Best launch of any mmorpg I've played

[Nethereal]

The first hour was rough as any game it's first come first served and a lot of luck to get in first to avoid most login issues.

After that though? Haven't been kicked after 16h+ and the server's as far as I can tell haven't gone down once.

Amazing.

[ryouma17]

i wouldn't call it the best but its definitely far from the worst

[PredatoryCatgirl]

[DamianFatale]

The first hour was rough as any game it's first come first served and a lot of luck to get in first to avoid most login issues.

After that though? Haven't been kicked after 16h+ and the server's as far as I can tell haven't gone down once.

Amazing.

Shadowbringers was better. There was queue hell for the first day but everything was smooth. There were almost no issues that happened other than a couple things here and there that were quickly resolved. Stormbloods was THE WORST by far of any expansion. I would put this ones launch somewhere between Shadowbringers and Stormblood. Heavenswards launch wasn't great either. It was pretty terrible. I'd put it as second worse for the expansions.

Worst launches: Stormblood, Heavensward by far, and A Realm Reborn if you count the launch of the post legacy XIV as a whole.

Middle Tier: Endwalker. It's amazing how far they have come with stability during a semi conductor shortage. The problems are pretty annoying, but as long as you're in the game its pretty smooth.

Best Launch: Shadowbringers. Hands down was the smoothest. It might be some time before we ever get a smooth launch like this ever again. I pray for the next time.

[Halivel]

It's not FF14's smoothest launch for sure (smoothest one was 5.0, and 3.0 wasn't that bad as well), but it's absolutely much better than the horrendous disaster that was 4.0 early access.
People cry about 1 hour queue, yet I remember Rauhban duty issue that would kick entire server at once and welcome player into 23k+ queue where you would sit for 4-6 hours with the hope of not being kicked from lobby because it would mean starting from scratch.

All things considered, I think 1st day was as good as it could possibly be with current servers's state that wasn't exactly perfect prior update either.

[DamianFatale]

It's not FF14's smoothest launch for sure (smoothest one was 5.0, and 3.0 wasn't that bad as well), but it's absolutely much better than the horrendous disaster that was 4.0 early access.
People cry about 1 hour queue, yet I remember Rauhban duty issue that would kick entire server at once and welcome player into 23k+ queue where you would sit for 4-6 hours with the hope of not being kicked from lobby because it would mean starting from scratch.

All things considered, I think 1st day was as good as it could possibly be with current servers's state that wasn't exactly perfect prior update either.

3.0 launch was garbage lol. There were so many world crashes that it made Endwalkers world crashes look like a drop of water.

[Halivel]

3.0 launch was garbage lol. There were so many world crashes that it made Endwalkers world crashes look like a drop of water.

Perhaps it depended on server or even personal connection on top of everything. I do remember some queues being then, but was a bit better than today. And I can't really remember any serious crashes.
(Perhaps it was just replaced by nightmares of 4.0 EA...)

[Macleod]

Haven't been kicked after 16h+ and the server's as far as I can tell haven't gone down once.

Staying on isn't the problem, actually making it in the game through queue hell is. 4.5 hours tonight for me so far and STILL WAITING...

[Gemina]

Literally what I'm doing right now.

Current thoughts revolving around what comment could infuriate a person greater than boasting about an awesome launch when thousands of players are waiting to get in.

Where's Titanmen?

[Naterade]

Shadowbringers launch was near perfection. This launch is pathetic. 4 expansions in and suddenly we have these 2002 and 2004 errors from being in queue too long. They are blaming the pandemic for not buying more servers. They've been working on this xpac for 2 years now, I don't feel sorry for them for waiting less than a year before their next xpac to decide that it was in their best interest to buy more of them. They should've added more servers 8 months ago when there was a surge of players joining the game, but they didn't do anything. It has nothing to do with availability, they didn't want to pay the price to upgrade at the time.