When Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers came out, the game’s fifth expansion over around a decade of the game running, the game exploded. Final Fantasy XIV was more popular than ever, it seemed.
But as it turns out there was more room to grow. This year’s expansion is called Endwalker, and it’s the end of the story being told this whole time. It also happens to be the end of Square Enix’s previous server situation.
Also, digital codes briefly sold out. Holy crap!
Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker Preorders are Way Too Strong
The latest Letter From the Producer stream leading up to the next update included quite a revelation. Compared to Shadowbringers, preorders for Endwalker are up over 150%. To quote a report from PlayStation Lifestyle, producer Yoshi-P stated Square Enix has to make a “multi-million dollar investment” in server equipment to compensate.
That’s a lot of server juice. But that isn’t the wildest part of this story by a longshot. Predictably, the physical limited edition boxes for Endwalker have long sold out. And a regular physical release isn’t happening this time (dang it, COVID).
That said, you can still preorder the digital expansion itself, or the “Complete Edition” which comes with everything to date. But for a moment, demand was so high Square Enix ran out of codes for its own game.
I know that sounds ridiculous. Codes are just digital right? Surely they’re endless. True, but not technically true.
Codes have to be generated, licenses have to be paid for, so on and so forth. So when codes are made, the publisher has to get them in batches. As noted on a ResetEra thread, the only option this morning on the Square Enix online store was to join a waitlist. For digital copies of a videogame.
This is a temporary problem of course; as of this writing you can buy the game no problem. But let the record show that Final Fantasy XIV is so hype right now that something that makes zero sense on paper happened. In the same thread, folks are also noting login queues several dozen players long, something that’s unprecedented when the expansion is still several months out.
Certainly, Final Fantasy XIV’s substantial free trial is a big factor here. Following tremendous response both from fans and critics for Shadowbringers, Square Enix made the game and its first expansion totally free to play (with some caveats). So right now is a great time to play catch up.
Compounding the matter even further is Square Enix is also running a free login campaign. When these crop up, players who haven’t been around for a minimum amount of time can hop back in for two weeks free of charge.
Related: The Daunting but Rewarding Task of Returning to Final Fantasy XIV
So yeah, when Endwalker drops in November, don’t expect to be able to jump right in on day one. It’s gonna be messy. What do you think about all this? Excited for Endwalker? Let us know at Prima Games’ Facebook and Twitter feeds!
