Final Fantasy XIV: Free-to-Play and beta announcement on PS3

[Squilliam]

Zuhyc said:

Squilliam said:
So, if this is free to play is there any reason to expect that this game will not release day and date with the Xbox 360 version in the west? If they are going to the trouble of porting FFXIII to the Xbox 360, then why would they waste some of that good effort by not releasing the Xbox 360 version under the same circumstances?

MMO games are difficult to make, so I can see them again staggering the releases between the different regions. They will probably release in Japan and perfect the game for 6 months or so and then release the game in the west, so use the hardcore market in Japan as like a limited beta before they release the game in the west to people who need to be impressed day one by the game.

Sony prolly bought timed exclusivity. A few years ago SE said they were woriking on a PS360/ PC MMO. They won't scrap the 360 version to please sony and its fans.

Buying the timed exclusivity in Japan would be cheap. Buying exclusivity of a game against a system which would sell millions of copies is counter-productive and expensive. You never see it happen unless the company has some prior claim to the franchise with say MGS or if the franchise is new, say Bioshock or Gears of War. Outside of Japan, Sony no longer has that prior claim because they lost it the day FFXIII went multi-plat and Microsoft gained it because they put so many resources into building up a userbase of people who buy tons of WRPG games. A userbase which can obsorb two 3M+ eventual LTD WRPGs in Fallout 3 and Fable 2 back to back a week apart.