Implementing both F2P/Sub is also an option

[Alavastre]

Depends on how you do it. In all honesty, it's hard because the gold sellers will use tons of free accounts which could make their job harder. But story and game play wise, FFXIV would benefit from having a free option up to level 20 and the Titan fight.

I also wouldn't mind a little cash shop that sold different armors or something once in a while. But that's me. I know most people hate the idea of paying for a sub, let alone the possibility of spending more on top of it. But that is the reality. SE is leaving money on the table because they don't have a cash shop.

But what game really is Pay to win? Why even mention it? That's always a fear that never manifests in Western MMO's.

[DoctorPepper]

But what game really is Pay to win? Why even mention it? That's always a fear that never manifests in Western MMO's.

I suppose that's a matter of opinion on the pay to win front. A lot of F2P games offer the ability to buy gear that's only 1-3 tiers below best in slot, thereby giving players with more money in real life an advantage over players who do not have extra real money to spend. Others sell items like exp boosts, gold boosts, etc. which have the same effect but on a smaller scale.

Personally, I consider those to be pay to win and that's why I mention it. I don't think that somebodies ability to play the game as effectively as somebody else should be determined by the amount of money they make in real life but more-so on the amount of time and effort they invest into the game. I'm good at IT and make good money in real life, that doesn't mean I should have an advantage over other people who make less. Last time I checked we're playing the game, not playing real life.

[Killance]

FF11 isn't F2P. FF14 ARR won't be F2P either.

Deal with that fact already.

[DoctorPepper]

FF11 isn't F2P. FF14 ARR won't be F2P either.

Deal with that fact already.

Did you even look the presentation over? Yoshida has an entire slide that basically says F2P isn't out of the question and that he thinks the 2 models can work together. Basically look at Rift/SWTOR/Tera/etc. and you'll see the exact model he's talking about. You can play for free but if you pay a sub you get additional services.

I think it's wonderful that you believe you can tell the future and I encourage you to continue trying but you should at least read the facts first. This is not FFXI and Yoshida also goes over the fact that they need to look at this game in a more modern sense rather than looking at the success of FFXI and trying to copy that.

[Akiza]

Buy to play with the option to subscribe is a better option then Free to Play that way developers can work on actual content rather than micro transactions. They can make a patch every 3months and have people that b2p the game pay for major updates and the subscribers get them for paying for the sub.

[Killance]

Did you even look the presentation over? Yoshida has an entire slide that basically says F2P isn't out of the question and that he thinks the 2 models can work together. Basically look at Rift/SWTOR/Tera/etc. and you'll see the exact model he's talking about. You can play for free but if you pay a sub you get additional services.

I think it's wonderful that you believe you can tell the future and I encourage you to continue trying but you should at least read the facts first. This is not FFXI and Yoshida also goes over the fact that they need to look at this game in a more modern sense rather than looking at the success of FFXI and trying to copy that.

Because all facts over the internet aren't exaggerated at all.

[Delmontyb]

I personally like the subscription model, but I know there are those out there who refuse to play a game with a subscription due to time limitations on their end. For them, paying to play the game when they might have one or two days a month to play wouldn't be good. So I've always wondered if there was a better solution, and I've seen that Dragon Quest did something like that, to where if you weren't subbed, you could play for X amount of time per week etc.

I think something like that might work for those users, but this is a tough issue to really tackle without hard numbers. Now, the following idea has the potential to be riddled with holes, but what if SE offered everyone 24 hours (or some other number) of game time per week for free. You still would need to buy the game, and you should still sub to have that restriction lifted at any point in time. To take this to a ridiculous place, say that time could be bottled up and sold, or bought from other players using in game money. So if you're away for a while you would have game time that's yours that you can sell on the markets, or buy more time on the markets from other players. Players who have the sub, should also fine a way to benefit from this.

Again, there would have to be stipulations in place because there might be all kinds of issues, but with over 2 million registered users, I would find no fault if they were able to jump in and play every now and then.

Just a random and crazy thought.

[Starlord]

Did you even look the presentation over? Yoshida has an entire slide that basically says F2P isn't out of the question and that he thinks the 2 models can work together.

In the presentation/interview, he was basically answering questions of "What do you think about F2P?" Meaning he is giving his opinion on F2P. His opinion is, F2P isn't out of the question, depends if the "money is there" and " If the masses want such a thing".

As of right now, they are making too much money off of P2P and, most people don't want this game to go F2P in terms of how the forums are reacting to it. The forums are also their only source of information of statistics about this.

The end results as of this moment is, P2P is here to stay.

[Jinko]

If they go F2P I will just go elsewhere.

[L-D-Omlette]

Snip

I am of mixed feelings on this front. What advantage do you really have in a PVE environment?

Hypothetically, let's pretend that anyone could buy i100 gear with real money. Now, since you said you make good money, lets pretend that you decide to buy a full set of i100 gear. I decide that I can't afford it and so I decide to get i100 gear by farming tomes over the course of a few weeks. Am I at a disadvantage? Is there content that you can do that I cannot? Does you having i100 on April 3rd alter my ability to play the game and enjoy it? Does me having i100 on June 7th alter your ability to play the game and enjoy it? There already exist players that get different sets of gear at different times, I don't understand how this is any different.

If this had open world, gank anyone, anytime PVP I could see this being a problem, but as it is now, that isn't an issue. RMT, as it is now, would also disappear because they would have nothing to offer that you couldn't get legitimately.

The other things you mentioned, exp boosts, gold boosts, etc. just seem like time-savers. If I have limited time, but more funds, I can keep up with those that have more time and less cash.

All that said, I am not for P2W or non-cosmetic (fantasia?) microtransactions for this game, since that isn't what I signed up for. Just have a hard time understanding the vitriol the model gets.