Remember When ARR Would Fail...Follow

This information was released in May of 2013. Yoshi's comments were from an interview he gave 6 weeks later in June.


No one suggested it was. In fact, it obviously wasn't because Yoshi clearly didn't know what he was talking about.


The only mistake in my argument is that you can't remember what I quoted you the last time you posted up an IGN article proclaiming that ARR had saved SE.

I get that regardless of what is posted here you're going to wave the FF flag proudly. That's fine. We've all come to expect that. Honestly, I just enjoy the mental image of you plugging your ears and yelling " LALALALA" at the top of your lungs to drown out any sort of sensible discussion. Carry on

In other interviews -- and in direct addresses to players -- they specified "new accounts." Here is one: http://www.swtor.com/info/news/blog/20130321



So, when you say:



Turns out, he actually did. Or, at the very least, he shares your views on "player accounts" vs. "players."



Filth, you've moved the goal posts so far that I'm not even sure what your argument is anymore. But you can throw one more mistake on the pile. Or, perhaps you should make a post arguing with yourself from the past. I'd love to see that!

Edited, May 25th 2015 6:54pm by Thayos

Totally not true.

My wife created a SWtOR player account. She played the game for like two days and then hasn't touched it since. She'd hardly be called a "player." And don't try to discredit your entire stance against player accounts by claiming FFXIV only matters because of multi-platform. I'm not buying that for a second.

FFXIV hit 4 million new player accounts earlier this year, and you know as well as I that the majority of the additional 2 million new accounts (since last year) are free trial accounts on single platforms.

In FFXIV, you argued that anyone who started a trial account would count as a "player account" without actually being a player. If that's the case, then I'd argue that anyone who plays F2P SWtOR without buying anything from the cash shop or subscribing is essentially a meaningless trial member too.

A player isn't a customer until he buys something, right?



I honestly don't know why you're using IGN as a tool to try to sidestep the discussion on XIV's success. I get it, you don't like IGN. We all understand that. When I post news, though, I don't start by asking myself, "Hmmm, I wonder what Filth will think of this?" Although, full disclosure, you did cross my mind as I was creating this specific thread, given that you've always thought so highly of the game's chances to succeed.

But nothing in that IGN article is untrue... so you throwing a fit and saying "I don't like it!" just doesn't really carry much weight.



What actually happened was EA's president mistook "player accounts" for "players." Then, six weeks later, Yoshi-P used SWtOR as an example of a F2P game that doesn't have as many consistent players as meets the eye... and based on other articles I've linked to, his assessment was correct. You'll see the same sentiment repeated if you look on forums for the game. It's only really worth playing if you subscribe. I agree that Yoshi-P was a bit callous with his wording, but the spirit of what he intended rings true. And if he was wrong, then where did those 2 million players go? Why are most of the game's servers so sparse just a couple of years later?



Why would they go through all the work to install a cash shop now when the game is being phased out? They're being totally upfront with their plans for XI; if people want to pay fees for that, well, that's on them.



Edited, May 25th 2015 11:08pm by Thayos

This is anecdotal, but my free company has a large chunk of people we call "mmo hobos." They have a base game, one that they return to, but they put it on pause and go do other things when they come out. After a few months they get bored and return to the base game.

For a decade the base game was WoW.

Now that base game is FFXIV.

Currently, the group has hit the WoW MOBA thing that just dropped, and enjoying the hell out of it. A few months ago it was the expansion to Dragon Age. Before that it was Destiny. Before that, it was Wildstar. And before that it was ESO.

Every time they've played it a little, went "meh" and then resubbed to XIV, if they even let their sub lapse at all (some people are lazy and don't need to pinch pennies, so just don't bother unsubbing while they play other things.)

That is the position that an MMO wants to be in. That's why WoW has been so successful for so long, and to a lesser extent, FFXI. People would try the new games as they came out, get bored, and return to WoW. Now FFXIV has replaced XI in that spot, and taken a chunk of the WoW players as well.

Yep, I've seen that too. My base game right now is FFXIV, and my second-most played game is Destiny. I've actually started dabbling around in Guild Wars 2 again (the issues that bothered me the first time around are still there, but still, it's a fun game), and I've been chipping away at Dragon Age (want to play through the first one again so I can play the second and third games). I'm getting The Witcher 3 with my new graphic card, so I may play Witcher 2 to familiarize myself with the story a bit.

I'm not an "MMO hobo," but how much time I spend playing other games definitely revolves around leftover time after playing FFXIV (and these days, I'm not willing to spend as much time gaming as I was five to 10 years ago.

Actually, Yoshi-P caused a stir awhile back when he didn't rule out shifting FFXIV to some kind of F2P model in the future. He reiterated that SE remains committed to the P2P approach, but he's savvy enough to know the game can still earn profits if P2P eventually becomes infeasible.

That said, there are reasons other than profits why companies might want to avoid F2P altogether. I've been following Nintendo's struggles with the Wii U as well as the company's reluctance to go into the F2P market (Nintendo refers to F2P as "free to start"). Nintendo's stance is once you start offering content for free, then you essentially send the message that your content isn't valuable, and then you'll have a harder time convincing people to pay for your content in the future. That's why Nintendo has no F2P offerings, and it's also why the company is so reluctant to lower prices for the Wii U and its games.

It's an interesting concept, and I wonder if SE's top leadership may share those beliefs. Just look at FFXI... years ago, another gaming company may have installed a cash shop and let the game live on as a F2P title (which could have worked, especially considering the bare-bones staff needed to update the game). But SE seemed content with just keeping things as is and letting the game age without any massive philosophical overhauls.

And the result of SE's decision? I doubt many gamers are seriously holding their breaths waiting for XIV to go F2P before they jump in and try it, and that's kind of a rare thing these days.

Edited, May 26th 2015 9:41am by Thayos

'MMO Hobo' I like it. Sounds a lot like my free company. Disappearing for a week or two when new games come out of interest to them. Me? I'm a one game player. I barely have 5-10 hours most weeks to play.

The quote you're referring to was actually from the same interview I quoted above...



I'm not sure it's really relevant because as we've seen, F2P has been able to sustain and even grow behind their business model. The only way the statement above really makes sense is if F2P is a 'cash grab' sort of tactic where the business expects their product to have a shelf life and they want to milk as much as they can to pay back investors. While SE doesn't have direct investors to the budget for their products, they do have shareholders to please and shareholders like to see profitable ventures. There's not all that much of a difference here.

At the end of the day it doesn't really matter who's money you used to develop and produce a product. Whether you are in the hole out of pocket or in the hole to investors, your ultimate goal is to get out of the hole and start generating revenue. The portion of the quote above that I underlined doesn't really change any just because you spent your own money or someone else money. That's why I questioned the understanding of Yoshi in the modern market.

Just look at FFXI. They want to continue to charge a monthly fee, but they're not willing to keep generating content for the game. That's an exact opposite to the point Yoshi is trying to make in his defense of subscription based business models...




F2P used to be a dirty word. As you see in this thread some people still attach the stigma of failure to it, despite it being more profitable in many cases.

Common sense says that games that offer their software for free get far more exposure to prospective customers, whether they stick around or not. There's no entry barrier of paying $50 for a box just to see if you'll like it. I don't think it matters how much disposable income a person has... if you literally have nothing to lose from trying something, chances are much higher that you'll at least give it a try. P2P, F2P or even hybrids of the two all try to generate enjoyable content to keep players in place or(as catwho mantions) at least make it comfortable enough that it's an oasis when the market starts getting dry.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I certainly hope you're not saying FFXI playerbase is in any way part of a "modern market".

Though, of course, they can be in the way that the people still buying VHS cassettes are part of the "modern market".

That's like saying someone who buys and enjoys records doesn't know what an mp3 is.

Why wouldn't they be part of the modern market? Are you somehow saying FFXI players have all lived in a bubble since they started playing FFXI? You seem to assume that FFXI players only play FFXI, which would be an inaccurate assumption. The majority of FFXI players you assume are not part of the modern market are also WoW players, EvE players, SWtOR players, etc., etc.

Even if you play one game primarily doesn't mean you have blinders on and don't realize when you're suddenly getting screwed compared to everyone else in the current market.

Fact of the matter is, for all intents and purposes ( other than milking money ), after November FFXI is done. Over. Instead of milking the faithful until they finally leave ( and maybe leave with a bad taste in their mouth in regards to S-E ) so FFXI can sunset in a proper manner, S-E should have given notice that FFXI would be shut down in November ( or even next November if S-E really just wanted to give them extra time before shutdown )while giving incentives for FFXI players to migrate fully to FFXIV ( like 50% off a 6 month subscription and a limited supply of XP boosters, for an arbitrary example ).

As it is now, after November every FFXI player has to constantly wonder when FFXI will finally be killed. Should they buy a 3 month sub? A 6 month? Will the game even be here in 3 months or 6? That is not how you retain customers to your product. How you treat customers with one product is how they will expect to be treated with the next.



Edited, May 27th 2015 3:27pm by Zorvan

Edited, May 27th 2015 3:29pm by Zorvan

Most companies say "We're keeping the servers on until "X" date, and no subscription payments will be accepted after "this" date.". Gives time for everyones sub to lapse out, and the players end up with a month or so free time at the end.

There have been a few games that just went *poof* though. Remember that one mmo where the devs accidentally erased the hard drives and had no backup? lol

I'm no master of the english language, but I generally try to make the ideas and information I present here as clear as possible.

In the text that was quoted, the first sentence was actually part of a device called a paragraph. Paragraphs are blocks of text that are used to group together common thoughts or ideas so that they're easier for the reader to understand. Perhaps if that first sentence had been kept in context with what was stated prior, it would have been easier to understand.



Sounds legit. Why then did SE decide to slow and eventually stop making content for their most successful game to date? FFXI qualifies as a relevant topic because Yoshi is speaking about the success of P2P MMOs. Honestly, you could apply his logic to just about any product that can be updated or improved on, but you don't even have to zoom that far out to be able to see that FFXI is an obvious example.



I love how you framed that Thayos. "SE has offered to let people play the game..." You almost make it sound like they're doing you a favor. Forgive me if that's not your intent, but that's exactly how it comes off.

Yoshi implies that F2P games fail to provide players with the content needed to sustain a player base because they don't charge a monthly fee. We've already see that is not the case. We have proven that F2P games can produce as much and in many cases, more content than P2P games. We also know that not only can F2P games sustain a player base, they can increase it. This is the only point he makes that I call ignorance on.

I agree with a lot of the things that Yoshi says in his interview. Most of them are generalizations about a company trying to sell a product in general and not specific to the MMO market. I just wish this guy worked for a company that didn't try to undermine everything he says...


I guess this clears up why SE will cease development for FFXI, but continue to require a monthly fee to play it