The game can only "fail" if it does not meet SOE's earnings expectations.
So either it needs a reasonable sized playerbase spending the equivalent of a monthly sub fee, or a huge playerbase spending smallish amounts frequently. I'd bet on the former.
The only concern I have is that the "core gameplay" from PS1 may not actually be able to scale up to the relatively massive population that is foreseen for PS2. With a large portion of F2P casuals in the game, the way it is played will not be the same as the relatively controlled play of PS1 sub-based population.
If you were a PS1 subscriber, you were committed to the game and the way it worked. You kind of "bought in" to the outfit-based gameplay, and probably would not pay a sub just to "mess around" for a bit every now and then. However with F2P, that player commitment is zero.
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