If you're unhappy with this game then unsub... forever.

[Jojoya]

Before I start responding to some of your individual points, let me say that I agree with your thread title.

If someone is unhappy with the game, they need to unsub for their own sake. Games are for our entertainment and relaxation. If a game isn't fun, it's not serving its purpose. Wasting money on it is counterproductive.

I remember CBU3 actually creating polls on the forums, if you can believe that, asking players what it was they wanted to change in FFXIV as it currently was. '

CBU3 didn't exist until 2019.

The polls did exist but CBU3 had nothing to do with them. They were there to help the game's "re-developers" pinpoint the most urgent changes needed.

Once the game was released and became successful, there was no need for the polls anymore. This is no different from the majority of other successful games. They aren't using a player democracy to influence their game design.

(comments on content difficulty and subsequent nerfs)

If the majority of players feel left out of content because it's too difficult, they quit the game. That doesn't serve anyone.

Citation? See Wildstar. Oh wait, you can't anymore. Game is dead due to a lack of casual content, especially at end game.

FFXIV does still have difficult content but do not expect to find it in the MSQ or content related to the MSQ, which is intended for players of all skill. There's nothing wrong with that. All those players who enjoy relaxing in easy mode are still contributing financially to the development of more difficult content for those who want a greater challenge.

(comments on formulaic content design)

Most long-running games that add new content on a regular basis have their fomulas. They've developed based on player response. Players will stick to what they like. Change the formula and you start losing players.

Citation? See World of Warcraft post Wrath. The more they took away for the sake of change, the more players they lost. It's only now that they're starting to bring back some of what was discarded that player interest is starting to creep back up.

Formulas that worked with players are safe. Change is risk unless the game was already failing (see FFXIV 1.0).

If you need something different as a player, try a new game. It's better than watching one you enjoy get destroyed by change for the sake of change.

(job design complaints)

Job design will always be a challenge for MMORPG developers trying to find the right proportion of job balance to job uniqueness.

Some players want uniqueness. Some want balance. Some want both. I remember the same issues in WoW. I've heard GW2 players making similar complaints because certain builds are considered mandatory for raiding.

This is not the only game that has suffered from it.

But I will agree that it suffers more in this game because the developers have a lopsided view of the Holy Trinity. Until they address that weakness, job design will remain a problem.

RE: Kaiten - most job changes don't happen because players ask for them. They happen because developers are trying to introduce new elements without increasing button bloat.

Kaiten might have been removed but skill potencies had been increased to compensate. They could have added Kaiten back but they would have reverted all those potency increases to compensate for its return. SAM players would no doubt have seen that as being punished for demanding Kaiten back.

I bet the Kaiten fuss wouldn't have happened if Kaiten hadn't been removed at the same time as the stat squish occurred so players could have clearly seen the impact of the potency increases.

It will be interesting to see how SAM is designed for Dawntrail. I suspect Kaiten will be back along with some additional button bloat since the impression left is that SAM players like a lot of unnecessary buttons to press.

FFXVI and YoshiP complaints

Do people understand the difference between the role of a producer and the role of a director in game development (or in any entertainment media for that matter)?

A producer makes certain a project has the resources it needs to be completed.

A game director oversees the actual creation of a game and guides its design decisions.

FFXVI was completed. If you have issues with FFXVI game design then direct your comments to that game's director. YoshiP was not the director of that game.

As for listening to the player base, listening to players and making changes in response to players would be 2 different things. We know they are listening. They have made some changes to the game and acknowledged those changes as being due to player feedback.

That they don't make other changes requested in player feedback doesn't mean they aren't listening. It may be those changes need time for development before they can be implemented in game. It may be those changes require technology that doesn't exist or is beyond what the clients owned by the average player can currently handle. It may be they don't agree that those changes are right for the game.

You can't always get what you want.

(cash shop complaints)

Welcome to capitalism - give the customer what they're willing to pay for. Those with the excess disposable income aren't likely to stop buying the extras they want to have because the prices are trivial compared to what they have available to spend.

It's a weird hill for people to choose to die on considering that the cash shop revenue reduces the need to increase prices elsewhere not to mention that we get far more items added as in-game rewards than are added to the cash shop each expansion. Outside of some specific situations, I'm using ingame rewards instead of items from the cash shop. The quality is still there in most cases. All they lack is the separate price tag.

If you don't want to pay more, then don't pay more. Nothing on the cash shop is mandatory for game play.

(comments that business exist to make money and have no reason to change as long as they continue to make money, consumers need to be smarter)

You've got the conclusion more or less nailed except for one thing. Business do listen.

They're looking for trends in customer opinions. Sometimes consumer feedback gives them ideas that will increase profits.

What you're asking for may not be seen as being in the best interest of profits. They need to decide if implementing your ideas will cause them to lose more customers than they gain. It's easy to assume that all other players want the same things that you do but that's rarely the case.

That is why you need spend your money where you think you're getting value in return. If your interests do not align or stop aligning with the product, it's time to move on to a product that does align with them.

Businesses pay attention to where consumer money is going and that tends to influence their decisions more than anything else.

What message are you sending with the way you spend your money?

I'm glad that you've taken action that aligns with your best interests.

But yours aren't mine. I'm still having fun with FFXIV and will continue to pay for the game until that stops being true.

Nah. If you're unhappy and you know it, clap your buttcheeks...

What a marvelous description of Zenos.

Yes, you are correct. I have a very small glimmer of hope combined with the fact that gaming landscape is mostly desolate of good options that don't have psychological warfare on the players, aka nickel and diming. I will 100% stay true in my word though and unsub permanently should Dawntrail continue the trend. I'm also not the one making complaint threads every single day though and talking about how unhappy I am with this game every single day.

You probably won't even remember this post 11 months from unless you go out of your way to bookmark it with a comment "Must reply when Dawntrail is released".

Better to quit playing now then come back to Dawntrail with a somewhat fresh perspective. Nothing is going to improve between now and Dawntrail's release.

You think it's going to remain merely fluff items? Just like when microtransactions were introduced, devs will test the waters gradually to see what they can get away with. They WILL introduce pay-to-win elements. Players will complain all while shelling out the money anyways, and years from now we will be in a pay-to-win landscape instead of the cash shop merely being fluff items. That's where this leads.

That's a bridge I will cross if it ever happens.

I don't think it will happen unless this stops being a subscription based game. As long as it's subscription based, it remains in their best interests to leave the cash shop items all vanity. As soon as P2W shows up, they lose all that subscription income and are left reliant on the whims of the whales.

No, there's one thing that speaks louder than any individual wallet, and that's multiple wallets.

What you should be doing is to use your voice to dissaude those multiple wallets. Let the world know this game is atrocious. Spread the message. We need this game's reputation to nosedive off a cliff.

Make sure to pressure content creators and reviewers and let them know how you feel.

Negative publicity is still publicity. All you'd accomplish is getting more people to buy the game to see just how bad it is. Some will find out it's not what they expected and that they actually enjoy it, and then SE will get all that extra revenue.

If you want a game to die, what you want to do is get people to stop talking about it at all.

"weren't you playing that game? I've been thinking about it" "meh, lost interest. Playing this other game now" "oh, maybe I'll try that game instead"