No one logged in today because of Lost Ark

[Xaruko_Nexume]

I find funny how some posters quickly forget a lot of shady stuff SE pull with FFXIV.

- Cash shop in a monthly sub with payed expansions.

- Rented retainer space. (Only MMO I know that do this).

- You have to pay if you want to change certain details from your character. Some olders MMO allowed this for free, like SWG.

- MSQ skip, class boost and retainer boost. (According to some posters here this is already P2W. Or at least if others games do it... hehehe)

- Instead of bringing back cosmetics from old seasons to be earned in-game they are throw at the cash shop. You member when games like Rift/WoW allow you to earn pass items with seasonal currency? I member!

- FOMO with pre-order bonusses and early access.

- Is the subscription for FFXIV APP still a thing?

- Want to keep your house? Stay sub every other month even if you don't feel like playing. Does not matter if their intention never was this situation, right now is a thing.

Sure, FFXIV still has one of the best monetization but is still bad, the whole idea of a sub game with payed subscription is that no additional monetization should be require. Probably will be worst if not because Yoshida and FFXIV team has fight against SE worst impulses.

Right now for most MMO's is a "pick your poison" situation.

For me personally, I dont disagree with your stance at all. I love Final Fantasy XIV but being required to buy the game, and a monthly sub, and buy expansion, AND pay for extra cosmetics. Not okay.

At least Lost Ark does have a truly free to play option.

[SturmChurro]

Some Korean games, like LA or BDO, instead of pick a race you select a champion, that's why "gender lock" is a more common thing. It's like a hero from Overwatch or a LoL character.

Anyway, by my personal definition, yes, LA is P2W. Just happen to be PvE game so, why even care? In FFXIV people can swipe for Ultimate clears and... who cares?. For what I know the game gets grindy once you hit Tier 3, at that point gearing upgrading cost are high and the process can fail (20% chance of success I think it is), items don't downgrade and the system has bad luck protection. Problem is, you can use alts to feed your main or/and swipe, so if you want to be part of the elite can be a massive grind and money sink. For a casual the usual daily routine is very similar to FFXIV (up to two hours of daily stuff seems to be the norm, but some mention as less as 30m per character).

Monetization is very similar to Guild Wars 2 so you can trade in-game currency for shop currency and get anything you need (like more inventory space and similar stuff) + login rewards and events. Also (at least in Korea) others players can sell cosmetics for in-game currency so you can benefit from whales. I do that in Black Desert and I have more than 320€ in cosmetics I acquired with in-game currency... on EU, NA is whale land so it's even easier.

However, anyone be warn, at least the Korean version, LA have some FOMO predatory loot boxes with the good looking cosmetics behind 5% and each box can cost up to 8€ (and costumes are compose from various pieces and I'm not sure you get the full thing in one box). Not sure if NA/EU will have that, but for anyone susceptible to that kind of crap, please, stay away from the game.

Yeah, I don't mind the idea of 'pick a champion' if there is actually like a well established backstory and everything else. Still, I think it's an excuse to include the gender lock. Either way, in general, I don't really care about a genderlock as much as others. Rather, it won't make me stop playing a game over it, I'll play the class I like regardless.

I'll give it a good try, I did have my eyes on this game quite awhile ago. I have played BDO to endgame, but I never played much after. Pay to win is just kind of annoying in general, and pretty much ruins games. With all the nonsensical grind, and this "bad luck protection".

This game definitely does sound like a sort of Black Desert 'Lite' to me. Loot boxes are definitely pretty annoying, not surprised at all it has that.

Right now for most MMO's is a "pick your poison" situation.

Most definitely. It really has sucked for awhile for mmorpg players. When I say I consider FFXIV as the best currently, that is me saying the other ones are just worse. I like FFXIV, but I do still have issues with it.

[Momo_Kozuki]

3000 words limit

- While I disagree with how some cash shop items works (like previous years' seasonal event items), I find cash shop in FF14 is pretty lenient: no lootbox, no ad that slams onto your face in-game. There are some small boosts like motorbike mount gives you one-star speed increase which is helpful for map exploration, or some outfit with exp bonus up to lv30. But they are pretty much irrelevant toward end-game.



- Rented retainers and slots is a bit scummy practice, yeah, but not a super necessary thing unless you want to maximize gil income for... whatever reason you feel you need gil for. I guess raider would want a lot of gil to pentameld every class they have? Or house buying from black market? Regarding of retailer slots, unless you have a habit of hoarding every single item, you won't need more than 2 retainers, even if you have every single weapon relics. Some other MMORPG I knows give you very limited space to store items, then sell inventory slots that you have to buy on every character, then personal warehouse slots, then account-wide warehouse slots then skill preset slots tabs, then whatever slots the publisher can think of. I really would love to buy glam slot/plates if this game ever offers (I doubt so, though), but it seems to fall into the technical issues, which no one can do about it.



-Meet Blade and Soul. You want to change your default hair style and its color? Plz cough up some currencies that you rarely earn in the game, or buy Ncoin for a service that apply full-body appearance change. Oh, they make sure you have buy excessive Ncoin to use the service, of course.


-While boosters in FF14 feels P2W, I don't feel they are. But I think this is debated to death for many times already, so I refrain commenting.


-Yeah, these are FF14's own FOMO which I really hate. You will not only miss the cosmetic, but also the quest in your completed quest log. You will never know what is the event story last year was, unless you youtube it.


- I feel this is a common practice of pretty much every game that offers pre-order bonus, not only MMORPG.


- It is still there if you want an extra retainer and more chocobo saddles. Other than that, it is so badly implemented that I don't know what to do with it, free or premium sub, lol.


- I have a house and yeah, I hate the idea of losing my house. At the same time, I want to lose it so I don't feel having to pay sub during content drought to keep my house.


So yeah, FF14 box and sub model still have its own shady predatory tricks. Even so, it is the sub model that keeps the game healthy and stay away from the common freenium predatory tricks that Korean MMORPG offers. If I have to pick my own poison, I would certainly pick the less painful one in long-term, instead of picking the poison that will cause gambling addiction and burn all your money chasing RNG.

[DPZ2]

I find funny how some posters quickly forget a lot of shady stuff SE pull with FFXIV.

"Shady" in your opinion perhaps, but above board, well documented and optional in the opinion of others.

Every MMORPG I've played in the last 15 years charges for expansions, even the ones that don't require a paid subscription. Rift, GW2, SW:TOR, WoW, FFXIV ... it's how they cover the production costs. Every single one of those I've listed has a cash shop, and subscriptions are available even for Free-to-Play MMORPGs (they give all sorts of bonuses if you do subscribe).

This is also the only MMO I know that provides over 500 inventory slots without charging a dime of in-game/out-of-game currency. You don't even have to craft/buy bags. Oh yeah - that jumps to over 900 inventory slots when you count the slots of the Glamour dresser.

You had to go back to Star Wars: Galaxies to find a game that doesn't charge for character changes? A game that has not been online for the last decade?

WoW charges for name changes, faction changes and race changes. Not much different from a Fantasia, although I believe the $25.00 price Blizzard charges for a single race change is only a wee bit less expensive than the group-purchase of 3 Fantasia.

Are other MMORPG games offering class boosts? Yes. Particularly the ones that have more than six years of content. I don't consider that P2W if they do. XP boosts and useful gear sets? Yeah, those are P2W

- FOMO with pre-order bonusses and early access.

Why is this even here? Show me a subscription-based MMORPG with an expansion coming that doesn't have these. Go ahead, I'll wait.

- Is the subscription for FFXIV APP still a thing?

Yes. You can run the FFXIV App without it. A lot of us do ...

... the whole idea of a sub game with payed subscription is that no additional monetization should be require.

World of Warcraft is still a paid subscription. Cash shop with level boosts. Heck, it even has a way to buy in-game currency. The idea isn't foreign, it's become well established over the last 15 years.

[Conundrum]

Why aren't the Lost Ark fanboys playing Lost Ark?

Oh...right.

[FoxyAreku]

Lost Ark has even worse race diversity then this game, along with gender-locked classes, that killed all my interest in it.

[LittleImp]

Why aren't the Lost Ark fanboys playing Lost Ark?

Oh...right.

At least it isn't as bad as Endwalker's launch yet.

[Driavna]

...

I don't disagree with you. At least FFXIV cash shop don't have another currency so you never has to spend more than you want. Stuff is not remove once added so no FOMO there. The game has a lot of mounts, pets, emotes and gear. Also never minded if someone purchase stuff from it (in any game really), if you like/make you happy and can afford it why not?

The argument of: "it's worst there", has never sit well with me, but that's me. I understand everyone has their own line for monetization.

I'll give it a good try, I did have my eyes on this game quite awhile ago. I have played BDO to endgame, but I never played much after. Pay to win is just kind of annoying in general, and pretty much ruins games. With all the nonsensical grind, and this "bad luck protection". .

How you upgrade stuff in Korean MMO's has been like that since their model was just monthly sub (well, stuff used to just explode if you fail an upgrade). Compare to other Korean games LA is not that bad, but any system that two players put the same effort but get different results will never be good, even if in theory I can do some mental gymnastic and convince myself with "Well, is like a drop from a dungeon. Sometimes you get it first time, others you need to grind for months".

[MidnightEquinox]

One thing I'll mention is that while I'm more or less aware FFXIV has a cash shop, it's not pushed in my face in any way. I don't even know where it is on the menu. I only know about it because people mention it. Nor does it ever sound like there's something in there that'd give me any kind of advantage or anything like that. It seems to mostly be a fat animal stable. :P

[iheartlove42]

FFXIV's cash shop is mostly all cosmetic stuff that won't give you advantage. The retainer shop though is the only greedy thing really.

Lost Ark on the other hand has an endgame progression system that will make 99% of the playerbase that joined cause Amazon paid their favorite Twitch streamers to promote it, quit within a month especially once those streamers return to FFXIV, LoL, or start playing Elden Ring. WoW devs wish they had thought of this progression system. You literally have to spend hours to farm materials to buy items that then do an RNG roll on whether they're going to upgrade the right stats for your class. To do this efficiently and keep up with endgame, you have to make multiple alts (leveling them each to ma lvl) to grind the materials to make sure you're guaranteed to eventually get the stats you need every day on your main. Oh yea, the amount of materials and RNG items you can get have weekly and daily caps. Or you can just pay money in the Lost Ark cash shop to skip the grind. From what i remember of playing the Korean version via a VPN, it shoves the cash shop in your face.

Compare this to FFXIV's endhame progression system which basically just throws tokens at you or makes sure you'll eventually win the gear you want in each raid if you want to roll for gear. There's no need for alts really.

Lost Ark caters to tryhard elitist raiders and paypigs, and honestly I won't miss the former if they left FFXIV since they already brought their toxicity from WoW with them here. Lost Ark in other countries already has a more toxic community than League of Legends, I expect it to outdo League here as well in that regard. It's going to be another "you best have the raid boss mechanics memorized before it even releases and if you die once we're kicking you from the group, and if we wipe we're disbanding". Koreans in internet cafes have physically fought each other over this game.