How do you not know that you have to pay for playing the mmo.



she is so going to lose.

The only paid for MMO that I've bought that does not have monthly fees is Guild Wars. The rest that I know of have monthly fees, how is it not obvious that this has monthly fees then?



What are the penalties the article is mentioning? If it is only an inactivated account then that they should sue activision blizzard aswell.

Now this may scare some people away from Final Fantasy 14.

v. Charges while the online game account is suspended;



other than that shes dumb for not knowing you get charged monthly.

I played ffxi for quite a while, but when i was done, theres no "cancel account" button, i had to call customer service and tell them to stop billing me THREE times. a year later i wanted to play again but that was thwarted since the only way to recover my character was through long and impossible to remember codes and ids. its ridiculous, way worse than any other mmo.

I hope the ***** wins. ("bad" word used to describe an "evil vagina" behind the asterisks, rhymes with punt.)



Sheer entertainment value of the reaction from everybody when the ***** does win. (derogatory word usually means "female dog".)



And to see the look on the lawyers faces when they thought they had an open and shut case.



Hell I'm laughing now just imagining it.

All companies should know you can't do anything with even the slightest risk of upsetting people in America without big warning labels all over them, give it a few more years and all games will probably have a first level where you have to guide your character through the disclaimers before you can start the game.

I today's economy, it's a smart move, but that's seriously extreme, especially if her bill only came to like $200 max. If anything, that $5 mill should be split up between all users of the MMO, then everyone will be over their misfortune and everyone gets a fair share instead of just this one single ***** claiming it all as if she was the only one to be screwed over.



(Though, I stay away from MMOs because not only do I prefer console games over online games, but I'm not going to pay a ton of fees for playing these games when I can very easily play my 360 games or even PSP games for a fraction of that price with either right-to-the-point 1-time charge for a period-of-time live play, or freeplay, like PSP.)

People are still playing FFXI?

yea, cause Square-Enix is an evil corporation who only want to screw over it's customers. There couldn't possibly be a reason for them to shut down a game, there just bastards.

what thell is going on with the video game indestry, they getting greedy al of sudden?



man thay desearve to get there ass sued off

Alright, here's a story.



Around August/September of '07, I tried a free trial of FFXI. barely played the damn thing. I uninstalled it and forgot about it.



Fast forward to last year around September and I am shopping for a birthday gift. I go to the register and they tell me my debit card was denied. What?? I always have money in the bank. I go to the ATM nearby and get a statement. I have negative money. Okay.

I call the bank to see what the charges were on my account. One is a 40 something dollar charge from Square Enix. Huh?

I call up the bank's customer service to go deeper into the matter. They say I have this charge from a month ago. If I recall, that day was a Holiday and playonline's customer service line was not open. I call the next day to find out what's going on. They tell me I am billed for 11 accounts activated around the same time from August. I tell them that is impossible. Long story short, they basically tell me there is nothing I can do. I'm not letting this happen so I call the bank back up and dispute the charge.



Within the next few weeks I am constantly talking to the bank and Playonline customer service. It culminates in me getting ahold of Playonline customer service and they tell me my account was banned for third party device use. Everything has been extremely fishy at this point. How convenient that my account is banned when I start calling about this crap. The customer service gives me the run around and I demand to speak with their supervisor/manager multiple times. They refuse to put him on, but finally relent.



It gets even stranger after that. They constantly give me the run around, and I continue to counter every point they make about what could have happened. They backpeddle continuously about what they say. I have my suspicions but say nothing. I threaten legal action and they get a little bit hot under the collar. I finish my business with these cretins and if you don't get it, let me spell it out for you.



I think certain individuals in Square Enix are scamming customers. Why do I think this? The dispute over the charge was won. I got my money back. I haven't heard from them since.



I have since changed my credit/debit cards and they will no longer see a dime from me.



Square Enix's playonline is a bunch of thieving, petty snake-oil sellers. Listen to this plea. I beg you not to do business with these idiots.

For FFXIV we wont be using it if we get it on the PS3 right? Though I'll probably just want to play the demo. No paying thank you.

@freya: i doubt they will even do a "demo" you'll have a trial of the game, which will require your credit/debit card and if you do not cancel they will charge it.



personally i played FFXI for like 6 years, from day 1 of NA release on pc and ps2 also. i have had multiple copies of the game, quit numerous times and went back. one thing the "late fees" they charge you double month to reactivate your account if a charge is denied (technically making you late)



also when you first start up your game, you get a free trial period, after that period expires you are already into your next billing period, but they do not bill you, until the start of the next billing period which ends up hitting you for basically 1 1/2 - 2 months. so 12.95 is true, but thats not what they hit you with when you first start up or if your account is suspended due to declined funds.



loved the game, just too much of a time sink. got all my money back for the years of playing though, sold my character way back when. say hi to Psylink on lakshmi for me

The first part is a good idea.

The second part makes no sense.



People like you say crap like this then you're the first ones freaking out when your monthly access costs more because of taxes and fees that were added in without informing you.

PlayOnline wont be part of FF14 they are kicking them out

This sounds like a woman who doesn't know much about gaming and I'm sure she wasn't damaged to deserve a $5 million dollar lawsuit. The thing is, they probably jack it up high so S-E will settle out of court for something more reasonable, I'd say anything below that. That's how these things go. If S-E takes her to court, they'll win, she better hope for a settlement.

I don't think you understand what he's saying, it's called a joke.

Poorly worded reference to the grandma that poured scalding hot coffee in her lap and successfully sued mcd's for a million dollar.

It's a class action. It's not 5 millions for one person, but, according to the article, for 100 000.

so that's, what, equivalent to 50$ per person. This is completely justified. People who think this is over the top should read the article again...unless I'm mistaken on what "class action" means...

I came to the same conclusion as you. Now to add to that, I'm pretty sure her lawyer had read the terms and conditions before even filing. Lawyers pretty much cover all the fine prints before making any argument and officially filing the sue. Also is $50 that she is asking for :) so it's justified.



After FF changed its way by going to MMO I stopped playing it completely - Yeah Darkotic948 I know what you are saying.

for once i liked Square Enix but now i wish their ***es get sued all over!

Never played 11 and won't 14, its a game and paying monthly is not for me.

square enix will win.

For one, D2 is a free online service, so blizzard has the right to do something like that.



That's not the deal breaker though. When you buy FFXI, you're not paying for software, you're paying for a playonline account. Each box has a code to create a playonline account.



When you for example deactivate all paid services (FFXI, tetra master), you have to login every 3 months to playonline. If you don't, SE will deactivate your playonline account and you'll need to pay 30 bucks for a new copy of FFXI, just to get a new code to create a new account.