Author: freeffxiv

Final Fantasy XIV is changing a lot with its relaunch, but many of those changes are a matter of giving the old a new purpose and function. Such is the case with the much-maligned levequest, previewed in the latest video update from the game’s alpha version. The new system seems much cleaner, with more narrow level bands, a distributor right at the camp, and a much simpler interface for starting and finishing one of these quick repeatable bursts of content.

Looking forward to working in a team a bit more? Then you’ll be happy that the second half of the video is devoted to an early preview of group combat, switching back and forth between several members locked in battle with large opponents. While the abilities and balance are still rough, it’s a clear departure from how the game looked and felt in the first version. Check out the full video just past the break.

Comments

BenjaminFindout

I really like it. The first version of FF14 was a mess. Im a long time FF11 player so I had some expectations. At first it might not look very spectacular but you can spot some very important parts. First off combat looks finally again impressive, full of action and it immediately reminds me of FF11 which is a very good thing. The given example shows a classic setup with tank, damage dealer, healer and supporter roles. For me this is fantasticnews. You can also see the classic attack from behind to take advantage of a blind spot. You can see an Archer doing his job and a Mage switching between heals and offensive spells. It all lokks like the reborn realm will be great. I hope they keep up the promise they deliver with these videos.

ShaneAngle

Of course, the new opening movie is the only piece of information we’ve had about the game for a little while, but it seems worth analyzing and examining even on its own merits. No, I’m not talking about speculating as to whether or not the guy on the horse who looks exactly like Odin is in fact Odin or not (spoiler, doy). I want to talk about what this means for the lore, what the overall effect is, and whether or not this monster of a trailer succeeds at what it’s meant to do.

The first part of the trailer is familiar to anyone who’s followed the game for a while; it’s the End of an Era trailer in its entirety, with no differences that my eyes could pick out. It’s a good trailer, but I wonder if it might confuse players coming to the game for the first time because there are a lot of important people on the screen in short order, and we don’t get a sense of who they are at any point in the video. That makes it all the more likely that they’ll be around in the new world just so players unfamiliar with the first version will know who these people are.

Mind you, Merlwyb is awesome, and I don’t want her to die. But the death toll from the Battle of Carteneau should really be higher than “one old elezen who might still be around in some form.” Punchy endings aren’t a bad thing.

Let’s move on from morbid ruminations. The second part kicks in after the final spell is cast, and in parts it’s just a pastiche of footage that we’ve already seen in bits and pieces. The roaring behemoth and Odin in the woods have been glimpsed before, and neither of them has any connection that we know of to what’s unfolded in Eorzea. They work as establishing shots but aren’t terribly exciting.

When we see Thancred and company, things take a turn for the interesting. The fact that they lived seems almost a given, especially as they were nowhere near Dalamud’s landing spot, but the fact that we see them hammers home the idea that it hasn’t been all that long since we were last in the world. None of them looks older, and all of them look to be expecting the return of the players, and of course they’ve got snazzy new pseudo-steampunk bits adorning their outfits.

This does raise some interesting questions regarding the storyline: Do they know that the players are coming back? Thancred and Y’shtola’s actions in particular seem to suggest that they were waiting for a sign that just arrived. That makes me wonder just how much of what has happened was already part of Louisoix’s planning in the first place, whether he expected the whole summoning ritual to fail or not. It might have always been a contingency plan… but that’s all wild speculation.

I have to say, Eorzea repaired awfully quickly from the absolute destruction Bahamut inflicted. I’ve seen five years thrown about as the accepted figure for the gap between the original game and the relaunch, but considering the effects of Dalamud, I think five years seems a little short. Still, none of the Circle members appears to have been ravaged by long years in a post-apocalyptic world, so it looks like five years is just about right.

Once we’ve had a roundup of the major NPCs, it’s back to the stand-in players, who do nothing particularly interesting — they call their chocobos, then run off toward a weird thing in the distance, full stop. Worth questioning is whether they’re in a reborn Silvertear Falls or not — the landscape could easily be Ishgardian, or Dalamud’s return could have restored what the airship’s tussle with Midgardsormr knocked loose.

As a lead-in to the remake, it works fairly well. While there are some bits that won’t be clear to non-veterans, all of the major points are addressed. There was a massive battle, a cataclysmic awakening, and all of the heroes were cast to another time and place to renew their efforts. If you weren’t around for everything leading up to what happened in the trailer, you can get the gist of it, even if it’s uncomfortably long in that regard. Not that there’s a whole lot that can easily be trimmed out.

As a trailer, it’s… less successful. More than half of it is either recycled footage or bits that we’ve seen in passing, enough that watching it for the first time feels like a long recap followed by a few moments of things actually happening. It raises some interesting questions, but some of those questions either would be answered in moments by the remake or will likely be ignored altogether.

It’s not bad, but boy, I would have rather seen a benchmark. Just for nostalgia’s sake, really; I do not have any real worry about the game running properly.

The currency one is what’s going to throw the largest number of players for a loop, as the game is reducing all money values to a tenth of what they once were. To reduce numbers, all money is getting the ones digit removed, meaning that players will be 10% as wealthy as they are now, but all vendor prices will be 10% of their current values. Net purchasing power should be identical.

There will also be a number of items removed from the game, altered, or otherwise changed with the new version. Players will lose several key items and ammunition, and other items will be bound to a player to prevent trading. Take a look at the full rundown for all the particulars on graphics, money, and other mechanical shifts to inventory management.