My girlfriend and I recently played the 14-day free trial of this game. Now we kinda miss it so we wanted to start playing it in the summer. Now there are a few factors that might still influence our decision. That is why I will ask the following questions! Important note to all those who wish to help us: we live in Europe.
1. Question about the 30-day free trial. I get that with every purchased game everybody gets 30 days of playing for free. Now that we have our 14-day trail accounts, will we still get the 30 days for free?
2. What I get from this site, the only obligatory fee per month is the €12,95. Is this assumption correct? I mean, can we play without tetrqa master and the whole playonline plus stuff (meaning that those things are just an added bonus), or are all the fees obligatory?
3. You might think I'm bitching about the prices, but it's just that Poland is a poor country, the wages are low and the two of us are university students with overloaded schedules who have to rely on their parents' money (for now, at least). That is why I want to ask you this: what happens if we only want to pay for some months? For example, we are thinking of playing this august and september. If we get the free period, then we'll just have to pay one. But the the academic year starts and we won't have enough time to play, so we might want to play more, say, in december, but later we won't be able to play again. How does this work, then? Would we be able to pull it off? If yes, how?
4. This one's about the payment method. We do not own credit cards, so all that is left are our debit cards. Does this work like with a bank transfer or do you just type your card info and they take the money at the start of each month?
I guess that's about all the questions I have. If something else pops up, I'll post it here. I'd really appreciate your help, guys. We really liked the game when we played the trial version and hoped it might one day become free, but we came to the conclusion that that day might never come, so I just wanted to know if it's affordable.
A few questions!
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03-08-2010, 05:38 PMFynnA few questions!
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03-08-2010, 09:13 PMOuch!
1. I believe you will get one free month the first time you register it with your credit card. I do not know how the 14-day trail period works, though, and I'm typically wary of it since it's used primarily by RMT as a means to advertise in-game.
2. The only fee you have to pay is the standard $12.95 per month. Not sure what the cost is in Euros. Additional fees (such as the charge for tetra master and additional characters) are optional.
3. You will have to cancel your Content ID at the end of September so that you are not charged in October. You are billed automatically on a monthly basis. You cannot establish ahead of time that you will only be paying for a certain period. If you fail to cancel your Content ID (a relatively easy process) before October 1, you will be charged the full fee for the entire month.
4. Your debit cards should work just like your credit cards. Just keep in mind that if you don't have the funds available in the account before they withdraw them at the first of the month, you'll have a hell of a time trying to get your character back up and running again.
5. This isn't something you addressed, but I think you should be aware, if you're already not, that this summer Final Fantasy XI will be undergoing some serious overhauling. In June the first of three planned level cap increases will be implemented. The second increase is scheduled to be implemented right when you plan to rejoin. This may make getting low level parties difficult, and since you only plan for playing a short period of time, there's a good chance that this will impede your ability to progress in the game more so than usual. I'm by no means trying to convince you not to play, but it is a reality of which you should be aware before rejoining.
Also yeah, I wouldn't count on Square Enix making Final Fantasy XI free any time in the foreseeable future. The most recent announcements regarding the game have cemented that they plan to keep the game going on their servers for a while yet, regardless of FFXIV's impending release. I don't see free, private servers any time soon. -
03-09-2010, 03:01 PMYeargdribbleI think you may, though it's possible the 14-day will negate the 30-day once you're fully activated because SE hates their customers. When in doubt, the glass is not even close to half-empty. It's possible that you could though.Quote:
Originally Posted by The White Wizard of Fynn
It's more likely that you have to register a whole new account to take advantage of the 30-days though.
Keep in mind that if you're playing even a little bit seriously, especially as a starting character, your inventory will be far from enough. Additional mule characters cost $1 each and since the US rate is $12.95 I have the feeling mules will be €1 for you.Quote:
2. What I get from this site, the only obligatory fee per month is the €12,95. Is this assumption correct? I mean, can we play without tetrqa master and the whole playonline plus stuff (meaning that those things are just an added bonus), or are all the fees obligatory?
First thing I wanted to tell you when I read this was. DO NOT PLAY THIS GAME. Seriously, if you're concerned about money and busy schedules just don't. If you lack willpower and become interested enough to play during university time, you'll screw yourself.Quote:
3. You might think I'm bitching about the prices, but it's just that Poland is a poor country, the wages are low and the two of us are university students with overloaded schedules who have to rely on their parents' money (for now, at least). That is why I want to ask you this: what happens if we only want to pay for some months? For example, we are thinking of playing this august and september. If we get the free period, then we'll just have to pay one. But the the academic year starts and we won't have enough time to play, so we might want to play more, say, in december, but later we won't be able to play again. How does this work, then? Would we be able to pull it off? If yes, how?
Second, SE makes it as hard as possible for people to stop and restart their accounts. Having done it a few times, it's honestly not worth it. With WoW and most other MMOs, you pay for 30 days and can cancel or renew at any time simply by logging in and saying you want to renew or cancel.
With FFXI if you activate your account on the 31st of a month. Guess what? You just payed $12.95 to play for the remaining hours of that day and will get another charge of $12.95 the next day. Like was mentioned, if you stop playing on the 1st of a month and cancel, too damn bad. You already paid for the month.
To make matters worse the whole content ID thing makes things complicated. You have to cancel them, but make sure not to completely disable your account. If you cancel your PoL ID your account is gone for good and the codes in the box you bought will never be useful again... congrats on your waste of money.
Another issue is that SE has been known to double charge accounts on "accident" so there's always a chance it could happen to you. Additionally, their customer service is beyond crap and getting that money refunded will be nigh impossible.
This should work, though if your bank has one of those things where they have weird approval pending stuff then your account will be shut off with SE and like has been mentioned, it's a huge pain to get it turned back on. These are the events where you're most likely to get double charged (how it happened to me).Quote:
4. This one's about the payment method. We do not own credit cards, so all that is left are our debit cards. Does this work like with a bank transfer or do you just type your card info and they take the money at the start of each month?
It depends on what you want to get out of it, but honestly I don't feel that it is affordable. There are other games that make it much easier to get in and out of your payments as well as start up your account, but they lack that flavor that I love about FFXI.Quote:
I guess that's about all the questions I have. If something else pops up, I'll post it here. I'd really appreciate your help, guys. We really liked the game when we played the trial version and hoped it might one day become free, but we came to the conclusion that that day might never come, so I just wanted to know if it's affordable.
They've said that when FFXIV comes out it will not have the same retarded billing service. There's a chance their new billing will carry over to FFXI. Then I wouldn't caution you against the game quite so much. If you had a computer that could pull it off you could even try FFXIV at that time.
I'd just suggest that if you're in school and want to be able to cancel and restart several times a year, this is not the game for you.