No content for 1 year :)

[Avoidy]

This game has the strangest defenders, its defence for the long patch cycles is, why are you playing this game?

The official forums are basically a place where "just play other games" type-people meet people who are only here to air grievances until they unsub and can't post here anymore. If these forums allowed unsubbed players or even trial players to post, you'd see way more criticism than we're even seeing now, but most people actually do just unsubscribe and play other games. I'm playing another MMO currently, and there are so many former XIV players in it that they're calling us "refugees." And all of them have cited similar reasons for leaving the game behind. Like, I'm getting WoW refugee vibes from the whole situation. Remember when WoW players were flooding into XIV, saying the future for their old game just seemed bleak? Same situation here. It's uncanny. Of course, none of them can post here because their accounts are no longer active or whatever. I think for a more holistic picture, it's important to look at the entire thing. Yeah, there are a lot of people who still love this game and they come here to defend it. The people who'd disagree with them are largely barred from posting here, but they're quite vocal (if you ask them why they quit xiv) when you run into them in other games. TLDR I think if the forums let anyone with a SQEX account post, a lot of these frivolous "just play something else" type arguments would get overwhelmed with derision from an ocean of people with basic sense. Like... obviously the option exists to play other games. People want to play this one. That's why they're here, paying monthly for it.

[xbahax92]

Yeah, there are a lot of people who still love this game and they come here to defend it. The people who'd disagree with them are largely barred from posting here, but they're quite vocal (if you ask them why they quit xiv) when you run into them in other games.

Kinda hilarious, if you think about it. Trying to defend SE and Dev choices by telling others to go outside. While they have simply zero loss, when others ask for more content. It's like they're protesting to run duties in FFXIV?

[Seraphor]

This game has the strangest defenders, its defence for the long patch cycles is, why are you playing this game?

Maybe stop treating everything like a battle and realise that people aren't "defending the game", they're simply giving you some healthy advice.

No game can pump out content faster than players can consume that content, that's just a fact of media creation in general.

It's insane to me that people should expect to have brand new content every single day, 365 days a year.

[Koros]

Why do you need to play this game 365 days a year? Play a different game if there is nothing for you to do until the expansion drops.

the best part about ff14 is that you can pay to play other games

[True-to-Caesar]

the best part about ff14 is that you can pay to play other games

Until you realize even with a house, small, medium or large… your money would be better spent elsewhere than a seasonal game pretending to be a MMORPG.
4-4.5 months between patches is way too much when you start to check other online games with or without subs.

People will keep excusing this, but it’s just bad, especially with what is delivered. You don’t even get new maps to explore.

This game has no real dedicated streamer because it’s impossible to create content since it’s barebones. Should give people a hint that something is not right here.

[TheNight]

If these forums allowed unsubbed players or even trial players to post, you'd see way more criticism than we're even seeing now, but most people actually do just unsubscribe and play other games. I'm playing another MMO currently, and there are so many former XIV players in it that they're calling us "refugees." And all of them have cited similar reasons for leaving the game behind. Like, I'm getting WoW refugee vibes from the whole situation. Remember when WoW players were flooding into XIV, saying the future for their old game just seemed bleak? Same situation here. It's uncanny. Of course, none of them can post here because their accounts are no longer active or whatever.

This has been the case in Lost Ark before as well, before that game went into the gutters. It still has superior combat and fun raids though as long as you refrain yourself from actually trying to get to cutting edge.

To your point, it is extremely ironic that the simps would declare that this negative sentiment is in the minority when it's actually probably the majority of everyone who has played FF14 before. Everyone I know IRL who tried FF14 quit because it was boring. And I have literally never seen any positive sentiment about FF14 outside of FF14 other than its story and its perceived positive community. FF14 itself is now at a point where people openly criticize EW's lack of content. People say that unprompted all the time in game and here's the kicker: unlike on the forums I literally don't see anyone ever disagreeing. It's far more common for people to join in agreement.

[Lunalepsy]

Except we have fall guys and 1 hr of main story consisting of Zero staring at another man's abs, that will surely last for a year

And? People are so obsessed with "content," they've forgotten the basic elements of what an MMO should be.

[Supersnow845]

And? People are so obsessed with "content," they've forgotten the basic elements of what an MMO should be.

You mean a live service always online game that gives us content

[Syln]

You know the worst part about all that ? If they incentivized more playing with other people "organically", content would be far less of an issue, but they chose to make the game solo oriented, even the group content feel like solo since you don't need to organize/communicate until you start doing extreme trial.

Now don't get me wrong, i'm a solo player enjoyer but that direction make new content a central part of the experience requiring decent and more importantly frequent updates, sadly they completely failed to deliver on that part thus resentment is growing and they can only blame themselves for it.

[Jojoya]

You know the worst part about all that ? If they incentivized more playing with other people "organically", content would be far less of an issue, but they chose to make the game solo oriented, even the group content feel like solo since you don't need to organize/communicate until you start doing extreme trial.

Now don't get me wrong, i'm a solo player enjoyer but that direction make new content a central part of the experience requiring decent and more importantly frequent updates, sadly they completely failed to deliver on that part thus resentment is growing and they can only blame themselves for it.

What would you suggest they do to create that "organic" opportunity?

Most of the MMORPGs since WoW's release have contained a fair amount of solo content. That's one of the things that made WoW so hugely appealing - players could progress their characters even if their friends weren't online to play. They weren't forced to socialize with random strangers who may or may not be pleasant to play with. It made player gatekeeping of content access less likely to happen.

What is it that makes some players avoid random group matchmaking and turn to solo content? Other players.

It doesn't make any difference how "organic" game developers make the group content experience if there will continue to be a segment of the player base being judgmental, hostile and just plain unpleasant to be around. Too many people already have to put up with that sort of thing all day long at work, the last thing they need is to deal with it in their games. Try to force the socialization with the negative element and the player population starts shrinking.

FATEs are a nice piece of organic content. Players are free to come and go as they please. When the only reason to do them is for XP, GC Seals and gemstones, parties are relaxed and friendly.

The moment SE tries to make FATEs more relevant for things like relic weapons, it gets ugly as everyone descends on the zones. Players using the OP BLU abilities to insta-complete FATEs and prevent others from getting credit. Players who mess around and reset mobs, causing the efforts of other players to be wasted.

It's a bit ironic that players are occasionally the reason players don't get the things they're asking for. What's the point of adding content that will inevitably end up ruined by those who can't "play nice"? Less of a headache to design content as solo content, while still leaving room to play with friends, than to design content to require socialization.

It takes time to develop new content. They could push out content faster but it would start getting really sloppy and would likely be filled with bugs. This is true of every MMORPG. Check the content release periods for the others over the years and see how much content was being produced and how long players had to wait to get it.

I know some people like to point at WoW right now but there are a couple of things to keep in mind: WoW has a bigger development team than FFXIV and the reason that Shadowlands ended up content starved was because they realized they had a dog of an expansion on their hands. They choose to put more of the development team to work on Dragonflight to make it a better game than to try to salvage Shadowlands. It seems to have worked but the pace of content releases will end up slowing back down for WoW again before much longer. Then WoW players will start having the same complaints that we hear about FFXIV.

The easy solution: learn to enjoy playing mutiple games. Don't look to a single game as your be all and end all. Play when new content is released, do what you're interested in then move to another game with new content while waiting for the next content release.

If you're going to keep asking for innovation and new types of content, don't be surprised when existing content gets shortchanged or left out as they move staff to work on the new stuff.

If you feel like you're not getting your money's worth, then stop buying. Go somewhere that is giving you a good value for your money. It does not make sense to be paying just so you can be angry and miserable.