FFXIV major server expansion and resumption of digital sales announced

Written by. Ryuki Ishii partially based on the original Japanese article (original article’s publication date: 2022-01-14 15:33 JST)

Square Enix has announced a major server expansion plan for Final Fantasy XIV, along with the release schedule for the Data Center Travel System.

In addition, they will resume the digital sales of the game on January 25 at 5 p.m. (JST). More specifically, the digital sales of the Starter Edition, Complete Edition, and Complete Collector’s Edition.

FFXIV has experienced a high level of server congestion ever since the launch of Endwalker, prompting Square Enix to suspend sales of the game itself in December (related article). Now, with the expansion of its data centers and the capacity to accommodate additional players, they are resuming digital sales.

“However, in the event servers continue to experience extreme levels of congestion, we may consider suspending digital sales again. We are aware that certain Worlds are experiencing high server traffic at peak times, and while some may consider this decision to resume sales to be premature, we ask for your understanding in this matter. We would also like to resume registration for the free trial after monitoring server stability a while longer.”

Oceanic Data Center & Home World Transfer Service

According to the announcement, the long-planned Oceanic Data Center will open on the same day, and the Home World Transfer Service will recommence the following day on January 26 (JST).

In regard to the Oceanic Data Center, “the original plan was to initially add three Worlds and later introduce two more. In light of the recent influx of players, however, we’ve decided to add five new Worlds from the start. With this, there should be more than enough room for everyone in Oceania to transfer over.”

Until now, players in Oceania have been scattered among data centers in multiple regions, causing inconveniences such as network delays.

Data Center Travel System

The Data Center Travel System, a system that allows players to visit Worlds in other logical data centers within the same physical data center, is now being planned for a 6.1x patch. “While the system has been designed to allow cross-region travel, we’ll be limiting it to travel between logical data centers within a physical data center at first due in part to differences in game economy and values.”

Data Center expansion

Details about the expansion of data centers in Japan, North America, and Europe are also listed in the announcement.

Japan:
The installation of new logical data centers and large-scale changes to World configuration in Japan are currently scheduled to be implemented around July 2022.

North America:
“We are planning a two-phase major server expansion. Due to the global shortage of semiconductors, it has taken considerable time to procure server equipment, but the schedule calls for the first phase to be implemented around August 2022, with the second phase to follow in the spring or summer of 2023.

In the first phase of the expansion, scheduled for August 2022, one new logical data center will be established and four new Worlds will be added under it. In the second phase of the expansion, we plan to add four more new Worlds under the newly established logical DC, resulting in a four-logical-DC configuration of 8:8:8:8.”

Naoki Yoshida, producer and director of FFXIV, mentioned that they are also considering a “yet-larger-scale upgrade at the time of the next major expansion (Patch 7.0).”

Europe:
“We are planning a major server expansion in two phases, similar to that planned for the North American data center. Due to the ongoing global semiconductor shortage, it will take time for requisite server equipment to be delivered. As such, the first phase of this expansion is scheduled for July 2022, while the second is scheduled for the summer of 2023.

In the first phase of the expansion, scheduled for July 2022, a total of four new Worlds will be added, two under each of the logical data centers presently housed in the European Data Center. In the second phase, one new logical data center will be established and eight new Worlds will be added under it, resulting in a three-logical-DC configuration of 8:8:8.”

Yoshida ended the announcement by mentioning that further information about “new content for the 6.x series, as well as plans for our next expansion (Patch 7.0)” will be revealed at the end of February.

You can check out the full announcement here.