Square Enix turned on the servers for Final Fantasy XI and XIV after the Tohoku earthquake with one small change, it offered free play through the month of April. Though Square Enix has actually been offering Final Fantasy XIV ‘play for free’ since it launched. The free trial period kept being extended and has never stopped going on and on. It was extended indefinitely when Square Enix restructured the team and announced plans to overhaul the game.

Naoki Yoshida the games producer, told Gamasutra that the end of the free trial is “still out in the open,” and that the team will only begin accepting payments once a solid plan for improving the game is in place. “Without that, me, personally, as a player wouldn’t feel good about asking the player to pay money,” he said. The prolonged free trial is “one of the ways that we can show players that we are serious and we are taking it seriously.”

So in true capitalist fashion the less people would like to play it, the cheaper it is. Go figure.

SOURCE | GAMASUTRA

02 Apr 2024 by Sarah Fox Contact Author by email , on twitter filed in Gaming Headlines