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ZAM Exclusive: New FFXIV InformationJun 3rd, 2009 at 3:18 PM by Pikko

The citizens of Vana'diel watched live blogs this morning, eagerly awaiting any news about the exciting new title Final Fantasy XIV Online, just announced yesterday. With the press conference transcript still to come, the team at ZAM put together a list of additional questions not posed earlier today in the hopes that more information was available. Read on for the response!

Discuss this new information on the new FFXIV forums!

The ZAM team sent a total of 10 questions to Square Enix this morning. Of these 10, four are answered below.

>> Will current owners of the Square Enix Security Token be able to use the same token they use in FFXI to secure their FFXIV account?

Players who have already obtained a SQUARE ENIX Security Token and have been using an OTP for FINAL FANTASY XI will not need to purchase a new one, and will be able to use their current one for XIV.

>> Will Final Fantasy XIV be available on Direct2Drive at launch?

Because of the estimated size of the game, we are aiming for a package release. However, we are also considering distribution via download.

>> People were ecstatic to hear about the beta. Can you tell us anything about it? Will it be a closed or open beta?

We are planning both closed and open beta testing periods. The schedule is not yet decided.

>> You've confirmed that FFXIV will not be using PlayOnline. Will FFXI continue to be launched through PlayOnline or will it be done away with completely?

As long as FINAL FANTASY XI service continues, PlayOnline will continue.

For the rest of the questions we don’t have any comment at this time. Glad to see you guys excited about FINAL FANTASY XIV!

Full list of questions asked:

You stated today that the races were ported over to FFXIV to make FFXI players comfortable in the new game, but will their backgrounds be the same or are the similarities only aesthetic?

Will current owners of the Square Enix Security Token be able to use the same token they use in FFXI to secure their FFXIV account?

Could you elaborate a bit more on how you will make the job system different from FFXI? Will players be able to play all job classes from the start rather than have to progress to a certain point to gain access to an Advanced job?

Will Fan Festivals now combine both FFXI and FFXIV players? If so, will we be able to hear any of the new score at this year's Fan Festival?

It took more than six years for a male mithra to make any kind of entrance into FFXI, will players be able to play a male mithra character from the start? What was the original reasoning behind making Mithras a female only race?

Campaign and Besieged have both been, without a doubt, very successful battle systems for FFXI. When you say that you will be implementing systems not previously utilized by MMO titles, does this include FFXI or will you implement a different version of your most successful systems into FFXIV?

The FFXI developers have always seemed to look upon true PvP with distaste, at least in Vana'diel. Will this outlook change in any way for FFXIV? Will you have special PvP servers for players who are attracted to this style of playing?

Will Final Fantasy XIV be available on Direct2Drive at launch?

People were ecstatic to hear about the beta. Can you tell us anything about it? Will it be a closed or open beta?

You've confirmed that FFXIV will not be using PlayOnline. Will FFXI continue to be launched through PlayOnline or will it be done away with completely?

Tags: FinalFantasyXIV, E3-2009, FinalFantasyXI, News

Comments

Not Budging

# Jun 16 2009 at 4:13 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1592342633367

14 posts

I'm not movng, mainly because it ain't coming for xbox360 and I ain't got the money for a PS3 for 1 game, also my mum has a spare PS3 not being used but still thats not the point. Can't believe they can just dump FFXI and bring a new one, but i get the feeling everyone is already gonna go especially the ODIN server so I'll need to head back to Call Of Duty for my fun again.

Final Fantasy XIV

# Jun 08 2009 at 2:11 PM Rating: Default

__DEL__1649292727579

5 posts

Why isn't this game on the xbox360? That's BS, that it comes out on Ps3! And will this be the end for new content for XI?
I don't know about anyone else, but I've put far too much time and effort to just throw my FFXI character away.

US accounts and EU creditcards

# Jun 05 2009 at 7:16 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1592791840126

Scholar

6,424 posts

A complicated question I'd like to know the answer to:
I'm a EU resident with a EU creditcard, playing and paying via PlayOnlineUS. For the Security Token I had to make a SquareEnixUS account and link it to my PlayOnlineUS account. If FFXIV uses the SquareEnixUS account, will I be forced to import US versions of the game and future expansions (like I do for FFXI)? Will I even be able to us that same creditcard for FFXIV, or do I have to make a second SquareEnix account for the EU and FFXIV?

Other important considerations

# Jun 05 2009 at 1:32 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1591952938584

165 posts

Why doesn't anyone ask the important question of, "Will JP and NA/EU/AU/whatever be on mixed servers?"

I know that many players wish for separate servers. Others, like me, would never play on a segregated server. Maybe SE will make mixed and separated servers so we, the players, can decide.

Also, SE, you better freakin' give us a Japanese IME in FFIV or you can forget about me ever playing the NA version v.v

Other important considerations

# Jun 08 2009 at 8:58 AM Rating: Good

ImmortalAlchemist

Guru

2,885 posts

Vancar wrote:

Why doesn't anyone ask the important question of, "Will JP and NA/EU/AU/whatever be on mixed servers?"

I know that many players wish for separate servers. Others, like me, would never play on a segregated server. Maybe SE will make mixed and separated servers so we, the players, can decide.

Also, SE, you better freakin' give us a Japanese IME in FFIV or you can forget about me ever playing the NA version v.v

It hasn't been asked because this question has been asked several times and SE already gave us the answer at the press conference. They said that all servers will be worldwide. This could change depending on the feedback from Beta, but as of right now, there will not be servers segregated by region.

____________________________

Tummie - Garuda/Lakshmi (Retired)

Return1 argued with Mellowy and wrote:

Seriously, you won't be @#%^ing happy until SE releases a full sized Bahamut avatar you can @#%^ing ride and use to kill players that annoy you, one shot AV/PW/Shinryuu, and burn the FFXI nations to the @#%^ing ground for fun. All while actually restoring mp used instead of costing any.

Other important considerations

# Jun 05 2009 at 7:02 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1592791840126

Scholar

6,424 posts

Vancar wrote:

Why doesn't anyone ask the important question of, "Will JP and NA/EU/AU/whatever be on mixed servers?"

I know that many players wish for separate servers. Others, like me, would never play on a segregated server. Maybe SE will make mixed and separated servers so we, the players, can decide.

Also, SE, you better freakin' give us a Japanese IME in FFIV or you can forget about me ever playing the NA version v.v

I think they will continue with the mixed region servers, since it's one of the big selling points of FFXI. You might not speak the same language, but if people know their job it doesn't matter since the auto-translator has just enough functionality to deal with that.

#REDACTED, Posted: Jun 03 2009 at 4:27 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) I think it will be nice to see SE to implement what Everquest did and allow importation of XI characters to XIV.

hoping for importation similar to Everquest

# Jun 03 2009 at 6:53 PM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1592345620963

494 posts

http://www.zam.com/story.html?story=18286#comments

According to that, transfers will not be possible.

Digital Distribution

# Jun 03 2009 at 3:25 PM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1653869779729

Scholar

340 posts

Hmmmm... think they'll distribute FFXIV through Steam?

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 03 2009 at 2:59 PM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1592345620963

494 posts

The first thing they need is a decent UI that can be upgraded as needed. FFXI's UI may have been good at release (ie the macros/macro bars), but they never truly upgraded it. It got to the point where it dragged the playability of the game down.

Secondly, in tandem with the UI problem, they need to be less **** about add-ons. WoW has shown that add-ons are important to a large portion of the MMO community who like to customize their game while still following the user agreement. FFXI was around before WoW, but now that WoW is out things have changed across the entire MMO genre. New games need to take these changes into account to remain appealing.

Playonline wasn't a terrible system I thought, but I won't miss it. I just hope it isn't replaced by something worse.

Between the atrocious UI, **** add-on policy, and the heavy level grinding (to get your first 75, pre-level sync), I feel they turned away a lot of potential customers. Of course, a fair number of people still play today, so maybe all that stuff works for some people.

On a final note, level sync is the best idea they ever introduced into the game and I hope they have a similar mechanic in FFXIV or less penalty on level spread within a group.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 03 2009 at 11:40 PM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1707092191686

Sage

1,218 posts

In response to Sorlac, many of the UI/addon issues are not going to change very much, since the game is not PC exclusive. I'm sure that S-E did not mandate a static UI because they don't see the value of customization, but because of the unfairness (perceived or real) of allowing PC users an advantage that console users didn't have access to.

Unless they do something unprecedented with the data structure of FFXIV on the PS-3, I'm not really sure how they'd be able to allow user made addons in a way that is fair to console users.

Things like allowing longer macros, better inventory management, etc are logical evolution, regardless of platform, but addons and deep UI customization (like what you see in WoW) seem unlikely.

I wonder though if they will continue the practice of allowing unlimited gear swapping, which is more than half the reason that players want long macros in the first place.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 05 2009 at 9:01 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1632097789857

Scholar

1,372 posts

KarlHungis wrote:

In response to Sorlac, many of the UI/addon issues are not going to change very much, since the game is not PC exclusive. I'm sure that S-E did not mandate a static UI because they don't see the value of customization, but because of the unfairness (perceived or real) of allowing PC users an advantage that console users didn't have access to.

Unless they do something unprecedented with the data structure of FFXIV on the PS-3, I'm not really sure how they'd be able to allow user made addons in a way that is fair to console users.

Things like allowing longer macros, better inventory management, etc are logical evolution, regardless of platform, but addons and deep UI customization (like what you see in WoW) seem unlikely.

I wonder though if they will continue the practice of allowing unlimited gear swapping, which is more than half the reason that players want long macros in the first place.

The PS3 is not the PS2 however. The PS3 has WiFi, a browser, and an easily replacable HDD. They could, if they wanted to, make it possible to download add-ons and customize UI(the latter being possible with the PS2).

Many games nowadays have sections where you can download user-created content into your game. However, SE would either have to have a area to create the UIs in the game itself, release some sort of SDK or modders would have to learn to code things for the PS3 themselves then SE would have to allow people to load them in their game.

It's completely possible, it's whether or not SE wants it to happen or not.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 04 2009 at 2:13 AM Rating: Default

__DEL__1704672984074

Sage

863 posts

I honestly don't really see why they make it for console to begin with. Looking back at FFXI all I can see that has been gained via having it on console as well as PC is problems. They talk about PS2 limitations preventing many things to be changed, yet they do the same thing all over again.

All the things you mentioned with macros, UI, addons etc etc are just examples, graphics is another. Like many say, PS3 is a beast now, but it won't be in a not too distant future. So why even make it for PS3? I'd like to have that question answered from SE tbh. I mean, it is probably due to money or something of the like, but somehow I'd like to hear SE explain their reasoning anyway if nothing else just to get an idea of how they think.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 04 2009 at 2:47 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1591893960199

14 posts

If SE could only develop FFXIV for one system, I think it would be PS3. Luckily they can and are developing it for PC too.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 04 2009 at 2:37 AM Rating: Good

__DEL__1594573336911

Sage

166 posts

It's due to the Japanese fan-base. If they were dealing primarily with North America the problem wouldn't exist. Dealing with the Japanese player-base though, to a large extent, requires supporting consoles.

That being said, speaking as a PC gamer, for all of the successes FFXI has had, it has also been a sweeping indictment of MMOs in general on console systems. When the lifespan of a game is longer than the lifespan of the hardware, inevitably problems arise. It brought in more customers, but at what cost in numbers of PC gamers? Without console support, and with a bit of foresight, FFXI could be challenging WoW right now; makes one wonder if it's a very sound business decision.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 08 2009 at 5:33 PM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1717978565550

Scholar

3,599 posts

VhailorEmp wrote:

It's due to the Japanese fan-base. If they were dealing primarily with North America the problem wouldn't exist. Dealing with the Japanese player-base though, to a large extent, requires supporting consoles.

That being said, speaking as a PC gamer, for all of the successes FFXI has had, it has also been a sweeping indictment of MMOs in general on console systems. When the lifespan of a game is longer than the lifespan of the hardware, inevitably problems arise. It brought in more customers, but at what cost in numbers of PC gamers? Without console support, and with a bit of foresight, FFXI could be challenging WoW right now; makes one wonder if it's a very sound business decision.

You realize the importance of the Japanese players yet you think that if it was PC only FFXI would be more popular that WoW???

Do you ACTUALLY know how many console players FFXI has? Nearly EVERY Japanese player is on PS2. In Japan apartments/homes/living spaces aren't very big at all. A dishwashing machine is a very rare thing in Tokyo. So they also don't have giant computers on a desk in a study room.

I am very happy with console support. I can play XI on my laptop but I highly doubt I can play XIV on it. I will need to play on my PS3 or not play at all. And even with "PS2 Limitations" FFXI looks better graphically.

"PS2 Limitations" has only limited inventory, hairstyle changes, and other minor things. Half of the reason we still have a game to play is from console support, and it's FFXI's strongest selling point. Hardly any mmo's support consoles.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 10 2009 at 12:20 AM Rating: Decent

__DEL__1707092191686

Sage

1,218 posts

Louiscool wrote:

You realize the importance of the Japanese players yet you think that if it was PC only FFXI would be more popular that WoW???

The Japanese players are obviously very important to S-E because that is the fan base they best understand. However, looking at the MMO market globally, Japan is significant, but not as significant as China, The United States, Europe, or even arguably Korea.

It is not a question of how important the console platform is for Japanese gamers or for S-E, but how important the console platform is for the world as a whole. WoW has 11 million customers, even though I'm sure FFXI is kicking their butt in Japan itself.

If catering to an extra 250,000 Japanese players is costing them 2.5 million NA, Europe or Chinese players, then it might not be a good business decision. However, I can respect the desire of S-E to make games that are first and foremost appealing to Japan, and it's not as if that decision makes them irrelevant outside of Japan.

Personally, I will play FFXIV on PC, because I have a high end gaming PC with a video card that cost more than my PS-3, but if I didn't have such a machine, I wouldn't mind having the option to play a quality MMO on PS-3 instead.

in the unlikely event they read this

# Jun 10 2009 at 9:27 PM Rating: Default

__DEL__1717978565550

Scholar

3,599 posts

Korea and China both suffer from the same computer quandary as Japan.

WoW is 11 million English speaking players. It's popularity has nothing to do with being a pc game and everything to do with its ease and accessibility.

If WoW was also on console systems it would be even more popular. Limiting a game to only one format is NOT the way to increase sales or subscriptions. The more platforms the better.

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