Quote Originally Posted by Andromeda View Post
It peaked at around 1.5 million users I think, which was pre-WoW. But after WoW it ran pretty evenly at like 500,000 users even today. When I gone the population really has not deceased. In fact, I'd imagine that they will be getting some more old players back with the level cap going up to 99 by the end of the year.

Square does continue to say that FFXI is the most successful FF game that they have ever had. This is due to having 500,000 subscriptions paying about $13 a month every month for the past 8 to 9 years. It is certainly not the money that Blizzard is making, but that is still better than any FF game that they have ever produced, even FFVII. So I'd say even if it was not successful in some regions, in the end it is the most successful series of the franchise and will stay that way until FFXIV is out for at least a decade unless FFXIV manages to grab a really large user base for a long period of time.
This doesn't sound familiar! That sounds like an awful lot of users. And do you really think it's the best or is that a general opinion of the company? I've never heard anyone say their favourite is XI!
I don't know if I believe it was successful though - do you base success on how much money a game pulls in? What with the addictive quality most MMOs seem to have, does it really mean anything? I think they should be counting copies sold, not money paid in.