Random Thoughts.....What Are You Thinking?

A month ago (October the 14th), The 2nd expansion "Stormblood" was announced at the Las Vegas fanfest 2016. The launch is planned for Early summer 2017 and the PS3 support will end, meaning that it will only be available on the PS4 and PC. The details for the annoucements were covered in our past "Keynote report", but we had the opportunity to interview the producer and director Naoki Yoshida while we had dinner with him right after the announcement. The interview didn't end during our feast, so we moved over to where Yoshida stayed to continue on with our interview that lasted for 5 hours.

The interview consisted of various questions about the expansion, the system changes to FFXIV itself and the problems they currently have.

We want readers to especially focus on Yoshida san's obsessions for raid content and his views on the FFXIV community as an actual active player (whic you can find on the 5th page). Usually these parts will be cut off the interview due to its irrelevance to the main topic, but we asked him and got the permission to include it untouched. With all the fun talk, it has become an incredibly long interview for a game, but i'd like players to read it in pieces to kill time until the Tokyo fanfest._

Q (Game watch). How did you feel about the keynotes?

A.(Yoshida): The pressure during the keynotes is probably the best or second to best i've felt in my life, which is close to the first live letter we had (bitter smile). We've had quite a lot of live letters, so the lines don't usually fly away during the previous opening speeches, but the cheers were so great and loud and while i hesitated to find the timing to start talking, i got stuck in the middle of saying "Welcome to the FFXIV fan festival 2016 in Las Vegas" and when was trying to say "Fan festival two thousand and sixteen...only the sixteen part remained in my head and the word "thousand" disappeared.

Q. It didn't look like you were that nervous. You looked relaxaed.

A. Every staff member that was watching from below the stage told me that, but i was really nervous. At the last NA fan fest back in 2014, i was almost traumatized with my failure there so i was even more nervous this time. The keynotes from the first fanfest that was also streamed was supposed to last for an hour, but it ended after 40 minutes because i couldn't keep track of the time while i was so nervous. I was all proud and thought i did my job as i stepped down from the stage and the staff told me it was good, but i looked at my watch and noticed "Huh? it was only 45 minutes !?" and as i expected, the internet was grumpy about how short it was and it wasn't worth paying for the stream. It wasn't like i forgot or missed out details i planned to announce, but i couldn't keep calm to stay on track so it ended up being short. So today, i made sure to stay on track to escape from my trauma, by including jokes and have spaces in between which made me even more nervous.

Q. Like you said, it was longer than the keynotes from the prevous fanfest so i was watching to expect even more

A. I personally wanted to reveal more, but we have 2 fanfests (Tokyo and Frankfurt) remaining with 3.5 waiting in line as well, so what we could announce was very limitted (totoro note: In one of the recent columns Yoshida writes for the physical copy of Famitsu, he revealed that the NA community team was actually the ones who said they wanted to be the first ones to announce the expansion in NA and that's why the NA fanfest was set to be the earliest of the 3). Which meant that announcing the expansion itself was all the news we could show and if we didn't keep the details for later, we wouldn't have anything to reveal at the other 2 fanfests. With such limitted info, it was a real challenge and struggle to get people hyped over it.

Back when we announced the "Heveansward" expansion, we announced it with no previous notice so that itself was enough of a blast to surprise people, but this time, people already had the expectations of "they're definately going to announce the next expansion" and with that in mind, i had to provide high expectations until our next announcement, so it was extremely sensitive. I barely got through it and now i'm releaved.

Q. Do you rate it 100 out of 100 this time?

A. The customers might have a different view, but i personally think i fulfilled my role. Standing in front of 5000 NA/EU players with all the cheering, no script and no staff members with cardboards assisting me with my lines, while i stay on track with time and speaking ad libs to buy time was my limit. Can't do anymore even if people ask for it.

Q. You didn't have a script?

A. No i didn't. When i do create a script, i write it myself but if i try to go with the script, i get even more nervous, so all i did was give Koji a rough script that told him "when this shows up on the screen, i'll be talking about this", but i focused all my energy on what i usually think about, what i needed to announce and trying not to leave anything out. We also only had one brief rehearsal. The rest was about keeping track of time and continue on the fly.

With the Fanfest we had in 2014, this is the 2nd fanfest, but if you count all the other regions it's the 4th, meaning that it was the 4th time having the keynotes. If i use raids as an example, the 2014 fanfest is Coil of Bahamut, the 2016-2017 fanfest is the Alexander raid and the players have already gone through the experience of first, second and final coil, so they look for more in this 4th raid. That's how i thought about the fanfest, so i was conscious about sending the hype train to the next fanfest with the so little info we could reveal.

With the other 2 fanfests starting with Tokyo, we'll be going into detail and expect players to look forward for new features and then we have patch 3.5. These will gradually reveal the whole scale of "stormsblood" and just like when we released "a realm reborn", we want this atmosphere where players wonder where the story is going and that is our objective.

Q. Rumors are already floating around in the ffxiv community, speculating who that lady from the trailer is.

A. Looks like it (laughs). Please enjoy all those imaginations. Ofcourse we have a guesstimate of how players will react and speculate, but us devs would also like to enjoy the "live" feeling of how players debate and estimate the future. At the moment, we are still on the timeline of patch 3.4, but by checking the announcements we'll be releasing in the future, players can gradually get closer and debate everytime new info is revealed, which i think is something you can't achieve in other games. So we are thinking about providing that sort of enjoyment.

Q. My personal guess is, that lady isn't Y'da. Y'da and Papalymo are both key figures and i'm sure those 2 will show up as a set in 4.0.

A. I won't say and limit it to "who", but the scions will play a role in Stormsblood.

Q. That's all you can say now?

A. Yes. Especially about the character in the red outfit. Is she a new character or is she already an existing character and who is she. That will be what the future patches will touch on, so we cut out a small portion of the "future" and showed the players. I hope players enjoy talking about all the possibilities.

Q. In 4.0, monks will be "the main protagonists", but will Widargelt take the position of the "Estinian for heavensward" equivalent?

A. That rather unique character who gives you his sweaty(estimated) monk gear? (laughs) He might show up in the job quests. He might be a little too sultry for the main story quest...I'd like players to look forward for characters who are related to Ala mhigo and how they turn out in stormsblood.

Q. By the way, when did you finish creating that teaser trailer?

A. You had to ask that?(laughs)

Q. I just honestly thought it was well done so i imagined a lot of time was invested.

A. I think it was midnight (JP time) on october the 7th. The term "finish" is difficult to apply, but it's almost like a full CG movie. The animation fixes are obviously done in the early stages, but the adjustments i asked for were parts where it felt dragged out a bit and scenes where it was difficult to see the "lore" and i got them to add scenes for that. Those adjustments and the length of the trailer were fixed 3 weeks ago.

The biggest changes we had to make were the expressions on the characters which is important to "shape them" and will eventually play a part in the main scenario, so i sent out precise orders which were fixed 2 weeks ago. Apart from that, we adjusted some "manga like animations" called "distortion" that visual works added to make shockwaves and shaked the air when the unknown lady clashed with the warrior of light. In a photoreal CG cutscene, it won't look cool if it's too fancy so i got them to tone down some of it. Those adjustments took place until a week before it was complete and then we changed the colors of each scene, clip after clip which ended last monday. I trust the visual works team, so i left for Vegas without checking the final version.

Q. You said that teaser trailer is only a small portion of the actual trailer, but what were you intentions behind choosing that combat scene?

A. To simply put it, there are too many spoilers so that was the only part we could show. Just like Heavensward, i drew the storyboard for the whole trailer and the stormsblood trailer turned out to express the total scale of the expansion compared to the heavensward trailer, so it made it harder to make a short version of it.

Q. That part seemed long enough

A.It's about 2 minutes, but it's a little less than a 1/3 of the whole trailer. Considering future PRs (public relations) and outcomes of the main scenario, we had a chunk of scenes we could not show until we release patch 3.5. Now i regret that i should have had the "short version" in mind when i drew the story board. I'll watch out next time.

Q. Will we get to see the rest of the trailer at Tokyo?

A. Maybe not at Tokyo.

Q. Did you cut off what was behind and after that teaser trailer?

A. We cut out a large portion of what comes "after" that scene.

Q. Going back to the combat scene. Why is the warrior of light fighting against that "important looking" lady?

A. I'll leave that for speculation. There are parts you will only find out after playing 4.0. Also, that last clash between the 2 characters didn't exist in the original story board. When we cut out pieces to make the short version, the last part lacked "impact" so we asked visual works at the last moment (laughs).

We deliberately made it to where it wasn't "FF-ish" this time. We already did the "Fantasy", "dark", "dragons","dragoons" and a scene where players can shout out with excitement in heavensward. Our intention with the 4.0 trailer (full version) is to maximize the surprise and expectations players will experience when they see all the dots connected after watching the whole trailer. I would like you to look forward to the whole picture which will be revealed gradually.

Nowadays, the methods of PR activities in the gaming industry have clearly changed and in my opinion i don't think a long and thorough extended advertisment fits new players, so i think the mainstream is having a "vertical launch of info" right before the release. With the current market, unless you're a hardcore gamer, players don't get motivated and interested unless they can touch the game right after they find out about it. With MMORPGs, we have players who continue to play for a long period, so a mid to long term advertising is also important, but when you release an expansion that is close to a "new title", you have to consider both sides. For example, the finished version of "Dragon quest builders (tldr: minecraft based on dragon quest) barely made it for release and the following was a coincidence, but we were able to release the trial version 2 weeks before the actual release which was the most effective of all trials we've ever released. This made me realise again that we've come to an era where it's a one shot challenge to advertise everything right before the game comes out.

In the old era, game titles were announced a year or 2 years before release and you would reveal tid bits of info every 6 months or so and that was the norm. The market and the players were starving so players were able to wait for new info and spent time imagining about the game until it was actually released, but the modern market is different where we have so many options (including other entertainment) to choose from so that kind of "info spread out over time" will get wiped out by games you can enjoy right at that moment. Indeed, we still have more than half a year worth of time until stormblood until early summer 2017, so a normal person will be slightly interested but forget about it after a while. So the announcement we just had wasn't for the mass majority, but aimed at the "current players" first. We'll start by building up the ground with the players and raise the heat with the future fanfests starting with Tokyo, and then we'll maximize the hype at the Frankfurt fanfest and from there on, we'll start a "vertical PR" right before release for the new players.

Q. What percentage of the info did you release here? (at NA fanfest)

A. When you think about the ratio of actual game time, the level cap release is pretty big so it's a difficult question, but we haven't told you anything about "new" features, so if we're talking about the amount of announcements themselves, i'd say it's perfectly 1/3...but actually, the "spoilers" we have ready for Tokyo and Frankfurt Fanfest are way huger.

Q. That's what i predicted. We haven't heard anything about the details.

A. We haven't, so this is just a prologue. Please wait for the announcements at Tokyo and Frankfurt.

Q. What's the hidden message behind the title of the expansion?

A. With "Heavensward", we had flying mounts and we decided we were moving towards the sky at an early stage of development, so the word "Azure sky" (note:jp version of heavesnward is Azure skies of Ishgard) popped up right away. With the themes of heading towards the sky and Ishgard in mind, the title "Heavensward" had the hidden meaning of "Eorzea has multiple heavens" so it turned out to be HeavenSward. The theme color for Heavensward was blue, so this time it's red. With "recapturing/releasing Ala mhigo" in the center, we have heat revolving around the flag of liberation and people moved by that "heat" winning freedom is symbolized with the color red. We had other choices like burning/ignition, but "Azure skies" for the last expansion isn't what you normally use either, so we said "if we're going to choose, crimson (note: the jp tile of the expansion is "crimson liberators") would fit" and it didn't take that much to come to a conclusion. We had a story heavily focused on "liberation" in our minds. I talked about this during the keynotes today, but it's not like "anyone" is wanting "change" and looking for liberation now.

However, there weren't many good english words for 解放者=liberator and even when we found a good term for it, it was legally prohibited to use it. We couldn't find a word that japanese players can instantly get a vision of and for example, if it was a word "we made up" like "Eorzea reborn" (JP name for a realm reborn) or "Azure skies of Ishgard", it was okay as long as players could understand it was a name of a place, but we couldn't decide a good name. The word "解放者=Liberator" was decided without a problem, so we were talkiing about a word with the same meaning and we got a response where "Liberator" would be suitable as "english", but you don't hear that word in japan so it would stick out as an unfamilar name. After all, we ended up applying kanji (japanese characters) as a sub title.

Q. i was expecting the location to be in the name

A. If we chose a location again, it felt like all the future expansions would be bound by that rule or pattern should i say, so we thought about removing the "region" from the title. But if you think about it for a second, even the title "Eorzea reborn" covers "Ishgard" which is a part of Eorzea, so it actually doesn't go under the rule of "having a region" in the title.

The reason and intentions behind having Ala mhigo as the stage.

Q. Did you choose Ala mhigo as the next destination to collect the foreshadowing we had in 1.0?

A. 1.0 had a lot, especially involving Ala mhigo with Ul'dah. Even with a realm reborn, that ended up being the core with Ilberd going out of control and the warrior of light cornered to head towards Ishgard. To continue on with FFXIV, i think we can't avoid Ala mhigo.

Q. So Ala mhigo was chosen pretty early on?

A. Not as quickly as Ishgard. When i took my current spot from the previous producer, i got the explanation that "all the gothic/dark fantasy elements will be found in Ishgard", but Ishgard wasn't in the game yet (note: you could only see it from the distance) and i thought that just having the lore for the place was meaningless.

So i thought the first thing i had to do was, open the gates of Ishgard and let the players enter Ishgard first. Another reason was because we could turn the story into what revolves around dragoons and dragons and that allowed us to choose it immediately. To add to that, with Japan being an extremely peaceful country, we thought Japanese players would have trouble accepting the values and settings Ala mihgo had, so i spent some time with my decisions. Having two sides: one that rules and one that is ruled by and advancing to take back your home or land wasn't a theme i thought japanese players would want to dive into, so i thought releasing Ala mhigo right after a realm reborn wouldn't have a positive response.

Q.Which timing did you choose Ala mhigo as the next stage?

A. Right after we launched 3.0. While adding volume to each of the patches, we had to start early to make the expansion something huge. That's also right about when we chose to end the dragonsong war with patch 3.3.

__Q. During heavensward, there's a scene where you fight Raubahn (who has the same name and weapon as the general of the immortal flames in ffxi), but was that intended to send the message that Ala mihgo is where the next expansion takes place?

A. If you ask that was intentional, the answer would be no. There's a possibility the staff did it unconciously. Raubahn is a character who originally won his way up the colosseum with his own arms, but we weren't able to use that setting in game really well up to that point. In patch 2.55 we saw him go reckless once and we can say he's a character who is easy to move around when it comes to face to face combat out of the 3 nations.

Q.Since we're moving forward to free Ala mhigo, do you have plans on how to represent the lore? Like having the Ala mihgo resistance fighting the Empire in all sorts of places.

A. Yes, we are trying to challenge gimmicks that we haven't had before. The story is originally about taking back a land that is politically occupied, so we'd like to make it look proper as an MMORPG. It's about time i want to put an end to the 3 nations of Eorzea not doing anything because of political reasons/considerations, so we'll be doing something new. I can't say much more than that, but it's a Final fantasy title after all, so there are parts where other MMOs wouldn't spend their costs on, that we intend to use our resources on to hype up the story.

Q. There were no announcements on new races, but what was the ratio of Auras like compared to what you assumed?

A. Roughly the same as what we estimated. From the data, we are sure there are there are a certain amount of people who have no hesitation changing their race. I think it's the shift of era where players casually change their race for fashion reasons. That doesn't mean they don't care about role playing, it's just where players love their own character so much and move like a lalafel when they become one and Auras wear what suits an Aura most when they go out to fight. I have an understanding that changing races is a part of role playing as well.

Q.Will there be new beastmen?

A. Yes.

Q. Are there any chances we'll have new areas outside of Ala mihgo. For example, areas that are located in the north of Ishgard?

A.. I'm not sure about that.

Q. Like Ilsaberd or Doma.

A. Like we said today, we would like you to free Ala mihgo. From there on, it's up to your imagination.

Q. During the keynotes, you announced that flying will be available in the 4.0 areas and that was unexpected in a way. It's definately fun to fly around, but it's difficult to implement right?

A. It is difficult, but the specifications are complete so it's all up to how we create the maps. Also, when it comes to an MMORPG, you'll see a lot of refusal from players when you take away something convenient that's already in the game, so the new areas are basically designed with flying in mind.

Q. Does that mean the 4.0 areas will be three dimensional?

A. At least the maps will be enjoyable to fly around.

Q. Will we be able to fly in the 3 natons when 4.0 is released?

A. No plans at the moment. I've said this before, but we don't have the cost/resources to put into old areas. If you just wanted to fly and do nothing, we could just block all the holes and let you fly, but still that would take a large amount of time to fix all the old areas. We'd prefer to spend that time on building new areas.

Q. Are there other transportations apart from flying?

A. It's not limitted to transportation, but we do have the intention to up the game experience by one more stage, so we'd like you to wait for further announcements.

Q. When you think about the "Final fantasy order", you start by walking then you enter the sea then you fly. Now in FFXIV you can already fly, which means the only option remaining is diving under.

A. It's nice to be able to dive under water isn't it. All we can do now is around on water, even though people wear swim suits and good graphics.

Q. Riding a boat sounds fun as well

A. The map suddenly converts into graphics with 8bit dots and you travel around Hydaelyn, then players start to argue because only the party leader can steer the ship (laughs). Sounds interesting.

Q. After seeing the new areas in Ala mihgo, the lighting and atmosphere seems different to the current ones. Is there a concept for these new areas?

A. I personally like the 3.0 art style. It fits the current generation and it's not over the top, clearly leaving the FF-ish beauty and also having the proper darkness where it's needed. With this experience we'd like to explore new expressions.

The recent orders i've given are about the gap between each of the areas. I especially emphasize it when we create new dungeons, like asking them to aim for one level above to make the color of the sky in Sohm al "fantasy-ish". Art designers tend to try to pull colors from reality when they have the technology to create realistic pictures. So that's why i tell them to aim for what you rarely see in photos in the real world, that "don't look real" but has a fantasy feel to it.

That doesn't mean we are adding shaders, but it's more about the potential of Originality and ingenuity hidden under each of the designers and i believe there's still a mountain full of ideas and color coordinations. By changing how they draw clouds or how the astro weapons are made can add another variety of art. Just using the finest and latest technology isn't original and i think there's still a lot of space for improvement out there.

Q. And that gets reflected on the new dungeons

A. Yes, i think you will be able to tell that from the new patches.

Q.Sohm al is one of them, where time elapses as you go through the dungeon and at the end it'll be night time and makes you want to go back to the start to see the difference.

A. Yes. Those aspects don't directly influence the number of subs we have, but if you continue to play over and over, it'll be harder to move away...where once you experience this quality and get used to it, you can't play some of the other games anymore and that's an appealing factor that Final fantasy has, so we'll continue to keep that up.

Page2 Regarding new jobs. There will bemultiple jobs for 4.0 as well

Q. So you were wearing a t-shirt again during the opening key notes

A. Yes. Last time it was Batman, so i thought it should be a Marvel character this time(laughs)

Q. So it had totally nothing to do with Dark knight last time

A. It's more fun when you can speculate over hints so it's sort of a spoiler (laughs).

Q. When you showed the screen introducing new jobs, there was a male and a female character standing there. Does it mean we are going to have 2 jobs?

A. There was no deep meaning other than having a male and female, but there will be multiple jobs again.

Q. No new roles for 4.0?

A. We won't be adding that.

Q. Until the end of time?

A. I'm not sure about never, but at least there are no plans for 4.0.

Q. Last time we got a job for each role and there was a sense of excitement for all the roles. I'm wondering if it'll be 2 or 3 jobs next

A. I think everyone is insterested, but i wonder how many...

Q. Will the Tokyo fanfest be the first place we hear about the new jobs?

A. Yes. Not only the jobs, but the details on various topics will start getting revealed there.

Q. All at once?

A. We'll also hold back some info at Tokyo fanfest as well. We'll be talking about some of them while all of it will be revealed at Frankfurt.

Q. We saw what we can speculate as two monks fighting in the trailer, but is it safe to assume that is the new artifact for monks?

A. What the warrior of light was wearing is indeed the monk's new job specific gear.

Q. How about the woman's gear?

A. Sorry, no comment on the female outfit.

Q. The woman was fluttering while she was fighting so i thought that might be a dancer instead of a monk.

A. We thought we would hear those voices and it seems like people in Japan are slightly leaning towards dancer.

Q. The woman in the art work by Mr Amano has a dagger as her weapon, but are they claws or hidden daggers?

A. Regarding the image illustration by Mr Amano, after telling him the concept, it was all up to his insipration from there on so it's not like i gave him a specific request.

Q. So it's dangerous to speculate based on that artwork?

A. Maybe dangerous(laughs). When it comes to work with Mr Amano, i give him details on the lore we're aiming for, the story, the meaning behind the title, the what we want him to draw in the background. Then we have a short discussion and after he says "The image is starting to float in my head", i leave the rest to him and that's the general stance i have.

Q. So what was the message you told him this time?

A. The flag. The liberators and the flag as the concept. It's not like they are conscious about being liberators, but when an artist from the future were to draw the, they will probably be called "liberators". They didn't make a flag for the resistance, but they just have a worn out flag to symbolize their unity. Not a single mark on it and the people who agree to fight for freedom are the ones to become "the picture", and that is what i told Mr Amano. Within them, the warrior of light and the woman in the red dress is included, and those 2 are the only ones where i specified what they are wearing.

Q. Deep

A. That's basically how i always ask Mr Amano for an illustration. For Heavensward, the concept was an evil dragon and 12 knights, but Mr Amano tends to change the number of knights based on his inspiration so Minagawa ( lead UI artist and patch logo designer) and i had some trouble there (laughs). I've always been a big fan of Mr Amano, so it's always very fun to work with him.

Lore and Level cap increase

Q. During the main scenario quest, the 2nd Emperor Varis Zos Galvus talked about the right to conquor Eorzea and how small of a matter it was compared to the fate of the star. Will the Garlean empire show their side and vision of the threat of "Ardor"?

A. That might have to wait until the 4.xx series. The warrior of light's view during the expansion will be all about focusing on the on going battle to win freedom from the Garlean empire's rule. In a realm reborn, the warrior of light prevented the invasion of the Garlean empire, then he/she put an end to the dragonsong war and finally the alliance consisted of 4 nations just came back. You will see a glimpse of the "Ideal of the Empire", but it will be further down the line where we dig deeper into it.

During the "Please look forward to it stage" we had today, we were asked if we have 5.0 in mind, but we have a brief image of how it's going to end. We'll continue to sneak foreshadowing here and there and gradually buil up the story.

Q. We heard a huge cheer when you talked about new primals. Will the flow stay the same where Ascians lead certain races to summon a primal and will that continue?

A. It won't be all about Ascians. The problem of it getting boring if it's all about Ascians is one reason and what the Ascians are currently doing is a measure of Interference in domestic affairs. When it comes to a different region, they'll have a different approach to the matter. With Ishgard, that was the dragon's eye. The Ascians are trying to dry up the aether to destroy the equilibrium of the world so they can unite the other worlds and summoning the primals is only one of those methods. The black ascians and white ascians have a slightly different way of thinking, so the story might expand from there. However, the Ascians might have a lighter role in 4.0 and their presence might be forgettable.

Q. The new character "Zenos" doesn't look like a typical Villain. Maybe it's because he climbed his own way up the Military, but it seems like there might be a crack in between him and the other Garlean generals like Regula and maybe Zenos is hated by them. I have a feeling Zenos might have something in common with the warrior of light.

A. This answer won't be about Zenos, but everything about Regula will be revealed after patch 3.5. We'd like to collect all the foreshadowing up to now and connect the story to 4.0. Some mysteries about the world will be left unsolved, but the other small foreshadowing in the 3.xx series should be solved.

Q. You said Zenos will be a totally different character to any of what we've seen. How is he different?

A. All i can say is, nobody will be able to sympathize with him

Q. He has a sheath (saya for a katana) and a sword, so "then he must be..._

A. What he actually looks like and his personality aren't that related, but his weapon is a gunblade (note: all generals from each 14 legion has a weapon called gun + weapon name. Examples are Nael's gun halberd, Regula's gun *** sword). By the way, after the 2.0 main scenario ended, the players were sick of the 3 nations talking about their public stance and quite a lot of players gave us feed back that they wanted to work for the Empire, but with 4.0 we won't be hearing those voices anymore(laughs) Zenos will be a different type of Villain or should i say an opponent you will face.

Q. Like Kefka?

A. Comparing them will spoil the image so i'll avoid that question, but Zenos is the son of the current Emperor.

Q. Just like how Ultima weapon was burried under the ground, it seems like there are Allagan ruins remaining in Gyr bania. Will the Allagan heritage play a role in any of the content in 4.0?

A. Please wait for patch 3.5 for now.

Q. I love Estinien. Will he show up again in 4.0?

A. I can't answer that question at the moment. What Estinien will be doing in the future was already decided before patch 3.3. He might show up again, but what sort of situation, what sort of gear and what he's going to say is something i'd like you to look forward for.

Q. So that means he's coming back

A. Will he show up during the 4.0 main scenario? is up to your imagination. I personally want him to join the scions, but with his personality, even if you did invite him, he'd probably say "I'm not interested" (laughs) and "I hate being in a swarm".

Q. With the new level cap increase from 60 to 70, a new story will begin, but are we going to move forward after completing the story up to patch 3.5?

A. Clearing all the scenarios for the 3.xx series is the condition to move on. It's matter of if we'll add a jumping potion or not.

Q. Which means, the story will continue on from Heavensward?

A. Yes. There's no doubt about 4.0 being a story continuing from the end of the 3.xx series.

Q. Is the story included in patch 3.5 going to be the finale to connect patch 3.4 to 4.0?

A. You'll see most of what's going on and a lot of things will join dots with dots. Also what we announced today (at fanfest) will be connected to those other dots. The puzzle pieces are spread all over the place at the moment in no specific order now, but those will get organized and turn into its proper form.

Q. You want us to enjoy that for the time being.

A. The "live" feeling where the patch moves forward and using the new info revealed from other sources to solve the puzzle is the fun part.

Q. In a past interview we asked about the "jump potion" but it's still not in the game for the global version. If you were to add it into the game, I'm guessing it'll be when patch 4.0 is released. What are your current plans?

A. The ratio of implementing it is around 7:3 and we have read the feed back from the community. It seems like the negative reactions are fewer than we expected. I remember touching on this subject in a different interview and again, the feed back we got was "As long as you don't destroy the balance and community, we'll leave the final decision to you". Ofcourse, it's not like it's already decided and we'll continue to consider listening to everyone's reactions.

Even after today's keynotes, when a person asked if we need to clear all the 3.xx content on the internet, another person answered "that's exactly why we need a jump potion" and after seeing those debates, it felt like our players are seriously thinking about FFXIV and the community.

Q. Let's say you were going to implement the jump potion for the global version. How will it work? For example, will you jump right to level 60 by drinking 1 bottle? or will you stop at level 50.

A. We already have it in game for the Chinese and Korean client, but you don't need multiple potions. It will always be 1 potion. At the moment you jump to level 50, but this will change into a potion that allows you to jump to level 60 in the Chinese and Korean servers. If we had a level 50 potion when the level cap is 70, even those who agree on adding the jump potion will be upset because it's incomplete. Those players who disagree will disagree if it's level 50 or 60 and it'll be meaningless if players can't use it to catch up to play with their friends, so it will basically always let you jump to right before the old level cap (note: level 60 if the cap is 70, level 50 if the cap is 60). Being able to play with your friends is important, so WoW distributed it to all players who came back right before Legion. FFXIV still doesn't have that many expansions, but if the game has as many expansions as WoW, i think more people can enjoy the new expansion with the way WoW did it.

Q. Fun experience isn't all about the leveling process and it's what comes after

A. Working your way up the ladder is fun. Content beyond that is fun, but if you need to spend too much time, you physically won't be able to play the game anymore and we want to avoid that. I don't deny the fun of leveling and if i had the time i'd enjoy it and i'd like it...but i don't have time....(laughs)

Q. 4.0 will raise the level cap but what's the vision you have on how players level from 60 to 70?

A. The flow will be where you level your first job by doing the MSQ and when you reach the ending of 4.0, you'll be around about level 70.

Q. I remember i had a hard time in Heavensward. Time after time, my level would be too low to receive the next MSQ so i'd go to focus on leveling and i couldn't focus on the MSQ.

A. With 4.0, we reduced the ratio of side quests and increased the ratio of MSQs instead.

Q. You mean the total amount of MSQs? or the volume of each MSQ?

A. The amount of total quests hasn't changed. For example, Let's say we had 300 MSqs and 200 side quests in patch 3.0. With 4.0 it will be 350 MSQs and 150 side quests. Rather than having side quests where we run out of ideas, we imagine players will be able to level properly if we have a deeper story for the MSQ and spend our resources that way. Also, Heveansward was the first expansion so we cut down the EXP you can get from earlier dungeons to be careful. With 4.0, we'll have the EXP from dungeons based on how much we gain now after the boost to EXP from 3.xx dungeons, so we'll have a relatively balanced out leveling process.

Q. You'll adjust it to where we rotate the MSQ and dungeons for leveling

A. Yes. The ideal is for players to move foward and enter the next area smoothly where the next story starts.

Q. With the level cap increase, i think the players are mostly interested about the new actions. Are we going to learn a new move every 2 levels like Heavensward?

A. We changed it a little. You'll definately have new actions, but we got feedback from the dev team that having a quest every 2 levels and learning a new action from each quest was a little tough to create a story for it. so there are actions you learn by just reaching a certain level and actions you learn through job quests.