FINAL FANTASY XIV Billing Information

[Kaylia]

You truly underestimate how many fucktards would pay 50 bucks to dress like Cloud. I underestimated how many idiots would go for that gaudy POS tidal talisman for the ingame coat.

Just look at what happened when Blizzard released their rainbow horse for 20$. They sold like 10 billions in 1 day, and it was the gayest looking item you could make.

They must have laughed that day, designing that horse probably took less than 1 week

[miokomioko]

Exp perk and stuff like that aren't a huge issue as long the game is playable and fun without them. If someone want to pay to get through the content faster, it doesn't really change anything.

As long that paying real money doesn't grant you an advantage over other in the end game, I wouldn't worry about it.

Lack of an even playing field turns a lot of people off from F2P MMOs... regardless of how little you happen care about it.

[Kaylia]

Lack of an even playing field turns a lot of people off from F2P MMOs... regardless of how little you happen care about it.

First of all, not many players consider leveling as a "field" that matter anymore. Secondly, why not see it as a small penalty for not paying? It's not like you have to toss absurd amount of money for a rested xp buff. Hell, if they offered me the opportunity to not pay montly payment in ffxi for a 20% xp reduction, I would take it any day.

When I played lotro, I was outleveling the content faster than I liked without paying..I can't even imagine if I had paid at that time.

[solracht]

Lack of an even playing field turns a lot of people off from F2P MMOs... regardless of how little you happen care about it.

Playing devil's advocate here (not related to which side I agree with), but I think a subscription fee turns even more potential customers off MMORPGs in general, especially in such a saturated market.

---

Anyway, things are completely different to what they were ten years ago. I'm not really going to write something long unless the discussion continues, but I'm not so convinced that the standard $10-15/mo P2P model can work well for new games in the current MMORPG market.

EDIT: Made a mess.

[Grey Jorildyn]

Free to Play is a great model as long as it doesn't become Pay to Win. Hence the vanity cash shop suggestion.

SE isn't seeing the big picture. Sell us tonberry pets, moogle outfits, and goobbue mounts in a cash shop and in two months they'll make more money than they would in six months of subs. Of course, the game still needs to be fixed and dressed up 2.0 style first. But damn, with all the FF paraphernalia they could put in such a cash shop, these fuckers are sitting on a veritable gold mine.

[miokomioko]

I don't know if I'm in a minority, but I hate how games end up looking with years of vanity shit. When you push the art direction to keep pumping out a constant flow visually different different crap, it turns into a complete fucking mess.

[Arximiro]

I'd rather just pay a monthy fee to keep a lot of the derps away. Nothing of course will get them all, but yeah.

[Lordender]

All i know is that I can't wait until this shit goes pay so we can start getting a sense of how many players stuck around.

[LD]

I think you're comparing apples & oranges when it comes to WoW, FFXIV, and F2P games. WoW being able to sell sparkle ponies has as much to do with their wider subscriber base as their committed players. No, that isn't the same thing, though both allow for more people to be more likely to rationalize paying $10 for something that's functionally the same as something they can get for free in the game. F2P games are split between those built to be F2P and those that grew into that model. The former very obviously has comparatively less money behind it to begin with. The latter are all 'failures' in the same sense that FFXIV has been, but none of them were built as next gen graphically. There's no way on God's green Earth that LotR or STO or APB cost as much in development, especially considering how strong the yen is right now. You can't gamble all of that on nickle & diming players until some of the costs have already been paid. Right now, when they go sub, they WILL get SOME money. If they go cash shop, they MIGHT get NO money. This is for the same reason no one wants to pay for a sub: If people won't pay for a broken game, why will they pay for toys in a broken game? The other F2P games at least seem complete even if they don't seem great.

[Lordender]

Meh, the ONLY thing FFXIV has going for them is there are lots of delusional people who think the game is good in its current state. The only reason why people even put up with the game is because they actually believe that the game will become great and they'll have this huge head start on everyone much like the Japanese did in XI where the NA's came into the game late(NA player in XI = PS3 player in XIV) in which by that time people believe that they'll have crafts/gathering @ max and will be able to exploit the new players. You also have a lot of players who are chasing the memories of what XI used to be trying to re-live the nostalgia of old FFXI. This is why we see droves of people who are against everything that is being done to bring XIV into the new age of MMO's.

We're going to see just how delusional fans of the series are come next month, personally I just don't believe its going to be enough people paying to keep it afloat until 2.0. I could see a lot of people subbing for a month to see 1.21 but not for 1.20 which looks to be a terrible patch to pitch a monthly fee to customers.

I just fail to see how a Dark Moogle fight that people will be done with fairly soon unless theres some hidden gimmicks that limit you on the amount of times you can fight it per day or an achievement system that not everyone is going to care about is going to convince anyone who was on the fence to pay for this game come January.

Delusional people were going to pay no matter what the state of the game was in, shit, I bet they were ready to pay last November for the game. We'll see, Jan to Feb is going to tell the whole story IMO because if the game has somewhat decent numbers off a very lackluster patch(content wise) especially with shitloads of players who have been playing should have a couple of capped classes to 50 and are only interested in endgame content. I think this stretch will tell a whole lot on the realistic chances the game gets to 2.0. According to the road map this looked to be the weakest of all the patches going forward.

[Charismatic]

Yeah... when they mentioned that they were going to commence billing after 1.20, I expected something far more grand in terms of actual content.
This is going to be disappointing for sure.


...and hell, expectations are already low.

[madpersian]

I just started playing recently (perhaps to recapture that FFXI nostalgia after years of WoW) and while there is a lot to like about the game, it certainly provides a lot of moments where you wish death on whoever designed the aspect of the game that's giving you shit at the time (like the targeting system). I even managed to get a friend into it to play with me too. We are planning on playing through 1.21 and see where the game is at. If we end up having little to do with our fifties and end up leveling other classes just for the sake of leveling, we'll end up going to Tera Online, GW2 or The Secret World. There's just too much good shit out there to stick with a badly designed game. No potential leg up on the competition come 2.0 would be worth playing through months of crap for.

As I play this game, I keep thinking one question: How could any game designer have sat down and played this game and thought to themselves "THIS GAME IS AWESOME!" Which I think would be the necessary before you release a game that will have an effect on your company's reputation for years to come.

I do hope the game is a success though. I want to play it through 2.0. I really hope Rabanastre doesn't become totally deserted after subs start because that would make me give up on this phase of the game even if 1.20-1.21 made the game mostly enjoyable to play.

[LD]

Eeeeeh...Parts of this conversation keep going back to FFXI in a non-negative light and I keep thinking that if that were a better game, we wouldn't be having as many issues with this one.

[madpersian]

I always wonder how much better FFXI and FFXIV would have been if they were designed for PC gamers by PC gamers. So many of the problems with both seem to be based on the whole console/pc hybrid attempt.

Back on topic, my friend was getting quite maddened by the whole billing setup. You rarely see an example of a company trying this hard to turn you away from giving them money. The only easy part of buying playing this game is buying it online or at a store.

[Thiefami]

Eeeeeh...Parts of this conversation keep going back to FFXI in a non-negative light and I keep thinking that if that were a better game, we wouldn't be having as many issues with this one.

Really another conversation all together, but XI made the ride to the top pretty fun. It did a great job at creating an epic adventure. The downside to all of this is it pretty much pooched anyone that started afterwards in dwindling populations. I think that is what some look to recapture. This game does not have that at all.

[Lucavi]

I always wonder how much better FFXI and FFXIV would have been if they were designed for PC gamers by PC gamers. So many of the problems with both seem to be based on the whole console/pc hybrid attempt.

I wouldn't have been any different. The issue isn't PC vs. console. The issue is Japan vs. World. Japan doesn't like PC. Japan doesn't predominately use PC. Japan uses console + arcade, neither of which are good markets for a quality MMO. You're looking at the wrong target.

XI would have been the same so long as Japan decided that it would do a copy-and-paste job of EQ's basic system, fused with "classic" FF design. Prettier graphics, but same concept entirely. There's no reason it would have been different; XIV was barely functionally different from XI when it launched. Same stiffness, same core animations, same dated concepts.

Its not the technology, its the people behind it;l the ideas behind it.

[Lordender]

I see confusion when I look at XIV even now, they look like an offense or a defense that don't know what the play call is and it ends up as a busted play. It seems like every patch SE takes 1 step forward and 3 steps backwards with either content or just flat out business decisions.

[Lucavi]

That's what happens when you slap a new coat of paint on an old system, get called out on it, and are forced to try to work triple overtime "updating" it to a current generation system. But we've argued this into death millions of times in the past; nothing has changed as of yet. We'll see how much changes come 2.0.

[Ambrosia]

@Corrderio

Yeah pardon for the long post, a little bit of venting in there as well. I would say that Wada probably pushed the team to get the game out sooner in part because of the investors were putting pressure. Sure the game was made in house, but if you can release a game, even with the potential risk, they deemed it better than to give the team more time. Had Wada told Tanaka that he could of taken an extra 6 months or a year in the project I am almost certain he and/or the team would of gladly taken it. And yes you are correct outside of Everquest I and II very few had any ideas of what else was out there as far in terms in MMOs or what competition was out there in an extremely saturated market compared to 10 or so years ago. Sure the diehard fans would still play the game but it is obvious they wanted a much larger market. And you could clearly tell like you said after beta ended how things would go. Although to this day considering that the UI/Controls were easily the number 1 or 2 complaint, and in closing the beta Tanaka had his message and ended with a similar 'We will look into this" really still baffles me till this day. I'm not sure if he already knew the shortcomings(a little too late) or he was just burnt out from the project or other factors to really care at that point or have the energy to say yes we will redo the entire thing or most of it.

@LD

I agree it is an extremely unpopular move, but what else is there that they can do. Not sure if it was an epiphany or what not, but thankfully they were not so arrogant or blinded like almost every P2P MMO model that came out in the past 6 years that utterly refused to give more than the 30 day free time that came with their games (even though there was clear evidence in almost every single one at the mass exodus that was happening). And as with MMOs the community is definitely unforgiving.

@Lucavi

Yeah pretty much that is how Asian companies/markets are usually... most of the time. NCSoft is notorious with this as well. And in part just like you said they have much less alternatives than the NA/EU market has, although that seems to be changing albeit slowly as time goes on with other markets seeping in that is not just Japan. And yeah you hit the nail with the whole looking at the wrong target with the console/arcade/PC comment. Considering that almost 99% of all MMOs out there are PC based speaks volumes, and the few that ventured into the console did ok at best for a few years with FFXI and maybe one other game that did very well.

@Mioko

Yeah that is probably the main reason why it will still garner some interest because of the 2.0 version(although more MMO companies have and are using the 2.0 3.0 as gimmicks so time will tell). And of course the PS3 console. We will have to see how well it does in the NA/EU market since out of the 500 or so MMOs out there only 3 or 4 have actually successfully converted to console, with FFXI being the most successful I think. But never say never, trust me, MMOs these days age way much faster than the ones that came out from 1996-2004. Most of the ones that have come out in the past 6 or so years have shut down, or shut down and came back as F2P, or went directly to F2P after the server count went below 3 or 4 or just made a hybrid out of them.

@Thiefami

LOL yeah pretty much, when it comes to vanity stuff people will pay for them. I wouldn't doubt if some people are pissed off with all the stuff XIII-2 is coming out with... but somehow are going to collect them all, if just for the sake of it.

@Lordender

I think with the party/person search you will see the JP folks come out with all those charts and spreadsheets again showing weekly and in a few cases hourly populations(as further to prove this some used to take snapshots every so hours and upload them to verify that the population was such and such at a given time) Almost in every case it would be prime time hours, in JP of course. Like if it were EST people would take it at 7 9 and 11 pm. And yeah I agree, you do see delusional people in the official forums, but it is like that in almost every MMO(even ones so broken that only have 5k or less in them) I think the new poll is going to take place sometime mid or late January? I think with that said we will have to see what the questions will be and what the response will be, who knows how many NA/EU are going to partake in that. If the poll is huge with like 20 or 30 questions that may very well change or be crucial questions that may affect the game, I wonder how that selected pool's answers will affect the rest of us(whether adversely or positively).







And one thing I forgot to mention in that previous tiny post of mine >.>. In no shape or form was I hinting that said MMOs coming out are the Holy Grail, and at worst case they may take a small chunk or a moderate chunk out the diehard fans that are playing FFXIV actively today. Each of those MMOs may have problems keeping the targeted numbers that companies want as well. But it does give all the other players that much more options in an already extremely saturated market to keep it as a P2P model (and a much less chance for them to try or re-try FFXIV till 2.0 and that is taking into consideration that we hope 2.0 hits a grand slam... or a homerun... or at very least get to 1st base). Besides the title and a few other things, what really sets this game apart from the rest of the fantasy games out there? You have the humans and the elves and the (insert the cute or short race here) and the (insert the big and tall and husky race here) with swords and knives and shields and armor.

Console/other genres don't have anywhere the point of saturation MMOs have at this very moment. I mean think of the recent console games that just came out such as Skyrim and earlier this year was Dragon Age 2 and The Witcher 2. For fighting games you guys had Ultimate Marvel and MK9. And for war games... eh like 3 of them lol... sorry I don't know the names to them all. Each of those genres had at most half a dozen or a dozen direct competition for 2011 more or less. And most of those listed, if not all did end up selling very well. Obviously there are other genres but you get my point.

Imagine if you will there were 500 of each types of games at this very instant. I mean if you go to wiki and go the "List of Wars" imagine for a moment if there were at least 500 FPS/War games that were continually being updated with the same graphics or better like Battlefield 3. Imagine the top 250 or so anime or cartoon or video games characters and all the possible crossovers, think sort of like Mugen but let's say to the level of MK9 or Marvel (as far as balancing.. yes it's not perfect, execution, style etc.). And finally imagine 500 or so games at the level of Skyrim, Dragon Age 2, and the Witcher 2. All of them being continually updated and lets top it off with let's say 80% of them are F2P(lesser quality of course with the usual Cash to Shop options... buy a horse for a few dollars... Hello Oblivion).

Do you think in any possible way that those games I mentioned would of sold even a fraction of what those games sold? Nearly impossible.

This is what the MMO market is exactly at this very instant. Console games have much more breathing room to work with. And yes I understand that many games do come out every year for consoles and some don't do nearly as well as the ones I mentioned, but that is still nowhere close as to what MMOs have to deal with. So yeah, every MMO has 5k 10k 20k 30k (these numbers barely mean anything for large companies especially) diehard fans that love their game for whatever reason. But what is FFXIV going to do to reach those people outside of the tight knit fans, what options/ideas are they going to market for 2.0 that will solidify the P2P option to go for a long time as well having a healthy player base that hopefully stabilizes or can continue to grow?

[LD]

Really another conversation all together, but XI made the ride to the top pretty fun. It did a great job at creating an epic adventure. The downside to all of this is it pretty much pooched anyone that started afterwards in dwindling populations. I think that is what some look to recapture. This game does not have that at all.

...I'm going to sum up my thoughts by saying that I liked the story, but completion had more to do with friend-wrangling, job composition, and blowing 2 Hour CDs than anything else. I spent the bulk of my time in FFXI (about 6 years) at the bottom and any positive experience I had in a BC encounter could have been replicated by carrying a piano up a flight of stairs. I was basically just happy it was over.

Yeah, the story was nice, but you can't segregate story and game play in a video game (unless the story is that there is no story: sports games, TF2, etc.). The poorer aspect will always taint the other and keep it from being enjoyable.