Translation Japanese to English

[Reinheart]

Todays Rep/Dev posts - posting short version of what I posted on twitter
Got Gamewatch article to post + 2.1 patch note YoshiP commentary stuff to post afterwards.

Triairy explains that how you can't give commands to arc/sch/smn pet while in Free Fight is working as intended. 2.0 method was a bug

Lastygalle explains for Beastmen Daily, at Rank1 you can only take 3 per beastmen camp, Rank 2 will increase to 6 per camp.

Gamepad users - Minagawa-san confirms it's a bug where if you run + move camera and hold L1 to zoom becoming auto-run. They will fix

[Reinheart]

This is going to be looooong.

I already had this finished and was up on google doc for public view so you may have already read the original translation but here's the cleaned up version (just removed JP text)
** please don't post in here for a bit, going to be posting multiple posts **

12/12/13 Game Watch Interview - Pre-patch 2.1 interview

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Source : http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/interview/20131212_627098.html

** Just heads up this first half of the interview doesn’t have much new information, hardly any new information imo. 2nd half might have more information. This one is all talk based on the current game and what’s been said on P.Letter Live X

* some parts are reworded, it’s not all 100% direct translation.


GW: I have checked out the 10th Producer Letter Live but the player reaction is great. When looking at the forums I can see some pretty harsh comments in there (laugh)


Yoshida: That’s the thrilling part of doing the live broadcast, and as long as people are still saying something about it it’s still good (sarcastic laugh)


GW: That’s true. For some online games, when it gets really bad player won’t even say a word and just leave.


Yoshida: Before the 10th Letter Live I posted 4 posts on the forums and was looking at the amount of views for it and noticed that when comparing to previous FFXIV the number doesn’t match, was thinking I should change the policy.


GW: What do you mean by number not matching?


Yoshida: I feel as many of the players who started from FFXIV ARR doesn’t really have any interest in the current forums. That’s why they don’t check it out. This is different from the previous FFXIV, and maybe the changes done to the forum is affecting the results of amount of views?


GW: I see. You’re posting all the Letter Live compilation onto the forums now, even with that there isn’t much users viewing?


Yoshida: Hmm, yes, when looking at the amount of players that signed up there isn’t much viewing. This is also showing up on Twitter as well, we haven’t been getting much questions during the live as well. Most are viewing the broadcast in real time, then posting the comments on the tweet. We’re happy to see the comments, comments such as “Really looking forward to it!” encourages us so we’re happy to get those.


GW: That’s odd, I was viewing the forums with lots of questions and was thinking the forums were lively. So there is fewer questions via Twitter now.


Yoshida: I believe this is also the part that changed from the previous FFXIV. Back then people said the forum is part of FFXIV’s main content (laugh).


GW: That’s interesting. So the player base varies and the type of player base is changing as well.


Yoshida: Although more chaotic, more comments can be seen on 2 channel. Game itself is an entertainment so players just take in what they are given, that’s normal, but at same time if they get bored of it, that’s it, they will leave without saying anything. That’s the reality. For those posting on the forums are the ones who really want the game to be better and reason why they are posting. However for LIVE we should be focusing on what the development team thinks is going to be the most interesting feature of the next patch. I believe we need deliver those to people who are looking forward to them. Apologizing in every broadcast feels like it’s going off track from the main purpose of the broadcast. They are our important customers so we have to make sure to not get too much off track. We are thinking about this while looking at the numbers. For the things a lot of the community is worried about we’ll go over it in the beginning of the broadcast then have everyone enjoy the broadcast, I believe we should go with that direction right now.


GW: How will the forums run in future?


Yoshida: That’s the part I’m still trying to figure out. For me the User Interface discussion is running really well, we have some simple requests, but also noticed right now people posting are those who can think of something now. That’s because Minagawa (FFXIV:ARR Lead UI artist) is responding with what can and can’t be done. Because other sections are too busy, number of my post has been less, that’s true, so maybe I should post some more to get discussion going more...... But to do that there are too many parts to cover. If we can narrow it down to just UI like how Minagawa is doing it’s possible but whatever comment I give is taken too seriously, so not sure what to do.


GW: That’s true. In the previous LIVE there was a comment saying Yoshida-san protects the Black Mages. For players playing other DPS jobs, they may feel frustrated, and as I expected that’s what happened on the forums. First thing I wanted to ask in this interview is what did you really want to say at that time?


Yoshida: It’s basically what I stated.


GW: So for you, as a black mage once they run out of MP that’s part of their risk and that’s their responsibility to manage the MP and reason why it’s balanced out with others? If you look at this from other close range DPS or other caster jobs, when the battle is prolonged they run out of TP or MP for healing, to manage that there isn’t much options available to do that. I believe this is bit unfair.


Yoshida: First off just looking at the TP and MP won’t be enough for discussion. You have to look at those individual jobs roles, their abilities, HP, MP, all of these have to be put together for balance. Also for class/jobs being fair/unfair is all part of regular MMORPG operation, so what I stated is just that, there isn’t anything more or less to it. When answering that question I had to think a little but even if I get into too much details it’s endless, so it was simply answered that way. Also even if you say you can have infinite MP, if you try to get the right amount of DPS out you'll need player skills to do so, right?


GW: That’s true. However, to go through MP rotation it doesn’t require difficult technique. Once you get used to it anyone can do this.


Yoshida: Is that really true? For example for Titan HM, is it possible to dodge the slides and tumults while counting how many more seconds left until the buff wears off. Make sure the Proc is taking effect without wasting and using MP near depletion then using Lv3 bfuf to rotate the casting time to dodge the bosses attack, rotate the MP without lowering the DPS. This isn’t something anyone can do. There is a difference in where one can use the job to it’s fullest instead of just being simple.


GW: So that’s your reason why you mentioned to the players to try out Black Mage. You don’t want players to talk about Black Mage from a point where they haven’t learned any additional skills or how the play style is different at post level 50.


Yoshida: Previously, during the beta test I have talked about how the battle system alone doesn’t have much meaning by itself, it needs to be played as a battle content, if you just look at the system along you’ll only see something simple. If you just basically run through quest based leveling to 50 any class/job’s difficulty is pretty much the same. Also saying that other class/job is too strong! goes with any MMORPG, if you feel that way, try that class/job yourself to experience yourself. In FFXIV we have a armoury system, you can raise other class/jobs with the same character, and compared to other games the leveling is much easier. Up till Ifrit HM or Garuda Hm you don’t even need Darklight gear. If you feel that class/job is super strong, why not try it, it’s a waste for not trying......


GW: I bet you the users will say this “YoshiP, that’s not what we’re talking about, I want to play Dragoon” and as a result it’s separating the close range DPS and ranged DPS.


Yoshida: Yes, but I believe it’s normal for people to get jealous of other players class/job.


GW: So, you’re saying If you think that class/job is strong then use it?


Yoshida: I’m a human too, I have emotions too. When I look at the player who’s really good at playing Summoner, I will feel “Hey that’s strong!?” For those class/jobs I don’t use and feel strong, I would get jealous of them...... I feel this because I like playing my own class/job. This is same for everyone, including me. We received a lot of comments regarding Black Mages from different view points, there were some that just gave out rumors and also comments to provoke me. So picking up those, there was a talk about MP so as my result I simply replied “If you really feel that Black Mages are strong, why don’t you try it out!” If you still feel that it’s strong, then you can continue to play Black Mage, for those that want to go full on Dragoon I can respect that as I like playing Black Mage myself. I believe it would be better to discuss about the Dragoons strength rather than talking about Black Mages.


Job A & B isn’t the same job. If you bring the features from job A into B there is no point to it. It’s better to bring out the features of that job more, by making it same it will just end up with weakening each others strong points and it’s just going to make it even more pointless. However, A & B both play the same role, and if there is a difference in that roles basic part then we’ll need to make adjustments. This is what happened between Paladins and Warriors, or where close range DPS and ranged DPS’s damage output difference. For that reason, instead of weakening the stronger one, we’re going to strengthen those to balance it out.


With the amount of time given for the producer letter live, I had to decide if going into details regarding this is going to fulfill a lot of players interest. I believe it would be better to talk about the upcoming patch contents more. But at same time I can’t just ignore the matter, so I responded with a simple answer along with a video. If we really got into the details it’s endless. Being able to rotate the MP is part of Black Mages restriction. While Black Mages DPS is strong, drinking potions or ether won’t be enough to case the spell, that’s how big the MP costs are. For this reason we have convert to avoid this situation, but the recast timer is set to be longer. You have to switch between stances, if you miss this even once it will be hard to recover.


Of course jobs that uses a lot of MP such as White Mage and Scholars have to watch their MP, however for these it’s designed so they have to manage the MP closely. With a design where there is infinite MP while having strong cure spells won’t be good for battle content balancing. You’ll mainly be using low cost cure spells as base and continue to do so. Black mages Fire 3 or Fire 1 while having Astral Fire III uses a lot of MP, casting spells 4 times requires you to think about switching the stance, however when you use Blizzard III when the fire just proc kicked in... I won’t go any further but it’s pretty hard and there are detailed restrictions. I want everyone to know that instead of comparing one another that this is difference in the jobs design.


Because there is a way to heal MP, that alone could be troublesome at same time it’s designed so that you may make mistakes. Comparing it to the DPS you do on the dummies in town and what you do in the actual battle content is totally different. Depending on the stance if you do it right, you can continue to refill the MP while not losing the DPS, this is the strong feature. On the hand you have to constantly keep thunder up, have to stop to cast, can’t stop casting, make sure you don’t run out of MP, casting time loss is not allowed. If you’re late on casting as a DPS role you won’t be able to output as much damage.


GW: So basically what you said in the LIVE is really just that. But for me personally, I finally understood what it meant now, I believe this is same for others too.


Yoshida: The meaning is just just. I don’t think it’s the right direction to go over this over 40 minutes time in the live broadcast. Also I mentioned this during the live but currently the most balanced job is Black Mage. They have wall, magic barriers and ether step, rest is to simple output DPS. However the amount of actions available for all jobs are the same, for that reason, for Black Mages they don’t have any specific role while fighting a boss. They can defend themselves, support others, move in fast, or deal damage. You have sleep but that doesn’t work on bosses so.......In the end you have to be able to output the most DPS or others will just tell you “We don’t need you”. That’s how this job is. They have to fight with this restrinction and pressure as a Black mage. However it’s true that it’s well balanced for both attacking and defence.


GW: I see. It may be that there is only limited dungeons where we can do repeatedly and how the black mages range attack is taking in a lot of effect making it seem that way.


Yoshida: There is also a bug for flare casting speed, so right now it will feel that Black Mages are standing out.


PR Staff: Talking from healers point of view, when we say we want Black Mage is that when we have a black mage that takes away one role from healers for Wanderers Palace.

Yoshida: You won’t have to put in repose, however there are many enemy inside Wander who are resistant to sleep effect, instead of concentrating on aoe sleep, there are times when it’s better for black mages to concentrate on damage while white mages pinpointing a target to sleep. But this is all case-by-case like if you have different strategy or new player in there. If you just think about aoe damaging for 4 players dungeon then as a DPS there is going to be parts where some are more convenient/inconvenient than others. This is true. However just talking about that I believe is different. Also there is that I have been mentioning that I play Black Mage, but I think this would be same if I said I was playing another job as well.


GW: I remember talking to Tanaka Hiromichi san regarding job balance in FFXI for Zilart and CoP. Was where we said Paladins were too strong and Warriors weren’t good, or how Red mage was too strong. For overall MMO this is one of the fun things to talk about (laugh).


Yoshida: It’s up to the person to feel if that’s fun or not, but this does linger around MMORPG’s (laugh)


GW: You’re the type of person that sticks out and as a gamer say a lot of stuff, the weight of comment is different so the players take it in good/bad. For example for Warrior players they are probably feeling happy silently looking at Paladins, while Bard players are feeling that their heart is going to stop because something that’s going to removed.


Yoshida: Since it was the first update I felt that the balancing adjustment needed to be mentioned beforehand. For Bards we were thinking that they can deal high instant DPS while they run out of breath fast, have a risk/return. For each boss phases they can continue to deal DPS resulting in much more DPS that what was estimated. Also a lot of party roles were concentrated, and reason why I mentioned it will be adjusted. But going into details about this one during Live is also different from the purpose of the live, so I want to be more careful from next time. For all the bards out there, it’s really a small change so please do not worry.


GW: I want to go over one basic stance, when physical type jobs are in long duration battles they run out of TP. This is the users using too much TP, and they need to learn to stop, or put in instance where they don’t use TP to adjust, is that how it is?


Yoshida: We put in couple adjustments, but in general I would have to respond to that question with a “yes”. There is some time to catch your breath between phase changes so by making adjustments there is part of player skill. Also from damage calculation by balancing it out that will show. This goes same for the proc rate but it’s going to be too detailed if we get into that.


GW: I see, so the Tp running out is basically part of the player skill, and that you’ll continue to observe and make adjustments as needed.


Yoshida: Yes. It’s not only this time but we’ll be making detailed adjustments every time. However saying this will end up with people saying, “How about my job?” or “How about that job?” so I believe we shouldn’t talk about it until the patch. For those that saw the live it wouldn’t be much problem, but when that message gets transferred and people hear “nerf” that part alone gets spread out. I learned that this time. But for Warriors, we made a big mistake on our end so we had to give out the details before hand.


GW: I was curious regarding Warriors, in the previous LIVE you mentioned that Warriors are actually strong but people haven’t used to it fully. I believe what you said then and the major change isn’t really consistent.


Yoshida: Due to the usefulness in Bahamut’s Coil was too great, we had to make major changes.


GW: So you believe that it’s well balanced outside of Bahamut?


Yoshida: I believe there isn’t any issue at all with Titan HM, it’s really up to the impression. The dev team and I have made adjustments to Bahamut’s Coil with Paladin and Warrior combination and played through all 5 turns. However at first we were planning to make the difficulty much harder while making the adjustments. If you make a mistake in the step no matter what type of tank you are, paladin or warrior it will be to a point where you can’t handle the numbers, we thought we had it right but through everyone experimenting Paladins were able to withstand that damage. For that reason even though the overall output DPS isn’t there as we estimated they were able to clear it, or a situation when more than 3 buffs stacked the it should of wiped the party but they were able to clear it. This is a good thing, but because of this the strategy was set this way and while working into this strategy it took out the Warriors position. This is the biggest mistake on our part.


We can make adjustments to the content. Make it where Paladins can’t withstand the damage, or weaken the specific action, but doing this will just be repeating the problem. Also people will have an image that if something doesn’t go the way devs didn’t like it’s going to be fixed. Also for something that can be cleared becoming where you can’t clear will also become an issue and problem. We’re going to keep the current strategy but make it where Warriors can do exactly same thing, that’s the direction we took this time. Also how the warrior are being looked at from healers point of view compared to a paladin was a bit confusing which also cause it to be unfavorable job. Warrior can withstand the damage but was designed so it can heal themselves at a fast pace. It’s riskier than Paladin but we were thinking with the amount of healing it can take it’s balanced out. But from healers point of view, the warriors take a lot of damage but they heal fast even if they don’t cast anything on them and confusing them.


We designed Warriors like Berserkers. They fight and in the end use Inner Beast to gain back 300%!. From players point of view, it was a job where it feels good to play. It’s technical job for players, where they feel superior. They can feel like they can withstand damage hit and still be like I’m still good, I’m good... then bam! self heal! From healers point of view, Paladins are hard, and can defend with a stable defense, while Warriors weren't. I believe you really had to know the Warrior to understand when is the best time to heal.
As a result up till Titan it was just different between the jobs features, and where for Ifrit HM Paladin had more advantage for stunning for recast, but in Bahamut’s Coil the difference was too great, and from healers point of view Warriors were too unstable resulting in “Warriors are weak”. So this time, we released all the information, and it will go through major changes. I have mentioned that it will be strong and hard. We have to make sure when others look at Warriors that they clearly see that they are harder and stronger now.


GW: I see, so the major changes for the Warrior is to try and get rid of the misinformation being spread


Yoshida: For Warriors, yes. I have mentioned in previous live to please experiment, it required the warriors to know when to manage Wrath and use Inner Beast, while the healer also have an understanding, however even though the Warrior knew what they are doing, needing the healers to know that as well was bit too much. It was bit too technical and it’s something we needed to reconsider.


GW: I have been playing since official launch for 3 month now, been playing at my own pace and finally at a point where I’m about to get a relic. I’m still too early for Bahamut. I really think the hard mode primal battles are done really well as a game and a battle. Haven’t won much but as my gear gets better the chances of winning have increased, it’s really fun to play.


Yoshida: You’re playing the best way it should be played. I believe that pace would be the best where you won’t feel pressured and feel just right.


GW: I’m playing Paladin right now but I really want to try out other roles for the hard mode primal battles. However, on the other hand aside from the gear issue, I also felt that there will people that will have a really hard time clearing. On top of the hard mode primal battles you have relic. I want to know are relics supposed to be something anyone can obtain, or the difficulty is set to a point where you need some skills and gear in order to obtain them.


Yoshida: For relics as long as you have some skill and communication, it’s not too hard to obtain. That’s how it was set and released.


GW: For example, no matter how well geared you are and you remembered the gimmicks, if you make any small mistakes or people die from lag resulting in a wipe. I would like to enjoy the end contents so I want to get relic but haven’t gotten there yet. This is bit hard for them.


Yoshida: Yes. for those people the current FFXIV ARR is tight for them. I believe the answer to this one is half of 2.1. Right now FFXIV is made of strength = wall of difficulty, the contents only goes upwards. No matter what kind of player you are the goal is all same. For that reason no matter if you tried to help others by telling them don’t give up, there are people that will be saying this is impossible for me, it’s just not possible.


GW: Yes, we have people like that in the LS and FC.


Yoshida: That’s our fault for not having the content prepared. That’s why in order to spread out the motivation of players in 2.1 we have different types of contents released at the same time. This is one of the reason why it was done this way. Right now you only had to PvE, basically fight monsters. And on top of that contents were all stacked on top, at same time the difficulty increases. Up till lv50 players not used to playing games can get up there, we made adjustments so that’s possible. However you’ll have people that can clear Ifrit HM, and somehow you just followed people and cleared Garuda HM, but it’s impossible to clear Titan HM. I believe there are a lot of people with this situation.
In order to resolve this was Alagan Tomestones, however even this was placed in end contents to collect. This time we’re adding a new Sirius dungeon, and two additional hard mode dungeons which is higher tier of Amdapore, however we are lowering the difficulty of Amdapore and this will be easier to clear. For those that was to casually collect tokens, those that was to collect tokens at a good rate, they both can do so without getting in each others way. We prepared many contents for patch 2.1.
Of course for those that are tired of continuously repeating, speed running, aoe burning through dungeons can choose to slower their pace. By using the Content Roulette you can collect 200 points per day. For example if you select a low level, you can go through dungeon without much gimmicks and get 200 philo bonus.


GW: Philo 200? That’s double of current max, that’s a lot.


Yoshida: Yes. The original structure was for those casual players to be able to obtain as patch eases the contents. When it’s first released it will be hard, in the next patch it will ease a bit, in the next patch it will increase in the item level cap. And patch after that will ease and go through the same process. That is how it is designed. In 2.1 you’ll be able to obtain stones from different contents, so you don’t have to go through dungeons, for example you’ll have a chance where stones will come out from treasure hunt, or through beastmen daily quest. We can finally spread the players motivation towards their goals through different contents. When it becomes 2.2 the item level cap will increase, and the new designs and strength will become motivation for top players. This is the base cycle. Since there was a delay in the patch, we’re sorry for the current situation but we’re going to going to fix this while aiming for this goal.


GW: So it’s going to be at one point where item level 95 is the standard?


Yoshida: once the cap is increased we’ll go further. The item level equals the content, and in order to not rush the difficulty we’re going to keep this margin.


GW: So it’s going to increase a lot. But in 2.1 the item level isn’t going to increase at all?


Yoshida: We’ll make the Alagan weapons 95, but for damage/stats it’s not too extreme. I’m sure players can calculate the amount. We made this adjustment this time to give motivation to the players who clear the hardest boss Twintania in Bahamuts Coil, so we increased by 5.
We’re still making adjustments to how much we’ll increase on the item level in 2.2 so I’m not going to answer that but depending on that there will be a new type of stone, and for those who wants to get those gears will working into accumulating tokens for that and get them. By that time Titan HM should be easy. Since you can defeat it faster with higher DPS, it will lessen the amount of mistakes, if the defense goes up you shouldn’t die even you missed.


GW: How about those that get hit by Land Slide?


Yoshida: For Land Slide, hmm, we did put in position check update which still keeps it as an online game but feels better.... all I can say is please dodge it (laugh). However by DPS increase even if one drops it should be easy to break the heart, it’ll be something like that.


GW: I see, since overall will increase.


Yoshida: Yes. It will increase depending on the amount of people. For example, if you tried the battle with 7 players who has allagan weapons right now, even if one drops I’m sure it will be still easy to beat Titan HM. That’s due to the difference in DPS. Like right now most people go into Titan HM with item level 70, which is the dark light gear. They don’t want to die and get embarrassed so those people will probably get darklight gear first to go in. But in patch 2.1 we’ll have Crystal Tower which rewards level 80 gear, which will make it easier to clear. Even if you get hit by one tumult you should be able to withstand and as long as heal is there on time it will be eased. Also not only for gears but as we move on to future patches we’re looking into easing the contents by adding player side buffs, if at that time you go in with the best gears first you may feel like you’re fighting a trash mob.


If we were able to release the patch 2.1 which was planned originally for end of November, it would’ve added contents just around the time people felt there isn’t much things to do now, and people probably would’ve said they didn’t really have to try so hard on Titan, they could of challenged after getting better gear first. The delay is my fault for not giving the correct estimates, dev team and I am working hard right now for this. Please hang in there.
What I’m telling both the development and operation team is that we need to go full on but make sure to not get impatient. The main goal for 2.1 is to make sure to deliver all the additional contents (widen the options). We can’t split that up, I told them to just go as planned, but make sure not to drop anything (don’t delay anything). If we release everything in bits it’s going to confuse everything else.


For example say there are 3 pillars in 2.1. If all three is released at once, players with limited time of play due to their normal life style has a choice to choose from. If we were to release just one for example Treasure Hunt. Everyone will all concentrate on that one. They will stop all other existing content but concentrate on this one new content. Treasure hunt is meant to be one of the options you have to choose from what to do in that day, it’s not something to be repeatedly played over and over. You simply pick up a treasure map, decode it, go to destination to find the chest, and fight. If you just do that every day you’re going to get bored.


GW: I see. So even if you release just one, the volume is not isn’t enough to sustain players playing full on.


Yoshida: yes. The volume in that situation is the volume for the entire selection, not just that single content. For example we released Treasure hunt first then Beastmen daily later. People would get tired of Treasure hunt so it won’t become part of the option. Beastmen daily, there is a set amount of quests you can take per day, however you can repeat those quests, it’s solo content where you can work on every day. For those players looking for challenging content they would say “It’s solo, and you can only do a limited amount per day......”
Next say we released extreme primal after that. Good thing about primal battles is that you can go directly into the boss battle, it’s casual yet hard, on the other hand you don’t have to work to get there (run through dungeon). You can repeat the battle as much as well. So in the end it’ll end up where once you get the item you want, that’s it for this. I don’t want to make it where the drop rate is 1% so players have to continue to keep on going for their items to drop.


If we were to release things in bits like this, we need about 4-7 days most mastering check, and it will take more time to release. And with that much more extra time put in by the time everything is released people will already be bored. Even though it may look like a lot of content for new players for existing users they won’t feel the same way. If we are going to continue this for 10 years we need to make the base/foundation or it’s going to get harder in the long run. We want to release the patches as early as possible but we said to lets make sure and not to rush things out.


GW: I see. So will this method of release going to continue post 2.2?


Yoshida: In patch 2.1 we have Housing and Wolves’ Den so it’s bit special. However as for volume, we will have 3 dungeons, brand new primal battle, PvP update, housing update, story update, UI update, Duty finder update in every patch. We’ll have these in every patch, from there on we’ll add in contents we may come up with and other casual things. That’s the image we have.


GW: You have mentioned some already but I would like to know how you feel personally regarding this 3 month. Was it going as planned, or was there lots of unexpected things? If so what were those?


Yoshida: It depends on the timing. The first two weeks congestion was really unexpeted.


GW: You say that every time, however for me that’s a bit weird. Towards the end of beta phase or during open beta most felt that this is going to bring in a large amount of players. I’m sure you could of guessed the amount of login rate and guess the outcome however it wasn’t physically ready. That’s my understanding.


Yoshida: I have no words to return if people thought that way, it’s true that we inconvenienced and we can only apologize. However, honestly it was beyond our expectations. And that’s because we have been looking at the numbers.


GW: So it was estimated at a lot lower number?


Yoshida: No, we did think that in the end it will reach up to the current records, however the estimate graph was much more narrow. We continued to add worlds since we were looking at the numbers, however we didn’t expect the graph line to go straight upwards, that is my mistake.


GW: After that two weeks it did calm down and became much more stable.


Yoshida: We had to make a lot of settlements. For servers space it’s not just hardware but what costs the most is the space cost. We have to increase the floor space to place those servers. Where I estimated wrong was at the timing of beta, there was fewer rate of people that came back from quitting the previous FFXIV. No matter how much we reached to them with mail, they didn’t participate. I believe those people really waited for the reviews of FFXIV ARR and watched/listened to other players voice before coming back. With those number estimated we expected the graph/slope to be more slower.


GW: I see. Are these the players who challenged the primal battles in a condition where there was huge lags?


Yoshida; No, it’s much earlier. Primal battles came much later. It’s those people that bought FFXIV right after it was released and got disappointed and quit. For those people they didn’t come back to participate in the beta.


GW: First time hearing that one. So you became a little weak?


Yoshida: More like the numbers don’t lie, so I took that in as the result. Being weak after looking at the result would do no good, so it’s my job to think of what to plan next. But I understood how much people really were shocked at the beginning. I thought we had to just keep on going as planned and get reviews from others saying the game is fun to try and have them come back and play again. However, once we opened the game a lot of them came back and that is what surprised me.


GW: I see. So when you calculated from the result, those people didn’t participate in the beta but suddenly started from the official launch after hearing all the good reviews from beta?


Yoshida: Not sure what really happened, it’s hard to break down that part, I think it might not be just the reviews from beta, could be because it got popular so sudden. That’s why I felt that customers are really honest.


GW: Okay so those two weeks passed and over two month passed after, how do you see the players completing contents, the rate they are completing them?


Yoshida: Honestly, I thought it would of been faster to Titan HM.


GW: Faster? So a lot of players took more time?


Yoshida: Not like that, I’ve been watching players play data checking the rate for them reaching the ending. If they played one character with one class directly to the ending it’s about 47 to 53 hours.


GW: That’s for players concentrating on the main story without much side tracking?


Yoshida: Yes. I was thinking from there on people who go straight to the end kept on going faster. However towards the end there are lots of 8 player contents and it requires those players to clear. The speed dropped from there. There were more players who got into crafter/gatherers or into other classes. On the other hand I was thinking there will be a lot of people that will stop to try Bahamut’s Coil but instead there were lots of people challenging it, that was unexpected. There are parts in the Bahamut’s Coil where we made mistakes on the adjustments, originally it was supposed to be much harder. But as a result instead of making it too hard and where it locks players out, we wanted to ease up a bit and be able for players to move on as it also leads towards their motivation.


GW: 50 hours to clear is just like offline game. It’s thought out like a regular RPG.


Yoshida: I think that’s still long for recent games. That is when comparing to stand along game.


GW: That is true. But for MMORPG comparing to FFXI for example, I felt the amount is totally different.


Yoshida: Im sure it’s much different when comparing to FFXI. Even Guild Wars 2 at release timing people capped at 36 hours, and on average was about 47 hours. In current generation having a story driven RPG without being side tracked taking 50 hours is long. I personally feel that’s too much, if it’s me my direction would be like Call of Duty with story for 6 to 9 hours, but has a lot of stuff put into it. To me I think that’s enough.


GW: For FFXIV ARR it’s full MMORPG while having lots contents which can be played for 15, 30 minutes. As for a working person I think that’s the part that encourages to play the game.


Yoshida: If they can look at it that way, I would appreciate much. It’s true that we have each content time short. for example tamtara has been there since alpha, but during close beta and official launch we shortened the dungeon length. We looked at player data and checked how much time it required to clear and shaved off parts of the content. We made adjustments to all the dungeons with Tamtara as a indicator. I believe it’s really important to consider how much time is needed for one content for all the players.


GW: On the other hand, from personally playing I felt that how fast the players became radical was crazy. I have seen many online games, but honestly didn’t think it would be this much in 3 month time. When I’m in Mor Dhona and listening to the shouts, I shocked to see some of them. The requirements is just too crazy I can’t even get in the shouts (laugh).


Yoshida: That’s our responsibility, it’s because the content spread upwards only...... Everyone is concentrating on that one stuff, I have been asking individual medias, maybe you're always in Mor Dhona or Wine port?


GW: I try to stay out of there (laugh). The shouts are pretty crazy. Specific job recruitment shout isn’t bad, but seeing shouts for relic but requirement to get in the party is to have a relic. Or shouts such as people who only cleared Bahamut, who doesn’t need any explanation only. These shouts are narrowing down the player so much. I see these shouts causing players to getting intensified.


Yoshida; I see (laugh) However those 2 locations are only few % of the entire Eorzea. When you look at the entire server having 3,000-5,000 players, those places alone isn’t Eorzea.


GW: So you don’t want us to talk just through image?


Yoshida: That’s why if you think of it was people looking at that narrow point it’s not that strange to see those shouts. I wasn’t playing back then but to study texture loop I logged in FFXI and was looking at the walls on Jeuno, at that time when Jeuno was in it’s peak moment it was prety much the same impression.


GW: Well back then it was more peaceful.


Yoshida: I think that’s because the amount of time needed to reach the level cap is different.


GW: That too, but they had level cap increases in steps so you gradually moved into those hardcore regions, felt that way.


Yoshida: Yes. It’s designed so that leveling is part of the content. Specially for Japanese players, a lot of them like to go through leveling. However leveling takes time, and if you think of it as tutorial like in FFXIV, FFXIV is simply lacking contents. For this one please wait just a bit more, I think you mentioned there are a lot of things that were new to you in FFXIV but I think this would change more at 2.1.


GW: The speed is really fast so I’m surprised.


Yoshida: I believe it is fast. I’m hoping in 2.1 we can let the players feel that they don’t have to rush to reach the end.


GW: Yes it’s important to understand that you don’t have to push yourself to stick with them. We have writers playing FFXIV ARR, even for those people playing MMO daily as work, they see how crazy it is and tell me “Hey it might impossible”, I have to tell them that’s how the game is structured right now so you don’t have to force yourself to get in there, if it’s too hard why not just get into gathering/crafting? (laugh) But, if I think of over their concerned I’m sure lots of regular players are feeling the same way. It’s like you being stuck on a spider web and even though you know you’re most likely not going to win you’re still moving. But you really don’t even have to worry.


Yoshida: I have both types of friends, my MMO friends are regularly going through Bahamut turn 5. On the other hand I have a friend I kept on recommending the MMO who now has 4 jobs caped and two gather/crafter class capped.


GW: They are both playing full on (laugh).


Yoshida: But the 2nd friend stopped at Ifrit HM (laugh). Didn’t go any further. He’s like “Relic? What? I don’t care about that now, I’m leveling gatherer/crafter.” For friend like that he’s not really too much into the next patch information and just casually playing. For the other friend going to Bahamut turn 5, he keeps on telling me “Give me the next end content right away!”. In patch 2.1 we’re going to have party recruit system. Through there you can form parties who only has glowing relics. You can be playing a crafter class and when you see something you like you can join in on that group. If you’re lazy and don’t care what kind of party to be with you can use the duty finder as well, there will be more options to forming/joining so I hope you’ll see those things in 2.1.


GW: Looking forward to that.


Yoshida: You can play Treasure Hunt from Level 30, and you can play different contents. Gatherers will find the map, there are maps from grade 1 through 5, so please take that along with your daily adventure.


GW: Can all three types of gathers find it?


Yoshida: Yes. You’ll obtain them while going through regular gathering. By decoding it you’ll be able to see a small map. Grade 1 through 3 can be soloed easily. Grade 4 can be soloed in general, however the difficulty is set to about where you need lv50 and try just a bit to clear. I believe for treasure hunt you can enjoy on your own, only grade 5, that one will require about 4 to 6 players.


GW: So does that mean we get a boss class mob popping up that requires a Lv50 party?


Yoshida: Could be one strong mob or lots of mobs popping at once.


GW: Reminds of me Ultima Online.


Yoshida: In UO we had demons pop out which caused a lot of panic (laugh). Grade 5 is like an extra. Up to grade 4 is the main. Grade 5 is something you can play over the weekend using the party recruit feature or with your group from Free Companies, something like that. You can also sell the maps which hasn’t been decoded on the market as well. Once you decode you can’t trade. Also you can only hold 1 treasure map of each grade for those that have been decoded.


GW: You can only open once a day?


Yoshida: No, you can only decode once per map. You’ll have to trash that map or go get the treasure to decode the next one. Simply you can’t have lots of decoded maps and go through every chest at once. You pull one lottery, you go there and find it. Change to Fighter/Sorcerer and open the chest, take down the monster and take the reward. For rewards there are good stuff and failure (not so good rewards).


GW: What kind of rewards are there?


Yoshida: There are Aether gear, you can also use it to get gil or experience points. For those players capped with the exp on the class/job, you can obtain Algan Tomestone Mytho and Philo. Also you can get materials which can be traded with philo, also some rare crafting materials HQ, other than that you get materials for housing, there are many things.


GW: There are rare drops too?


Yoshida: Yes, and not only just one, there are times you can get 5-6 at once.


GW: So you just go there while you have the map, you get the circle you kind of see in the mission battles, something like that?


Yoshida: No, you have to perform an action “Search”, if that location is the place shown on the map, it will show the treasure chest. It’s really simple. You try to open the chest but mobs pop out so you have to kill them to open it, it’s simple. You were gathering and collected these maps so you can choose to go around them the next day with your battle class. It gives option to the players how they want to go at it.


GW: If a level 50 person is doing it, no matter what rank they do they can obtain tokens?


Yoshida: It needs to be certain grade. Other than that it’s all up to the rate, there may be times you get a lot, and times where you get nothing. If you really want to get them at optimal pace, this isn’t something you want to play to calculate for rewards. If you want to get them at optimal pace, it’s better off running through high level dungeons, sirius.


GW: So it’s more of a solo based content.


Yoshida: It can be solo based, but it’s a choice for players to choose from what they want to do during their play cycle.


GW: Will the Beastmen Daily quest be similar?


Yoshida: Right now the beastmen simple are there to bring down the primals, it looks like people hate them in the world of Eorzea and feels like someone who’s being persecuted. If you look at it from the three nations point of view they are a group that’s causing trouble to them. For example Sylph’s are nice but feels as if people in Gridania is having an issue with them, they say they want to live together, but if there is any troublesome issues they ask the Scions of the seventh dawn. I think that explains relationship between beastmen, but really the trash mobs and the tempered are the ones that became crazy and trying to bring down primals.
Though beastmen daily quest, you can see that they have their own lifestyle, they have a principle and religion, there are those close to people, and those who want to coexist with people, at same time there are those who want their own race to only exist while rest to vanish. Adventurers will communicate with them to learn their lifestyle and solve the issues they have at hand to form a friendship. Through that you can purchase things that are only sold in their region, or obtain things.


GW: As for the system, is it going to be like Grand Company where you have several beastmen tribes and you choose one of them to help them out to gain point to earn different bonuses?


Yoshida: You choose up to 6 quests from the list of quests available every day and clear those to increase friendship.


GW: If you go to the current beastmen fort, you get attacked by them, but in Ever Quest once you gain point you don’t get attacked, is there a system like that?


Yoshida: In general no. If you played EQ you would know but once you do something like that you’ll need a system that balances the allies. If you raise one side you have to lower the other. However in the world of Eorzea there is “Tempered” which places hate against the people, so this time we made it so you can gain allies with all. However for those already “Tempered” will attack you no matter if you are allies with that tribe.


GW: Ah okay, those guys at the bases are all tempered huh.


Yoshida: Yes, we have made sure to separate that part.


GW: I would like to ask you regarding the future of existing contents, first starting off with F.A.T.E. From what I see you can switch to class instead of job or level, put on flash ability and just spam flash. It seems like the game is just for that. I’m serious, or I want to play the way it should be played so I play as that job regularly but I have situation where people say “What the hell are you doing?” (laugh)


Yoshida: Ah, they say, why don’t you spam flash?


GW: Yes. I join F.A.T.E. as WHM to cure people as usual, or put in stone, but there is a mood where people look at you like “Why aren’t you switching back to class and put on flash?” From developers point of view is this kind of play ok?


Yoshida: I have joined F.A.T.E. parties many times but no one has ever said that to me.


GW: No one said this to me in F.A.T.E. party as well but, within LS members, people that are close to me have said this couple of times. The conversation itself regarding this might be rare, might be something not well known, but when I’m participating there someone spamming flash the whole time, so I’m not saying it’s everyone but I wanted to know at what point devs are thinking that this isn’t right, “wait a sec”.


Yoshida: First off, right now there isn’t other ways to gain EXP easily like F.A.T.E. and they are just trying to clear the F.A.T.E. the optimal way possible for them for leveling up.


GW: So that means, the easy leveling in F.A.T.E. was already part of the plan?


Yoshida: Yes. It’s better than not leveling up at all. For F.A.T.E.s you can freely join and freely end, concept is casual. Game isn’t there to make things hard, it’s to have fun. In FFXIV ARR we have an armoury system, and there are lots of things to raise, we don’t have much of “Hey they aren’t playing the way devs planned, we’re going to fix it!”
We don’t want players to feel that they have to play every day and feel like “I don’t want to do this anymore” killing the same monster over and over thinking “what am I doing”...... Once you finally got to the content, others tell you, you have to level this other job too. If that was me in that position I would be frustrated (laugh). In FFXIV ARR we have additional skills, but you don’t have to work really hard into it, that’s how the action levels are set.


GW: You’re interesting person, you came back with an answer I wasn’t expecting (laugh). I was thinking devs were thinking players are playing the way they didn’t plan, I’m sure the NPC’s aren’t expecting adventurers to just come in spam flash, and get full reward with that, thinking that devs will be like “what kind of game is that?” (laugh)


Yoshida: I’m more like impressed that they have studied the system well. The participation points is looking at the amount of hate. However, for a party, it calculates the parties participate so you just need one flash actually to get the required line, you can shorten the clear by dealing more damage so you cna move onto the next F.A.T.E. I think that’s more effective way.


GW: But, even if you don’t know those details system, you just spam flash and you’ll get the experience points.


Yoshida: Using flash is correct method, for me instead of going through 8 player dungeon where you may end up wiping every day, I think it’s okay to go through these type of battle just to have fun. It’s more like an MMO. You can participate while chat freely, I like that environment.


GW: I think so too. That’s why around level 45 F.A.T.E.s you’ll need to fight regularly, and I like those. In Coerthas (sp?) there is the Zvara (sp? dragon battle) where you have continuous F.A.T.E. where you fight a boss in the end and if you don’t fight correctly you can die. That one is exciting and if you clear you get a good amount of experience points. I think there is too many people there, but I think it’s good balance as a game. that’s why I came here today to tell you that it’s better if all F.A.T.E. had that kind of experience, but you’re saying “it’s alright” so that was unexpected (laugh)


Yoshida: Reason why I can say “It’s alright” is because I know what’s inside 2.1. Right now before 2.1 release you really only have F.A.T.E. to easily gain levels without having too much pressure on you. But with treasure hunt you’ll be able to get treasures by defeating 2-3 mobs, if lucky you get crafting materials, you can throw that up on the market, I’m sure there will be those that will be plaing Treasure Hunt. As for Crystal Tower that’s 24 player content, so there some will feel like “it should be ok if I made a small mistake”. As for the top tier players they can pause from running Bahaumt’s Coil turn 5 and try out the extreme primal modes, that will be another option for them. The difficulty is set to right around Turn 4, 5. From Beastmen daily quest there are things you can only purchase from them, you also have beastmen mounts, so you can decide to do that everyday if you wanted to.


What I want to say is with all these type of contents being introduced in 2.1 you may not have as much players participating in F.A.T.E.s as you see now. For that reason, the amount of players doing 1 F.A.T.E. should come down to the estimated number. Once that happens, if you’re just spamming flash you’re going to end up dying. I’m sure it will be exciting like the way you want it. For me F.A.T.E. will be something to do to gain Company Seals or do when I don’t want to run dungeons any more. Use the party recruitment feature to get 8 players and run F.A.T.E. for 3 hours or something like that. I’m hoping it leads to something like that. Most of the general F.A.T.E.s are made so it can be cleared with 4 players, even if you fail it you still can gain experience points from it.


You won’t be able to take down Zvara with 4 players but with the right players with high item level players it may be possible, it will take some time but it will be possible. Can’t say the reward will match the time it took to take down, that’s a different issue. Anyhow once the number of participants comes down to the right amount of players everyone will try their best and win and get the rewards.


GW: I see so in 2.1 it should be balanced back to what was estimated?


Yoshida: I’m hoping that the players motivation will spread out so it will be like that.


GW: How about Odin or Behemoth? Those get a lot of people


Yoshida: I don’t think the amount of people coming by won’t change. For those two people gather not for experience points but the reward item, and also it’s like a big party. The issue where Odin and Behemoth disappears causing it where people can’t defeat it will be fixed, we’re sorry for the wait, but it will be possible to plan out a strategy to win.


GW: I have tried out different types of contents in FFXIV ARR but my favorite right now is the hard mode primal battles, next are the guild leve mercenary jobs. It’s really minor stuff and you can play them from low to high level equally, not much people play it but there are many variations and it’s really using each lands and area well, it’s well planned content. You can adjust the level so that’s good also. There are different types of bounty’s and you learn your jobs role as well, it’s really well done I want to interview the person in charge regarding the guild leves, it’s really detailed and planned out.


Yoshida: The person in charge would be very happy to hear that


GW: On top of that the gil and item rewards is not bad, only part that’s bad is the experience points, and that’s why people don’t play.


Yoshida: That’s because the F.A.T.E.s are easy.


GW: Yes, that’s it, because F.A.T.E.s are so easy no one does it. If someone asked you “Hey what are you doing now?” and you respond “Guildleve”, they would be like “What the...?”.


Yoshida: But, I think because you took the time to carefully clear the contents is the reason why you can now fight the hard mode primals without an issue.


GW: I believe so, it’s not good to take a shortcut for everything, like those character that are raised through F.A.T.E.s are horrible isn’t it?


Yoshida: (LOL) We have the same comment on the forums, we didn’t accept it as the question for LIVE but there was one asking “How do you feel about all the jobs coming out of F.A.T.E.s?”


GW: I really think that myself too, those character that grew just by flashing flash can use tokens or primal weapons they got from another main job and they look really strong because of the gear but it’s only the looks. I really wonder about how you feel about those.


Yoshida: Again this is something I would say “I guess it’s alright?” It’s up to the player on how they want to play and enjoy. For those that like to level aside from if they use that class or job, that’s a different matter. It’s true that if they get together with a party that’s seriously playing it’s not good for both sides, so to challenge in contents we are going to put average item level restrictions.


GW: Going back to Guild Leve, right now you only have up till level 45. Are you not going to add any level 50 leves? If you raise your character to level 50, that’s it for Guild Leve?


Yoshida: Yes, for Leves we were thinking to end it there.


GW: For me I wanted to see level 50 leves, and instead of experience post offer tokens and have those for people who want to take time. I believe there are a lot of people calculating how many more dungeon runs they have to go through to get the weekly 300 mytho cap. I have a higher priority for guild leve tickets, when I’m out on a business trip I can’t play for couple days so I think to myself, today I have to do it 10 times (laugh).


Yoshida: We have people in the company that ask about getting mythos to the cap, or they have to run 4 more times this week to cap. Like inside the elevator on Fridays their talking about how they didn’t complete the cap for the week yet (laugh).


GW: As for guild leve no one talks about them, no one is asking questions on the forums either and that’s sad, if there was level 50 guild leve, and have good clear rewards and tokens, I’m sure there are a lot of people that would like to play it. At least I would play it (laugh).


Yoshida: In 2.1 that role will go to the Beastmen daily quest and Treasure Hunt. Beastmen daily quest is kind of like guild leve with a story behind it.


GW: I see, then for guild leve fans like me, we could just go over that and enjoy those.


Yoshida: Yes. I would prefer if you could concentrate on those. Get up to around level 42 with Guild Leve then afterwards do the Beastmen Daily quest. Unlike a allowanace system, you can choose up to maximum of 6 quests per day. You will be able to get rewards so it’ll be easy to calculate.


GW: Moving on, earlier you mentioned things that take a long time to do as a content isn’t good, but Chocobo raising takes a lot of time. I think it’s setup hard that you can’t imaging how long it’s going to take to raise to rank 10. What’s the reason behind this?


Yoshida: I believe the current one is too hard, in the end we are planning to add an expansion along with housing update with the chocobo stable, where you combine it with the one where you can raise from a baby.


GW: I see, so right now is placed as a temporary measure?


Yoshida: It’s still bit hard.


GW: For the Chocobo stables Chocobo raising, is this different from the current one?


Yoshida: We are planning one where you raise from a baby so it’s little bit different from current.


GW: So, with stable you get the 2nd Chocobo and you can also raise right?


Yoshida: Yes. However the 2nd one isn’t from already grown Chocobo but one where you grow from a baby.


GW: If you can grow from a baby, you can have more than 2? Have 2nd, 3rd, 4th one?


Yoshida: If it get too much it’s going to be hard to write on the database so I believe we won’t increase too much.


GW: So basically for now which one do you want to raise/ride? The first one or the 2nd one?


Yoshida: Something like that.


GW: I made the first one healer so I want the 2nd one to be a Fighter.


Yoshida: Ah, yes I would like to make that possible.


GW: There are people asking to redistribute the points, will this be possible?


Yoshida: We don’t want to reject too much, so we are talking to put it in as some type of reward.


GW: Right now we have the Lightning collaboration event which can have low level to high level players gather and enjoy.


Yoshida: Thank you. I just may be a positive thinking person but I thought it would be nice for a MMO to have that much people come in and go crazy. I understand people wanted some more challenging content but since it’s a collaboration we wanted to make it where new players to hardcore players can all enjoy. I believe it’s important to have it set to where players can try out even if they just started playing FFXIV ARR. I don’t think there is any meaning to it if there wasn’t enough instance and people can’t play at all, I don’t want it that way.


GW: Later on there are plans for FFXI and Dragon Quest X collaboration event’s which is planned as F.A.T.E. are they going to be similar to this times collaboration event?


Yoshida: If you could please think of it as something that on top of the current one. They both have it’s own scenario and have it’s own rewards. I believe there will be a lot of participants at the beginning but we have the event time set for a good while, so i hope people can join in at a more slower pace. We would like to look into later for those like the ones requested. Also I noticed there were people spamming Holy in the low level F.A.T.E. and wanted them to know “calm down, you won’t get rewards that way... first level sync” (laugh). That was fun to watch.


GW: I believe for those that live the online games and don’t know Final Fantasy XIII was like “What’s going on” at this collaboration event.


Yoshida: Yes, when the event started “Lightning” became a tred for that day on Twitter.


GW: In future are there any possibility for other collaboration events with such as Romancing Saga or Kingdom Hearts?


Yoshida: Not sure. FFXI is the same FF series MMO and for Dragon Quest it’s also MMO genre so we talked about doing it together. It was a bit irregular situation.


GW: So it’s not something to expand all the other franchises?


Yoshida: I like both Saga and FF series, however they both differ in different ways. The part that’s good about Saga series is that there is a feeling that you can’t go back and fix things, once something happens that’s it and you have to put up with it.


GW: I’m sure people will be hyped up if there was a 8 player hard mode primal like event with hard mode Saruin (sp? English name?) with BGM from Itoken (Itou Kenji - Saga series composers)


Yoshida: Haha, that would probably be interesting (laugh)


GW: Instead of spreading collaboration with games from your own company, it would be interesting if you went outside the company like the Monster Hunter series you like.


Yoshida: I like Monster Hunter, and if I can want to do maker battle, I think that would be more fun...... FFXIV ARR still is lacking on many contents so I think we need to go from there first, we have to start from ground up.


GW: Anyhow with this event I felt that game fans are allowing these types of collaboration events, felt the change.


Yoshida: But, when we announced it there was a lot of people rejecting as well (laugh) I think it was good to try it out.


（後編に続く）
Continues to 2nd half... below... ... .. .. .. . . . . . . . /drops dead

[Reinheart]

part 2
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Source: http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/interview/20131213_627195.html

GW: Alright, going to start asking questions regarding patch 2.1 A realm awoken. First off you regarding the 12/17 date. I thought it was pretty fast. Since it was delayed I was thinking you were going to push it back till end of the year. So this was a happy miscalculation on my end.


Yoshida: Lots of players also thought it was going to be end of the year, 12/30, or going to be in January. I checked everyones reaction and relieved.


GW: Is this schedule due to everyone working hard? Or was it because it was originally planned for November and it was pushed back for about 20 days?


Yoshida: The correct one is that it got pushed back about 20 days. The dev teams really worked hard so it can be released with 20 days delay, for all the players that is patiently waiting for it and dev team I only can apologize.


GW: At the first half of Producer Letter LIVE you mentioned that the instance battles will feel better from patch 2.1. How will it change? Can you please go into details?


Yoshida: During beta say two players fought each other in Wolves’ Den. Say a Monk was in from of the white mage and it was trying to hit the white mage, if the white mage made a quick turn the packet information isn’t updated so there will be a gap between the data and what’s seen on screen. We made it so the information on this movement is sent instantly so it’s matching closer to what you see on screen. We were able to put this in without putting much stress.


GW: So it doesn’t mean that it will break the regular 0.3 second wall, and send/receive packet information at much faster rate?


Yoshida: The 0.3 second is absolute value that’s in almost every MMORPG, if we change this it will break the server specs, 0.3 seconds is a stable number so that why it’s close to tradition.


GW: You mentioned that the feel is going to be better on certain areas, but which areas in particular are we talking about here?


Yoshida: Hard mode, extreme mode primals, all high level dungeon post Wanderers Palace, Hard Mode Ultima weapon, Crystal Tower. however we may just do this for all dungeons.


GW: I forgot how long ago but when I started playing FFXIV I checked the Ping to Square-Enixs server. (Laugh) reason why was because I had experience of being pushed off the edge with land slide from Titan Hard Mode, I was thinking to myself “I dodged that for sure, why!” and that’s when I checked, at that time I was using the smart phones tethering to play. So when I checked it was slow. Went back home and checked again and the Ping was in the one digit and was easy to dodge. The previous FFXIV’s server lag was really horrible, but for FFXIV ARR for the lags it’s most likely a problem with the local side environment. However, there are many out there that claim it’s the game sides issue and it’s hard.


Yoshida: I can’t talk about that from my end so please do so from GAME Watch’s side (laugh).


GW: It’s really simple matter, if you can just release ping check tool to game server it will resolve this issue.


Yoshida: It’s not so easy to add that officiallly when there are several ISP’s involved.


GW: But, since we all know the IP it’s possible to add it in the benchmark program to show when players check the PC performance so they can understand the issue. I really think the current situation is unfair. People still mentioning it even after FFXIV ARRs launch must mean that there are that much people that is misunderstanding.


*don’t bash the messenger (translator)... I’m just translating what’s on here... I got lag too (I don’t fully agree with above statements, specially it’s different for NA/EU players.)

Yoshida: What I can official say from my end is that if you’re really going to fully go into the contents please have the best environment. But this is really hard, there are those that will say “You are the one creating the Online Game, you prepare that type of environment”, or look over it and make adjustments so you can dodge those.


GW: That’s impossible.


Yoshida: It is, if we do that we can’t make difficult contents.


GW: If you’re able to dodge with 3 digit Ping then it’s not fun as a game


........./tableflip 3 digit ping is regular for me... (calm down)

Yoshida: We would need to extend the time players have to dodge. But doing that will make the content super easy, so it’s impossible.


GW: This one is a complicated issue


Yoshida: Yes, there are many instances where it requires a lot of movement for end tier contents.


GW: But from the players side, they will keep on saying that something is definitely wrong with this game since they are dodging for sure on their screen. I think this isn’t good for both sides.


Yoshida: We have saying on our side too “I dodged it on my screen!” there are people who keep on hitting the trap every time and someone told that person “Stop doing it!” and he said “I dodged it on my screen!” when he said that another person who was calm mentioned “Then reinstall the game, your game is bugged” (laugh).
Putting the joke aside, the measure we put in this time will post the position you stopped so it should reflect the rendered image directly. This one is hard to explain, but I believe it should feel much easier to dodge. Even for extreme mode primal battles difficulty was adjusted thinking of this.


GW: Talking about feeling, from viewpoint of a tank that tanks by the wall, even if we fight with the camera zoomed out all the way, if the camera hits the wall the viewpoint is forced to go inwards and it doesn’t go back and it’s frustrating (laugh).


Yoshida: I’m sorry, from 2.1 it will go back to normal.


GW: But how it gets pushed back in when hitting the wall is still there?


Yoshida: That will still be there. if we remove the “Camera Collision” from objects, where it doesn’t hit anything this won’t happen, however it will create a situation where the camera goes inside walls and pillars. It’s the matter of allowing this or not, I’m actually happy to hear you talk about this one (laugh).


GW: I’m in charge of playing online games and foreign games, so to me I feel like “Why don’t you take this out from the beginning?” It’s more of Square-Enix’s policy, FFXI has this, it’s setup so you’re supposed to play with the default screen.


Yoshida: Yes. Previous FFXIV was built with this in mind. I really wanted to fix this in the previous FFXIV but if we take it out it breaks the rendering so we couldn’t.


GW: I see.


Yoshida: As conclusion, there will be objects that will hit the camera, ut in patch 2.1 there will be more objects that can be passed through. For dungeon camera check, in the end I do it through the workflow, but I’m telling the person in charge we should be able to remove the camera collision for these walls and pillars. I believe this needs to be learned gradually.
There are some customers who think”camera digging inside is a bug!” or “camera going through the pillars is weird looking!” it’s something we can be peculiar with because this is FF series. Especially games from Square-Enix is built beautifully so it’s made so you can view from the best camera position. It’s impossible for us to have it where it digs in or goes through objects, what you’re asking is forget about all that and for camera just let it go through all the objects so it doesn’t interrupt the field of view right?


GW: Yes. Isn’t that how it should be for online games field of view?


Yoshida: It’s depends on the values, since it’s FF series or online game, it get hard


GW: Some are even saying they can’t do it because of personal issues, so it’s not that but it’s more of if the players allows it’s really easy to do?


Yoshida: In the end if we were to allow it, it will involve permissions. Also there is an issue where if we really need to have things that can be done on a single player game on a MMO. If we went by allowing it to pass through objects and take out all the camera collision, it will be possible to get the best field of view and it will allow us to remove stressful process.


GW: So it’s up to if the Square Enix fans will allow that?


Yoshida: That’s why, we are being careful regarding this matter. This time we implemented a feature when the camera auto zooms to go back it’s position. We’re sorry for the wait, other than that we’re removing the camera collisions one by one (laugh).


GW: Next regarding the 3 new dungeons. We have two hard mode dungeons from Haukke and Copper Bell, can you explain why you chose these two?


Yoshida: The dungeon update plan is made up till 3.0, with every patch we have one brand new dungeon, 2 hard mode dungeons with 3 new dungeons, that’s the plan. First for 2.1 we need to choose the dungeon that’s going to be selected. At launch timing there are unexpected risks so we need to choose something that’s easy to do, or later we’re going to have cost issues. At that time, the maps that were made before I came in from previous FFXIV such as Dzemael or Totorak, the gimmicks were decided later but the map design wasn’t normal, to choose that requires a lot of cost isn’t a easy task. So we talked about choosing a dungeon that was made specifically for ARR.


GW: Was it too big?


Yoshida: yes. The previous FFXIV dungeons are long, that’s why it took time to cut them up, also there are measures that are different from previous FFXIV and ARR, also it’s not easy to change the mood.
For that reason, we chose Haukke and Copper Bell. Haukke is a manor, so the passageways are fixed and it’s pretty simple to change the structure, in the original level design there were other routes that were removed. Since it’s two story building it’s pretty easy to change the feel by going through a different route.
When we’re going to release the first hard mode dungeon, this will also give the players a understanding of what we mean by hard mode. For copperbell there were parts that we removed although we wanted to do originally, so there are things the person in charge had planned for gimmicks and other ideas.


GW: Gimmick meaning the one where you get the bomb out to take down the slimes, those kind of stuff?


Yoshida: All the gimmicks for hard mode will be different. It’s not simply where mobs HP is higher or stronger, the entire gimmick will be different.


GW: So we won’t have that bomb one but something different?


Yoshida: Yes, the strategy will be totally different so please look forward to it.


GW: We’re going to get mytho and philo and rare equipment as a reward correct?


Yoshida: Yes. I’m sure people are tired of Wanderers Palace and Amdapore Keep so next main will be these three dungeons. From a new players point of view, they will have selection from 5 dungeons.
The three dungeons that will be introduced this time will be the hardest 4 player dungeon, so if you want to obtain tokens at an optimal pace then you should run through these three dungeons. Under these three will be WP and AK so those will be little bit easier to clear.


GW: It’s a bit odd that WP and AK is going to be under.


Yoshida: For those stuck with job specific gear (AF) I am hoping that they can think this will allow them to finally go though WP and AK.


GW: Currently the game is turning into a game where you just repeat dungeons, but with the new dungeons being introduced will this put an end to it?


Yoshida: By having more contents, it will lead to more gear drops, it will allow more selection to choose from. However for those that are aiming to get the mytho gear they will probably need to repeat the dungeons.
Like what I mentioned in the previous LIVE regarding the content roulette some mentioned that going through low level dungeon and getting 5 mytho points isn’t going to motivate anyone. For those trying to find the best optimal way to obtain tokens, of course they will feel that way, and you won’t be able to obtain much mythos from easy dungeons. It’s not meant for it to be that way, this is for those that want to collect dark light gear for their new class, and when they want Philosophy tomestone they go through low level dungeons. Or those who don’t mind going at a more slower, casual pace. They go through it once a day and they can get 200 philosophy and 5 mythology.
Low level dungeon is easy so by doing this every day I’m sure the player will be come more confident and they will get better, by the time they know it you have 80 mythos from running all the runs for 5 mythos. It will create situation like If you try just a bit more you can get a mytho gear? that will be much easier and give the player more confidence to try WP/AK next, I’m hoping it leads to something like that, that’s why the mytho is set to 5.


GW: I see so that 5 mytho has a deep meaning to it (laugh). For those that really feel that it’s hard shouldn’t pressure themselves to go but best wait till patch 2.1


Yoshida: Yes. Also, in this generation there are so many different types of entertainment available so even if you say that, there will be those that can’t wait for the patch. that’s why just like now, once the patch is released we’ll send an announcement to let them know we got this much new stuff so please check it out. Having players come back after checking everyone else having fun is alright, I’m totally fine with that. As a result of continuing to do that in previous FFXIV, we have three times more customers once subscription started, so by continuing to do it for a long run, and releasing contents which we feel is fun to play with is what I believe is the best the operation for MMORPG can do.


GW: Also during the live you announced 90 day reward, 180 day reward, 270 day reward, how effective are those?


Yoshida: I believe it has a strong effect. It’s something those players who continue to subscribe can get.


GW: So it leads to motivation to continue subscription.


Yoshida: Yes.


GW: Later you will continue to keep on doing 360 days, 450 days but are you going to prepare something every 90 days?


Yoshida: It won’t specifically be 90 days time always, but we are planning to continue doing this.


GW: In general it’s going to be minions and mounts?


Yoshida: For 1 year, 360 day subscription we want to give something better, right now we’re selecting one from the list of candidates.


GW: What kind of things are there?


Yoshida: It’s still a secret (laugh).


GW: This is probably going to be about 2.2 but why was the vanity system pushed back from release? Why did it become 2.2?


Yoshida: It simply didn’t make it on time......


GW: This time through FFXIII collaboration even we were able to collect all the lighting gear. It’s really designed well but it’s level 13 gear so if we fight with that, people are going to be like “huh?” (laugh). If you would’ve released the vanity system at the timing of 2.1 I think it would of been fun to play with lightnings looks.


Yoshida: I fully understand what you’re saying (laugh) I really wanted to put it in. But the debug and check process is really hard.


GW: You have to test out with every gear?


Yoshida: We have to try everything once, it’s simple to just go over the items that are introduced in that patch but we have to do this to every item and that’s the scary part. There are many tasks and debugs to go over, as well as making it well balanced with the dye system, balanced between the item levels, etc., so we’re carefully developing this and will deliver in 2.2.


GW: I have several questions regarding Crystal Tower. First, you mentioned the Forbidden land of Eureka as keyword during LIVE. What kind of things are you planning for that?


Yoshida: If you have played FFIII, I belive you can imagine somewhat how it’s going to be. If you go through the Ancient’s Labyrinth I’m sure people can assume how Eureka is going to be.


GW: I see, so weapons such as legendary weapons, things that FFIII fans can look forward to is in there?


Yoshida: Yes. We’re really being particular for this one, and there is a story setup to the tasks you have to take before entering the Labyrinth, even after entering the Labyrinth I hope players who know will smile.


GW: Regarding that Crystal Tower, this time like Bahamut’s opening we’re just getting the start or are we getting a lot at once?


Yoshida: There will be 4 bosses. If you defeat all 4 bosses, the raid for this time is completed, then have players look forward to the next one in 2.3.


How big of a volume is it to clear?


Yoshida: That’s hard to answer. It’s a play where we ask 24 players to try their best at a doing big jump rope. Sometimes it will be really easy, when it’s tough, it’s going to be really tough.


GW: For example, in Bahamut’s Coil you have 5 levels, how many parts is Crystal Tower split up into?


Yoshida: It’s just 1. So to simply put it’s Crystal Tower stage 1. Crystal tower is about 4 turns put together, but the size of each turn/number of bosses is completely different from Bahamut’s coils 1 turn.


GW: So it’s going to be the longest content which can be challenged with 24 players with 120 minute time limit for FFXIV ARR.


Yoshida: It’s a big dungeon, and you’ll have a lot of players, you’ll need time to plan out a strategy so it’s set a bit longer.


GW: If it goes smoothly it’s about 1 hour? Just think of it like AK’s length?


Yoshida: It’s much longer than AK for sure. The current instance dungeons are setup for 4 players with mid-boss, mid-boss, boss but for Crystal Tower it’s Boss, Boss, Boss, Boss and in between those you got Trap, Trap, Trap, something like that.


GW: That sounds like it's going to be hard, so it’s something you should sit down and play full on during the weekends.


Yoshida: Yes, exactly. I believe players should be able to fully challenge it. I believe even if it’s during the week day and you got a group together around 10pm by the time it’s done it’s about the time for going to sleep. I think it’s about that much.


GW: Recently during the live we keep on hearing different keywords and need to pay attention to them but will Leviathan come out in 2.1?


Yoshida: Leviathan is for 2.2


GW: How will it come out?


Yoshida: Please look forward to the main story.


GW: So it’s going to relate to the main story in 2.2.


Yoshida: Yes, 2.1 has a pretty good amount of volume, in patch 2.1 it will take a big step forward. The patch title A Realm Awoken also is a title for the main story too.


GW: The main story from ended with a deep meaning. There were asciens and name of new person was revealed. So 2.1 will go into continuation of that?


Yoshida: You’ll see Asciens in 2.1, there is also one enemy who showed up in the main story up to level 50 who disappeared, that person will come back as well.


GW: If the main story was about 50 hours, how long is this times story?


Yoshida: For the story? It involves dungeons in between so that’s hard to answer.


GW: So doesn’t that mean Crystal Tower will also be involved?


Yoshida: No, Crystal Tower is a completely independent episode of its own.


GW: So it’s like going to the new dungeons such as Sirus?


Yoshida: It’s Qarn, not the hard one but the normal Sunken temple of Qarn, there is a quest asking you to go there, you’ll be level synced. We lowered the difficulty a bit so I hope people can go there without hating it.


GW: Yes, there isn’t much good memory from Qarn. It’s one of the dungeons I don’t want to go repeatedly (laugh).


Yoshida: When making adjustments to Qarn this time, when we checked the bosses speed of the laser I said “This is faster than Ultima Weapons Lasers.......” Qarn was adjusted after all the contents were made and was the last dungeon to be adjusted so our senses were bit off.


GW: So you want players to try it out since you adjusted the difficulty?


Yoshida: Yes. I believe there are many that haven’t cleared Qarn yet also, so this will be a reason for them to go.


GW: On the other hand you can say this time you have to clear it.


Yoshida: yes, if you want to continue onto the main story you would have to clear it.


GW: How much volume is there this time for the main story?


Yoshida: If just saying the main story, and just simply going after the story in 2.1, it’s bunch of quests so ummm about 10 hours. Of course if you use teleports it will be much shorter, and if you skip through all the dialogues it will be much shorter. Just think of it as 4-5 hours. This is just talking about main scenario.


GW: Other contents will have different types of story set for them as well.


Yoshida: yes. You have the Hildibrand Story, Crystal Tower Story, Extreme mode primal story, beastmen daily quest, I haven’t put these into the main. If you put all of these in I’m sure it will easily go over 30 hours. Also you would need to clear in order for Extreme mode primal battles so if you get stuck on there, I’m not sure how long it’s going to take. So it’s hard to answer this one.


GW: What’s the total volume of patch 2.1?


Yoshida: If you’re going to play through every content I’m sure it can go over 300 hours. If you’re picking few stuff here and there it should still easily go over 80 hours. Just think of it as buying 1 brand new game at the end/beginning of the year. I believe there is enough volume.


GW: At the end of the extreme mode primal battle trailer, Ultima Weapon came out but you were surprised going “What’s this?” Was that some kind of mistake? It didn’t sound as if you’re going off of a script, or was it really something you weren’t expecting?


Yoshida: It was unexpected, it’s the last boss from the main story we’re talking about here.


GW: Really unexpected?


Yoshida: I’ll let you decide on that one (laugh).


GW: So is this Hard mode Ultima Weapon going to be 2.1’s last boss?


Yoshida: No, that’s not it. Ultima Weapon is basically a independent content. It involves the Wandering Minstrel, please look forward to the content.


GW: What’s the requirement for Hard Mode Ultima Weapon? Do we need to have the hard mode primals cleared?


Yoshida: No we didn’t put that kind of restriction. As long as you have cleared the main story you would be able to go.


GW: So the difficulty isn’t that hard?


Yoshida: Hmm I think it’s about hard mode primal battle.


GW: In the trailer we were able to see tons of lasers we couldn’t see in the main story battle.


Yoshida: Yes the attacks are pretty severe. But really the original one was made like that.


GW: Oh, so for the Ultima weapon in the main story you took it out?


Yoshida: It was too hard. It was really fun but too hard. Everyone in the battle team including myself liked it but when we thought over, we said this is too hard to regular 8 players who’s playing through the story. Specially after going through the dungeon for 60 minutes, everyone’s going to lose their hope (laugh) So for the main story we released the one without the gimmicks.


GW: That’s true, it was much easier than what you expect from that name.


Yoshida: If anyone goes through a long dungeon like that and end up fighting something strong than what’s available now, they will lose hope. That’s why this time we added some more to what was available originally.


GW: The reward hasn’t been revealed yet, what can we get?


Yoshida: I’ll keep that a secrete still. There is specific frop for it, I believe it’s going to be fun.


GW: You got this much volume in 2.1 and you’re not going to release a packaged version?


Yoshida: We won’t release it, it’s just a patch.


GW: This going to be same for later?


Yoshida: Yes, we aren’t planning much till 3.0. However for the PS4 versions master, we’re going to add some inside aside from what’s there from beginning. We’re not sure if that’s going to be till 2.1 or 2.2.


GW: What kind of update are you thinking until the 3.0 expansion?


Yoshida: About 2 and half month to 3 month. Right now lots are thinking 2.2 is going to be far later but we’ll deliver it correctly and gain everyone's trust.


GW: So if 2.1 is December, then post 2.2 is going to be March, June, September, December, something like this?


Yoshida: Would like to do it so it goes that way.


GW: You mentioned that you are going to a Letter Live in Osaka after the new years, how will you do this?


Yoshida: I ordered that I wanted to do this even if it was in a public hall. I want to invite at least 200 people over.


GW: Are you going to talk about the PS4 version there?


Yoshida: We’re going to show the PS4 version during the next 11th Letter live, so it’s going to be about 2.2


GW: Oh wow! 2.2 already?


Yoshida: We’re planning to do this in January so I want to start like, hows patch 2.1 doing for everyone, you guys enjoying? Well lets start talking about 2.2 then......


GW: So if you announce the 2.2 in Osaka, Are you planning to talk about 2.3 in Fukuoka or Sendai?


Yoshida: Right now we’re talking about doing one every two month, go to about 5 cities throughout the year. Sapporo, Sendai, Nagoya, and Fukuoka.


GW: You also mentioned about the world tour, I’m sure this is a happy new for Western players.


Yoshida: Yes, we need to do this one.


GW: Since the development is in Japan, it ends up being closely within Japan.


Yoshida: Yes. And if you do that for foreign players it’s not fun for them. Even for the Legacy players in Japan we were only able to meet them in the main cities so I would like to go around Japan to thank everyone, I have been saying this since previous FFXIV. I don’t mind it being just 200 people but I want to have fun with everyone and have content setup for the event. So do something like the titan battle with everyone and talk with everyone for 4, 5 hours, battle together, then go into the live broadcasts. We’re planning to do Producer Letter Live in that form.


GW: Nice, so not only public open broadcast, but you’re going to have some play area, seems like it’s going to be a long event.


Yoshida: I want it to be that way. From customers view point we’re imaging about half day event.


GW: So you’re going to do this for 3 days straight like in game show?


Yoshida: No no just one day. It’s too much, I’m going to die (laugh). Scale of game show is different so it’s possible but it’s really hard to do.


GW: So how is the world tour going to be?


Yoshida: think of it as FFXI’s Vana Festival, it’s will have few thousand. Do Eorzea Festival in japan then continue doing that in US and end it in Europe. We haven’t decided on the order yet.


GW: For FFXI they had hotel hall room as event with two day event, will it be something like that?


Yoshida: Yes, something like that. I don’t want to open too much time apart so I believe we’ll only do one day each.



GW: In FFXI it was a tradition to announce the expansion pack but what’s the content for world tour?


Yoshida: I think it’ll be something like that. I’ll let you imagine.


GW: So does that mean at later 2014 we’ll have expansion pack release?


Yoshida: We can’t release expansion patch that fast. Doing world tour without anything to talk about will just make people angry so I’m just saying we’ll prepare stuff.


GW: After 2.1 you have PS4, then you have DirectX 11 version but how’s that one going?


Yoshida: Right now we’re fully working into the PS4 version so once that’s settled it’s the next step. First we’ll show the live demo on the 11th Producer Letter Live.


GW: So you’re going to have the PS4 there and demo the PS4 version?


Yoshida: We can’t show the test kit, so it will basically be the screen, however for the remote play portion, I’ll probably show me playing on the PS vita.


GW: We’re going to get to see the PS Vita’s remote play too, that is something to look forward to.


Yoshida: yes, for that reason, so people can tell it’s not fake but really the PS4 version.


GW: From your point of view, how’s the PS4 version turning out?


Yoshida: It’s amazing.


GW: Is the PC’s highest quality setting working fine on it?


Yoshida: It’s really nice to have a lot of memory, really happy about that one.


GW: For those playing on PS3, you want them to switch over to the PS4?


Yoshida: It will be another option for the customers to fit their playstyle. As we already announced we will make it free upgrade working together with SCE so we would like players to look into the available options.


GW: Is the rendering at full HD 60 frame rate?


Yoshida: No, instead of being particular about 60 frame rate on the PS4 we concentrated on character rendering. Since it’s an MMO making it 60 frames won’t have much merit to it.


GW: I see. So it’s held at 30 frames but display more characters simultaneously so it’s easier to play as an MMO?


Yoshida: yes, set to 30 fixed, but instead be more careful on the maximum rendering.


GW: So unlike the PS3 version there won't be a display limitation, basically everything will be displayed?


Yoshida: It will be same as the PC. We’re going to not put a restriction and do everything we can.


GW: So the only limitation for the PS4 versions feature is just the frame rate?


Yoshida: This isn’t really a limitation but at this timing both PC version and the PS version will have a option to adjust the amount to be rendered. For example, there will be a option to adjust how many character to display. This can be set so it just shows the PT member, etc. Something like this.


GW: On the other hand, how’s the PC’s graphic update version the DirectX 11 versions development?


Yoshida: Right now we’re focusing too much on the PS4 so it’s still not clear yet. At current timing we can’t specifically say what’s going to be ready when. But I can tell you that the development is on going and we have already address the 64 bit.


GW: As a new direction for PC games, AMD mentioned of a Mantle API which is on the new generation Radeons, by using Mantle it can work much faster than the DirectX, do you have any plans for Mantle version or optimization towards Radeon?


Yoshida: We won’t have for a while. It’s only been 3 month from launch for us. We have to do everything in order. The upcoming patch 2.1 is a large scale update, from February 22nd we have the PS4 beta throughout the world, and next year we have Chinese version launch, then we also received lots of voice from Taiwan, Korea, Russian and many other regions. We have to work on these a step at a time.


GW: I see. So next year you’re going to start the China and other regions?


Yoshida: If possible, we would like to start by looking into it.


GW: For that will it have it’s own server and separate the server and service?


Yoshida: yes. If we were to make the current service as a global version and there will be regional release versions. We worked really hard on this so we would like for as much players to play it.


GW: The direction of the game is completely different from FFXI


Yoshida: Really?


GW: Yes, in FFXI, you had servers place in Japan, and you operated the service through your own company, that was the absolute policy, and there was no asia release.


Yoshida: I see, but when I took over FFXIV the China release was already decided, and we have continued to work with Shanda Games for the Chinese version.


GW: In future not only the Chinese version released by Shanda, but we might be able to see Korean version or Russian version, many different versions.


Yoshida: China is a must. It’s the largest online game market.


GW: Has the Chinese version beta test start?


Yoshida: No, not yet. We’re working with Shanda to decide on the Beta timing.


GW: So it’s pretty much made?


Yoshida: Basically yes. We have been working on the translation at the same timing as the Japanese so it’s pretty close.


GW: When will the official service start in China?


Yoshida: For now let me just say “sometime next year”.


GW: How about the business model?


Yoshida: We’re still going through the final negotiations, we haven’t decided if it’s going to be F2P. Shanda has been looking into lots of new things as well. Right now Chinese customers are pretty confused with the F2P so we’re talking about changing the direction.


GW: So next year it looks like it’s going to be not only 4 languages, but more like 6 languages.


Yoshida: It’s not that simple. Even WoW launched in China after 5 years operation. It’s that hard to start a operation in a new region. First we need to prioritize the global version, within 3 years span, then decide on how we’re going to expand.


GW: Alright moving into the end but after 2.1 release, what kind of expectation can players have?


Yoshida: Right now the game is narrow, and within that narrow path people are trapped inside and it may feel really tight for the players. If you think of it as a tree, right now we only have a trunk of the tree without any branches, first we’ll have features that will make the tree thicker, those are contents where players can fight each other, or housing system, next you’ll have branches coming off these. You can decide which branch to play on today. I want everyone to please enjoy that first.
As for the daily selection, for better understanding there was one part missing, this time there are a lot of contents which has daily and weekly restrictions. For example for weekly restrictions we have the 300 mytho cap. Bahamut’s Coil clear flag is reset weekly. This time you’ll have Crystal Towers item drop’s NEED policy with weekly restriction. For example you go in and 3 items drop, you choose which item you want to NEED and if you win the loot you can’t NEED again till the specific time it resets. But this is only win a loot. It doesn’t mean you just NEED once and you lose the rights. You can NEED as much until you win the loot. Once it resets you can get again. So at first please NEED only on something you really want. You can go inside the content as much as you want to for example you can go in to help your friends. Say out of the 24, 2 people still need it, when it’s like that it’s possible to help.


GW: You can’t NEED but you can GREED?


Yoshida: No, it will automatically pass. However once it resets you can NEED again so you can do so then.


GW: Ah! So you can basically only get one item per week?


Yoshida: Yes. Also as I mentioned about the Beastmen daily quest, you’ll have different tasks in one day, once you clear 6 that’s it for that day, you can’t do more than that. Next the Extreme Primal Battles, there are 3 of them, if you clear all 3 you have an ending for the Extreme mode, you’ll get a special item drop. If you have 3 of these you can trade it for weapon with item level 90 of your choice. There isn’t any restriction to challenge the EM Primals but you can only get this weapon once a week. So please think of it like “If I do all three of these I can get one weapon this week”.
With these there will be total of 5, if you just look at each one individually it will look like it’s full of restrictions but if you think over your schedule for the week that’s a lot of things to do. First go through the Bahamut’s Coil you’re working on, then collect 450 mythos for that week, then go to Crystal Tower to get the item you want, but it may not drop with just one try...... then you got daily beastmen quest along with 3 EM primals to get ilvl 90 weapon...... There is 8 jobs total so it’ll take 8 weeks at fastest.... if you think that way this isn't really a restriction but we want players to do something over and over till they get tired but try out different things but at same time be able to get items.


GW: Although each one has it’s own restriction if you try to do everything it’ll end up with a lot of things to do.


Yoshida: I’m sure right before the 2.1 release for those that look at the patch notes will say “More restrictions” but once they try it out I’m thinking they will understand why we placed the restrictions.
Also we have Treasure Hunt and Wolves’ Den, housing, and Guild leve, Guildhest, Content Roullet, so I wish they don’t think of the restriction by it self. If you look at the overall image, you’ll have many options to choose from for what to do that week. I want it to be that way.


GW: Is there any restrictions on the 2 major contents of patch 2.1, the Wolves’ Den and Housing?


Yoshida: There isn’t any, you can play as much as you want, if you gain points you can trade for item, even if you lose you’ll get points so please freely try it out.
For housing there is about 300 items being added, so if you’re to complete all the items, it’s going to be really hard. Indoor furnitures, outdoor furnitures, wall, roof, weather vane...... If you ask how long it’s going to take for it, it’s hard to answer.


GW: I’ll just ask this one even thought it might not get answered, is the housing cost still a secret?


Yoshida: It’s not decided yet.


GW: That’s a lie (laugh).


Yoshida: I mean it.


GW: Can you at least let us know how much the price will be lowered every 6 hours?


Yoshida: If I answered that you can calculate it (laugh). There is an already existing example called Dragon Quest X and there is a record on how much it costed at the beginning......
Honestly, it’s not decided yet, on 11/25 the person in charge of Housing came to me and gave me the cost of the housing items, and land and cost of the house. However, I’m more concentrated on the algorithm used to get those cost out. There was two things in there I had to question so that’s being adjusted.


GW: What was the issue? Was it too expensive?


Yoshida: No, it’s the root section, when I asked where did you pull this number from, for what reason? And there was issue with that one, so we’re looking over that. If we don’t do that the price won’t be valid.


GW: I want to know amount of digits, is it 3 digit ten thousand gil possible or requires more?


Yoshida: The building itself won't cost that much but the land is expensive, just like reality. For what’s built on top you can replace and do others so.


GW: Lastly can you please give a comment to all the players?


Yoshida: Sorry for making you wait a long time. As mentioned in the interview if you compare this to an amusement park, we had the main story which is like the main street entrance leading to roller coasters just going straight. From patch 2.1 you’re going to have the coffee cups and Ferris Wheel, there are things that has one day pass, or fast pass, there are lots of features in there. We realy made you wait a long time, but I this should be the grand opening of a amusement park named Eorzea. I hope everyone can enjoy it.


GW: Thank you

[Reinheart]

Game Watch - Patch 2.1 recital YoshiP's comments summary

YoshiP and Foxclon read out the the patch notes on live broadcast on Monday, they added few comments here and there. I tried to do live translation but was already 4am by the time he was going over the housing so I crashed so my translation didn't cover job changes. Game Watch one covers all of it so translated that one here.

====================================================
Game watch outline of what was mentioned this morning
====================================================

Source: http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs...17_627960.html
*going to translate from the parts I believe are important then work around other parts left.


There was one error on the adjustment and they had to apologize, the Alagan gear parameter changes coming in 2.1 is aimed to similar stats as mytho gear however for the whm, smn changes had no merit to them so they are going to place a Hotfix to fix the parameters back. It’s their adjustment mistake.



Regarding Beastmen Daily Quest

Y: If you do 6 quests your gil will increase about 4500-5000 gil


Gil output from Dungeon
Y: From lv50 dungeons you’ll be able to obtain about 3000 gil


Crystal Tower
Y: There are Chronicle quests for Crystal Tower so you’ll clear these to challenge. You can use Duty Finder as solo, doesn’t have to be 8 people, you can register with 3, 4 people too but can’t have parties like 3 tanks, 3 healers. (have to follow the regular DF format)


EM Primal Battle
Y: EM Primal Battle will feel different for tank/healer/dps. For DPS Titan will probably feel the hardest, and for healers and tanks I believe Ifrit will feel harder.


Moggle Mog
Y: It will be pretty lively so please look forward to it. You can see each Moogles personality so on your first try check out those and enjoy it, and from 2nd round go full on.


Ultima Weapon HM
Y: Battle is set in which way it should bring the popular BGM (ultima battle BGM) and feel right for that BGM. This can be challenged right after you hit lv50 and finish the main story quest. Balance is not hard as EM primals.


Primal Battle Time limit change
Y: Changed the time from 90 min to 60 min, this is set this way for situations when you go in and feel like this is not possible to win, 90 minutes was too long for that so we changed to 60 minutes.


Wolves Den
Y: There are two types, one where you go with Lv50 only, one through Duty Finder and one with premade party. You’ll be able to get the max recod (points) from premade party. If you get hit from PC while casting it will be cancelled 100%, however attacks from pets will be calculated as usual. For archers depending the distance to the target the damage will reduce.


White mages PvP action (aoe healing one)
Y: People are commenting this is too strong, but it’s hard to cast in PvP so you’ll need to set this ground target ahead of time to increase the healing powers, where you place it is the key.


MNK/Dragoon PvP action weapon throw
Y: When running away from opponent hitting you, you would want to turn around and sprint but that’s always not the best option. By using this weapon throw, it will cancel the sprint. We also have items that will replenish TP so please use those.


PvP tournaments
Y: We would like to plan out PvP tournaments, please sharpen your fangs. I’ll be playing this regularly as well.


Treasure hunt
Y: I see comments saying G5 is probably going to get popular, this may be true if you setup events with your FC to run through them on the weekend, but if you’re going to do it daily G4 would probably be better (easier). If you hit the good reward on G4 you get about 5000 gil. If you get items you can probably earn more. You can do this every day.


Housing:
Y: Reason why the land cost is high is because we didn’t want to create a situation where the lands are sold out and end up where players can’t build anything. We counted the amount of free companies, amount of members, how much gil those members have in each world. We are taking away RMT so that amount isn’t included, but there are gil that has been spread by the RMT so we took away a fixed amount from calculation as well.

We thought about which size housing the free companies will purchase for the ratio.

It’s based on countdown auction, and it starts from rank 6, from there the price will come down.
Regarding the amount of gil you can earn from 2.1 - for battle class for one person you can get about 15000 to 18000 gil. With role bonus it will go over 20000 gil. If you do this over 7 days time it will be pretty good amount of money x number of FC members. If you do this for about 3 month time you should be able to buy it, that’s how we set up the calculation. On the other hand for the legacy servers for new players the price is higher than new worlds and they may feel like how are we supposed to buy this? so later we’ll make adjustments. The current price shown is the highest amount where no one will purchase. I’ll say it again but we’ll observe the situation and look into lowering the price.


Personal Housing
Y: Personal Housing will have a different price. It will be much cheaper.


General concept for job balance
Y: Increase the close range DPS’s damage, close up the difference between close range and ranged, this is the basic concept. For Warriors we had miscalculation on our end for Bahamut’s Coil and it was bad therefore we made major changes.


Puglist/Monk
Y: Basically if you attack from behind your damage will keep on increasing, that’s the base adjustment. (Damage increase skill) is 30% increase for Puglist/Monks but if used as additional it will drop down to 10%. You’ll be more busy and depending on the player skill the DPS will be different.


Lancer/Dragoon
Y: It’s made so you can output instant DPS more. There was higher chance of error when using jump so we made adjustments there. Compared to Monks, Lancer/Dragoons will be able to output the max damage faster.


Bard
Y: We move the role of Rain of Death damage down effect to Warriors.


White Mage
Y: There was two error on our end for Alagan gear for healers, so we’ll fix this next week. Also some are misunderstanding on this one, for Medica2 (JP - Medicara - Medica 2 on English right?) the heal amount hasn’t changed. The additional effect added onto the character was reduced to half and duration was extended to 30 seconds.
Next for Holy, we reduced from 240 to 200, it was too strong from healers point of view. We don’t want to give a pressure to WHM where they have to use Holy, but concentrate more on healing, this is why it has been reduced.
Next Curega it wasn’t used as much so we lowered the cast time, and increased the range to make it more useful. Curega is a target AE. What that means is you can target the tank and by using curega on the tank it will heal the nearby DPS as well. In patch 2.1 there are many situations where you will need to use this curega.
As I just mentioned curega isn’t a heal around your own character, it’s spell where you target another player, so it has a high effect to instantly turn around the situation.
With that said we made adjustments to Medica2, we haven’t touched up on the HP heal amount for Medica2. The HoT that’s put onto the players after was adjusted from 100 to 50 and increased from 15 seconds to 30 seconds. By doing this you won’t need to recast as much. Also I have pointed out to the development team that this HoT is being wasted. Players are already at max hp and it’s over healing. By casting this at a earlier time it should become more stable. It will be very important to figure out when to use medica, medica2, curega.
For example for Titan’s tumults you can have medicara up and use curega when getting hit hard. Both Medicara and Curega was adjusted together as a set. By casting it at a ealier time it will make it more stable. As for the enmity which everyone is worried about, please try it out and I think you can figure it out. That’s all there is to it I think. Curega is really useful now. We haven’t nerfed WHM, it will be useful and we were able to separate the stance from Scholars.


Black Mage
Y: Listed under the bugs fixed, the casting time being halved by Umbral Blizzard allowed to add two spell effect in a row, and we put in a bug fix for Flare, so the DPS is lowered a lot. I think that’s a major point to note.


Summoner:
Y: For experts they probably know this but the amount of DPS you can output is insane. Virus is a really strong debuff, and this was too superior for casters in end content, even as a ranged class using this virus correctly became a key at same time it took away a role from other classes therefore we made the adjustments.
Regarding how thunder became class specific, for summoners they used the (archer class ability to increase damage) and cast Bio, Bio2, Thunder and contagion to extend the effect time, for that reason they were able to output high amount of DPS. For boss battles, there are times this gets reset but for DoT’s the effect lasted even at these times, so in overall it was doing a lot of DPS. If we were to adjust other DPS classes using this as a base, it would cause more issues, so I apologize but we had to make adjustments here.
If we touch on the DoT itself, it will take away the enjoyment from the technical class such as Summoners and Arcanist, so instead of losing the DoT effect or lowering the damage, we made adjustments on the additional skill to retain as much of the original skills. Even after the fix compared to other ranged DPS class you can output high DPS so you’ll still keep your fist place. Summoners requires to manage MP while controlling the pet at the same time making it a pretty difficult job to play so I believe the balancing it there. As for Bane, there is the 3 target restriction however this is a large amount of DPS so depending on how you use it, it can output pretty crazy damages.


MateriaIV
Y: Before you weren’t able to get Materia IV as much from Lv45 items, this will increase. Also higher level items will have higher rate to produce materia IV now.


Mount Goobbue
Y: We changed the design from the Legacy’s Goobbue and we retained the value of Legacy’s version.s


Duty Roulette
Y: Even if you join in on the low level, it’s setup so you can get about the same amount of reward as going high level so please check out and participate on the low level contents.


Primal Battles, Guildhest - refilling PT members
Y: Until now you couldn’t refill the party, if one person left the group it wasn’t enough, so we made it where you can now refill. However they will spawn in the middle of the stage so there may be times they pop up when the situation is dire. With fewer players you’re going to end up wiping anyways so might as well wait for someone to pop in before retrying. Even if they pop in the middle as long as they don’t run towards Titan they won’t get attacked so it should be safe.


Lobby server being separated.
Y: Until now when it tried to get the world list you got error sometimes saying you couldn’t obtain the JP world list, I believe many people saw this error. With many new worlds being added, it caused more stress than what was originally planned, so we made more detailed separation within the data center itself to make it easier to obtain the world list. For the very first time it will ask you to select the server you play in, after that it will automatically pull the information from there. I believe this should help resolve the login errors. I imagine people shouting “Yoshidaaaaaa!” but I’m thinking of different methods to lessen this.


Conclusion
Y: I am hoping we can deliver the patch details in future. By listening to us talk I hope people can understand the details on the patch and hoping that leads to more players using the changes/features added. As for the job changes, it’s best to try it out so please try and enjoy it. You’ll be able to download the patch right after the maintenance so we’ll try our best to complete the maintenance.
For housing, we fully understand the starting cost is extremely high. But there is a lot of things added in this patch so while you enjoy those other contents I believe the price should come down.

[Antanias]

Your hair is different Subligar King o.O

[Reinheart]

Your hair is different Subligar King o.O

Forums still showing the FF13 Snow... I changed back and dyed my hair but I guess it's not showing yet ><

[mbncd]

Has Reinheart gone on holiday or just nothing interesting being said in Japanese at the moment? No translations for a while.

[Reinheart]

Has Reinheart gone on holiday or just nothing interesting being said in Japanese at the moment? No translations for a while.

Sorry, I'm here wasn't much said on forums side either, got 2 rep posts saying happy new year. Been busy last month like hell. This month so far looks like it's back to normal so I can start translating as usual again. But so far nothing yet, I think SE in Japan is off for couple more days.

[Reinheart]

Rep Post 01/06/14
- Low level roulette will be selected from higher level dungeons
- FC points/credits from Wolves’ Den planned for future
- Fishing while sitting
- Getting knocked back while using Holmgang is a bug
- Mog letter - You won’t lose mail with attachment even if box is full so don’t worry

Rep Post 01/06/14 Low level roulette will be selected from higher level dungeons.

Right now you only get low level dungeons and hardly get into any mid level dungeons. This was set this way but devs are looking into changing that in 2.15.

こんにちは。
Hello

実装されてから結構な回数を通っているのですが、異常に偏ってる気がしたので投稿してみます。
あくまで私はですが、極めて高い確率でサスタシャ、タムタラ、イフリートの３つから選択されます。ここにカッパーベルとトトラクが１，２回という感じでハウケタ以降のIDは一度も選ばれた事がありません。
Since released I’ve been going through the roulette a lot but feels like it’s leaning towards one side too much so let me make this post. This is just from my experience but I have been getting into Sastasha, Tamtara, and Ifrit at high rate. Aside from this I’ve gotten into Copperbell and Totorak maybe once or twice and haven’t been chosen to go to dungeons post Haukke Manor.

ご質問の通り、現在は低レベルのインスタンスダンジョンが選ばれやすい仕様です。
Currently it’s set so the low level dungeons are selected more.


パッチ2.15にてこのロジックの変更を検討しています。
「人の足りないコンテンツに優先的に割り当てられる」という方針に変わりはありませんが、
現在より幅広いレベル帯のコンテンツに当たりやすくなります。
In patch 2.15 we are looking into changing this logic.
The rule regarding where contents with not enough players will get priority will not change, however it will be possible to get into various level contents than what it is set to now.

Rep Post 01/06/14 FC points/credits from Wolves’ Den planned for future.

こんにちは。
Hello

カンパニーポイント、カンパニークレジットをPvPコンテンツでも得られるようにしてほしい
タイトルの通りです
現状だとPvP主体のカンパニーはとても苦しいです
ウルヴズジェイルだと他のポイント、クレジットがもらえるコンテンツに対して時間当たりに回せる数が多いので少量でも構わないのでもらえるようにしてほしいです
Please make it so we can earn company points/credit through PvP contents.
Right now it’s hard for companies to do PvP, for Wolves’ Den you have to go through it for couple hours compared to other contents which you can obtain points/credits. Please make it so you can get some points from it even if it’s just a small amount.

コメントありがとうございます。
現在、ウルヴズジェイルではフリーカンパニーポイント／カンパニークレジットは溜まりませんが、
将来的にはウルヴズジェイルでも溜まるようになる予定です。今しばらくおまちください。
Thank you for your comment.
Currently, you don’t get any free company points/company credits from Wolves’ Den, however in future we are planning to make it where you can acquire those. Please hang in there.

Rep Post 01/06/14 Fishing while sitting

クルザスで氷に穴空いてる所に椅子が置いてあるのでそういうとこで座って
釣りがしたいです。ちなみにヒットしたら立ち上がり吊り上げたらまた座る感じで。
I would like to sit down and fish on that chair in Coerthas where there is a chair on ice.
Also when you get a hit to stand up to catch the fish, then sit back down afterwards, something like that.

パッチ2.2で、釣りをしながらエモートの「座る」で任意に座れるようになる予定です。
エモート「座る」で 「座り釣り ⇔ 立ち釣り」を切り替えられるイメージですね。
In patch 2.2 we are planning to have an option where you can use the sit emote while fishing. So you can switch between fishing while sitting, fishing while standing through sit emote.

Rep Post 01/06/14 Getting knocked back while using Holmgang is a bug

とはいうものの、ノックバックに関しては、仕様なのかバグなのかはっきりしていただきたいものですよね。
For Holmgang’s knockback I want to know if it’s working as intended or a bug, this needs to be verified.

ホルムギャングの効果中にノックバックするのは不具合です。
時期などはまだお約束できませんが、今後修正予定ですのでしばらくお待ちください。
Being knocked back while holmgang is in effect is a bug.
We cannot promise the timing yet but we are planning to fix this so please wait for it.

Rep Post 01/06/14 Mog letter - You won’t lose mail with attachment even if box is full so don’t worry.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/134376?p=1756557#post1756557 - Saying even if your mog letter is full if there is an unread mail in your mail box it won’t get deleted so don’t worry. And for any other features they have to look into it carefully as RMT may use it wrongfully.

[Royal]

Have you read much on the JP forums about them being unhappy about the direction of crafting? Being secondary and almost useless in the game? Just curious if they share the same opinion as alot im reading on these forums.