Surprised by how many new players seem to be arriving

[ralphieceaser]

I decided to make a new character while waiting for 7.0 and I was just positively surprised by how many people new players seem to be around, specifically people who even type in general chat and say they are new or ask questions most old players would know.

 

I know with WoW dying and FF14 being a huge success the MMORPG community is spreading to other mmorpgs but I am just surprised people havent tried swtor until now considering it has been available for so many years.

 

They certainly have a lot of story ahead of them.

[TrixxieTriss]

I decided to make a new character while waiting for 7.0 and I was just positively surprised by how many people new players seem to be around, specifically people who even type in general chat and say they are new or ask questions most old players would know.

 

I know with WoW dying and FF14 being a huge success the MMORPG community is spreading to other mmorpgs but I am just surprised people havent tried swtor until now considering it has been available for so many years.

 

They certainly have a lot of story ahead of them.

 

FF14 is having massive login issues at the moment. And they have just temporarily shut the option for new players to join their game. Both new paying and free to play people won’t be able to join their game till they get new servers at the end of January/February (https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/news/detail/e7388986bc24d5a1337e0beed057f7b5b78b9bb3)

 

So we are probably getting some of those people who have left WoW, but can’t play FF14 due to congestion issues and now they can’t even buy the game to play it if you’re a new player. Talk about a wild business scenario where you have to stop people buying your game cause it’s too successful, lol. Bioware and EA should be paying attention and copying FF14 more instead of copying WoW which has been in a decline now for years.

 

It’s surprising what proper resources and reinvestment can do for a game when it has a visionary running it. When you consider how far it’s come because FF14 was such a shamozal when it launched and they had to rebuild most of it from scratch and give it a new engine and new relaunch 18 months latter. The game is now the number 1 MMO on the planet.

 

Just imagine what swtor could have been with that sort of leadership and investment and talent.

Edited December 17, 2021 by TrixxieTriss

[GeneralGyro]

FF14 is having massive login issues at the moment. And they have just temporarily shut the option for new players to join their game. Both new paying and free to play people won’t be able to join their game till they get new servers at the end of January/February (https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodestone/news/detail/e7388986bc24d5a1337e0beed057f7b5b78b9bb3)

 

So we are probably getting some of those people who have left WoW, but can’t play FF14 due to congestion issues and now they can’t even buy the game to play it if you’re a new player. Talk about a wild business scenario where you have to stop people buying your game cause it’s too successful, lol. Bioware and EA should be paying attention and copying FF14 more instead of copying WoW which has been in a decline now for years.

 

It’s surprising what proper resources and reinvestment can do for a game when it has a visionary running it. When you consider how far it’s come because FF14 was such a shamozal when it launched and they had to rebuild most of it from scratch and give it a new engine and new relaunch 18 months latter. The game is now the number 1 MMO on the planet.

 

Just imagine what swtor could have been with that sort of leadership and investment and talent.

 

you do know ffxiv copied wow right?

 

yoshi p forced his team to play wow back in MoP to get an idea how to make a good mmo

Edited December 17, 2021 by GeneralGyro

[ralphieceaser]

you do know ffxiv copied wow right?

 

yoshi p forced his team to play wow back in MoP to get an idea how to make a good mmo

Well technically true but the game is honestly nothing like WoW, they took a few good ideas from WoW but then focused on their vision where Yoshi P many times said would be the story, something that sounded very weird to some hardcore mmorpg players who simply cant understand that many people dont play mmorpgs for high end group content, but the casual fun solo experience and I am including solo que group content in that one.

 

Hell, Ion and the dev team would have a heart attack in FF14 where casual players could get max gear in every other patch by doing casual activities and not le l33t mythic raid, or the fact that ultimate raids in FF14 dont have gear loot and it instead about the achievement and cosmetics.

[TrixxieTriss]

you do know ffxiv copied wow right?

 

yoshi p forced his team to play wow back in MoP to get an idea how to make a good mmo

 

Yes, they sort of did in a way. Yoshi has said without WoW leading the way, there probably wouldn’t be a MMO like FF14.

 

The difference is, they stopped directly copying WoW early and had their own ideas and direction. Swtor has nearly always been a WoW clone with a SW theme and VA. If WoW did it, swtor eventually did it (even if it was a bust in WoW ).

 

FF14 is the leader now in the genre because they reinvest heavily in the games development and have their own clear vision. They aren’t copying WoW.

[GeneralGyro]

Yes, they sort of did in a way. Yoshi has said without WoW leading the way, there probably wouldn’t be a MMO like FF14.

 

The difference is, they stopped directly copying WoW early and had their own ideas and direction. Swtor has nearly always been a WoW clone with a SW theme and VA. If WoW did it, swtor eventually did it (even if it was a bust in WoW ).

 

FF14 is the leader now in the genre because they reinvest heavily in the games development and have their own clear vision. They aren’t copying WoW.

 

i think ffxiv remake also copied swtor, making ffxiv a story first mmo second game

Edited December 17, 2021 by GeneralGyro

[SaerethDL]

honestly 90% of them probably joined/subbed because they thought 7.0 was launching on the 14th and now they have to get their money worth.

[kage_goomba]

Everyone and their mother will say this game copied that....and that game copied this.

Point is...it is what it is...and it's not WoW by a long shot.

You'll find people pointing all the way back to Everquest at that rate.

 

FFXIV is in a very bad way right now. Contrary to what people are saying.

 

Never in the history of the game (As far as recent history is concerned - ignoring 1.0 and that's a way way back time frame) have they ever suspended all sales/ads/new player access for "Christmas" time like that. That's going to hurt them - hard.

 

Its a big big and very unprecedented change in tactics.

The other issue is they had 6 months to a year to plan this out - the WoW thing was on the wall in terms of what was going on for a very long time - and it didn't really become critical mass until Blizzard pulled their stunt - or should I say Activision

 

FFXIV should have done exactly what they did when Shadowbringers launched - deployed more servers - they even split the DC I play in (Aether) nearly in half to do it to make room.

It worked damn near perfectly - I was there during launch - literally no issues in terms of log in or play or queues. Nothing like today.

 

Today your lucky if you have to wait 3 hours to play - and that's just wrong.

People complain and whine about SWTOR's direction and what they did to delay the launch - I say be fortunate your not in FFXIV right now - at least you can play this game - FFXIV should have delayed their launch by 6 months to a year just to deploy more servers. (And for the record - I'm not poking at the 7.0 naysayers - whom I agree with - just talking about being able to play the bloody game!)

 

The saying "it will get better soon" isn't a valid excuse - because that is only truth when players quit the game due to the fact they can't even play said game - people won't tolerate that....not for much longer.

 

Even today - still having queue issues all over the place from the various discord servers I'm monitoring - some even just flat gave up for they day getting disconnected from a guild event and stuck waiting in queues is temper inducing all the same.

 

SE won't even have a roadmap for new servers till end of Jan - that's a long ways off.

 

Very sad time to be a FFXIV player - frankly someone had to have made a decision to convince Yoshi P not to expand hardware - there's just no way even he would ignore this. But who knows at this point. What's done is done.

 

In-spite of everything - SWTOR is in better shape than people give it credit for in retrospect.

Successfully failing is not a good term right now.

 

Ironically - no one will want to go back to WoW - so yeah - expect traffic over here for sure.

New World isn't exactly winning any points either.

 

I for one am thankful in-spite of all the 7.0 crap.....here's hoping the delay will clean that up.

[ralphieceaser]

In their defense making more servers is never a good idea for mmorpgs on launch dates, that is because historically mmorpgs almost always lose a huge number of players after the first couple of months which means you end up with a ton of dead servers, its a common phenomenon since people just jump on the new thing and leave later even if your game is great, its the nature of mmorpgs.

 

But it definitely feels like FF14 problem is unique, they are suffering from too much success and popularity, to the point they had to stop sales and ads for the game, meaning now active accounts are probably being sold for a decent amount because this scarcity is gonna make people want to play even more due to the hype it has created.

 

Though didnt they also say there's some shortages with certain server making materials due to covid or due to the whole crypto thing? I am certain they were definitely planning on making more servers, just not the huge amount that would be needed to fit the huge wave that was coming for them.

 

Thankfully I just show the entire story through youtube so didnt have to deal with that xD

Edited December 17, 2021 by ralphieceaser

[kage_goomba]

In their defense making more servers is never a good idea for mmorpgs on launch dates, that is because historically mmorpgs almost always lose a huge number of players after the first couple of months which means you end up with a ton of dead servers, its a common phenomenon since people just jump on the new thing and leave later even if your game is great, its the nature of mmorpgs.

 

But it definitely feels like FF14 problem is unique, they are suffering from too much success and popularity, to the point they had to stop sales and ads for the game, meaning now active accounts are probably being sold for a decent amount because this scarcity is gonna make people want to play even more due to the hype it has created.

 

Though didnt they also say there's some shortages with certain server making materials due to covid or due to the whole crypto thing? I am certain they were definitely planning on making more servers, just not the huge amount that would be needed to fit the huge wave that was coming for them.

 

Thankfully I just show the entire story through youtube so didnt have to deal with that xD

 

Historically adding servers for launch being a bad idea? Didn't happen in FFXIV's case when Sahdowbringers launched - it was a successful launch. So If anything they where the exception to the common rule if you have games to give examples for.

 

Again - they had 6 months to a year to plan this out....and historically they knew that population was going to explode just like it always does on new expansions.

Players show up on new expansions/new patch - sub up.....play the game....then leave. Just like clockwork.

Last year we saw WoW have a meltdown - streamers like asmogold or whatever the hell his name is showed up and brought with him a tsunami of players of the worst kind to the typical kind all over the place in FFXIV.

Suddenly we have queues just logging in - granted it would last about 2-3 minutes - but it was never an issue before.

Just going to major city areas was slower than all get out - things we would never ever have to experience.

You'd think SE would have analytics and see what was coming. They planned the launch of Shadowbringers in that regard - why not Endwalker?

Instead all we got was "plans to launch an asian DC" - and well....there you have it.

 

Everyone was cringing from the start when WoW had its "explosion"

 

You can't honestly tell me they didn't see the oncoming train that is today....there's no way in hell.

The excuse of "Shortages" no longer applies when you had all the time to plan out the outcome.

 

As I've said so many times - better to have a working game that people can play and enjoy while content is delayed due to "capacity" or "function" (IE: like SWTOR's 7.0 Delay) than to launch and suffer the consequences of a bad decision. There's just no way to excuse the lack of foresight. Everyone and their mother predicted this outcome - albeit not loudly - but it was a given that WoW's mass exodus would lead to this. (That is a known meme too - people leave FFXIV and go to WoW - then bounce back to FFXIV etc.)

 

Also yeah..selling accounts - not good - but also a guaranteed perma-ban - I don't see that being an issue - I do see people "Sharing accounts" being an issue - and that again - perma ban. Even then - that's presuming you can even log in to play the game in the first place.

[SteveTheCynic]

i think ffxiv remake also copied swtor, making ffxiv a story first mmo second game

Which *totally* explains why the base FF14:ARR (after the remake, but before the expansions) includes mandatory group content as part of the main storyline.

[ralphieceaser]

Which *totally* explains why the base FF14:ARR (after the remake, but before the expansions) includes mandatory group content as part of the main storyline.

Seems like a mistake they learned from and didnt repeat.

 

Plus solo que group content where there is 0 need for socialization might as well be seen as solo content where the other players are NPCs helping you complete the dungeon and story, there's 0 barriers in such design.

 

There is a very big difference between actual organized group content and solo que group content unless you want to argue about definitions

[Ghost_Spectre]

SE won't even have a roadmap for new servers till end of Jan - that's a long ways off.

 

After the lawsuit and the implosion of Activision/Blizzard, FFXIV was in the spotlight thanks to content creators like Rich and Asmongold, among others. Before that happening, SE announced they had 22 million active subscriber accounts. A few weeks after the influx of players, they announced having 24 million active subscriber accounts. These do not include free trail players. They only count active subs playing the game as it is required to go passed Heavensward now.

 

YoshiP and company announced they were having to acquire more servers to handle the influx. However, due to the current Covid crises, obtaining chip sets and other hardware were 2 to 3 months behind on supplying. Therefore, they were adjusting the current login servers (which is where the problem lies) to handle more players.

 

They recently found bugs in these servers that caused a these disconnect errors. One bug would not display the current login information correctly and after someone "logged in" they'd sit in the queue for a bit then be summarily dumped. The 2002 error bug was due to having the maximum amount of people in the login server, 17,000. However, that has been addressed.

 

The current issue is waiting in the queue. I waited a week after release for people to get in before the official launch and ran into the 2002 error. I waiting another 1 before trying and it was the other bug they discovered that kicked me to the curb after getting in the queue and waiting for 10 minutes before being bounced.

 

Very sad time to be a FFXIV player - frankly someone had to have made a decision to convince Yoshi P not to expand hardware - there's just no way even he would ignore this. But who knows at this point. What's done is done.

 

As noted above they had already planned on setting up new servers early fall of this year. Supply chain issues as delayed them receiving and bring them online. However, let's go back to the history of this game concerning new updates. After ARR (A Realm Reborn), the encountered long queue waits; however, they weren't as bad as they see with Endwalker. Nevertheless, based on the performance of Heavensward, Stormblood, and Shadowbringers it was implied they based their anticipation for Endwalker to have similar login issues. What happened was not solely on "they weren't prepared" as it was a few undiscovered bugs that caused what happened.

 

That said, though you will find many raising a ruckus in Reddit, you'll find most of the player base is sympathetic to what's happen and appreciative to what YoshiP and his crew are doing to resolve it. Frustrations at waiting to get in and play are there, yet players are not condemning the game nor the developers.

 

To claim that FFXIV is in a "bad way" because of that is a miss-characterization of the situation and far from the truth. One only needs to spend time with the content creators who are playing Endwalker and watch the response of the thousands of viewers. It is overwhelmingly positive. I for one, am patiently waiting to play the game. I have decided to wait until after the first of the year so they can smooth out any other issues that's happened.

 

I will continue to play my subscription, play and stream it. I'm all in for FFXIV not only because the game is the best; however, because the community as a whole is the best one I've ever been part of. No other MMO/MMORPG I've played has had a community such that FFXIV has. FFXIV offers, perhaps the most magnificent story progression ever and a community that treats everyone very well including new players, casuals, and hardcore players equally.

[TziganeNZ]

Which *totally* explains why the base FF14:ARR (after the remake, but before the expansions) includes mandatory group content as part of the main storyline.

 

Which is precisely why I will be cancelling my sub with FFXIV. I worked my way through the base game, but really didn't enjoy being forced to group to progress the storyline. Now that I'm into the first expansion, I haven't logged in for quite some time because I can't face being forced into a duty just to move through the story.

Edited December 17, 2021 by TziganeNZ

[Ghost_Spectre]

Though didnt they also say there's some shortages with certain server making materials due to covid or due to the whole crypto thing? I am certain they were definitely planning on making more servers, just not the huge amount that would be needed to fit the huge wave that was coming for them.

 

Thankfully I just show the entire story through youtube so didnt have to deal with that xD

 

Yes they did when they felt the influx of new people and new they were need new servers. However, it would be 2 to 3 months before acquiring them...or it could've been longer. Again, the problem lies in the login servers, not the game servers. The issues getting errors at the login servers were caused by unseen bugs they recently discovered and rectified. New servers will be installed and quite possible, IIRC, they have the capacity to expand the game server populations too.

 

Many detractors look at this as "end of the world" type things for games, especially for MMO competitors. However, they could not be further from the truth. When a MMO has an issue like this...how can it be bad when you have one of the, if not the largest active subscription player base? BioWare/EA would kill for this problem. Like it was at launch...with more servers than one could count.

 

Oh, and here was the underlying cause of the 2002 error. I just read it. This changes everything regarding what they thought it was.

 

"■ Error 2002 While Waiting in Login Queues

 

In regards to Error 2002 that occurs during login queues, outside of causes related to unstable connections, we have confirmed a bug. This bug was part of a login-related program created back in FFXIV version 1.0, and thanks to the reports and tests carried out by many of our players, we were able to identify the cause of the problem. We apologize for not being able to identify the issue on our end and thank you all for submitting detailed reports regarding this matter.

 

Although the code for fixing this bug is already prepared, applying the fix will require patching the game client, which will be addressed in Patch 6.01, scheduled for Tuesday, December 21. As this issue occurs while waiting in the queue for a very long time, we considered releasing the patch ahead of schedule, but in the end decided to include it in Patch 6.01, as there is already a lot of new code in the pipeline for the patch and interrupting the process of verifying them may lead to other bugs. We apologize for the inconvenience and ask for your patience a bit longer."

 

[Ghost_Spectre]

Which is precisely why I will be cancelling my sub with FFXIV. I worked my way through the base game, but really didn't enjoy being forced to group to progress the storyline. Now that I'm into the first expansion, I haven't logged in for quite some time because I can't face being forced into a duty just to move through the story.

 

You mean like having to complete a solo flashpoint required to complete the story quest here in SWTOR? Solo story duties are no different. Even if a dungeon is required or part of the story, you do not do those alone. Select that dungeon, jump into the queue and you're off and running just like you would do here in SWTOR for flashpoints and the others.

 

If you have not played Heavensward and beyond, you are missing out. ARR was tedious, yes. It was designed that way to set the stage for the follow on expansions. By the end of Shadowbringers, everything falls in place to show you the big picture. Endwalker will end the saga.

[TrixxieTriss]

After the lawsuit and the implosion of Activision/Blizzard, FFXIV was in the spotlight thanks to content creators like Rich and Asmongold, among others. Before that happening, SE announced they had 22 million active subscriber accounts. A few weeks after the influx of players, they announced having 24 million active subscriber accounts. These do not include free trail players. They only count active subs playing the game as it is required to go passed Heavensward now.

 

YoshiP and company announced they were having to acquire more servers to handle the influx. However, due to the current Covid crises, obtaining chip sets and other hardware were 2 to 3 months behind on supplying. Therefore, they were adjusting the current login servers (which is where the problem lies) to handle more players.

 

They recently found bugs in these servers that caused a these disconnect errors. One bug would not display the current login information correctly and after someone "logged in" they'd sit in the queue for a bit then be summarily dumped. The 2002 error bug was due to having the maximum amount of people in the login server, 17,000. However, that has been addressed.

 

The current issue is waiting in the queue. I waited a week after release for people to get in before the official launch and ran into the 2002 error. I waiting another 1 before trying and it was the other bug they discovered that kicked me to the curb after getting in the queue and waiting for 10 minutes before being bounced.

 

 

 

As noted above they had already planned on setting up new servers early fall of this year. Supply chain issues as delayed them receiving and bring them online. However, let's go back to the history of this game concerning new updates. After ARR (A Realm Reborn), the encountered long queue waits; however, they weren't as bad as they see with Endwalker. Nevertheless, based on the performance of Heavensward, Stormblood, and Shadowbringers it was implied they based their anticipation for Endwalker to have similar login issues. What happened was not solely on "they weren't prepared" as it was a few undiscovered bugs that caused what happened.

 

That said, though you will find many raising a ruckus in Reddit, you'll find most of the player base is sympathetic to what's happen and appreciative to what YoshiP and his crew are doing to resolve it. Frustrations at waiting to get in and play are there, yet players are not condemning the game nor the developers.

 

To claim that FFXIV is in a "bad way" because of that is a miss-characterization of the situation and far from the truth. One only needs to spend time with the content creators who are playing Endwalker and watch the response of the thousands of viewers. It is overwhelmingly positive. I for one, am patiently waiting to play the game. I have decided to wait until after the first of the year so they can smooth out any other issues that's happened.

 

I will continue to play my subscription, play and stream it. I'm all in for FFXIV not only because the game is the best; however, because the community as a whole is the best one I've ever been part of. No other MMO/MMORPG I've played has had a community such that FFXIV has. FFXIV offers, perhaps the most magnificent story progression ever and a community that treats everyone very well including new players, casuals, and hardcore players equally.

 

I read somewhere that we will be getting FF14 servers in Australia/NZ next year sometime. So I’m patiently waiting for those before trying out the game.

[JediQuaker]

I decided to make a new character while waiting for 7.0 and I was just positively surprised by how many people new players seem to be around, specifically people who even type in general chat and say they are new or ask questions most old players would know.

 

I know with WoW dying and FF14 being a huge success the MMORPG community is spreading to other mmorpgs but I am just surprised people havent tried swtor until now considering it has been available for so many years.

Well, this can't be right. According to these forums, SWTOR died at the release of 5.0, er, I mean 6.0, er, I mean, will die with the release of 7.0. 😂😂😇

Edited December 17, 2021 by JediQuaker

[MystyqeofXev]

Anyone who thinks FF14 is in a "bad way", must be calling a Priest to perform last rites on WoW. My friends list on the latter has been a ghost town for close to three years (BFA), I see people I used to raid with playing other games. Blizzard hasn't released a new WoW video in forever. (Even with YT removing downvotes).

[TziganeNZ]

You mean like having to complete a solo flashpoint required to complete the story quest here in SWTOR? Solo story duties are no different. Even if a dungeon is required or part of the story, you do not do those alone. Select that dungeon, jump into the queue and you're off and running just like you would do here in SWTOR for flashpoints and the others.

 

If you have not played Heavensward and beyond, you are missing out. ARR was tedious, yes. It was designed that way to set the stage for the follow on expansions. By the end of Shadowbringers, everything falls in place to show you the big picture. Endwalker will end the saga.

Don't quite understand what you are talking about here - I do SOLO story flashpoints as part of the story. Solo story flashpoints are VERY different from FFXIV's duties. Some I enjoy, some I don't, but they are SOLO with just me and my companion (and the Godbot if early enough). I am not forced to GROUP with other players to do the flashpoint, as I am with FFXIV duties. It is the FORCED GROUPING with other players that I detest.

[SithKoriandr]

Ironically - no one will want to go back to WoW - so yeah - expect traffic over here for sure.

New World isn't exactly winning any points either.

 

I don't know about that. I'd go back to WoW if I could make a Void Elf Paladin

[mirellha]

I don't know about that. I'd go back to WoW if I could make a Void Elf Paladin

 

I would go back if it was like as their first launch, with a new community. The one owning the game now is more than a hell for me. WoW is no more the Dev game, but only the players game and unfortunatly the most horrible mentality ones.

 

I went back when they relaunched it, feed by all the fond memories, left after a week, deleted everything and asked blizzard to supress my accounts (4). That was heartbreaking to see what the game had become.

[kage_goomba]

I would go back if it was like as their first launch, with a new community. The one owning the game now is more than a hell for me. WoW is no more the Dev game, but only the players game and unfortunatly the most horrible mentality ones.

 

I went back when they relaunched it, feed by all the fond memories, left after a week, deleted everything and asked blizzard to supress my accounts (4). That was heartbreaking to see what the game had become.

 

This is something I keep hearing from various people. Not surprised.

[Cedia]

I would go back if it was like as their first launch, with a new community. The one owning the game now is more than a hell for me. WoW is no more the Dev game, but only the players game and unfortunatly the most horrible mentality ones.

 

I went back when they relaunched it, feed by all the fond memories, left after a week, deleted everything and asked blizzard to supress my accounts (4). That was heartbreaking to see what the game had become.

 

Yeah, I've been a WoW player on and off since 2004. I quit recently when I realized that the inmates were running the asylum.

 

I don't think I could ever delete my account, but it would have to be some next level stuff to get me to return at this point.

 

This is why I get very concerned when I see SWTOR's current changes taking after WoW.

Edited December 18, 2021 by Cedia

[ralphieceaser]

I would go back if it was like as their first launch, with a new community. The one owning the game now is more than a hell for me. WoW is no more the Dev game, but only the players game and unfortunatly the most horrible mentality ones.

 

I went back when they relaunched it, feed by all the fond memories, left after a week, deleted everything and asked blizzard to supress my accounts (4). That was heartbreaking to see what the game had become.

Dont think I will be touching WoW anytime soon, it is clear by their design direction and changes they have done nothing to improve the game for the average player, only to make the game more of a raidlogging simulator.

 

And their new council started with a giant disaster that blew up on their face, plus the fact that they mostly picked raidloggers so of course they are not gonna get any more casual friendly feedback xD