I also think the regional data center idea is stupid. It is just swapping around who is getting screwed over.

Any and all existing global shells will disintegrate when this choice is present. By global, I mean those that include people living in Asia.

-> Regardless of reason, there will be (server) preferences. If one group within the LS seeks to impose a forced restriction, then you can consider that group selfish. And there is no way an LS can enforce a restriction on server choices either.

-> My LS is NA mostly, but I speak Japanese. To go with the crowd, I'll transfer to a NA Legacy server but that doesn't mean I am going to like it. Similarly, if I make them go to a JP server, they won't like it either so I have to suck it up on this one.

-> I loved the "cultural color" that came with the forced cultural interactions. I loved getting multi-cultural alliances and parties to work. I grew up in a country where there are people of all colors, speaking all kinds of languages. In a way, the original servers were a reflection of home. On a higher idealistic level, regional servers favor xenophobia and poops on racial tolerance.

-> Furthermore, it is also forcing non-JP asians to play on JP dominant servers. Before regional servers, the English speaking population would at least be large enough to make it a non-issue, but now they will be the minority. Sure, they can choose a 300ms connection to NA/EU servers over a 150ms to JP, but do people think that will be fun when more Ifrit-like battles appear? End of the day, someone is still screwed. It is just that it is no longer the EUs.

We can now play a more lag-free game but now we face a monochromatic in-game society. To me, the game just effectively lost one of its unique attractions.