Yoshida discusses Final Fantasy XIV beta tests 3 and 4, President says goodbye
If you didn’t have 2 hours to sit through the entire live producer letter that was done on the ‘Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn’ YouTube channel, then you can catch up on all of the details that were announced.
Current President Wada held a short pre-recorded video at the beginning of the live producer letter. In the video Wada stated, “I’m sure some of you have heard, I will be stepping down as President. Thank you for your support all these years.” Wada followed up by saying, “To be quite frank, as a businessman I haven’t been performing as well as I should. In order to address our current situation, we’ve had to make many difficult decisions.” In the end he said goodbye with, “We felt this change of leadership was a necessary part of the process. Although I will no longer be president, I’m confident the company will press on and thrive in my absense.” As for the new president, Yoshida states later in the video that “the new president seems to be a gamer as well.” Foxclon follows up with, “I wonder what he’ll be like.” Indicating the two may not have met at this point.
Then the video eventually ends the pre-recorded message and cuts to the live-feed. As for the beta-testing Yoshida stated, “Yes, it’s finally here. We’ve already sent out more notification mails to 50-60,000 new testers worldwide.” The duo then shows off the ‘Limsa Lominsa Housing Area’ at 7:38 into the video. The beautiful area is along the shoreline at sunset.
These houses are examples of houses that players can build in the game. Players have to buy the land and then can start construction, building certain items can grant your party certain buffs (like EXP bonus or a gil bonus). Players will be able to upgrade to a larger house as it stands right now though that can change. Players will also be able to sell, or give, houses to other players. Other house related news will come after the team better understands the stress that the housing mechanic will have on the servers.
In the future there will be videos showing off each class. If you were hoping to play as the Arcanist in the beta, odds are you won’t be able to. Yoshida stated that, “We’ve been trying hard to push it out, but it probably won’t be ready” but they will “show it off in a video” at a later date. Chocobos in the game will be synched to the player’s level and “there will still be ways to enhance your chocobo” says Yoshida. Players will be able to teach chocobos skills like offensive attacks or supportive skills, almost like skill trees. The chocobos will act like a comrade in the game. Yoshida gave the example that a Warrior-class player might want a chocobo that can heal, to help him when soloing or questing. One change in chocobos is in the barding. No longer will stats be connected to barding, instead they will be cosmetic. This is so people will be able to choose the look they want, and prevent everyone’s chocobos from looking the same because of a favorite stat-boost. At launch, you will not be able to take a Chocobo into an instance. Yoshida says it will be implemented in the future.
As for great-swords, there is no plans yet but Samurai or Dark Knight may be getting them in the future. Yoshida said “only the battle team knows fo sure.” Another note on weapons, the strongest in the game are still on track to be “dropped from the Great Labyrinth of Bahamut” according to Yoshida. There will also be a “clear path for progression through content and gear” says Yoshida. “When you’re level 50 you can clear a scenario and go after a good primal weapon” he added. Then a player would “challenge the Crystal Tower” to get items and finally “challenge the Great Labyrinth” according to Yoshida.
Gear in ‘A Relam Reborn’ will have “sockets”. You can then fill these sockets with materia. There’s no failure rate for this and some items will have more than one socket available. There is a mechanic that allows the “process of adding materia beyond the set number of sockets” and that is called “multiple melding”. Unlike in 1.0 a failure to this method only loses materia, not the item like before. Also changed, materia is no longer restricted to gear types, any materia can be applied to any gear. Items will have stat caps though, Yoshida gave an example of an item having a STR cap of 5. This will be determined through an items level, stopping a level 1 sword from being too modded that other swords at higher levels would be worthless. Crafters should enjoy the complicated system according to Yoshida who states, “I think it will also give crafters an opportunity to be more involved, taking on the role of materia experts, giving advice on how best to enhance their wares.”
At 20:51 into the video you can get a great look at Limsa, the beautiful city by the shore. The video shown is actually from the Beta phase 3 build, which is what will be open to PS3 owners if nothing changes. The UI isn’t shown because it is in such an early stage and is currently “unstable” says Yoshida. There have been improvements made to the ‘Aethernet’, which will allow players to “easily move from one part of the city to another.” You can watch this in action starting at 29:31. At 26:37 you can get a great view of the ‘Grand Company Office’.
As for job classes, Yoshida says the have been “rebalanced” when compared to 1.0 adding, “because classes can use a wider variety of abilities from other classes, I think they’re much better suited to soloing and questing.” That being said Yoshida also reminds players that “dungeons designed for leveling will usually be made for groups of four”. The “end game” however is when “jobs really start to shine.” teased Yoshida.
As for instances, Yoshida thinks there could up to 18 ready to go at launch. Yoshida promises to show a certain instance where, “The sky is visible, and there’s this dense jungle portion”. He followed up by stating, “We have some incredible new dungeons filled with beautiful, natural elements” which will be shown later.
Yoshida shows off some artwork of the PvP armor that will be upcoming at 1:09:00 into the video. Including a very nice artistic image of the ‘Swan Robe’ which will be available in the game. Yoshida says your goal in PvP “would be to gain points through matches to obtain PvP skills, passive abilities, and gear to grow stronger”. There will be a way to purchase abilities. Yoshida states that “one paladin PvP ability and its effects changes depending on what grand company you’ve joined.” Limit-breaks will come in 3 levels “like Final Heaven” says Yoshida. He then says, “When you see the names you’ll think to yourself, ‘this is FINAL FANTASY.”
1:27:29 gives another great skyline view of the surrounding open-landscape, something that you probably don’t want to miss. If you were hoping for a Wiki database for monsters and items, there won’t be one because of PS3 restrictions. There will be a database on the Lodestone and there will be an App released in the future.
Phase 3 will start the PS3 beta test, though a date has not been determined at this time. Phase 3 will add Limsa Lominsa and Ul’dah but it will also add Free Companies, guildhests, and large-scale FATEs will be added for testing.
An interesting tidbit for anyone that bought the Collector’s Edition of 1.0, Yoshida stated, “Don’t worry, we’ll be sure to have something prepared for those who already purchased it.”
You can watch the full video below.
more info: ffxiv
