Tokyo Fanfest

[Kieron Lohengrin]

tiem 4 shardjumping
 

 

 

finally get to visit the 2005 tech demo
 

 

 

and ingame florida

 

 

non-healing DNC to go with non-tanking SAM

 

 

Lali-ho

 

too much light = bad / too much dark = bad SMT-style dichotomy confirmed

 

 

zipperbelts 8man raid incoming

 

 

god bless BLUFever leaks

 

[Shion]

I love this setting and plot a heck of a lot more than I would Garlemald, since we just had an entire expansion of fighting the empire. I just hope there's an easy way to travel between the Source and the First for RP, and it won't be a "WoL only" thing.

[Kieron Lohengrin]

Adventurers in FFXI used Traverser Stones for interdimensional travel to Abyssea. We may end up with a similar plot device in 5.0 - and if not, RPers will just make one up anyway. We've known that interdimensional travel is a thing since Lightning's FF13 event way back in 2013, but I don't think it's a coincidence that they lined up the FFXV crossover event for Noctis' own dimension-hopping shenanigans right before 5.0, too.

 

We've known for a while now since Heavensward that too much light = bad and too much darkness = bad, but it'll be interesting to see how Natsuko Ishikawa writes in the centrist balance / anti-extremist philosophy and lets it play out. We're in for an emotional rollercoaster if the DRK quests are anything to go by. A number of elements are straight up lifted from previous FFs as well - end-of-the-world decadence and apathy from FF 13-2; Warriors of Darkness, Crystal Tower, and the Eternal Wind musical interlude from FF3.

 

Come Tuesday it'll be interesting to see who survives the setup for the expansion, given all the hints they keep dropping with the bodies in the trailer and the Black Rose chemical weapon.

[Tregarde]

I'd argue that we knew of travel between worlds/starts/dimensions, and that if Light or Dark wins it spells doom, since 2.0. These were just driven home a lot more with the Warriors of Darkness storyline. Anyway...

 

I like a lot of what I saw. The new classes look like fun. The new cities and zones look interesting. The story looks like it's finally delving into what I had already guessed a long time ago - that balance is necessary.

 

What I don't like is gender locked races. I understand that the design teams had limited time and resources, but why spend it giving us two half-races instead of one complete race?

[Unnamed Mercenary]

26 minutes ago, Tregarde said:

What I don't like is gender locked races. I understand that the design teams had limited time and resources, but why spend it giving us two half-races instead of one complete race?

 

There's been a LOT of social media talk about this, but it likely boils down to a few things.

 

1. SE received a ton of feedback that players wanted a beastly race and they also wanted Viera.

2. Some high-up exec probably decided for them that adding "new races" was too much of a cost and that they wouldn't be doing that after 5.0.

3. Game development is absolute hell internally and these people will probably not be sleeping until after 5.0 releases.
 

Based on the [Tokyo Fan Fest] Day 1 Media Interview with Yoshi-P , here are a couple of snipped answers.

 

Q: Why were you so insistent on adding a beast-like race, the Hrothgar?

A: The great thing about MMORPGs is that people from around the world with different values and tastes can all come together and play. FF games have good-looking men and women, but FFX is an example of a stronger look. Guin Saga may be a better example, but at any rate, since we're creating a fantasy, I want to shine a spotlight on that aspect as well. Even if we added another handsome race, it felt like the only real difference would be the ear shape. Back when we showed off a basic sketch of a wolfman, a lot of players around the world voiced their desire for a wolf race in 4.0. At our current patch rate, with that much equipment data being released, and adding a new race multiplying the amount of work required, we could probably only add one more race with our current workflow. We agonized over which race to add, and ended up with what you see now, and the lion T-shirt I'm wearing now *laughs*

 

Q: When did you decide to implement the female-only Viera and male-only Hrothgar?

A: It was during Return to Ivalice, around 3 months after 4.0. Viera was confirmed then, and Hrothgar came about at the same time when we were discussing plans with Matsuno-san. We were deciding whether to make a Hrothgar female or a Viera female, and after selecting Viera, work began right away, because otherwise we wouldn't make it in time. As mentioned before, the face parts are special and Hrothgar has big differences between its faces, like a lion face, wolf face, leopard face. It became a fixed model relatively recently. Viera was done right before Paris Fan Fest, and Hrothgar was done recently.

 

[Kieron Lohengrin]

So they'll probably announce second genders as a feature in 6.0. If not for that C-suite decree of no more new races forcing them to cram in hrothgar and viera, then all this would've seemed like a missed opportunity for more customization options and subraces for existing races instead, based on their first world counterparts.

 

As for the theme of balance, the plot seems headed toward reestablishing peace and harmony between Zodiark and Hydaelyn instead of destroying one or the other. We know she freaked out 10-15,000-ish years ago, split the worlds, and everything his Ascians have done since then may have been misinterpretations of his will / going too far, jihadi-style. I'm guessing 5.0 = solving first world problems and restoring their night, 6.0 = negotiating peace between Garlemald and the Alliance, combined with going to the moon and negotiating peace between Z and H.

I expect Yoshi-P to coincide his retirement with the Ascian plot wrapping up, and we might get to see Thavnair, Sharlayan, or the New World in 7.0 and beyond, Adoulin-style.

[Valence]

Banri Oda and YoshiP confirmed that travel between shards can be achieved with the power of the echo, and that all of you WoL will be able to TP as usual.

 

Other than that, we still have the 2 other solutions:

 

- Hydaelyn and an ascian or a powerful person with the echo transporting you like they did for Minfillia or Arbert.

- Using Syrcus Tower, if it can even be used again like they did for Shard 13.

Edited March 26, 2019 by Valence

[Kieron Lohengrin]

A bit more feedback from here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1x30qZohmIc-18urZVcePILzOXdbUt_AnUd8GTvPw4uI/edit

 

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When we create a fantasy game, especially for FF14. We have a good variety of races. We don’t really need any more cute or sweet looking characters because we have so many as it is.

 

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As a follow up, is the team considering adding the other gender for these two races in future expansions?

 

A.) Short answer is we haven’t made a decision on that. The reason why we can’t say for sure. We need to optimize our work flow with the existing races and the new ones. After that, perhaps we do the other gender. But we don’t know right now.

 

We did consider Male Viera instead of adding an extra race, but we tried to take player feedback on adding a more beast like race as well as the strong desire to receive Viera. We did expect strong feedback on the gender lock. It was a tough decision, but we decided to do our best to meet both the player feedback and our development team’s vision. It will be very costly to add a new race or genders. So I won’t say no, but I would not like to set expectations high.

 

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The reveal that Dancer was a ranged DPS caught a lot of players by surprise as well. Why did the team decide to add another DPS to the game as opposed to a new healer?

 

A.) Out of curiosity why was the community generally expecting it to be a healer?

 

Me.) Mostly because we really expected it to be both a tank and a healer for the expansion.

 

A.) Simply we only had two ranged physical DPS so we wanted to add another. We have 4 tanks and 4 melee dps, 3 casters and 3 healers, and yet there were only 2 ranged dps. We wanted to balance the number of jobs across the board.