Final Fantasy XIV Endwalker queues: Devs apologize with free play time

Final Fantasy XIV's new Endwalker expansion is out now in early access, but gamers are having lots of trouble actually playing. Square Enix has offered up free game time as an apology.

Right now Final Fantasy XIV's game servers simply can't keep up with demand. Everyone wants to play the new Endwalker expansion and the online networks are just filling up too fast, leading to long login waiting queues and maxed-out worlds. The developers are now giving out 7 days of free game time as an apology to all subscribed users, and more time could be offered if the issues continue, the team says.

"Considering that we are asking players to wait in queues for extremely long periods of time and the ongoing situation making it difficult to play normally, we have decided that during the official release of Endwalker on December 7, we will be granting 7 days of free game time to all players who own the full version of the game and have an active subscription."

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Square Enix also explains what's leading to the Error 2002 code:

There are two primary causes.

The first occurs when attempting to log into a logical data center (such as Aether or Primal) and there are more than 17,000 players in the login queue. This leads to an Error 2002 occurring, resulting in being unable to enter the login queue.

The other occurs when your internet connection experiences packet loss or a period of network instability, causing the server connection to be momentarily disconnected. At the moment, we are seeing more cases caused by this.

If you're using Wi-Fi, the devs want you to switch to ethernet LAN connection to help stabilize your internet connection. They've also identified the peak login times for various regional data centers so you can plan your game time accordingly:

• North American Data Center: 12:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. (PST) / 20:00 to 6:00 (GMT)
• European Data Center: 3:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. (PST) / 11:00 to 23:00 (GMT)
• Japan Data Center: 1:00 a.m. to 7:00 a.m. (PST) / 9:00 to 15:00 (GMT)