Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn‘s server issues are more than a little well-known now that the game has reached launch day. Thanks to user numbers far higher than what Square Enix had expected, players have experienced errors logging into the game and character creation has halted on multiple worlds more than once.
Tonight’s maintenance aims to increase the North American and European data center capacities, but digital sales of Final Fantasy XIV through the Square Enix web shop have been closed until the server issues have been ironed out.
It seems Square Enix’s approach to the higher than average player influx is to expand each server’s player capacity as opposed to add new servers. On one hand, you could argue this is good because it will cut down on server merges later in the game’s lifespan — but on the other hand, what would otherwise be a phenomenal launch is going poorly. It’s a bit of a mixed bag.
What is reassuring here is the number of players trying to play the game. Just traveling from one place or another, one can see that player numbers are far higher than last week’s phase 4 beta. People want to play Final Fantasy XIV, and the rumors are that there are over 2 million players trying to (or successfully) playing the game. It’s amazing.
Launch day speech from Naoki Yoshida
These past 24 hours have been difficult for some players and an emotional roller coaster for producer Naoki Yoshida.
Yoshida spoke at the launch event in Tokyo yesterday to address the fans directly, delivering a heartfelt and teary-eyed speech on the struggles of bringing FFXIV back as A Realm Reborn. Reddit user FFXIVtranslatorguy translated Yoshida’s words, which can be read below the video itself. (Be sure to head to the thread and say thanks if you have the time!)
With a team that has poured so much into bringing Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn to life, I feel confident moving forward with this game. Server issues be damned.
FFXIVtranslatorguy‘s translation:
I’m tearing up guys.
First of all I want to say that I am sorry for us having to go into maintenance for the NA/EU servers. I want to apologize for taking precious time away from players during early access. From here on out is a long journey. *starts to tear up, crowd gives encouragement*
It’s almost been 3 years since I took over development for FFXIV. At the time I hadn’t been involved with the game that much, and I thought that it wouldn’t be that big of a deal to remake it. I have always loved Final Fantasy and have always loved MMO’s. *starts to tear up again* At the time, I gathered the team together and told them that we were going to remake the game just two days before we announced it to all of you on December 2nd.
I still remember it now, but at the time, we were in a studio like this one, and Souken (current director of game music) was in the background checking my mic levels. I clearly remember him standing there give me a guts pose (one fist in the air, think Rocky) but at the time I had the same kind of worries as the players; how is this really going to turn out?… Isn’t this going to be impossible…. *pauses*
But one by one I got support from all of you. It was said in the questions earlier, but normally an MMO takes 4-5 years to create and carefully plan. Earlier, Wada said his role is a tank. I had the same idea of being a tank when making this game. Up until now I have gone through each facet of the game (implies that he also bore all of the responsibility).
But I am not saying that it is just me who made FFXIV: ARR. This was all due to the players around the world, the core staff here, and the hundreds of staff not here today. I came here today planning on not crying, but today we have finally taken the first step with FFXIV: ARR. And it is only the first step. Honestly I don’t think we have any time to rest. We are working on patches and expansions.
More than anything I want to thank the players, especially those who started from the original FFXIV, and those that have joined our community. Thank you all for all of your support so far. I only hope that we have released a game that will not bring shame to Square Enix. from here on out there is no finishing an MMORPG. FFXIV:ARR is not a game that we made alone, but a game that we made along with all of you. From here on out we home to keep creating this game from here on out, from this place with you for 5-10 years.
I again want to say thank you for all you have done so far and we hope for your support in the future.
Published: Aug 28, 2013 03:56 am