Final Fantasy 14: Dawntrail Puts Up Biggest Player Numbers Since A Realm Reborn

Love to see it. I didn't buy Dawntrail, because I'm still back in Shadowbringers, but I did resub, so I'm back in the fold. Just such a wonderful game and so consistently engaging and rewarding.

I'm pretty happy I don't have to buy Dawntrail right now since I'm in Stormblood. I will say Stormblood hasn't exactly hit me very hard like Heavensward has rn. God I wish I could play through Heavensward for the first time again.

Having finished only the base game I would really like to pick up 14 again, but it just feels too overwhelming. I have a backlog on both my PS5 and Series X and this game must take at least a year to finish with all the extensions?

I have played FFXIV on and off since ARR beta. Prior to that I played a ton of MMOs going back to EverQuest in 2001. FFXIV has definitely been my favorite. I think a lot of people are coming back to see graphics improvements, which on PS5 are very improved when you look at the textures, though subtle enough that they don’t stand out too much. With that said, I don’t really care for the story of Dawntrail. This is particularly bad for me because the MSQ is my biggest draw to the game. For people who don’t care about the story, or skip the dialogue (like I did in WoW) this probably won’t be an issue. I would give Dawntrail’s story a 5.5/10. Your mileage may vary.

That's impressive! "72k concurrents on Steam alone, as well as being available on both PlayStation and Xbox consoles."

That doesn't actually account for the majority of players using the native Windows/Mac versions. It's a game that's more awkward to buy on Steam than native launcher unless you need it on Steam Deck because you have to link Steam to it like a console. Only Square would have those numbers. (The negative is you can't ever switch between Steam and non-steam for "reasons" that make no sense.)

@Michael2008ish Something not too different happened to me in that my original account created on PS seems to not use the username I had recorded for it. I think "something" happened with PS logins or something that broke the usernames or changed it from what you think it was.

I ended up creating a new account to start with the Xbox release, and moved that to PC+XB. The old PS account is just disposed of, not a chance I'm giving identifying documents to a Square Enix customer service rep. If I ever want to play on PS again I'll have to create a whole second PSN account just for this game, as my main PSN account is forever locked to that stupid abandoned account.

@8bit4Life I think the difference about this expansion is we are not the main characters but sidekicks which is an interesting spin. Was it predictable, very but I don't think it was as bad as a 5/10.

If you go to xbox game store FF14 isn't among the top games played right now it's not even in the top free games either. So Steam and PS are the most current players with the combination with xbox.

@Odin1985x Not sure about other regions, and this page doesn't rank games in order, but the XIV Free Trial is definitely on the "Top Free Games" page on the US store:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/top-free/games/xbox

Considering the game launched in March I assume the majority of XB players are below Lv70 had haven't needed to start paying yet (and definitely not at Lv90/end of End Walker and haven't needed to buy Dawn Trail for months and months still.) It's good to see it's on the top listings, actually, I didn't expect to see it TBH.

Still, I'd bet that the the actual top concurrent players source is neither PS nor Steam, but the native Windows client (not through Steam.) Steam makes for a weird, clunky console-like middle-man on PC where the direct (sold by Square directly through Mog Station/Square Enix Store, plus Amazon, etc) client lets you use different logins, the Steam version "links" to your account like consoles do. Most PC players are probably using the non-Steam version for that reason (myself included.)