FF14 player count reached the lowest point in 4 years. We lost 75% of the playerbase.

[Red-thunder]

because even back in ARR and Heavensward you could find people to play with.

Yeah because back then people played the game, not ERP with Mare in the Quicksand or go to nightclubs and AFK.

[Oizen]

I like how any time steam charts are used as an example of a games decline, you see all the mouthbreathers who can't grasp the concept of sample sizes.

[Sayari]

It's clear from this thread that people not only don't understand statistics and sample sizes (good grief, that's a solid sample size and it works), they also don't understand that Square Enix is a business.

That means being happy people are leaving is shortsighted. FFXIV isn't just some magically fantastical world for us to just log in and do whatever we want, it's a product of a business that, at its core, needs to make profit to survive. Less people = less funding = less game. That's it, bottom line, how it works.

You can argue until you're blue in the face that servers haven't lost 75% of their players; I've played on all NA servers recently and it seems all but Aether has. Have they moved to other datacenters? Some of them, sure. Have they quit? Some have. This is not a good thing, and excusing or explaining it away, or arguing about the statistics, is not serving any purpose that will help this game survive.

Like it or not, we WANT to keep those WoW players. We WANT people to stay subbed. We WANT people to play.

More players mean more game. Take off the blinders and we can have a more constructive conversation about what the game actually needs.

[hydralus]

More players mean more game.

Does it, though? They've had a large influx of players since Stormblood and it hasn't translated to more game.

[Dante131]

Does it, though? They've had a large influx of players since Stormblood and it hasn't translated to more game.

i mean thats even worse isnt it ? Still Sayari is not wrong with her post. Maybe more players more game is a bid of a bad wording but you know whats the meaning behind

[Gwenkatsu]

Less people = less funding = less game. That's it, bottom line, how it works.

That's one way to see it. Another goes like this: Less people = less funding = company realizes that their flag ship is sinking = more money is invested to get the ship back on course = game improves

So whether the game bleeding subs is good or bad news is totally up to the viewer. But at least voting with your wallet is a feedback that cannot be easily ignored. Whether the company has the skill and brains left to turn the ship around is a totally different question, of course.

[Hallarem]

The only thing they listen to apparently is money. So the more people unsub, the better. If a restaurant has bad food the customers should stay away until the menu and atmosphere improves.

[ovIm]

That's one way to see it. Another goes like this: Less people = less funding = company realizes that their flag ship is sinking = more money is invested to get the ship back on course = game improves

The only thing they listen to apparently is money. So the more people unsub, the better. If a restaurant has bad food the customers should stay away until the menu and atmosphere improves.

Thats where I am more pessimist. Knowing how Square Enix has handled bad games in the past, my fear is that the more people unsub, the less effort Square Enix will put into FF14, until it goes into maintenance mode. Sure, that is a very gloomy outlook, one where I would definitely love to be proven wrong.

[CNitsah]

Thats where I am more pessimist. Knowing how Square Enix has handled bad games in the past, my fear is that the more people unsub, the less effort Square Enix will put into FF14, until it goes into maintenance mode. Sure, that is a very gloomy outlook, one where I would definitely love to be proven wrong.

Yeah, I would not be surprised if they had some other mmo in the making, because 14 years is already a long time, and they know it's gonna be more difficult to get new players on XIV. SE wants a MMO, MMOs have been carrying the company for nearly 20 years, and I would not be surprised they're thinking about a new one.

That said, FFXIV is not FFXI, FFXIV achieved to reach out of the mmo players niche, thus I feel like if XIV is not in a good state when (and if) they release a new mmo, people won't bother checking it because how critical they have been about XIV.

Basically, if they don't have a new mmo, XIV has to perform well, if they have a new one, XIV also has to perform well, because it's gonna be hard to market a mmo "from the company that killed its previous MMO at its peak with bad decisions" or "from the company that let it previous mmo rot".

[Sayari]

That's one way to see it. Another goes like this: Less people = less funding = company realizes that their flag ship is sinking = more money is invested to get the ship back on course = game improves

So whether the game bleeding subs is good or bad news is totally up to the viewer. But at least voting with your wallet is a feedback that cannot be easily ignored. Whether the company has the skill and brains left to turn the ship around is a totally different question, of course.

I know my post was oversimplified (as someone pointed out) and with your own statement, you are not wrong. We can hope that this becomes the case but we'll see what Squenix does.