Ultimate demise of 14?

[genuine_stranger]

100% this is why every time we go down this road, I always point to player data.

People can post all the Dawntrail and Wul Lamat hate threads. People can review bomb. People can say what they wanna say, however they wanna say it.

At the end of the day, the direction of this game is dictated by player data.

And if the player data does not corroborate all the bellyaching... well, I'm so sorry ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Not to dismiss your point, but we don't have any official data on active players / subscribers.
The only thing we get are tracked achievements for either finishing the game or duty, and mmo population sites with some sketchy formulas to predict player numbers.

For all we know the game could have 2 million active players without F2P players, or we could have a massive falloff after the first month of DT release and be left with 200k subscribers including F2P players.

[localareanetwork]

I like playing with friends.

[Shinku_Tachi]

Not to dismiss your point, but we don't have any official data on active players / subscribers.
The only thing we get are tracked achievements for either finishing the game or duty, and mmo population sites with some sketchy formulas to predict player numbers.

For all we know the game could have 2 million active players without F2P players, or we could have a massive falloff after the first month of DT release and be left with 200k subscribers including F2P players.

But Yoshi-P and Co has that information, and the direction taken and decisions made are based on it.

That's my point.

But we'll know when things are actually getting bad and we're suffering a significant lack of player retention. They will start merging worlds.


Edit: I just realized where the miscommunication was. When I said "point to player data," I meant that as in pointing to the term or phrase, not physically pointing to player data, because as you said. We don't have it.

But yeah, anytime in these discussions I always mention player data because it's easy to lose sight of and forget. Square Enix sees everything. And every decision made is based on it.

[sindriiisgaming]

snip

Game isn't gona die. Just the quality will deteriorate until 99% leave. This is already happening to the raiders

[Maltrea]

So I started playing the game in about 4.2, fell in love with it and continued playing pretty much every day up until Endwalker. Having finished Endwalker's 6.0 story, I tried doing the usual, such as raiding, but I stopped halfway through without finishing the tier. Ultimately, it was just burnout. I was tired of the state of the game. I was looking at everything negatively, bored of the same formula, bored of everything, and so, I ultimately took a looong break. About 2 years worth of a break, to be exact, as I just came back to the game recently for Dawntrail and I've regained quite a lot of love I had had for the game long ago and am enjoying my experience. Not that much has changed since then, and my old FC is unfortunately very dead and I don't really have a "place" I belong to anymore, but despite it being the same game, I feel refreshed after a long break.

What I mean to say is, in the end, it really is just mostly burnout speaking. While there are definitely rightful criticisms to be made about the state of the game, once you start viewing everything negatively, it's almost 100% burnout speaking, as you start just picking apart all the small details instead of trying to enjoy yourself. Everything has become too familiar to you in the game, and so, you try to pick it apart. As the saying goes - "familiarity breeds contempt", and when you have spent years and so many hours playing the same game, this applies even more so. It isn't just FFXIV, I've seen people from all kinds of game fanbases who had loved their games for a long time, but the biggest veterans of those fanbases were usually the most cynical and negative about their states, despite plenty of newer players saying otherwise.

You just need. a. break. There's a reason holidays and vacations are mandatory everywhere in life, and that applies to more than just work, even things you enjoy.

[Dante131]

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...al-Fantasy-XIV

Evergreen post for a lot of people on this thread (not all, and not OP mind you).
People need to take a step back and understand that the forums are a big bubble/echo chamber, and every feeling is amplified to the max. It'll be fine.
But also take another step back and wonder if you actually like the game, especially people telling the game has been shit for 6-7 years, why have you been playing all this time then ?

I’ve been playing this game for a long time, and I can honestly say that I’ve loved the most moments of it. Final Fantasy XIV helped me through some difficult times, and it’s where I met my now-wife, which has given the game a special place in my heart forever. I don’t believe the game will “die” or simply disappear, but I do think it’s reasonable to be concerned about its future. Before anyone labels this as doom-posting, I’d ask that you hear me out.

The fact is, other companies aren’t standing still. They are heavily investing in their games, which leads to significant updates and changes. Change is something that, in my opinion, FFXIV has been slow to embrace. I’m not referring to minor adjustments like reducing the number of books needed for Savage content or a graphics update after 12 years. What I mean is that other companies are observing what works well in different games and incorporating those elements into their own, keeping their offerings fresh and competitive.

There will come a point where everything that FFXIV currently offers becomes standard across the MMO genre. When that happens, many players will start to question why they should continue playing FFXIV over other games. While the game may still retain its core audience (hopefully), its overall popularity could decline.

Being concerned about the future of the game isn’t inherently negative. As customers, we all want the game to be as good as it can be, and that’s why these discussions are important. I agree that sometimes people overreact and predict the game’s downfall over minor issues, but the current state of the game should be a cause for reflection. I can’t recall a time, at least since the beginning of Stormblood, when the community has been this divided.

[Morphiana]

Stop the doom posting. Game is fine, there's a minority of people on the forums who have been negative for the past 4 years or so.

MSQ is far from fine, this was worse than Stormblood which was notorious for not being great. It isn't just the forums. Professional review sites have it as mixed, streamers are mixed, and on social media when people being up FFXIV there's usually someone who brings up DT not being great. Word of mouth for the game isn't great at the moment which is how it got to be as successful as it is, by fans who enjoyed what the devs put out telling everyone about it.

Let's be clear, they can't screw around. They got lucky WoW tripped over itself at the end of Shadowbringers which boosted the game from "doing well" to "doing amazing". However, WoW has since recovered in terms of the quality of content put out and has an xpac in a couple weeks. DT being mixed is no where close to being a nail in the coffin but it will hurt and if they don't fix things as players will go elsewhere just as they did to during Shadowlands or whatever.

That being said, historically when the community has had a strong negative reaction to something they try to change course. I believe they'll do that here. Though, I don't expect it soon as the story for 7.0-7.4 or 5 is likely finished.

[Payadopa]

The MSQ was "okay", jobs can't possibly get worse and more boring, the entirety of the gameplay experience is behind dozens of hours of visual novel stuff and the only thing that has gameplay is so formulaic people can predict what's to come with a release date attached to it. Not to mention the state of healing, WAR or the ilvl in general.

As someone who's been playing since 1.0 and took breaks, I cancelled my subscription. SE only caters to either single players, RPers or meta slaves. Group content barely exist, job design is on auto pilot and most forms of personal responsibility to your group like enmity management, positioning and even healing has been taken away without being replaced with anything. Elements don't exist and we have a literal button that equips the best gear since gear is only a number with zero creativity.

The biggest red flag for me was Y to the P saying that we shouldn't expect job changes prior to 8.0. Guess I'll not pay till then.

[Claire_Pendragon]

The biggest red flag for me was Y to the P saying that we shouldn't expect job changes prior to 8.0.

1st it was
"wait till 5.x"
then it was
"wait till 6.x"
then it was
"wait till 7.x"
and now its
"wait till 8.x"

ppl keep falling for this trick lol...

[Kirutsuki]

Thank you all for replying to this.
It doesn't really matter if you agree with me or not. I have gone on break since I made this post and I will continue to read your replies every now and again.

Ultimately the facts remain the same to me personally. The game needs to inspire me to play it and if it keeps doing the same content with different skins, it's just not going to appeal to me.
I was happy seeing raid mechanics being made more "dynamic", but that was the only thing that made me smile, everything else in almost every other gameplay system just felt the same stuff I did in Endwalker and wasn't brining me much joy.

As said, it might be burnout and I am on a break from the game, but there is also some truth to me personally when I say what I say.
It's not like someone can come in and say I'm wrong and I should just learn to like it, I probably wont and that's ok.

The devs probably wont change their formula which means I will probably never return to the game fully.
I'll still try the new exploratory zone, but even there I already know they are releasing it in multiple parts, so I will have to wait until its entirely out.

Regardless, thank you all and I hope you all still have a grand time with the game, even if I wont.