Dev Tracker: Discussion

[Kyte]

FFXIV's party finder really made me see how shouting for members is incredibly archaic- they need to put something like that (with a couple of modifications) into XI asap.

[Bukadan]

id rather not leave the party creating to that randomness. too many shitty players that would doom a party before its even started

[Kyte]

Ideally (and this is why I said with modifications), there would be an option that doesn't allow random people to join and instead is more of a posting with needed jobs listed. Under that option, the leader would still need to send the actual invite.

[Shenrien]

anything like LFR or PF or something would be amazing.

[Draylo]

That would be pretty awesome.

[Treize Kordero]

I heard Free 2 Play has a big stigma in Japan hence why they haven't went with that model. I don't know how true that is but a friend was telling me that the JP see F2P as a failed game.
Right now FFXI being Free 2 Play is a silly idea (maybe not silly but pre-mature) something to consider after a server merge and the population of whatever 8 servers are left dwindle more.

This is a 11 year old game.. I'd say launch 1-2 new 2-4 week free play campaigns for 2014 and even institute a price drop for FFXI and discount for players who play both FFXI and FFXIV.
May 2014 is 12th year anniversary right? I'd like 25% (at least) reduction in subscription fee with my duo-decennial ring.

But for the love of Altana and all that's under light SC.. get rid of the PS2.. let that magnificent majestic creature join it's ancestor in Playhalla. I'm probably beating a dead horse but I'd like it if they would just make a PS3/PS4 compatible version and give PS2 owners the chance to freely upgrade to that version.

That should be something they could do. I'm not talking graphical updates either just same old on the newer systems.

Couple that with sub. price drop and I think many folks will be happy.

[Shenrien]

Killing off the PS2 wont magically fix the issues that plague the game, and would ultimately do more damage to the community that the game has than help it.

[arus2001]

I heard Free 2 Play has a big stigma in Japan hence why they haven't went with that model. I don't know how true that is but a friend was telling me that the JP see F2P as a failed game.

It's not really a stigma limited to Japan, but something ultimately regurgitated by delusional P2P fanboys that love to believe every red cent of the sub is going toward the benefit of their game of choice. We're not in 2005 anymore where F2P invariably means P2W. A game only fails when one can no longer log into it and I think that's actually been fairly rare of bigger name titles. Of course, Yoshi erroneously picking on Star Wars when justifying P2P for XIV likely didn't help this perception and the fact some upcoming MMOs are trying to launch that way may be interpreted as a superior model, but the players will ultimately decide. Box sales and 3 months of subs, even if a shipwreck, is more money than just box sales. So I can't really fault a dev for starting that way, but it certainly makes luring in the P2P sheep who just blindly want to believe they'll get better service a whole hell of a lot easier.

More pragmatically, my stance on F2P XI lies in the admission of a skeleton crew. They want a premium price? Give a premium product. Otherwise, slash it or show some appreciation to the FF fans for a decade+ of contribution. Hell, eliminating the $1 per mule charge would go a long way.

[dasva]

It would allow them to possibly impliment some fixes that they are unable to now. But yeah it could hurt a bit too if it kills subscriptions... how many still play on ps2 anyways? I'm sure by now people have upgraded their game systems lol

[Xantavia]

IF they were to think of a F2P model, I kinda like what Sony did with DCUO. Three tiers, completely free, middle tier if you bought an expansion, or monthly pay model. Paying monthly could be like it is now, but free options have non game changing limitations. So less mules available per account, lower gil cap, can't be a linkshell leader.

[Prothescar]

orrrrrrr they could not have any restrictions at all and just give the sub payers additional benefits, like 25% XP boost, CP/ISP/AN/Bayld boost, etc.; that's how games like SWTOR, RIFT, and TERA do it. Would actually make a reason for people to pay a sub without feeling forced to do so due to there being limitations.

[dasva]

Get 1 alex/hmpa day if subbed

[Shenrien]

Only 82 years for a free mythic.

[Priran]

XI going F2P would be wise, too. I know this tends to evoke irrational auto-hate from people

lol, have you ever played a subscription-based game that went F2P? The hate is anything but irrational.

[Anomie]

That would certainly get people to log in... a lot moreso than the log-in campaigns do....

[Shenrien]

Most games that adopt the log-in campaign event thing, usually require you to log in and be online for a certain amount of hours to gain the points, not just log in, and instantly get your points and log out, most common seems to be about 2 hours from past titles I've played.

[dasva]

Yeah but they want to encourage that extra dollar from mules lol

[Spira]

its probably not a good idea to think of it as a dichotomy..
instead of F2P or P2P, its more like F2P, P2P at current pricing model, or P2P at some other pricing model.

I'm of the opinion that going F2P is a little premature for FFXI at this stage, and partly because i fear that effective monetization in FFXI will ultimately be a huge power creep. It's all about the stats after all.

Instead what they could do is to lower the subscription fees (its hella expensive compared to XIV) and draw in a crowd that might be ok with paying a little less for the older MMO. The bundle method is good too. If people perceive both subscriptions to be discounted, they'll just continue to pay for both (even if they don't play both). Thats if they go the price route for the cash cow.

If they're willing to pump some resources in, then they could release the game on PS4 (i hear its pretty easy to code if theres PC version available) and it'd be akin to having a 'FFXI HD remaster' lol. Essentially all they'd need to do is have the game output with quality that we've been achieving on PC for years by oversampling, because the games models are capable of that already. They could use that to drop support for the PS2, as well as attract a wider/new console audience on the PS4. This is the route I'd love to see them take.

[Kincard]

Pay-to-win is likely what this game would become if they turned XI FTP, because they've shown they actually have no problem doing that in the past even within the P2P model (The Kato Addons, arguably Abyssea). I should note that the free week or so they gave a while back is what got me to resubscribe though, so maybe more campaigns in that style would be helpful. I'm not at all interested in XI being anything but P2P, though. The only FTP I'd be okay with at this point are those really limited ones, like you can only access original and Zilart content or something. The free trial to the game that's available is too limited even for me.

An LFG tool would be really great. JPs already use the seacom system but it's still pretty user-unfriendly (whereas English players are apparently too lazy to use it at all).

[fantasticdan]

Just lower the subscription fee to like $5, done.