(EU/PAL) In-Game Item Campaign with ShopTo!

[Laerune]

I dont know why they just don't sell stuff via square-enix store or mogstation.

That is the million dollar question. If they sold the promotion via the Mog Station or SE Store (example, buy 60 days gamecard and receive the promotion items) all of this and future promotions would have been solved. Now I am wondering, if they just like making EU players angry.

[Saiah]

How is it that the EU promo campaigns are partnered with such shitty companies?

[Lambdafish]

I'm confused as to what the complaints are. The site ran out of stock? Of course it did because the rabid XIV fanbase jumped on it day one and dried up their stock (to be expected, I doubt shop to had any idea how popular the campaign was), we cannot judge anything until we see how quickly that situation clears up. As for the site itself, Shop To's website might look a bit iffy, but the company is legit and I have used them many times before.

Oh and the thing about the FFXII preorder, amazon does the exact same thing with pre-orders now after what happened with the first NA campaign.

SE shouldn't do these campaigns not because they are a bad idea, but because they bring out the absolute worst in the community.

[DarkDepravity]

I am more than a little flabbergasted by the fact that no items are in that campaign that are actually usable for PC except the time card (which they don't have in stock anyway), this is pretty abysmal even by SE standards.

Edit:
And it would be nice with some digital downloads for those who aren't within the customs union and as such have to deal with import taxes etc.

[Theodric]

SE shouldn't do these campaigns not because they are a bad idea, but because they bring out the absolute worst in the community.

You do realise that many players - myself included - have been very patient for a great many months whilst offering constructive criticism at every turn only for the exact same mistakes to be repeated over and over, right? Furthermore, issues that afflict the North American and Japanese communities are responded to by Yoshi-P himself. Whereas European players are lucky to get a response from our community representatives - and even then the issues aren't properly resolved. We've been told that they'll eventually be on the Mog Station but no set date has been given and we're stuck losing out on the items and seeing players from other regions enjoy and display them.

So at this point in time it's perfectly understandable as to why some people are very vocal in their frustration. You can tone police all you like but their concerns aren't invalid - and this isn't the first MMO that has actively screwed over European players, either. Given that some of us have been playing MMO's for roughly a decade I don't feel as though it is unfair for us to feel very irritated at being treated like second class customers.

[Rufalus]

SE shouldn't do these campaigns not because they are a bad idea, but because they bring out the absolute worst in the community.

I think some measures could have been taken to reduce customer stress; communication between S-E and Shopto before announcing the campaign to ensure sufficient stock. They sold out within minutes, on a weekday. Apparently some items were sold out before the campaign began (did anyone get the elusive timecard?) People just want to follow the instructions of the campaign and receive their item code. At the moment it's impossible, but I appreciate S-E letting us know they are working on the problem. The community is harsh anyway even without provocation, but in this case I kinda like that people are leaving negative feedback, it makes me hope things will be resolved faster and maybe better prepared next time.

[Vidu]

I'm confused as to what the complaints are. The site ran out of stock? Of course it did because the rabid XIV fanbase jumped on it day one and dried up their stock (to be expected, I doubt shop to had any idea how popular the campaign was), we cannot judge anything until we see how quickly that situation clears up. As for the site itself, Shop To's website might look a bit iffy, but the company is legit and I have used them many times before.

Oh and the thing about the FFXII preorder, amazon does the exact same thing with pre-orders now after what happened with the first NA campaign.

SE shouldn't do these campaigns not because they are a bad idea, but because they bring out the absolute worst in the community.

Even if ShopTo didnt know, SE and the people on their site responsible for the campaign should have known. Seeing how we got those campaigns by player demand in the first place they have no excuse for not being aware of that. They must have been aware about the issues regarding that magazine back then aswell - and if anything they should have data on how many active EU-accounts there are aka how many potential people to be intrested in those items. We've got that 175 page thread about people wanting them. So no excuse for not being aware of that on their part.
Seeing how ShopTo cant handle that, its obvious that SE made a bad choice of a campaign-partner - and not for the first time, which is even more shocking and infuriating.

Until SE can figure out a way to properly do those campaigns I agree: They shouldnt do them at all.
I understand that specially in europe it might be more difficult to get campaigns running for everyone, since you've got laws for all those different countries but at this point I'm seriously wondering why they're even still trying. Each campaign is just more bad PR for SE, really - because each campaign is bad in its very own way.
The reason everyone is jumping on this campaign is, yet again, a lach of transparency regarding wether or not certain countries will get campaigns aswell and when. Or when those items will be put on the mogstation.
They've shown again and again that they dont have the will or manpower or ressources or knowledge or whatever to handle EU-campaigns, which is sad - a good promo would have been nice! But since they cant do that, I'd rather see them stop and just set a date when the items are going on the mogstation...

[Illusiva]

I think some measures could have been taken to reduce customer stress; communication between S-E and Shopto before announcing the campaign to ensure sufficient stock. They sold out within minutes, on a weekday. Apparently some items were sold out before the campaign began (did anyone get the elusive timecard?)

Interestingly enough, I put the timecard on backorder right before the website initially crashed. When the site came back up, my timecard order had been processed and charged for (they don't charge until they process the back ordered item). This morning I have a dispatch email for it. I've had to submit a ticket to ShopTo though because despite having the timecard in stock after all and despite the fact that the order clearly shows the DLC as part of the list of items purchased, the "Activate Code" button for the DLC is missing...

[duw]

It feels like with every season that comes along, something really irritating happens to EU players. Only a few months ago were us NA-server EU players being shut out of the game entirely, waiting on a community fix (god bless this forum for that) and once again we have to deal with a campaign that wasn't thought through. I understand why not everything can be put on mogstation, that there's an issue of what is available in what country (eg. the outfits locked in Asian servers) but... we waited months for this promotion and most of us wont even have a shot at getting it. We pay for and love this game just as much as NA players do, please stop shafting us! I know it's just extra items and things, but we feel left out as a community, especially the players on NA servers who have watched everyone else receive these items ages ago.

Please, don't let us down again!

[Psygoli]

Others have already expressed valid points on the campaign and how it was handled in EU and I was wondering if this was seriously the only way to implement the campaign in EU? The campaigns have a pretty bad history in EU so why has there been no improvement in handling them?

Would it have been a bad idea to make it mogstation Campaign, like someone already mentioned? That way everyone would have had a equal chance on getting the items. Like buy 10-15€ worth of items from mogstation and receive the items as a extra reward or just put them up for sale in mogstation without any strings attached.

Also the starting date for this campaign is pretty weird IMO. Instead of Monday you choose to start at Thursday, with people being left wondering what's happening for the weekend making the community grow even more frustrated than what it is already.