Launch queues. They happen. A lot. Normally they happen when a new MMO or expansion drops and everyone rushes to start playing the new content, though as we've seen they can also happen when a game just gets really popular. It's something that many older MMORPG consumers have grown to just accept as "par for the course." But should we, and (putting on my best therapist's hat) how do they make you feel?
FOMO is rampant in today's society, so many people I talk to get upset that queues happen because it means time they aren't spending in the game world they want to inhabit. Many people take vacation days off to jump right into their game, while others plan their time around the possibility of queues.
This has been on full display multiple times this year with both Final Fantasy XIV and most prolifically I would say New World. Final Fantasy is dealing with them once again thanks to players wanting to drop into Endwalker during the early release period which started last Friday. However, server queues have been a thing the FF14 community has contended with all year, especially as the summer months hit and so many players jumped into Square Enix's MMORPG for the first time. (Thanks free trial!)
New World's launch queues, as I wrote earlier this year, felt worse than normal, with tens of thousands of players waiting to get into servers with their friends, favorite streamers and much more. This felt exacerbated for me personally given the company who made the MMO has a parent company that specalizes in running server infrastructure for basically the whole of the Internet. It felt more avoidable thanks to the angle that Amazon was in charge.
We were obviously mistaken.
Personally, I look at queues two ways. From a technical standpoint, it isn't as easy as spinning up more servers and scaling that way. I get the developers are in a tight spot and no amount of forecasting demand and numbers will fully prepare for a launch.
As a player, it's frustrating when you block out time to play - especially as a single dad who has limited playtime as well - and instead of playing I'm staring at a queue screen with seemingly no end in sight. On the flip side of this coin, though, it's a good sign there is a lot of demand and, hopefully, a signal of a large, active community.
But how do you feel about Launch (or really any) queue? Is it just another thing to navigate as an MMO player, or is it something that bothers you? Let us know in the comments.
