1k characters is a rather restrictive number for any sort of real communication of ideas. -.-

Look at it this way. FFXIV is a better game than GW2 in pretty much every category. It has more content, it has a more cohesive and well written story, it has better thought out battle mechanics that only had to be thrown out and reimplemented once rather than repeatedly. Yet despite this GW2 has been much more successful than FF14, having sold more copies, retaining more players, and making more profit for NCSoft than FF14 can ever really hope to considering the double-development money pit that they wound up in. A major reason for this is because FF14 has never really been able to retain players, between the original subpar game and now these barriers to entry that are full of as much pointless time wasting fluff as they are good story content. The majority of new people come, they play until they get hung up on filler, and then they let their subscription lapse.