Never Have I Felt My Time & Support So Disrespected In Over a Decade of Online Gaming

[Kizei]

Let me preface this by saying that this is not a critique of housing demolition on its own. While I don't exactly love the system, I understand its necessity given the finite number of housing plots available, and the only way to give everyone a fair chance at finding a home.

My problem is the deletion of housing decorations.

I am a hardcore MMO player, though many would consider me a casual since I don't generally partake in hardcore raiding or PvP in most games. Rather, I concern myself with light role playing, customization, fashion, and, of course, housing.

I have played FFXIV since the release of Heavensward - certainly not as long as many of you, but long enough to have amassed my own collection of items from story quests, past holidays, or personally bought or crafted. Each of them holds as much value to me as the end game gear of a raider, especially when I can use them all to make a space feel like my own.

Recently, however, I had my years worth of progress thrown away because I could not login for a few months. Not because I did not pay my sub, not by any intentional doing of my own, but because my house got demolished and I missed the window to reclaim my items.

As stated before, I'm not upset over the demolition of my house, the loss of the Gil I had invested in the property itself - I knew the risk when I got into that. And while you might say I should have known the same could happen to my individual items...

Why should I have expected that those items would disappear, too?

It isn't as if I have to worry about my gear from the Eden raid disappearing when I don't login for a few months - I might fall behind in gear score, sure, but my progress doesn't get erased.

It isn't as if my retainers' bags get emptied when I leave them unattended.

It isn't as if my own armory, inventory, or anything else gets erased when I am absent.

So why do my housing decorations?

I have spoken with the Game Masters somewhat on this matter, and I thoroughly respect that their hands are tied by either their policies or lack of tools to replace any of my items, or even just the ones I purchased from the Mogstation. And yet, I still find this just completely unacceptable; Not only are years worth of crafting, saving, story progress, and holiday attendance now permanently gone, but also $100 I spent on the game is translated, essentially, into nothing.

What has really come to bother me is the Mogstation items I lost in this process. I had spent well over $100 on various pieces of furniture from the Mogstation over my years of playing, and I expect that if I am going to be buying something with real life money, I should retain access to it... Not that it's just going to be revoked when I'm gone, and not given back to me when I return. Asking if I could only have those items which I paid for with real money only resulted in the same response of "Unfortunately, this concern is outside the scope of our currently offered services."

(Continued in next post, due to character limit...)

[Kizei]

I have never come across another game with such a harsh punishment for inactivity on such a seemingly relaxed facet of the game.

Archeage is a game that has come to mind during this ordeal, as it had a very similar housing system in which space was finite and houses got demolished if one did not login and pay their taxes. But, unlike in FFXIV, when the house was demolished the furniture inside was not lost - it was mailed to you, stored inside the letters in your mailbox with no expiration date, no questions asked.

Archeage was marred by horribly Pay-to-win systems, and yet I felt my achievements and progress were respected more in this free-to-play game than now in the subscription based, triple A MMORPG that is FFXIV.

I urge Square Enix to take a close look at this system. I have enjoyed the game for many years and, while I've never held back when it comes to critiquing game systems and decisions I didn't agree with, it was never enough to drive me away entirely. Yet now I feel so heartbroken and at a loss that I can no longer find the motivation to play again.

I've heard many rumors as to why the system is the way it is - that server space is a concern being one of the most common reasons given. While I may never know the true reason, there must be some way to address this concern given the way other systems work - as mentioned earlier, I never have to worry about any gear or other items being deleted due to inactivity and, while I understand server space is finite, it should be a problem that can be remedied given how popular and profitable this game is. It will take time and development costs, but I can guarantee you it will make a lot of players more eager to invest in other parts of the game and the Mogstation to know they don't have to fear the loss of their hard earned items.

TL;DR - The current system of deleting all housing items from a demolished house if they are not reclaimed within 35 days needs to be changed, or at least some means of replacing these items and/or a more lenient policy needs to be given to Game Masters so that they can assist players who find themselves unable to login due to unforeseen circumstances. If nothing else, at least allow us to restore things we paid real money for.

I know it may not be easy to fix, but Square... You really need to take it into consideration before more players get burned the way I did. I know some of the blame is on me for not knowing more about the system, but erasing a player's progress like this (outside of understandable cases such as the user being banned, the end of the game's life, or other such circumstances) is just such a slap in the face to anyone who has played the game and spent money on it over the years.

[ERMITANYO]

Start over again sir/madam, but this time get an apartment first, its safe from auto demolition and/or displacement in case of an fc disband.

[Edax]

Why should I have expected that those items would disappear, too?

Because your were told that this would happen. What makes you think you're extra special that the public rules wouldn't apply to you? You admit you understood the risks.


"* Players will have thirty-five days to redeem items from the resident caretaker before they are made irredeemable. Items belonging to a free company estate can only be retrieved by members with the authorization to purchase or relinquish land. Items belonging to a private estate can only be retrieved by the owner." - https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...3e7ccabefa9954

[Jojoya]

So why do my housing decorations?

Because when you have housing items placed or in housing storage, the data for those items isn't attached to your character. It's attached to the house/apartment/private chamber where they're placed/stored, then that location is associated with your character. It's why we can take a housing item that is marked as Untradable/Unmarketable and trade it to another player by placing it in a house where both have furnishing placement/removal privileges. Once placed, the system doesn't recognize the item as belonging to us but rather to the house.

Unlike your retainers (and their storage) or your chocobo (and its saddlebags), a specific house location can have many different players as owners over time. We don't know how SE has the programming set up for tracking items but my guess is that it's not well design to track which player owned what items from a house that had been demolished several times. They limit how long we have to reclaim the items as a result.

Is the period we have to reclaim the items too short? Perhaps. I don't know if that's something SE would find it reasonable (for their code) to increase.

Should there be some sort of exception made for Mogstation items so that they could be recovered? I would agree if it weren't for what I described above - the ability to trade housing items not intended to be traded. Players could trade their Mogstation items to another player who is a tenant/owner of a shared house then try to get Customer Service to give them a replacement item because they no longer possessed it. It's definitely a system that would be abused if offered.

If the thought of losing a real money purchase item following a demolition bothers you, then don't purchase them in the future. Stick to housing items that are easily replaced through in-game methods.

I'm sorry if you feel it is harsh but it is how the game works and SE has their reasons for setting the "rules" of housing this way.

[MitsukiKimura]

Let me preface this by saying that this is not a critique of housing demolition on its own. While I don't exactly love the system, I understand its necessity given the finite number of housing plots available, and the only way to give everyone a fair chance at finding a home.

My problem is the deletion of housing decorations.

I am a hardcore MMO player, though many would consider me a casual since I don't generally partake in hardcore raiding or PvP in most games. Rather, I concern myself with light role playing, customization, fashion, and, of course, housing.

I have played FFXIV since the release of Heavensward - certainly not as long as many of you, but long enough to have amassed my own collection of items from story quests, past holidays, or personally bought or crafted. Each of them holds as much value to me as the end game gear of a raider, especially when I can use them all to make a space feel like my own.

Recently, however, I had my years worth of progress thrown away because I could not login for a few months. Not because I did not pay my sub, not by any intentional doing of my own, but because my house got demolished and I missed the window to reclaim my items.

As stated before, I'm not upset over the demolition of my house, the loss of the Gil I had invested in the property itself - I knew the risk when I got into that. And while you might say I should have known the same could happen to my individual items

You have 45 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

[HyoMinPark]

You have 30 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

It’s 45 days—not 30—to prevent auto-demolition of an estate.

[Risvertasashi]

You have 45 days to log in at least for even 1 minute out of that 30 day time span to prevent your house and items from being lost. You even get a Email warning ahead of time about it so it's not like you weren't given any sort of warning. I'm sorry if you feel this is wrong or if you felt like your stuff was taken for no reason but Square enix should not be responsible for your mistake.

I mean, it's not like there's no way to improve this system either.

For example, some other MMOs - if something like this happens - will have your stuff sent through their delivery system to you. And there is no expiration date. You could log in 5 or 10 years later, and your stuff would be there waiting for you.

So my question is... why are we complacent in accepting subpar systems for one of the biggest and most successful MMOs on the market?

[MitsukiKimura]

I mean, it's not like there's no way to improve this system either.

For example, some other MMOs - if something like this happens - will have your stuff sent through their delivery system to you. And there is no expiration date. You could log in 5 or 10 years later, and your stuff would be there waiting for you.

So my question is... why are we complacent in accepting subpar systems for one of the biggest and most successful MMOs on the market?

It's not hard to log in for 1 minute out of the 45 day time span you earn. Though It could be better, it's not impossible nor hard to make sure your house stays there. Also your moogle mailbox can only hold 20 mail at a time so my question is.. Are you going to put more work on the development team just because you don't wanna log in for that 1 minute?

[Risvertasashi]

It's not hard to log in for 1 minute out of the 45 day time span you earn. Though It could be better, it's not impossible nor hard to make sure your house stays there. Also your moogle mailbox can only hold 20 mail at a time so my question is.. Are you going to put more work on the development team just because you don't wanna log in for that 1 minute?

I've been lucky enough to never miss a window in the years of playing that I've had an in game house.

But I'm also experienced enough to know that, as they say, "sh** happens". And, yes, one day there might be a time where I can't login because of unforeseen circumstances.

Also, that's 20 messages you can receive at a time. You can have more than 20 pending messages. With the currently existing system as is.