Personal Housing Server Limitations and the Future of FFXIV Development

[YuriRamona]

Yoshi-P has outlined that server limitations are the reason for the lack of cheap and available personal housing.

It was clear to a small portion of us when FC housing first rolled around that the underlying reason was server limitations.

Now, when it's clear that server limitations are the sole reason for the development decision, people are STILL arguing up and down about gil, economies, and rich players.

So what are the possibilities for the true reasons why Personal Housing is so limited?

1. SE has decided that they don't want to throw more money at expanding server capacity.
2. Alternatively, the game can't feasibly/easily support larger, faster, and more complex servers.

Given that FFXIV has proven to be a cash-cow for SE, I find it highly unlikely that they are withholding funds because they don't see it as a worthwhile investment. It's much more likely that the game is deeply flawed in its network and development structure.

Let that sink in for a second.

• A game that was released in 2013 can't support a housing area with more than 30 plots with a few hundred visible player-placed objects.
• Over a 9-month period, SE was able to open a handful of housing wards (2 wards in the 2 months since 2.3).
• Interiors are limited to 200 player-placed objects. Rooms to 100 player-placed objects.

In my opinion, SE is basically telling us that they've reached their limit when it comes to multiplayer interactivity as it relates to their server capabilities.

Static, simple, textured objects that sit on lawns and tables are too much for SE to handle.

What does that mean for open-world environments?
Graphics upgrades?
Faster network code and real-time, client-side actions?

Forget about dynamic open-world encounters.
Forget about seamless alliance interactions.
Forget about flying in airships and seeing anything that isn't pre-rendered/static.

These are some serious shortcomings for a game that is supposed to be current-gen that we as a community, need to address.

[Davester]

i agree,having an MMORPG reach it's technical limits this early and with this big of a feature is just wrong

[Vaer]

They said they were going to try to squeeze every bit of power of existing servers for now.

If all avenues are exhausted and it's still not enough, then they will get more servers.

That's what they said in the Q&A.

Maybe this backlash will finally force a decision.

Q: I have enough gil to purchase land, but there aren't enough open spaces. When are you planning to add more land? Also, is there any information you can reveal about personal housing?
A: Kasuga: At the moment all I can say is that we are looking into it, but we're at the point where Yoshida will make a judgment call.

Yoshida: First, we'll be adding land in patch 2.38, and it will then be possible to purchase personal housing, but the issue of how many plots to add will be under discussion until right up to the last minute. Just the other night we had a meeting which included Kasuga about even more additional plots and what kind of plans they have in order to accommodate them. At the same time we've been looking into whether we can increase the number of plots by juggling our graphic resources. Currently, we're working out all the parameters and then we'll be deciding how to do it and at what time based on the results.

Kasuga: The quick answer as to why it's not so simple to add more land is because of the infrastructure. Compared to our initial plans for infrastructure, the current demand for land has far exceeded what was predicted, and in the event that we decide to go forward with the current infrastructure, we would have no choice but to address the issue with software. And if we were to rely on a software solution, it would be difficult to secure the time required to test everything out, further delaying the release of new land.

Yoshida: Of the ideas we have at the moment, we are trying to make the final decision as to which solution is the quickest and would allow for the most land, as well considering the amount of time and resources it will take. Of course there have been those who have suggested spending millions to enhance the servers, but this would be the last resort for our engineers. We're currently looking into exactly how much we can increase the amount of land with our current resources and we'll be doing this right up to the last minute. If it appears that all other avenues have been exhausted, then I'll make the call to beef up the servers. At the very least, we will be increasing land in patch 2.38 and you'll also be able to start purchasing private housing.

Source: http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...65#post2427365

[vientown]

i really don't think airships will ever happen, i think they budgeted for ~400'000 subscribers, and everything after that is pure profit. i don't think they'll go over their budget and add any sort of interactive flight, as that would require modelling a world. that is largely shortcuts + texture bgs. maybe they'll have a cute retro world map 'zone' that lets you fly over to cute chibi versions of landmarks.

[Valar-Shadowmourne]

This is the true, underlying issue behind some design decisions, it seems. The whole Housing debacle has been very informative as to the inner working of SE, both on a technical and design aspect. I've my own personal gripes (The Hunt, or better known as The Camp for Free 110), but their implementation of 'personal housing' has really put things into perspective.

Maybe things will be much better when the DX11 version comes out, seeing as how they are having to rework many things for the transition.

The most humorous part of it is the people complaining about housing prices and plot numbers, pulling the exclusivity card and whatnot. The inability to read between the lines or apply appropriate critical thinking is typical.

[Roris]

They keep saying how the game has 2.3 million accounts but how many of those are actively subscribed to this day? I get they want to play it as safe as they can and not invest too much on infrastructure and pretty much anything else so they spread everything as thin as they can to reduce costs and increase profits, it's understandable after 1.0 failed for being rushed into the market. You'd think though with this so called great success the game has had they'd have enough resources by now to do a bit more and go the extra mile, and indeed they might be currently allocating that money and resources towards the expansion. They always seem to bank big, almost as an excuse, on the next big thing on the roadmap. It's happened since 1.X, the ARR alpha and betas, PS4 version, the entire 2.x patch series, etc.

Still they have the real sub numbers they always refuse to concretely state, so most likely there could be a real decline in subscriptions for them to be avoiding spending more on server infrastructure, understandable for all MMOs of this type really.

[Quesse]

The issue I have is that its suddenly my problem that servers can't handle the load.

I can't enjoy housing content because they felt the need to both limit capacity and jack the prices to astronomic levels.

How should this be my problem??? Just fix it!

I just want to garden >.<

[Alberel]

I have never played an MMO that had a hard cap on housing availability like this.

The entire POINT of instanced wards as we have now is that the server just creates more of them as the others fill up. I've played several MMOs that use the same housing system as we have here and new wards were created automatically as older wards filled up. There was never a limit on capacity.

It's deeply troubling that this game has such severe server capacity limitations when every other MMO on the market has no such problems.

[AttacKat]

So what are the possibilities for the true reasons why Personal Housing is so limited?

The real issue: same mistake they had with retainers back in 1.x, way too much cosmetic junk, and not enough real meaningful items with in a zone.

Remember, a zone is limited to a few thousand items, therefore, 30 plots per ward, each house with 20~40 items, each item with many details, your build details. So even let's say it is an avg of 50 "items" per plot, you are already looking at 1500 items per ward, plus other "accessories".

Yeah, no way we will see much more unless they serious expand the "housing" servers that will sit empty most of the time due to item limits per zone.

[Makado]

If they continue to hold back and limit my play because they don't want to pay to have servers to accommodate us properly, I'll be quitting. They are essentially saying "we don't want to fork the cash over to allow you all to enjoy the game, so we are going to nickel and dime our way to maybe having most people continue to play."

No thanks SE, that just isn't how you keep people happy. And now we know this is how you are going to look at things in the future. I had faith, and these statements are not making me believe. At all.