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

[Supersnow845]

The silver lining in a game that is based on the number of people subbing is that less people are subbing

Once again 14 players would rather play a dead game than share THEIR game with people they don’t like

[Crafoutis]

The silver lining in a game that is based on the number of people subbing is that less people are subbing

Once again 14 players would rather play a dead game than share THEIR game with people they don’t like

100% agreed.

[Naoki34]

It's funny that Endwalker was such a smash hit, and they managed to mess up Dawntrail because they wanted to try something different. Well, they'd better get their next expansions right, otherwise it's so long.
Good luck to them.

But still, do the skins have to be so uninteresting? Because nostalgia for old FF skins doesn't work for me. So I have nothing to do and I'm taking a break between each 7.* patch, since what used to motivate me to do dungeons/raids 30 times a week is gone, and the skins are boring. It depends on the content. And hearing the old music again, not even remixed from FF11 for Ivalice, and now again in Dawntrail. Yet they know how to make beautiful Pulse remixes, and even if the change is real, I won't notice the difference because I don't expect to hear music from the PS2 era or earlier in FFXIV.

That said, I'll renew my subscription in 60 days to keep my house.

[Elephantality]

It's funny that Endwalker was such a smash hit, and they managed to mess up Dawntrail because they wanted to try something different. Well, they'd better get their next expansions right, otherwise it's so long.

Wasn't End Walker supposed to be the end of the story anyway?

[Crafoutis]

Wasn't End Walker supposed to be the end of the story anyway?

Yep, and it was a great end. Kinda hate seeing Dawntrail come out and end up being "They should have stopped after Season 2" kinda content, introducing weak stories with terrible characters.

[Daralii]

Wasn't End Walker supposed to be the end of the story anyway?

EW was supposed to be a definitive end for Amaurot's influence especially, but they clearly had no idea where to go from there, so we got Azem's dimensional key immediately afterwards and now the Ascians are back in play.

[XtremePrime]

Wasn't End Walker supposed to be the end of the story anyway?

Very much so. It was suppose to be the end of the story arc that began in ARR regarding the Hydaelyn and the Ascians/Ancients.
Endwalker gave people a perfect.. well- end. An epic fight at the end of the universe where we become the hero that saved everyone.

So of course all eyes were on Squeanix to show us where our next adventure is going to be... and boy did they miss the mark

[Jason_Ashford]

EW was supposed to be a definitive end for Amaurot's influence especially, but they clearly had no idea where to go from there, so we got Azem's dimensional key immediately afterwards and now the Ascians are back in play.

Very much so. It was suppose to be the end of the story arc that began in ARR regarding the Hydaelyn and the Ascians/Ancients.
Endwalker gave people a perfect.. well- end. An epic fight at the end of the universe where we become the hero that saved everyone.

So of course all eyes were on Squeanix to show us where our next adventure is going to be... and boy did they miss the mark

I distinctly remember Yoshi-P saying Endwalker would finish Zodiark and Hydaelyn's story. I don't remember him specifically stating that the ascians were done, especially when there were several of them that were still active and unaccounted for at the time that Emet Selch and Elidibus met their end.

I think it is also presumptuous to assume they are going to retread the ascian plotline. Remember, the only ones who were keeping the ascended ascians focused on reviving the ancient world and Zodiark was the unsundered trio and all of them are gone now. Far more likely we will be seeing storylines revolving around ascians who are now untethered and are free to pursuit their own desires.

The events of Alexandria and the 9th are strong evidence that they are not interested in rejoinings anymore. Their use of souls would have abhorred Emet Selch and Elidibus who want all the shards of each soul to rejoin together.

[Striker44]

It's funny that Endwalker was such a smash hit, and they managed to mess up Dawntrail because they wanted to try something different. Well, they'd better get their next expansions right, otherwise it's so long.
Good luck to them.

Nah, I'd say it's more what the posters below you pointed out. It's not that they "wanted to try something different", just that they finished the "real" MSQ. FFXIV's storyline is complete. But in the world of gaming corporations, when a certain game remains one of your most profitable products even though it's run its intended course, you're forced to continue. The dev team is basically in a lose-lose situation...if they say the game is done and put it into maintenance mode at the height of its popularity, there would be an outcry and pitchforks coming out...if they keep going even though there's nothing really left to do and just try to put something, anything together, it'll never match the "high" they had just reached and they'll get trashed for that instead.

To me, DT was still a hit, and just looking around my server (Greg), there's still tons of people playing. Prime time hunt trains are still hovering around 150 people compared to around 200 when DT first released. Queues pop quickly for me all the time, even when I'm picking very specific dungeons or trials for WT. Of course, I came into DT with the expectation that the most the game could reach would be a 7 or an 8 (instead of ShB/EW which were both 10's for me), and since that's where it landed, I've been very satisfied.

[bic12]

Lmao that's literally the opposite of what you've said before DT.