity during this time period.

There isn't even much long term content in 7.35. Deep Dungeon with the new system is nice, but most people will do it once or a few times, then leave again. Daily society quests until you finish them, Hildi quests which are done day one, and the Monster Hunter collab, which is just two different fights.
Not trying to doomtalk about the game, but a big issue is how they drip feed the content lately. And the content that was supposed to be "the big thing" failed miserably.

[Drimn]

https://reddit.com/r/ffxivdiscussion...n_taiwan_2025/
Posting a Reddit link with a translation because the actual transcript is obviously in Chinese.

This is the most bizarre line of thinking I think I've ever seen. "People love what we're doing and are invested in our very successful story, so we'll blitz through the conclusion in such an unsatisfying way that the big bad that we've spent 10 years hyping up is a midboss loot pinata, all so we can hurry to The Passion of the Wuk?" Where is the logic here?