ELI5: Why the absolute hell did SE not use Azure or AWS as a temporary solution?

[Tyssyn]

Another game I play moved to Amazon's Cloud servers, and while it's not an MMO, it's absolutely HORRIBLE. Lag is atrocious, things don't want to render quickly at all. I shudder to even imagine how bad FFXIV would be. I've also played New World, performance of the game was ugh.

[LariaKirin]

They said they have considered it and decided against it. Likely for good reasons.

Using AWS as a "temporary solution" is a suggestion born from ignorance - it is not a solution to the temporary problem we have now.

AWS doesn't magically just scale without effort. You need expertise to specifically design for it, otherwise you risk making things worse.

You can't simply copy-pasta your way into AWS. We're talking about complex infrastructure that was not built for cloud in the first place.
They would be looking at a migration process that takes months to years of planning, executing and testing.

Even if we entertain the fantasy that they could "just AWS 4head" in 2 days - migrating to a completely different environment for a temporary problem is a completely stupid business decision.

TLDR: AWS is not magic, stop pretending it is.

[Psythe]

Its really not that simple either. It takes time and a likely amount of changes to code and functions. Even off loading something more logical like just the login service becomes a feat in itself and introduces several more points of failure. Even if you could find suitable hardware that allows your code to work without many changes having the extra tunnel or point to point connection can be a point of stress or failure itself.

I have seen a lot of devs turn to aws or azure and come out saying nope never again and going back to using a fully or self hosted non virtualized platform.

[VisperCon]

They said they have considered it and decided against it. Likely for good reasons.

Using AWS as a "temporary solution" is a suggestion born from ignorance - it is not a solution to the temporary problem we have now.

AWS doesn't magically just scale without effort. You need expertise to specifically design for it, otherwise you risk making things worse.

You can't simply copy-pasta your way into AWS. We're talking about complex infrastructure that was not built for cloud in the first place.
They would be looking at a migration process that takes months to years of planning, executing and testing.

Even if we entertain the fantasy that they could "just AWS 4head" in 2 days - migrating to a completely different environment for a temporary problem is a completely stupid business decision.

TLDR: AWS is not magic, stop pretending it is.

Isn't failing to do anything for the last nine months to improve servers to prepare for this launch when they have the data to show their MoM growth and historical data to show the increase in returning players for an expansion even worse? It's not like the idea is "do it in 2 days" but they had MONTHS to prepare for this launch and have utterly failed in that regard.

[Tanis_Ebonhart]

They tried using AWS. It didn't work and they literally explained why.

If anyone thought of it then I assure you that they have already tried it.

Please at least Google search this before asking.

Isn't failing to do anything for the last nine months to improve servers to prepare for this launch when they have the data to show their MoM growth and historical data to show the increase in returning players for an expansion even worse? It's not like the idea is "do it in 2 days" but they had MONTHS to prepare for this launch and have utterly failed in that regard.

You work for them? Is that how you got that they aren't doing anything? Please.

[VisperCon]

They tried using AWS. It didn't work and they literally explained why.

If anyone thought of it then I assure you that they have already tried it.

Please at least Google search this before asking.

Source...that isn't from over 5 years ago? (Because obviously technology doesn't change in five years...) They use AWS for Dragon Quest X by the way so this isn't some new concept to SE.

[RyuDragnier]

Isn't failing to do anything for the last nine months to improve servers to prepare for this launch when they have the data to show their MoM growth and historical data to show the increase in returning players for an expansion even worse? It's not like the idea is "do it in 2 days" but they had MONTHS to prepare for this launch and have utterly failed in that regard.

1. They need a specific chip type to increase the amount of servers.
2. Said chip type is currently hard to find and we have a global shortage of, and have had, for over a year now.
3. All the WoW players came to FFXIV 6 months ago, increasing the active playerbase to a size NOBODY could have predicted.
4. Due to all of the above, they did everything within their power to take care of things while trying to avoid things getting worse.

[VisperCon]

1. They need a specific chip type to increase the amount of servers.
2. Said chip type is currently hard to find and we have a global shortage of, and have had, for over a year now.
3. All the WoW players came to FFXIV 6 months ago, increasing the active playerbase to a size NOBODY could have predicted.
4. Due to all of the above, they did everything within their power to take care of things while trying to avoid things getting worse.

These all sound like issues of a systemic failure that were years in the making compounded by either an unwillingness to invest or strategize. They had record profits in April of 2021, that was 8 months ago and the population continued to grow MoM. That's just basic trending and forecasting. Companies need to be able to pivot to deal with these types of things but SE's complacent approach to their servers have showed quite the failure. If they "did everything within their power to take care of things"...what exactly did they do?

[Zanarkand-Ronso]

Im also Mentally Frazzled how many people make new Threads of the Same Topic we already have.
And say the exact same things that were already said on another Thread.
Are people just Desperate for Upvotes?

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

These all sound like issues of a systemic failure that were years in the making compounded by either an unwillingness to invest or strategize. They had record profits in April of 2021, that was 8 months ago and the population continued to grow MoM. That's just basic trending and forecasting. Companies need to be able to pivot to deal with these types of things but SE's complacent approach to their servers have showed quite the failure. If they "did everything within their power to take care of things"...what exactly did they do?

8 months ago was in peak "there are no chips" season. They would have had to forecast this years ago, which means forecasting WoW falling to pieces and almost everyone and their mother jumping ship overnight. No one forecasts growth like that when its outside norms. Also COVID happened, which caused more people to have time at home, increasing counts of logged in players, and at that point, it was too late to fix things.