FFXIV population decline continues

[Eyrilona]

Seeing how the later years FFXIV have nerfed a couple of older dungeons that's been fine for years upon years because people started complaining how "they were too difficult" just sends me the message how people just don't put in the effort to improve themselves as gamers as people once used to anymore, and that's casuals included.

Since nobody else seems to have picked up on this claim, I am going to ask what you mean, because the only simplification of dungeons I am aware of was because they couldn't get Duty Support NPCs to handle dungeons with unique and interesting mechanics. The other side of old dungeons feeling too easy now is all the potency increases retroactively given to job abilities as the jobs developed (due to SE's, "we never want to take away, so every rebalancing only means making some job's numbers bigger" approach), moving player power further and further away from what it was when those older dungeons were made.

But I may be wrong -- in what instance were older dungeons revamped as a dev response to players complaining about them being too difficult?

[Teno]

You do realize it is the casual players that built this game to success. If they want to focus on the 2% of the midcore/hardcore playerbase, they should expect the numbers to continue to plunge. Some of us who have been around over a decade may just decide to never come back. The game is on a downward spiral, the writing quality tanked with DT. I highly doubt this game makes it to 10.0.

Nonsense, it is not the current casuals that built it. The game had more meat to it from a casual perspective back then. It wasn't as bland and one dimensional as it is right now. That is to say, different breed of casuals built it.

[Dogempire]

Probably not an issue. There's little to no appeal at the moment for casual gamers with the content actually expecting people to put in effort to complete it, no exploration zone for grindcore content, and little to no 4 player party or solo content.

Yeah, I've done a few savage tiers but nowadays I'm just... really not interested in playing "Everyone does the mechanics 100% correctly or everyone explodes"

Having to co-ordinate with strangers with varying degrees of capabilities and being held back by the lowest common denominator gets very old after a little while, would like more content that either doesn't punish mistakes as harshly or is completely solo so you can suffer through your own mistakes, also content like Bozja offering differing types of buffs to spice up gameplay adds a lot when it comes to casual content.

[Clockworks]

Nothing surprising, this company has shown times and times again they are absolutely out of touch with the entire playerbase, and the playerbase keeps defending their terrible decisions.

[JackRazor]

Nothing surprising, this company has shown times and times again they are absolutely out of touch with the entire playerbase, and the playerbase keeps defending their terrible decisions.

Can you clarify this? If the playerbase agrees with / defends the company's decisions, wouldn't that mean they are in touch with the playerbase?

[Exmo]

Can you clarify this? If the playerbase agrees with / defends the company's decisions, wouldn't that mean they are in touch with the playerbase?

That's a good point

[Kaurhz]

Can you clarify this? If the playerbase agrees with / defends the company's decisions, wouldn't that mean they are in touch with the playerbase?

This wrests entirely on the defense being made in earnest. Or whether it is just standard passive aggressiveness and dismissiveness. Plus, you may have a lot of players that don't actually engage with that content, yet defend that specific piece of content, so I do think that both can happen in this instance, to be honest.

and frankly in gaming and even in the feedback cycle, this happens far more often than it should.

[NamiRocket]

This wrests entirely on the defense being made in earnest.

That's one way to shut down a dissenting opinion, I guess. Oh, but what if... now hear me out, what if the argument against this expansion is often histrionic, hyperbolic, and extremely selective in its facts?

You'll find that blade cuts both ways. Maybe come up with a better, less lazy way to counter an argument.

[Voidmage]

I don’t know how bad or normal this is nor do I really care if I’m being honest. I have my theories to the why and so on but who knows.

Is it worrying? Right now I wouldn’t say so.
Imo having strong competition and a reason to develop good content is good for these kind of games.
Personally (even though it’s probably the wrong thing to say) I feel kinda relieved?
EW was when Yoshida and co were on a massive high and even if it was deserved after Shb I think they enjoyed a bit too much glory for too long from players and media alike and it showed with the most lacking content expansion called EW (and let’s be honest that was also when the DT story was written).

Maybe losing players and getting criticism for quite a number of things while getting compliments for things like the new dungeon difficulty will push them to get serious again.
Things like chaotic show that they do want to implement new things.

So all in all no I am not worried but am kinda positive that this might be a chance to get back to better times.

It will start to get worrying if they ignore it though.

[DynnDiablos]

I don’t know how bad or normal this is nor do I really care if I’m being honest. I have my theories to the why and so on but who knows.

Is it worrying? Right now I wouldn’t say so.
Imo having strong competition and a reason to develop good content is good for these kind of games.
Personally (even though it’s probably the wrong thing to say) I feel kinda relieved?
EW was when Yoshida and co were on a massive high and even if it was deserved after Shb I think they enjoyed a bit too much glory for too long from players and media alike and it showed with the most lacking content expansion called EE (and let’s be honest that was also when the DT story was written).

Maybe losing players and getting criticism for quite a number of things while getting compliments for things like the new dungeon difficulty will push them to get serious again.
Things like chaotic show that they do want to implement new things.

So all in all no I am not worried but am kinda positive that this might be a chance to get back to better times.

It will start to get worrying if they ignore it though.

When the majority of your playerbase is casual and turned off by harder dungeons and chaotic raids, I don't believe going "all in" on more of that type of content is wise. The mid-core/hardcore players represent the minority.