Error 90006

[Krotoan]

Not sure why a VPN should be required to properly play a game that was already released globally.

Had no issues with this game or any other MMOs previously and suddenly, I need to pay extra for a VPN to play a game?

How about SE deduct the cost of the VPN from my monthly subscription if said VPN is deemed required to play FFXIV?

For a possibly more relatable comparison.. this would be like telling your gym they should pay for the extra gas it takes for you to take the road without all the potholes to get there. Yeah you payed for the membership, but your gym (or whatever other service that requires you to get there or connect to it for it to work) has no control over the middling infrastructure.

If you want someone to complain to, complain to your ISP.

[IdowhatIwant]

Not sure why a VPN should be required to properly play a game that was already released globally.

Had no issues with this game or any other MMOs previously and suddenly, I need to pay extra for a VPN to play a game?

How about SE deduct the cost of the VPN from my monthly subscription if said VPN is deemed required to play FFXIV?

Perhaps you should educate yourself on how the internet works and take this up with your ISP.

[TristanX]

Not sure why a VPN should be required to properly play a game that was already released globally.

Had no issues with this game or any other MMOs previously and suddenly, I need to pay extra for a VPN to play a game?

How about SE deduct the cost of the VPN from my monthly subscription if said VPN is deemed required to play FFXIV?

Internet issues is not a problem by Square Enix. News is already out there for the cable fault.

Yes, VPN is optional. It is entirely up to if you want better connection.

[Icytempest]

So, basically what you are saying here is to, suck it up as the infra is shit or pay extra to get VPN?

How about:

SE explores other ways for transfers of data from the data centers to the affected users?

Investing in regional servers instead of centralised ones? Eggs in one basket analogy.

Addressing the current issue so that the affected gamers do not feel ignored/marginalised? Or are we not as important as the NA and JP players? Seems like the issue is affecting mostly OCE and SEA players.

[Krotoan]

So, basically what you are saying here is to, suck it up as the infra is shit or pay extra to get VPN?

How about:

SE explores other ways for transfers of data from the data centers to the affected users?

Investing in local servers

You can take it however you wish. I'd like to clarify that SE has next to no control over the route your internet takes to connect to their servers. Suggesting you pay maybe 5 bucks a month or less for a VPN service is probably the more viable solution than convincing an entire company to move their million dollar servers close to YOU to make it work better or creating an entirely new data center OR suggesting they somehow convince service providers in between to prioritize and optimize their customers traffic somehow.


But sure.. that would work.
you edited so:

Addressing the current issue so that the affected gamers do not feel ignored/marginalised?

I am curious what you think this should look like? Apologize for a company that is not part of them having a problem?

Seems like the issue is affecting mostly OCE and SEA players.

Which they already have servers planned to be setup for but which are being delayed by the shortages every other tech industry in the world is suffering from.

So you've also moved on to "do what you're doing but faster even though it's impossible".

[Icytempest]

You can take it however you wish. I'd like to clarify that SE has next to no control over the route your internet takes to connect to their servers. Suggesting you pay maybe 5 bucks a month or less for a VPN service is probably the more viable solution than convincing an entire company to move their million dollar servers close to YOU to make it work better or creating an entirely new data center OR suggesting they somehow convince service providers in between to prioritize and optimize their customers traffic somehow.


But sure.. that would work.

Cool story bro. Noted with thanks.

[Krotoan]

Cool story bro. Noted with thanks.

You're welcome. Please feel free to ask any further questions about ISP, internet infrastructure, hosting, and how games interact with it all since it is literally part of my actual job and I like to provide perspective.

[Icytempest]

You're welcome. Please feel free to ask any further questions about ISP, internet infrastructure, hosting, and how games interact with it all since it is literally part of my actual job and I like to provide perspective.

Please go to the technical support forum and share your wisdom. At the very least, someone cares.

[Packetdancer]

SE explores other ways for transfers of data from the data centers to the affected users?

It seems perhaps a bit excessive to ask Square-Enix to set up international fiber links a'la the affected submarine cabling. The game may be profitable, but that's a thing that would dwarf their entire operating budget for the game.

To use the earlier gym analogy, this is like saying "Well, since the road I need to take to the gym has potholes, and because everyone's avoiding the potholes the alternate route is congested; has the gym considered making a new road?" It's both outside of their particular area of business, and probably well beyond their budget to do even if they wanted to.

(FWIW, "the alternate route is congested" is in fact precisely the problem here; with that cable in a faulty state, internet traffic is being routed around the damage... which means you still have access to places on the other side of that cable, but the metaphorical alternate roads have a traffic jam during 'rush hour' as a result. Which causes packet loss or delays, which can be fine for some things but is not so great for online gaming, which will see it as a connection drop.)

Investing in regional servers instead of centralised ones? Eggs in one basket analogy.

In general, MMO architecture has one 'logical' server consisting of many, many actual individual physical servers... and those servers must be in the same physical datacenter, or else you get really awful performance. If the inventory server that handles all your inventory was on the east coast, and the instance server handling, say, Mor Dhona was on the west coast, even with really fast links it could become painful just to open your inventory.

And that's without getting into what would happen if something happened to infrastructure outside of their control -- like a cabling fault that cut the two halves of the datacenter off from each other.

They'd have to split the datacenters into smaller ones -- like, take half of the servers from Primal and put them into two separate datacenters -- in order to make putting the different servers in different physical locations feasible. But that would likely have an impact on Duty Finder and Party Finder, inasmuch as you'd have a smaller pool of cross-server players to draw from.

Which sucks, but does mean there are honest-to-god real technological limitations as to why the datacenters need to be physically in a given location, rather than taking a given datacenter and peanut-buttering it across the world.

Addressing the current issue so that the affected gamers do not feel ignored/marginalised? Or are we not as important as the NA and JP players? Seems like the issue is affecting mostly OCE and SEA players.

I mean, they're planning an entire new datacenter for OCE/SEA; I'd say they're aware of the problem and the need for a new datacenter in that region. But the pandemic has caused Issues when it comes to getting the final hardware they need, and also sending technicians out there to actually set things up.

It sucks for folks in your situation, no question, especially since they said they were doing this datacenter and now it's been delayed. And "use a VPN" feels reductive inasmuch as adding another requirement to play a game you've already paid for feels unfortunate, even if it's beyond Square-Enix's control, akin to "well, I guess I have to take another road to get to the gym".

THAT SAID, in the interests of constructive advice... for what it's worth, as gaming VPNs go, Mudfish is what I would call "ridiculously affordable". As in, "I paid US$10 for 80GB of traffic three years ago, have repeatedly used it to get around internet outages, and I still haven't run out of my allotted time and needed to pay to refill." It's also known to work well with FFXIV specifically.

And while it sucks to maybe need to use a VPN, the cable outage is a massive problem for far more companies than merely Square-Enix, so I would be shocked if it wasn't fixed in the first half of January. (Which, according to various internet infrastructure news sites, appears to indeed be the timeline they're operating on, so presumably the submarine cable will be replaced within the next 2 weeks or so.)

So as much as the situation sucks for anyone in your position, a VPN is not the end of the world. (I hope.)

[TristanX]

So, basically what you are saying here is to, suck it up as the infra is shit or pay extra to get VPN?

How about:

SE explores other ways for transfers of data from the data centers to the affected users?

Investing in regional servers instead of centralised ones? Eggs in one basket analogy.

Addressing the current issue so that the affected gamers do not feel ignored/marginalised? Or are we not as important as the NA and JP players? Seems like the issue is affecting mostly OCE and SEA players.

Oceanic is planned. Estimated Feb 2022.