Final Fantasy XIV Announced! PS3 Exclusive!

Not that I'm complaining at all about Final Fantasy XIII's wonderful soundtrack, but I wonder why Uematsu is working on all of Final Fantasy XIV, but Square-Enix isn't getting him to work on any of the other games' soundtracks? Another Hamauzu/Uematsu tag-teaming for a game's score would be absolutely fantastic, since they compliment each other so well.

Totally. I hope they get him back for FFXV, though I feel kind of ridiculous talking about that so early.

New artwork.

Sexy. But what's with this image being credited to this Kazuya Takahashi guy despite it looking exactly like a Yoshida piece? I saw it and screamed "Yoshida!" before even checking the game information part of the site and discovering he was Art Director. Masterful mimicry or mistaken miscrediting?

EDIT: On second thought, I can see how it isn't by him. Still though. It reminds me of his work.

Can't be doing with MMORPG's and it pissed me off when they did this with FFXI.

I dunno, maybe you need the social aspect behind it to make it fun which I never had, the only person who played it who I knew was me. I need a storyline to drive my games.

I get most people's aversion to MMOs (I have one too, despite like a few of them), but FFXI was one of the few to feature a very solid, fairly traditional storyline throughout. I played it just for the storyline at first (which was told across a series of 9 multi-part Missions), but continued on with the typical MMO quests when I made some friends. If you played it rather traditionally you could get an experience somewhat akin to a regular FF story, but with actual people to help you as you go along.

Originally Posted by Nictel

So you 'train' your weapons? Could they be alive?
Sounds like an interesting concept.

I wouldnt think that they're alive, maybe there will be some weapon customization.

Originally Posted by Slime

So IGN has a pretty decent article about what we know about FFXIV so far, and I've copied some of the details I think are the most important/interesting:

Also, some details gleaned from this article, though most of them are summed up in the IGN one:

-There will be no levels or experience points
-The game features a very different Job system
-Weapons are the focus of character growth
-Eorzea is the name of a continent in the world of "ハイデリン" (Haiderin/Hadelin?)
-The world has a high level of technology
-Item synthesis will still be a factor
-The concepts of time and seasons will be present
-Nobuo Uematsu is doing the entire soundtrack by himself
-Tarutaru are smaller
-The Galka won't have tails in this world
-The names of the races may change
-They expect the PC specs to be pretty high

So, most importantly:

No experience! No levels! Weapons!

This is definitely intriguing. While I'll admit this threw me off at first, I'm now kind of excited by the possibilities. If the focus is on building the strength of your weapons instead of the character itself, then this game could be a lot more interesting than other MMOs. For one, the constant grinding might be less of an issue. That, and perhaps FFIX-style synthesis may play a role, and we could even have awesome Vagrant Story-style weapon customization, albeit less tedious. This could end up making the game very unique, and being an MMO, pretty much everyone may have neat-looking custom weapons.

That, and think about when Project Rapture (FFXIV's codename) was announced: August 2005, about exactly two years before Yasumi Matsuno left Square Enix (August 31, 2007). Way back in 2001, Matsuno helped develop the PlayOnline platform, and oversaw some of FFXI's development. Is it possible that he was involved in the early stages of this too? That could explain the focus on weapons, since Vagrant Story was centered around weapon customization as the primary form of character development. Also, Akihiko Yoshida is handling art direction, so this game may even have been Matsuno's game from the beginning. How cool would that be?

Anyway, that's all I have for now. Can't wait to hear more!

OMGOMGOMGOMGOMGOMG.

I'm not even going to comment besides.

It is produced by Hiromichi Tanaka (Final Fantasy I, II, III, and IX) and directed by Nobuaki Komoto (Final Fantasy IX, XI), with art direction by Akihiko Yoshida (Vagrant Story, Final Fantasy XII) and a musical score from Nobuo Uematsu (Most Final Fantasies ever).

Ah, this is going to be so great! Earlier you said that it was being released in 2010... is that for everybody? I don't think I could wait more than a year for this.

Yes yes! Worldwide launch, so none of those beautiful little Japanese people are getting it before us in PAL and NA!

And I agree about what you posted just now. I was so much more excited when I found out who was doing it. Uematsu doing the entire OST? Producer and Director from IX, one of my absolute favourite FF's?? Oh wow.

... are they going to have a beta version (or something like that for download) for the PS3 beforehand?

In an interview they said there would be a beta (the actual question was will current XI players get into it), but they said they weren't completely sure about their plans associating with it right now. There will be one though.

I'm so all over this.

That's right! Let it take over your mind. It's going to be amazing.

...dangit, I'm actually tempted to check out an MMO now. -_-; I really want to know what kind of character growth system this will use if it isn't levels.

Originally Posted by Tiroth

...dangit, I'm actually tempted to check out an MMO now. -_-; I really want to know what kind of character growth system this will use if it isn't levels.

Regarding character growth, maybe they plan to do something like how Oblivion does it (I don't recall Oblivion using experience points, but maybe I'm wrong).

Bleh, Oblivion's character growth system was horrible. Probably my least favourite from near any RPG x:

Uh...what was Oblivion's character growth like?

If I remember correctly, it was kind of like:

1) Fight a lot
2) Go to sleep
3) Wake up with a screen that lets you allocate 3 stats

I might be thinking of Morrowind though (the game before Oblivion). Either way, it was horrible.

Yeah, that wouldn't be so good. :/ It'll be interesting to see what they come up with, though. Also - any clues on how the job system'll work? I haven't got any experience with FFXI, but I've played III and V.