Final Fantasy XIV's Yoshida Naoki on Going F2P - 'No Plan at All' - MMORPG.com

SBFord

Final Fantasy XIV's Yoshida Naoki on Going F2P - 'No Plan at All' - MMORPG.com

A new interview with Final Fantasy XIV's Yoshida Naoki has been published on Korean site Iven.co.kr where he is specifically asked about the possibility of moving the game to a free-to-play revenue model. His answer is unequivocal, "We have no plan for F2P at all." The answer came as part of a larger discussion of the 4.3 update and general gameplay in Final Fantasy XIV.

Read the full story here

Bloodaxes

Even tough I stopped playing the game, I still believe it's one of the best mmorpgs we have.

Sticking to the pay 2 play monetization is the best way to ensure players don't get toyed with. There's many mmorpgs lately that are offering shiny items or content in the cash shop just for a quick buck. Very few are lasting for long.

I command them for sticking to their notion after all these years.

JeffSpicoli

@bloodaxes Agreed to me this is the best MMORPG on the market right now. Unlike WOW they don't treat the player like a idiot when it comes to skills and rotations. The game is constantly updated and has enough complexity and depth without making anything feel like a chore or a grind. Did i mention the Music ? Yeah thats great to

Last i heard this game was doing very well with subs, I can't see why they would go to a F2P model.

Dr_Shivinski

Look at all the F2P mmos out there right now and ask yourself if that's what you want for FFXIV. Yoshi knows what he's doing.

Warlyx

In the developer’s perspective, we think that quick profit is not the right way. Even if FFXIV is making sizable profit surprisingly well, we do not want to push players to reach further in their wallet. Instead, it would be better to encourage at least 2 to 3 times the population with lowered spending per individual, establishing healthy continuation of 3 to 10 years in sight. Hence we have no plan for F2P at all.

Yoshi know what hes is talking about

cheyane

Dr_Shivinski said:

Look at all the F2P mmos out there right now and ask yourself if that's what you want for FFXIV. Yoshi knows what he's doing.

Very true.

Rukushin

@thunderC ; I completely agree with you. FFXIV is the best we have right now.

Kajidourden

I no longer play because I no longer have any interest in the WoW with an ff-skin gameplay/content/endgame but they are wildly successful, I don't see why anyone would think they would go F2P.  Hell they still charge a sub for FFXI I believe. 

goozmania

Is he going to be asked this asinine question every few months?

Siveria

goozmania said:

Is he going to be asked this asinine question every few months?

Probally, But it won't happen, not only do they have million of subs to this wow clone, they also have tons of idiots paying a fortune for overpriced cosmetics in the cash shop. I gave up on FF14 as every class feels to much the same as each other, like the melee dps all felt the exact same to me. I actually prefered how 1.0 was, as it was actually unique in a good way and not just a cookie cutter wow clone like ff14 2.0+ is.

What can ya say though? Wow clones is where the money is today. Till that changes were never going to see an actual mmorpg, just more of the same repetive themepark bullcrap thats been spewed out since wow was successful.

I used to love mmorpgs, then wow happened, I tried wow, was on in 1.0, but then every single mmorpg that came out kept trying to clone wow, and the genre is pretty much a stagnating cesspool now of games that are essentally the same with just a diffrent skin on it.

I recently went back to play FF11, and I have to say its by and far better than any current mmorpg, might be part nostalgia talking though.

timeraider

Who makes up these rumors that ffxiv would have plans for f2p... And what idiot takes them serious....

timeraider

Siveria said:

goozmania said:

Is he going to be asked this asinine question every few months?

Probally, But it won't happen, not only do they have million of subs to this wow clone, they also have tons of idiots paying a fortune for overpriced cosmetics in the cash shop. I gave up on FF14 as every class feels to much the same as each other, like the melee dps all felt the exact same to me. I actually prefered how 1.0 was, as it was actually unique in a good way and not just a cookie cutter wow clone like ff14 2.0+ is.



What can ya say though? Wow clones is where the money is today. Till that changes were never going to see an actual mmorpg, just more of the same repetive themepark bullcrap thats been spewed out since wow was successful.



I used to love mmorpgs, then wow happened, I tried wow, was on in 1.0, but then every single mmorpg that came out kept trying to clone wow, and the genre is pretty much a stagnating cesspool now of games that are essentally the same with just a diffrent skin on it.



I recently went back to play FF11, and I have to say its by and far better than any current mmorpg, might be part nostalgia talking though.

How long ago did you play ff14? Heavensward and blood made the gameplay for most classes alot better... And it still makes WoWs pve look like a calm schooltrip compared to the savage dungeons of ffxiv

Albatroes

Because they are not in a position to think about going f2p. They have a cash shop that they update monthly, that has cringier purchases tactics than a lot of f2p games (purchases based on sex, 1 time purchases for characters including certain mounts, or even locking certain weapon skins behind costume only bundles like the deep dungeon scythe). On top of that you have space being rentalable externally only via their retainer rental with retainers acting as auction house space as well and can also bring back rare pets/crafting materials exclusive to retainer missions (some view that whole thing as p2w). Now you got the app which has a premium option that lets you get an addition retainer/more bag space ontop of that/market board purchasing via phone. All of this stuff in a p2p game. So tell me why exactly would they need to even consider going f2p when they've had the f2p options in place for years now? I believe the game is solid enough but SE's monetization needs to dial back a bit. They more than likely make just as much money via their cash shop as they do via subs, if not more if you look at the prices on half of their stuff.

One thing I did find funny though with one of Ion's Q&As is his revealing of Blizzard's WoW team size being around 300 ish, which is about the size of the FFXIV dev team. Yet, that's small I guess.

rojoArcueid

If FFXI is still sub based all these years with less people than XIV. There's no reason for XIV to drop the sub. I am not the biggest fan of subscriptions and will never be, but IMO XIV is where it's at today thanks to the sub. If they ever drop it you can kiss good bye to a fair game. The same would happen if WoW drops its sub.

What they could do is follow WoW's strategy of dropping the base game price and only require the sub + purchase of the latest expansion.

Albatroes

rojoArcueid said:

If FFXI is still sub based all these years with less people than XIV. There's no reason for XIV to drop the sub. I am not the biggest fan of subscriptions and will never be, but IMO XIV is where it's at today thanks to the sub. If they ever drop it you can kiss good bye to a fair game. The same would happen if WoW drops its sub.

What they could do is follow WoW's strategy of dropping the base game price and only require the sub + purchase of the latest expansion.

Well, how SE works as a whole is they funnel money through projects to make up for lower profits in specific ones. For example, money made from FFXIV went to help FFXV with all its free dlc and such. I mean, I respect them for doing funds like that but I think their over 'need' compromises the integrity of a single project. Going back to what I was saying about FFXIV cash shop, they used to have gender specific outfits (i.e. swimsuits and such) interchangeable within game if you bought them via the cash shop. Now they are sold separate, so if you decide to change your character's gender, you have to buy the opposite sex variant of the same item. These outfits then have to be bought again and in the same way if you have an alt, instead of there being a way to send these items to an alt or being account-bound like say WoW does with their pets/mounts or even B&S does with their outfits, allowing you get stamps to send outfits between characters. Its just really cringe stuff to milk more money, but again the money gets recycled into other projects. Even when FFXIV failed the first time, money from FFXI was going into that as well as XIII, which almost made them go bankrupt.

acidblood

FFXIV really has no reason to go F2P (yet*), as others have said though the monitisation is starting to go (has already gone?) a bit too far...

- More and more stuff ending up in the cash shop (3.5 EUR for 1 piece of music you can only listen to in your house / inn room, really?)

- Still only 2 retainers for a standard sub, but for $$ per month you can have up to 7

- Another 5 EUR per month for extra side inventory tab (70 items) and yet another retainer

- Paid auction house postings via the otherwise pointless App

* I say yet, as SB on the whole has been a bit of a disappointment, with less content than HW, far less 'new' content (most is just 'copy-paste' with a new wallpaper), and the garbage that is Eureka... if the next expansion is little more than a repeat of this I would not at all be surprised for sub numbers to drop dramatically (especially once the likes of Pantheon, WoW Classic, Ashes, etc. hit beta / release)... I'm also not sure SE cares much about FFXIV any more (beyond the money it makes them), so if F2P starts to look more profitable...

Wizardry

There is no such thing as free,the real title would be scam the users with cash shop crap.
So Square has no care to scam gamer's with greedy cash shops.

FFXI already had the numbers drop by a lot and guess what,NO cash shop crap.

Perhaps people are just not used to a dev doing things fair ,so use to garbage devs and their loot boxes and cash shops.
Just a couple hours ago,i am greeted on Blizzard's app with FREE golden loot box advert.To me that is scummy,i play games for fun that are fun to me,i don't want your scummy bribes to play your lousy games.You can try and bribe me with 500 golden loot boxes,it won't work.

Seeing devs try to BAIT users in by use of a FAKE term...FREE makes me sick,even more so that people support that crap.

GeezerGamer

Who would have ever thought there was a connection between publishing a good game and running a successful subscription model?

**Shrugs**

Albatroes

GeezerGamer said:

Who would have ever thought there was a connection between publishing a good game and running a successful subscription model?

**Shrugs**

I'd say a large part to a sub model's success is what other things they have on board to pull from. Blizzard and SE both have always had other IPs to pull from and recycle funding into their games when needed.

As an aside, I didn't know Blizzard and SE were so close with SE publishing WoW in Japan. It starts to make sense that their patch schedules fit around each other so well.

ChildoftheShadows

So subscription plus cash shop is better than free to play plus cash shop?

kitarad

Their sub is lower than other games. so they supplement it see no issue there. Afterall you don't need more retainers.

Scot

ChildoftheShadows said:

So subscription plus cash shop is better than free to play plus cash shop?

Yes and it always has been.

Phry

Scot said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

So subscription plus cash shop is better than free to play plus cash shop?

Yes and it always has been.

Subscription + cash shop is not ideal by any means, but there is far less onus on forcing players into having to buy items from the cash shop just in order to progress or be able to play in a meaningful fashion that is not in some way 'degraded', with F2P games there is practically a requirement to use the cash shop, or be forced to accept a sub standard gaming experience and a heavy grind to progress at a much slower rate than those who do use the cash shop.

Darkonflare15

Wizardry said:

There is no such thing as free,the real title would be scam the users with cash shop crap.
So Square has no care to scam gamer's with greedy cash shops.

FFXI already had the numbers drop by a lot and guess what,NO cash shop crap.

Perhaps people are just not used to a dev doing things fair ,so use to garbage devs and their loot boxes and cash shops.
Just a couple hours ago,i am greeted on Blizzard's app with FREE golden loot box advert.To me that is scummy,i play games for fun that are fun to me,i don't want your scummy bribes to play your lousy games.You can try and bribe me with 500 golden loot boxes,it won't work.

Seeing devs try to BAIT users in by use of a FAKE term...FREE makes me sick,even more so that people support that crap.

"Square has no care to scam gamer's with a greedy cash shop?" Lol. Final Fantasy XIV has a cash shop they called the Mogstation. They update that shop every month. They also have a companion app that has a premium plan option. They do not need free to play because they are getting money from users through their force subscription while selling them cosmetics that they can only use while being subscribed.

moosecatlol

DRK, #greatcommunitybtw, and server stability were the main reasons I quit.

I had a longer drawn out post where I was mocking @thunderC , by putting *DARK ARTS* between every word of my post. However these forums do as they wish, maybe another time.

ChildoftheShadows

Scot said:

ChildoftheShadows said:

So subscription plus cash shop is better than free to play plus cash shop?

Yes and it always has been.

Doesn’t make sense. Sounds much worse to me.