FFXIV's technical limitations are beginning to concern me.

[TeraRamis]

1. Glam counts can't be expanded.
2. New players can only roll on certain servers during extremely limited windows.
3. Current players see intermittent alt creation restrictions.
4. The website 'runs out' of digital copies of the game.
5. There's almost always a queue.
6. There are always restrictions in place on marriages.
7. The mogstation is a clunky mess (albeit slightly improved) that feels like it dates from 2005.
8. There are weird systems for everything: retainers, crafting, gear swaps, glamour (the prisms, the plates, the dresser, the armoire).

Is... anyone else starting to see a pattern here? Look, I love the game, and I really am a lifelong fan of the company and the franchise. But I'm beginning to feel like FFXIV is kind of being held together by spit and baling wire. And while things have been creaky and "quaint" like that since launch day, I'm starting to worry that the entire muddled system is in real trouble (having the digital copies go down - even for a while - is alarming, and I'm hardly the only person that saw that as a big red flag).

It is my belief that the design team does the best that they can with the resources allotted, but that they've been carrying water with a rusty bucket since day one. And with this sudden surge in players, that shoestring approach to hardware, in-game QOL, population maintenance, website stability, etc. is no longer sufficient.

This is a really, really critical time in FFXIV's lifespan - easily the most crucial moment since launch. And I'm really not seeing a company that has prepared for this trial. In fact, I feel like they've been caught unawares and are trying to bail like mad to stay seaworthy.

Please, Square-Enix - now is the time. Reinvest in this game.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

The queue is just the login servers being done smart. It's less than 30 seconds most days.

There are no marriage restrictions? Other than "hey, we may do maintenance on these days at these times so... Maybe don't schedule on this day"

They ran out in terms of "we only make so many digital keys at a time, and can regenerate them again when needed" a lot of places to this. Not really a technical limitation.


New character creation is really only impacted during spikes of activity, like when a mass exodus of a competitor happens, or during expansion launches.


You picked like, the most out of norm week to bring up issues when things have been fine for months..

[Shougun]

How did you make that list without adding housing? lol

Another one might add is that mog purchases are not all account bound due to memory difficulties or so we were told.

Because it takes, if you're not trying to rush things, quite a long time to get current and that's just doing the content in the line, not side stuff, I'm assuming this wave will do well so long as interest isn't dissuaded by the main game itself (if it's your cup of tea or not). It's mostly later that you start to see these issues, though in FFXIV's defense the compatriots of competition are not doing much to make things seem scary for FFXIV. Personally with the right words, pacing not throwing anyone off (good thing they smoothed out ARR before this wave happened, I bet it is paying off really well now), and the expansion doing well, that FFXIV bought itself quite a bit more time if SE wanted to use it - the obvious fact is FFXIV is currently on the way upwards, of course at some point it might peak, and I do think there is going to be some interesting challenges with 7.0 (all the built in investments are mostly paying off in 6.0), but it's not a dying game, it's a growing game.

I still hope they're secretly either working on some hardcore ARR 2.0 (doesn't mean destroying the world or cutting content) like technical changes, or another mmorpg though (which also doesn't mean closing FFXIV, like how FFXIV didn't close FFXI). I feel the age and potential 'technical debt' is unfortunate, debt which I don't really blame them for (doesn't stop wishes though, like glamour log or what have you - I mean many wanted a housing / calm area for all and while I doubt it'll be full housing, strongly doubt, I think Sanctuary is going to answer a lot of casual desires as best as the system can answer them and so I hope it does very well). I think that they got here from 1.0 is like O_O; *clap* and they all should be proud. Yet at least in my mind's eye I think "damn if this team can do this as it is, what happened if they were given the proper resources and time from the beginning and allowed to design things without the world shouting FASTER FASTER FASTER".

[Theodric]

I share many of your listed concerns. I'd like to see FFXIV prosper for many years to come, though I fear the lack of a major competitor is holding the game back on a fair few fronts.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

I share many of your listed concerns. I'd like to see FFXIV prosper for many years to come, though I fear the lack of a major competitor is holding the game back on a fair few fronts.

Let's be honest, a new competitor isn't going to magically fix the technical issues XIV has.

Those come from the rush of building a replacement for 1.0 in less than 2 years from what essentially is scratch.

Archage, BDO, eso, etc, were all supposed to be big competitors, and most of them panned or never drew any of xivs playerbase away for more than a month or two, despite lots of people saying otherwise before they launched.

XIV will continue along its way, and only once the devs find a good spot in the cycle to start mucking through old legacy code will they attempt to unravel the mess, if they are even able to.

They have mentioned in the past a lot of the people who wrote much of the underlying systems no longer work there, and they stay away from those systems to keep from breaking something they can't fix.

[ForctyusGold]

i personally really hate new mog station how when you want to buy an item, it will redirect you into square enix shop .... the old one was way much better.

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

- Who said they can't be expanded? I think the Dresser was introduced in Stormblood, when Shadowbringers came out they expanded it. Did they explicitly say they can't/wont go higher?
- Server Sizes can only be so big yoh.
- What restrictions are you talking about? The inability to share items easily is the only thing I can think of, and you can still do it. If your in an FC, just have the ALT join the FC and share items. The only other limit here is there are untradable that bind to the character. Or is this what you are talking about that is such a bad limitation?
- Can't explain that one. It happened, no idea why or how.
- Why yeah, the game is really bumping right now, and servers can only hold X amount of players. But the amount online and going offline changes constantly, and outside of New Expansion Release, your probably gonna wait no more then 1 minute in que. You can spare 60 seconds I hope
- What Marriage Restrictions are there?
- What is Clunky about the Mogstation? An example/short story would be nice
- You think those are weird systems? Maybe you just dont understand them, or just dont like them. Because I dont know anybody who has said those things are weird or even hard to understand

[Jeeqbit]

We have been told we are getting a multi-million server investment after 6.0 so that may help.

New players can only roll on certain servers during extremely limited windows.

A server can only hold so many people at once so that is fine. Obviously what will need to be considered is more servers.

The website 'runs out' of digital copies of the game.

That is so strange that it's fascinating. I always thought digital copies of something were unlimited.

[SniperCT]

We have been told we are getting a multi-million server investment after 6.0 so that may help.

A server can only hold so many people at once so that is fine. Obviously what will need to be considered is more servers.

That is so strange that it's fascinating. I always thought digital copies of something were unlimited.

Adding more servers has the danger of those servers becoming ghost towns once populations settle. See: Well just about every MMO that's launched in the past 15 years that panicked and added too many servers because of an initial rush.

As for digital copies, they can only generate so many keys at any one time. So when that stock runs out, they have to generate more, which takes a bit of time to run the generation and then provide it to the people running the store (or 3rd parties like steam and GMG). Since they probably expect x amount of sales in any given month they probably only had what they expected they'd need and not much of an overflow.

[DrWho2010]

We have been told we are getting a multi-million server investment after 6.0 so that may help.

A server can only hold so many people at once so that is fine. Obviously what will need to be considered is more servers.

That is so strange that it's fascinating. I always thought digital copies of something were unlimited.

it CAN be unlimited but they can CHOOSE to only generate so many codes so they can keep tabs on how many are being consumed at any point. Also the NA/EU stores are run by a 3rd party storefront (Scalefast) and so if they "run out of stock" they have to request more codes from Square Enix first.