Final Fantasy XIV players on Xbox are reporting that they’re being banned after using Xbox’s native group finder to look for guilds, or more accurately “Free Companies”.

Free Companies are what player guilds are called in FFXIV, and stand in contrast to “Grand Companies” which are basically PvP factions for each of the major city-states in the base game. However recruiting and searching for “Free Companies” can apparently trigger Xbox’s word filter and flag players for solicitation, assuming they’re offering something for “free”.

One Reddit user shared their experience after they were banned and included a copy of the message which reads:

61 day suspension – 61 days remaining

Looking for Group (1 strike)

Eligible for an appeal

Start: 3/24/2024, 4:32 PM

End: 5/23/2024, 8:32 PM

Expiration: 9/20/2024, 4:32 PM

To

Reason for action

This account violated the Community Standards and was subjected to enforcement action.

Impact

While the current suspension remains active, this account cannot communicate with others, join multiplayer games, or upload media to the Xbox network.

Details

“Hello Sprouts! We are currently recruiting for a new Free Company that accepts anyone! Please have Discord because we have PC Players! Pm if interested friends!”

This is the ban I received, when my appeal got denied they said it was due to solicitation, the Details section is my post. Asking for Discord does not trigger a ban as I have done it for ages and Xbox as Discord integration

Other players on Twitter have begun sharing their own strange FFXIV experiences where Microsoft’s word filter blocks innocuous in-game text.

The Xbox word filter is insane lmao pic.twitter.com/RtyO9vjhQ1

— Joe (cubescore 0) (@blamite) March 31, 2024

At the time of writing, these issues still appear to be affecting players, so be careful Xbox players!

Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail is expected to release June 28 for early access, and on July 2 for all players.

Final Fantasy XIV is available now for the Playstation 4, Playstation 5, Xbox, and Microsoft Windows (through Steam). You can check out our review of the latest expansion Endwalker here.