Quote Originally Posted by Jojoya View Post
You don't have to pay extra to get your first housing in those games, though, and their cash shops are subsidizing a lot more than just housing since they have no required subscription (RIFT is F2P, ESO is B2P).

I would be fine with an extra real money fee for housing if it was to pay for extra housing allowances above and beyond what's normally allotted to an account, but not if it was the only way for someone to get their first house. A subscription is already required to get that initial housing - there's your subsidization that should be providing for every player.
The existing apartments should count as that initial housing.

I wonder if it’d be feasible for SE create a separate instanced personal housing area that:

- Has entrance at Gold Saucer. (So portals to major cities)
- Purchasable/leasable either through Online Store/MogStation. Maybe allow MGP as a leasing option if they’d rather not have it be exclusively through real money.
- Have both exterior and interior of a small house with fixed surroundings. Maybe allow buyers to choose from a set of different themes like wooded, lakeside, desert, beach front, etc.
- Allows gardening patch without cross-breeding (so they don’t have to re-do cross-breeding mechanism). Instead, give residents monthly courtesy tokens that can be used to purchase otherwise cross-breed only produce from a special vendor. They can make the items non-marketplace trade-able so the it doesn’t become an advantage over other players.

Benefit over small house:
- Does not get demolished until/unless the character is deleted.
- Purchasable as soon as Gold Saucer is unlocked.

Allowing real money purchase should help fund this housing area so it can expand more easily to accommodate more players if demand is there. And if it’s well-received it can divert some players from ward housing, so hopefully it’d decrease competition for wards a bit too.