Lakshmi.Byrth said: »
Here you guys go:
http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/50106-Server-Populations?p=5902389&viewfull=1#post5902389
The answer is that the switch from a horizontal to vertical model did probably have some impact on FFXI and then FFXIV delivered another big kick to the face.
If you look at the trend from early May (April 29th outdated RMEs), it continues downward until the July version update (7/8) at which point it jumps back up. This is probably because the spike from the version update (lots of people get kicked off, so more than normal have to log back in) gets smeared together with the start of the first login campaign (7/10). If you ignore the bump in activity from July to early September (9/2) because it's probably from the two login campaigns, then the trend from May to July is pretty much continuous with the decrease seen in September.
Obviously FFXIV was the impetus for many people to finally quit, but it is possible that it wouldn't have had nearly as large of an impact if the horizontal to vertical progression switch hadn't happened. I'll point out that April is pretty much flat.
Edit:
These are the number of "sessions" or pure number of pings to google analytics from people opening Launcher. Line is added by me.
8/27 (FFXIV's release date) is when the number of sessions hits the black line again, not 9/2. So at least some of it the decrease is directly due to FFXIV. In my opinion, though, it would not be unreasonable to blame the horizontal to vertical progression switch for a substantial amount of the decline too.
http://www.bluegartr.com/threads/50106-Server-Populations?p=5902389&viewfull=1#post5902389
The answer is that the switch from a horizontal to vertical model did probably have some impact on FFXI and then FFXIV delivered another big kick to the face.
If you look at the trend from early May (April 29th outdated RMEs), it continues downward until the July version update (7/8) at which point it jumps back up. This is probably because the spike from the version update (lots of people get kicked off, so more than normal have to log back in) gets smeared together with the start of the first login campaign (7/10). If you ignore the bump in activity from July to early September (9/2) because it's probably from the two login campaigns, then the trend from May to July is pretty much continuous with the decrease seen in September.
Obviously FFXIV was the impetus for many people to finally quit, but it is possible that it wouldn't have had nearly as large of an impact if the horizontal to vertical progression switch hadn't happened. I'll point out that April is pretty much flat.
Edit:
These are the number of "sessions" or pure number of pings to google analytics from people opening Launcher. Line is added by me.
8/27 (FFXIV's release date) is when the number of sessions hits the black line again, not 9/2. So at least some of it the decrease is directly due to FFXIV. In my opinion, though, it would not be unreasonable to blame the horizontal to vertical progression switch for a substantial amount of the decline too.
I'm still not convinced that vertical model is better, either. I never have issue with doing sky in 2012, since I don't do sky everyday for 7 years, I alternate between different event. The total amount of time I spent in sky is probably about 1 month.
Do delve for 7 months and nothing else to do except delve, is no better than do sky for 7 years, but in reality you only spend 1~2 month doing it if you add every sky run together.
Vertical model give a sense of choice and freedom, you can choose what to do, based on you preference and mood, IMO way better.
