playerbase down 25% in 4 months?

[Tezz_Xivectro]

It doesn't take a scientist to figure out that this game is still dying off. This game will likely not see any true prime until PS3 and after (it's like a broken record around these forums).

[Xenor]

I don't know about other servers but the playerbase of Wutai recovered quite a bit with 1.18. It's still low but the increase is noticeable everywhere. There was 4 people sat in the CRP guild just now, it used to be dead at this time of day. And I have seen many players returning who I hadn't seen in months.

[Preypacer]

I don't know about other servers but the playerbase of Wutai recovered quite a bit with 1.18. It's still low but the increase is noticeable everywhere. There was 4 people sat in the CRP guild just now, it used to be dead at this time of day. And I have seen many players returning who I hadn't seen in months.

I was kinda thinking the same thing.

Yeah, it was *seriously* quiet in this game, even up to the evening before 1.18 released. I think there were all of 3 people in all of Gridania, including myself.

The day of the patch, however, I already saw a substantially greater number of people... easily a couple dozen. And it's really only increased since then. I regularly see people all over the place in Grid. now, as well as out in Black Shroud. I pass individuals and small groups killing mobs regularly, the aetheryte camps always have a group of people in them...

In my little spot in Ul'dah where I'm sitting right now as I type this, there are at least 30 small white dots showing on the area of the map shown in the compass. People are definitely active.. There are people running aorund, crafting, shouting for groups, etc. etc.

Indeed for the 4 months prior to 1.18, it was steadily losing population... However, since 1.18, I'd say it's definitely picked up... substantially. I'd say it's almost on par with what I saw at launch, overall (though at launch, you saw more people clustered in smaller areas as everyone was starting from scratch...)

It would be interesting to see what those stats show over the next few months as the new patches come out. I'm guessing that, as long as they continue to improve the game as they have been, and overall opinion remains positive as it's been, we'll see an increase.

[Argh]

So apparantely someone made a post on the JP forums and made a lodestone crawler to check active players over the last 4 months, they found that around 25% have stopped logging on, even once in the last 4 month period from when they started scanning. Thats a large loss during free mode when they are still updating the game, that means those 25% didn't even bother to log in after updates to check stuff out.

http://ffxiv.zam.com/forum.html?foru...7781898&page=1

Link to the original JP post in that topic.

This is because the direction of the game is still poor. I said it before that they should make it like classic ff11 as that would bring out alot of older players who want to re-live it in a new world with new graphics. but they instead increase the size of rats and beetles, still do not offer us an AH, refuse to bring back classic classes, allow gear to be worn by everyone, and make the world meaningless with no death penalty along with copy pasted zones and teleportation. They are still chasing the WoW crowd thinking theu could hit a home run but they will continie to fall flat on their face.

[Abriael]

This is because the direction of the game is still poor. I said it before that they should make it like classic ff11 as that would bring out alot of older players who want to re-live it in a new world with new graphics. but they instead increase the size of rats and beetles, still do not offer us an AH, refuse to bring back classic classes, allow gear to be worn by everyone, and make the world meaningless with no death penalty along with copy pasted zones and teleportation. They are still chasing the WoW crowd thinking theu could hit a home run but they will continie to fall flat on their face.

hey, look! Someone's completely out of the loop!

Funny how some rehash completely obsolete criticism to try and bash a game they don't play and they don't even keep up to date with.

Classic classes -> Coming
Gear -> Lots of it is restricted now
Death penalty -> Increased (and people are whining about it lol)
AH -> The wards now work like an AH.

Conclusion, you don't know what you're talking about, back under the bridge, please.

[Preypacer]

AH -> The wards now work like an AH.

Was with ya up to here...

They're a step closer, but Wards are in no way working like an AH.

An AH doesn't require you to navigate through menus to first find the item, etc... then back out to a main menu, then select the ward, then teleport... then run to the NPC and buy your items. Then run to an invisible "trigger" in the room, select to either exit or to search for a new item, then warp to that floor... etc.

If the wards worked like an AH, you would do all business at a single location, ideally a counter clearly designated as an Auction Counter (or NPC, etc). You wouldn't be interacting with nothing, teleporting from instanced room to instanced room and chasing down NPCs to get the items once you've found them.

Auction House = No extraneous running and teleporting around to purchase an item once you've found it.

MW's are not quite there yet.

[Abriael]

Was with ya up to here...

They're a step closer, but Wards are in no way working like an AH.

An AH doesn't require you to navigate through menus to first find the item, etc... then back out to a main menu, then select the ward, then teleport... then run to the NPC and buy your items. Then run to an invisible "trigger" in the room, select to either exit or to search for a new item, then warp to that floor... etc.

If the wards worked like an AH, you would do all business at a single location, ideally a counter clearly designated as an Auction Counter (or NPC, etc). You wouldn't be interacting with nothing, teleporting from instanced room to instanced room and chasing down NPCs to get the items once you've found them.

Auction House = No extraneous running and teleporting around to purchase an item once you've found it.

MW's are not quite there yet.

The functionality is pretty much the same, with added functions like window shopping and actual visualization of what you're buying on a character.

the time lost by moving into a ward and buying the item (which you already know is the cheapest) from an NPC (that you definitely don't need to "chase down" as it's clearly visible, marked, and rezzes before all the others (but yay for the use of hyperbolic terms to try and make things look worse), is negligible. So yeah, It's basically an AH, and it's laughable to see some screaming bloody murder about it because it's not called "Auction House".

[TonyMontana]

The functionality is pretty much the same, with added functions like window shopping and actual visualization of what you're buying on a character.

the time lost by moving into a ward and buying the item (which you already know is the cheapest) from an NPC (that you definitely don't need to "chase down" as it's clearly visible, marked, and rezzes before all the others (but yay for the use of hyperbolic terms to try and make things look worse), is negligible. So yeah, It's basically an AH, and it's laughable to see some screaming bloody murder about it because it's not called "Auction House".

My biggest problem with the Market wards is how the price list for an item only lists the cheapest 20 of any item so if 33 people list the item you dont see the prices for the last 13. The only reason this is an issue for me is because generally people charge more for the HQ version of an item which means in my senario if 10 of the items were HQ and were the 10 most expensive of the type of item they wouldnt even make it on the list.So I would have to zone into every single ward and run from one end to the other to check for the HQ version of the item. That takes about 15 minutes for 1 item.

[Preypacer]

The functionality is pretty much the same, with added functions like window shopping and actual visualization of what you're buying on a character.

the time lost by moving into a ward and buying the item (which you already know is the cheapest) from an NPC (that you definitely don't need to "chase down" as it's clearly visible, marked, and rezzes before all the others (but yay for the use of hyperbolic terms to try and make things look worse), is negligible. So yeah, It's basically an AH, and it's laughable to see some screaming bloody murder about it because it's not called "Auction House".

"Yay for hyperbolic terms to try and make it look worse"? I was describing the steps required to purchase an item once you've located it.

Seriously... get off the defensive.

Not every response or disagreement with something you say is a personal attack. Not every description of something you personally are fine with is "hyperbole". In fact it's hyperbolic for you to characterize it as such.

FFS.

Whether it's "negligible" or not is completely subjective. The fact remains, it's extra steps required to do something that could otherwise be done with one or two simple menu clicks. Search Item > Select Item > Purchase Item.

Now go ahead and get all bent out of shape because I disagreed with you again.

[minihalcyon]

The functionality is pretty much the same, with added functions like window shopping and actual visualization of what you're buying on a character.

the time lost by moving into a ward and buying the item (which you already know is the cheapest) from an NPC (that you definitely don't need to "chase down" as it's clearly visible, marked, and rezzes before all the others (but yay for the use of hyperbolic terms to try and make things look worse), is negligible. So yeah, It's basically an AH, and it's laughable to see some screaming bloody murder about it because it's not called "Auction House".

An auction house lets a player place bids on an item, not simply buy it. Also, auction houses typically aren't separated into dozens of rooms, filled with multiple people (retainers) through which you much search to find the items you've 'won'. There is something wrong with this in regards to flavor - it's a market ward, and not a functional auction house. If functionality was the same, so many people wouldn't be so quick to point out that they are, in fact, quite different.

Something feels off about it to a lot of players (as vocalized on the forums multiple times), so it's probably not yet correct to call it an AH. We'll know when this changes because, when it does, people will stop complaining that there is no AH, and instead start complaining about how much the AH sucks. ^^