Unlike Western MMOS (AoC, Warhammer, etc) this game does not have the same demographic. AoC was designed for US and Europe, it had ZERO ZERO ZERO presence east. FFXIV is the opposite, it's designed for the east. I will be money that FFXIV will have way more subscribers a year after its PC release than did AoC. Why? Because SE knows its demographic and don't pretend otherwise.
That's why all the yelling and screaming about the horrible UI (some legitimate, some just trolls) won't change it. It's designed for the 400-600k Japanese PS3 Market. People in japan don't play on the PC, virtually none existent, You go to cafes to get your PC gaming on, hardely ever at home.
Let's say you get 100k subscribers in the US, 100k in Europer and around 400-600k in Japan, that's a 600k - 800k subscriber base. You better believe that game is considered a financial success.
People really need to stop thinking that everyone mmo is designed for every person in the world. This is a niche game through and through. I happen to fall in that niche because of FFXI. I'm a FF fanboi, but a realist as well. I don't like certain aspects of the UI (i.e. taking 10 minutes to sell 20 things), but hey, I LOVE using the controller to fish, to harvest, to fight, etc.
People made the mistake in thinking thta FFXIV was designed for everyone. SE made the mistake thinking the West would put up with its marketing/communication/business model. SE also didn't realize that people just didn't understand how it operated.
That's enough of my rambling.
SE locating all of their servers exclusively in Japan is also further proof of this.
I've said it before, SE are playing it safe and want to secure their place in the Japanese MMO market, where the only serious competition is not WoW, but mostly F2P games coming mainly from China and Korea.
They know they can't fight a two-front war and cater to both the Japanese and western players at the same time, not with an MMO at least.
The problem is that refusing to acknowledge the issues or indicate that fixes should be on the way only hurts the game. Sticking your fingers in your eyes over valid concerns is utterly ridiculous.
The problem is that refusing to acknowledge the issues or indicate that fixes should be on the way only hurts the game. Sticking your fingers in your eyes over valid concerns is utterly ridiculous.
That could be right but the fact is for those like me who like the game, theses minors problems (yeah for me the ui, mouse, lags are minors) are simply not a gamebreaker. Im sure these things will be fix and for the other thing people complaint about like the grind,crafting, quest , exp limitation etc... these are the gameplay style and i like it.
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SE locating all of their servers exclusively in Japan is also further proof of this.
I've said it before, SE are playing it safe and want to secure their place in the Japanese MMO market, where the only serious competition is not WoW, but mostly F2P games coming mainly from China and Korea.
They know they can't fight a two-front war and cater to both the Japanese and western players at the same time, not with an MMO at least.
http://www.mmoinfo.net/ranking/log/votec.cgi?no=8&kako=2010
FFXIV is at the very top, and Ragnarok is second. Note how WoW is completely absent from the list. (use Chrome to translate)
Good point OP. In the same vein as every single feature of an MMO can and will be spun in a negative light by some poster at MMORPG.com.
The problem is that refusing to acknowledge the issues or indicate that fixes should be on the way only hurts the game. Sticking your fingers in your eyes over valid concerns is utterly ridiculous.
That could be right but the fact is for those like me who like the game, theses minors problems (yeah for me the ui, mouse, lags are minors) are simply not a gamebreaker. Im sure these things will be fix and for the other thing people complaint about like the grind,crafting, quest , exp limitation etc... these are the gameplay style and i like it.