Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

[favian]

Is there any plans to distribute FFXI trial to potential users through the internet or retail outlets such as GameStop?


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I'd like to join an MMORPG, however i am split between joining WoW and FFXi. I have no particular bias towards either franchise. However, i did engage in the WoW trial the last time they allowed it to happen. (Blizzard distributed the trial through fileplanet.com and through video game shops in the form of $2.00 demo discs)

It seems like a lost opportunity to not distribute FFXi online or in retail stores in a 14 day trial format similar to wow's strategy. It could introduce potential new subscribers to FFxi who have been on the fence about it like myself.

The closest thing to a demonstration is the Benchmark program they release for FFXI, but that doesn't really showcase the experience at all.

I want to try FFxi, but without having to make a $30 investment, because of the chance that i may not be interested in subscribing after the included 30 day trial is complete.

It seems like a nobrainer on square's part. The amount of subscribers coud easily increase by giving a generous trial to gamers.

[Jarre]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

wth a MMORPG I doubt 14 days is enough to actually see if you like the game. as with all MMORPG's the game is vast and there is a lot to take in at the begining which can be frustrating, if like alot of people you will experiment with many characters, different races job combinations etc. until you find the one you like. I.e. I started as a hume, went to elvan, then taru, then Galka. Galka being my 4th character I stuck with it and now a year and a half on, hes still going strong.

If you want the easier game go to WOW if you want a challenge, a brilliant helpfull community and a company that tries hard to combat Real money traders and keep the game upto date with new bits etc, then join us here on FF.

[favian]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

wth a MMORPG I doubt 14 days is enough to actually see if you like the game. as with all MMORPG's the game is vast and there is a lot to take in at the begining which can be frustrating, if like alot of people you will experiment with many characters, different races job combinations etc. until you find the one you like. I.e. I started as a hume, went to elvan, then taru, then Galka. Galka being my 4th character I stuck with it and now a year and a half on, hes still going strong.
If you want the easier game go to WOW if you want a challenge, a brilliant helpfull community and a company that tries hard to combat Real money traders and keep the game upto date with new bits etc, then join us here on FF.

14 days is an adequate amount of time to pique someone's interests. The minimum purpose of any trial is to at least demonstrate what is in store for the user if they take the plunge.

Wow's trial programs have been very successful even at 14 days.
The idea of spending $30 on a trial for a game i may not like isn't appealing to me.


I understand there will be a lot of bias in this forum and recommendations for ffxi, but i'd like to try it myself. We all have different sensabilities. it may or may not appeal to me. it is odd that square hasn't taken some of the more successful cues from blizzard's playbook.

[KalemLyco]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Jarre has got it down to a 'T'

Here on FFXI the world is vast and ever-changing. The people here are friendly and with the auto-translate feature we are often playing with people from Japan and other such countries that don't use English as a first language. We are constantly learning from one another and helping.

We are also constantly fighting Real Money Traders (RMT) and eliminating them from the game.

Come join the wonderful world of Vana'diel

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

14 days is an adequate amount of time to pique someone's interests. The minimum purpose of any trial is to at least demonstrate what is in store for the user if they take the plunge

Wow's trial programs have been very successful even at 14 days.
The idea of spending $30 on a trial for a game i may not like isn't appealing to me.

I understand there will be a lot of bias in this forum and recommendations for ffxi, but i'd like to try it myself. We all have different sensabilities. it may or may not appeal to me. it is odd that square hasn't taken some of the more successful cues from blizzard's playbook.

Hate to break it to you, but WoW tips the scales in a player's favor so you could progress your character a decent ways in those 14 days. FFXI is a completely different beast and more in-line with MMORPGs that preceded WoW than the ones that came after, though it does have a lot of its own unique differences as well.

A lot of the FFXI servers have been up for over five years now, in this time a lot of people are now high level and it is now harder to start out at lower level. FFXI is not solo-friendly from the beginning, after you get between levels 10-15, you'll find partying is very much a necessity to progress. Since so many players are high level now and don't wish to return to the low levels, starting out or even going back to level a new job or character is quite a challenge.

Keep in mind Blizzard caters exclusively to a PC userbase, so getting a downloadable trial is easy. Not so with SE and FFXI, they support three different platforms - all of which are capable of playing FFXI on the same servers. Were SE to make a 14-day trail, then it would be needed on PS2/PS3, Xbox360 and PC. As it is, you're getting a free month and access to all expansions with the Vana'diel Collection currently at $30, that's quite a deal considering most players payed $50 to start, and $30 to play the subsequent expansions early.

And more important than any free trial is to research an MMORPG fully before you even think about about purchasing and subscribing to it. Know the full scope of what you're getting into, don't leave it to a trial period where you likey will not see everything. Everyone has a different pace, I've known those to make signifigant progress in FFXI in 14 days and some never get past level 20 in that time.

I have a lot of friends that play WoW that would call it a wolf in sheep's clothing. The solo side gives way to an endgame where you're dependant on guilds to do everything - but WoW is not hyped up as that experience, its hyped as a soloable one. Ultimately every MMORPG boils down to teamwork and coordinating events with lots of other players. But Blizzard - or more accuractely their parent company, Vivendi Universal - marketed WoW as the opposite.

Demos are nice, but they're never representitive of the full experience. Know what you're getting into, trials don't always tell the full story.

[Murphie]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Still, a free trial is a nice way to see if the game you are thinking of buying is worth trying out. The closest thing we have is the Buddy Pass, which isn't really the same thing at all, but it's at least something. Of course, for that to work, you need to know someone else who has a copy of the game, since there aren't any (legal) online outlets for you to purchase the game.

Many MMOs have free trials. And often those free trials are what sells a person on the game. I picked up a copy of EQ2's new expansion (comes with all previous expansions and the original game), because the trial was so great. Heck, I'd probably still be playing it, if I could have convinced any of my gaming friends to join me (they didn't want to try the trial, or are too into their current game of choice). WoW's two week demo is a great way for people to find out first hand if they even like the basic mechanics of the game. You can't find that out via screen shots and conversations on a forum.

I've tried 1-2 week trials for most of the MMOs I've played. I don't like to buy something like this without having something of an idea of what I'm in for. So, SE probably could grab some new folks with a downloadable trial. Would that suck for PS2/3/360 users? Yeah. Would I care about that? Not so much.

But will they do it? Highly unlikely. That's just not how SE works.

[favian]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Thanks murphie, thats exactly how i and many others feel. I'd like a buddypass if anyone can graciously provide one. I will see what i can do about getting the game installed.

As of now, i'm still unconvinced. While i do not find it surprising that some of you are advocating final fantasy xi on a FFXI forum, As it stands now i have meddled in the world of WoW for free, and i have not meddled in Vana'diel at all. That to me, means a lot in deciding which mmorpg to join.

I suggested a 14 trial on square's part, but a free 30 day trial of the core ffxi game isn't unreasonable at all, considering the fact that the game has been up five years now.

Omgwtfbbqkitten, you stated that it is difficult to start out at a lower level at this point of the game's lifespan because everyone has moved up. That isn't very encouraging either. I have also taken that into consideration now.

I fail to see how $30 is a bargain for an mmo considering i may not have any use for the expansion pack after the trial is over and i decide not to subscribe.

At the end of the day, there is only so much praise you can give a game before you have to let the enduser try it out for themself. For every WoW counterargument, there will be a a counterargument against FFXi. That alone is a reason to let the user decide for themself which mmo they like. Who knows, a trial could expose a player to the world and they'll end up loving it, where as before they had no real exposure it at all. Square shouldn't drop the ball in this respect.

A trial can be easily distributed online (the core game) for windows. Yes there are other ffxi platforms, but mmo players are predominantly windows users anyway, especially in america. I see it as a lost opportunity to give ffxi more leverage in north america if they don't do it.

I made this thread in the Ask Square forum because this is something i want them to know is on the minds of myself (and others) and it is a deciding factor over which mmo i join.

[Celeal]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

$30 USD for the FFXI collection set, and it offers 1st 30 days for free. It is like one dollar per day. If you like it and decide to continue after the 1st 30 days is over, you just need to pay the subscription. There is no need to buy the expansion set. I guess it is just a different way to do business ^^?

[Murphie]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

I'd send my Buddy pass your way if I hadn't already given it to some stranger who used it without even thanking me.

But we do have a Buddy Pass request thread here. If you post there, you may be lucky enough to get one. Maybe not, but it's worth a shot.

Which I had another suggestion for you though.

Celeal - Except that all MMOs give you a 30 day free trial, so most people aren't looking at it like that. It's part of the standard package. That said, for $30 - $13, you're only paying $17 to see if you like the game. But I still think you shouldn't have to pay that $17.

[favian]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Thanks for your help. I searched up buddy pass after you told me about it, and this is what i found:

http://ffxi.boonty.com/

is this where i'd enter the pass when/if i aqcuire one?

[Murphie]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

I've never seen that site before, Favian. I meant here at FFXIOnline, we have a Buddy Pass thread.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

You seem to be looking for arguments against WoW where there aren't any. I'm just stating the reality of both games. Your desire for a trial version does not alter the fact that when the trial is done, you still will not have a better picture of either game, just part of a picture. Sometimes part of the picture just isn't enough.

My advice is to check out the job forums for both games, read up on how the jobs are described as well as how people like to play these jobs. WoW affords you the opportunity of making several characters to get a feel for each race and class, but many of the classes are available from the beginning. FFXI doesn't restrict classes by race and you can change jobs on the same character, but you do not have all access to every class from the start, only six.

That's the kicker - a job you may want to try will not be available to you in trial even if SE did provide one. It sometimes a long road to be what you want in FFXI.

Researching your purchases is pretty essential to gaming these days, demos and hype will only carry a game so far. It may seem like work to look so deeply at games like this, but your wallet will thank you at the very least.

[Murphie]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Yes, but part of the picture is still better than no part of the picture at all. And a free trial is research, of the tangible kind.

Will two weeks in this game give you a full picture of it's mechanics? No. Will it give you a better picture than you would get from reading about it on forums and various websites, and viewing screenshots? Yes.

[Ziero]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

I agree with both points, a free trial will help give a better indication as to how the game works and plays, even if it doesn't even show you a tenth of what the game has to offer. But on the other hand a free trial will provide a very limited view of the entire game as a whole. My best example would be m purchase of PSU recently at the insistence of a friend who just loved the game. I paid for it in full, purchased my online account and enjoyed it for the entire time my account was 'free'. But just two months into playing I started noticing some glaring downfalls of the game and began to pay more attention to some of the 'little things' I overlooked in the beginning. Seriously, if I ever think of having a complaint about SE's support, I just look at Sega's services and know it could be a LOT worse.

Having said that, a *real* free sample is never a bad thing to have. Even if it is just two weeks.

[Gentoo]

Re: Any chance of distributing a trial for FFXI anytime soon?

Hmmm. This is an interesting topic to play with. A trial client really should be a 12 hour trial, good for two weeks, not a full 14 days of play. That would be enough time to get accustomed to the controls, get a good feeling for the graphical detail, and allow an outgoing player to interact with other players.
It also would be short enough that [hopefully] a player wouldn't be too attached to their character and not feel too bad about having to start fresh again. This would allow trial clients to be quarantined to a specific server (we wouldn't want gil sellers to use free trial accounts to amass gil on the standard servers).

If I pretend that I'm a new player interested in trying out a medieval flavor MMOG, FFXI pretty much comes in last in my list of games to try.
I can go download a free trial for Dungeon & Dragons On-line, World of Warcraft (maybe this changed with the burning expansion?), Everquest 2, Guild Wars, and Lineage II... ( These are just the games I came with off the top of my head, I know there are more).
Or I can pay $20-30 to try FFXI for 30 days "free." Many of those other games, as Murphie pointed out, already give me the first month free so this doesn't give FFXI any competitive advantage.

So with the lower bar of entry, I'd probably favor any of those other games to FFXI. I'm thinking that a trial client might be a great way to start getting new blood into FFXI.