Just thought that those who are not ready to switch to FFXIV yet would be pleased to hear this.

http://www.strategyinformer.com/news/8758/square-as-long-as-there-are-players-we-will-continue-to-support-ff11

Despite launching another MMO version of the franchise later this year, Square have said they will continue to support their previous MMO, Final Fantasy XI.

Speaking in an interview, Senior Vice-President of Software development Hiromichi Tanaka, said that, whilst he believes Final Fantasy XI has "reached its time", they will continue to support the game if there are still players.

"Since FFXI has been out of eight years, we think it's reached its time now, so obviously we would want FFXI players to shift to FFXIV," he said.

"However, we do understand if FFXI players have special memories of FFXI, so there must be some people who will continue to play FFXI. So, we would like to keep of them happy, and we will try to introduce some bonus for our customers, probably from a monetary point of view."

"We will continue working on FFXI. Even after we launch FFXIV, we will still continue the development side. So, as long as the players enjoy the game, we will continue the service."

Final Fantasy XIV will be released on PC in September this year, with a PS3 version slated for March 2011.

That's cool. I just picked the game up when it was on sale on steam. $5 for the game, all expansions and add-on content. I've been trying to find a good free server, but hopefully they just make it free to play some day.