Your Favorite Easter Eggs & (Pop) Culture References in FFXIV

They are everywhere, from FATE and quest names to NPC dialogue.

I was just catching up on Sorrows of Werlyt and in Terncliff there is a Rueful Civilian NPC who partially quotes a Pink Floyd song, "Dogs", from the album Animals. Apparently he is, "Just another sad old man, all alone dying of..."

Whether they are easy to spot and identify or buried in near obscurity, which have you found? Any favorites? :cool:

Pretty much any of the subtle or obvious references to other Final Fantasy games in the series. I particularly enjoy the Return to Ivalice and Bozja storylines on that front because they capture much of the same atmosphere and themes of Final Fantasy Tactics, Vagrant Story and Final Fantasy XII. All of which are among my favourite games in existence.

I don't care much for the general pop culture references beyond that. Of the many reasons I grew tired of World of Warcraft, the obsession with inserting pop culture references everywhere happened to be amongst the biggest turn offs for me. I just hope we don't reach a point in FFXIV where lengthy quest chains spanning entire zones happen to dictate a zone's overall narrative. In WoW, it started subtle and grew more common over time.

None, because I largely don't care about such things. Previous FF refs or mythological refs on the other hand are a different story, and in particular those to XII.

I don't mind the pop-culture references, because they're more just puns than anything (due to Michael-Christopher Koji Fox being an admitted pop-culture fantatic), although on more than one occasion I find myself rolling my eyes and groaning at my monitor "FERRRRNE!!" when I find a particularly silly one. ;)

Probably my favourite though was two references to one of my favourite songs; Bonnie Tyler's Total Eclipse of the Heart (no, the GLA/PLD weaponskill 'Total Eclipse' is clearly not one though ;)) - when facing the Siren at the Ship Graveyard on the Isle of Umbra during the ARR story, the siren recites stilted broken sentences that are actually part of the lyrics for that song, and much much later, the description for the Yin and Yang minions outright recites the lyrics, such as "Turn around". I grinned when I saw that. :D

Like Theo and Lauront above though it's the references to past FF games that I enjoy the most, and have made something of an obesession trying to find them all. ;) Incidentally there were some really old threads that attempted to list as many sci-fi/fantasy pop culture and FF series references in FFXIV if you're interested. ;)

Gonna echo the "none", and honestly those + the nael quotes in UCoB are making me seriously consider switching the game to a different language.

Brute Justice and its components being named after the Combaticons made me chuckle.

I've always loved Matoya's cave in Heavensward, which is a recreation of a scene from the original Final Fantasy where you meet a witch named Matoya and her backwards-talking brooms. But on top of that, one of the brooms makes reference to the Mr. Sparkle commercial from The Simpsons: "I am disrespectful to dust. Can you see that I am serious?"

There's a Stormblood quest called Radiata Stores, which references an old PS2 game called Radiata Stories. Got a little chuckle out of me that they would remember a little game like that.

Does anyone know why I cannot make a new thread on this Forum? I'm trying to get help resolve a technical difficulty which is preventing me from playing the game at all for the last 6 days and I have received no replies to my tickets so far. I have spent 6 full days trying to trouble shoot and I have tried pretty-much everything I can. My only hope was making a new thread here but I cant even do that. Please I need help im just trying to play the game I paid for. The game keeps crashing every time there is a cutscene past heavensward i.e. welcome to ishgard and quests after that. I simply cannot get past this and I am close to giving up and I am very sad that I cannot log in.

I have tried reinstalling the game, all the windows drivers, steam, GPU drivers, tried using direct X 9, all drivers have been installed clean 2 times. nothing seems to work. I have seen at LEAST dozens of posts about the same issue because I tried the first 3 pages of google search for every tip and trick i can use for troubleshooting. I think it will take me over an hour to list all the troubleshooting I have done over the last 6 days. This is my last ditch effort to get some help because I really dont want to do a charge back as steam will maybe ban my account. But I cannot afford to waste the kind of money I spent to buy this game. Someone please. :C

There’s a very low level quest in the Shroud called Parasite Cleave, a reference to the ps1 best horror game of all time Parasite Eve. Overall though i’m not particularly a fan of the references unless it’s to other square games. Random pop culture ones just kind of take away from the world.

It's Not Lupus

https://ffxiv.gamerescape.com/wiki/It%27s_Not_Lupus

Can rarely ever beat a House reference.

There's a quest in Shadowbringers called "Legend of the Not-So-Hidden Temple".

I don't know if it was intentional or not, but it always reminds me of the 90's kids game show Legends of the Hidden Temple.

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Originally Posted by Seera1024

There's a quest in Shadowbringers called "Legend of the Not-So-Hidden Temple".

I don't know if it was intentional or not, but it always reminds me of the 90's kids game show Legends of the Hidden Temple.

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Oh, that was definitely intentional, and also well played. I remember watching that show a lot as a kid.

I like when Fate titles or quest names have wordplay based puns in them. Whether they're an actual pop-culture reference or not, doesn't matter. If there's a pun, I've likely smirked at it and exhaled sharply out of my nose.

Also I somewhat feel that the term pop culture reference doesn't apply to some of the references they make, due to being obscured by time. A lot of them are not what is hip and happening right now.

Let's see... MightyMollusk already pointed out the first one that comes to mind for me. I absolutely used to lose it when people just said it was, "a sentai reference."

Beyond Brute Justice being discount Bruticus... hmm. There's a grand leve in Ishgard called, "Negative, They Are Meat Popsicles." That's a Fifth Element reference. The leve itself is actually about frozen, dead Ishgardians that need to be honored with adamantite swords. It's a BSM leve.

I like to think of the cheery nature of all the pun titles and things for Fates and Leves as an expression of the WoL using humor to help ignore trauma and stressors.

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Originally Posted by Lauront

None, because I largely don't care about such things. Previous FF refs or mythological refs on the other hand are a different story, and in particular those to XII.

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FF references can be easter eggs as well. Just depends on what catches someone's eye.

I still think Flappy Berda should have had a followup FATE caled Angry Berda.

My favorite easter egg is the Edda one, in connection to Tam Tara Hard. Still creeps me out after all these years. However my favorite nod to another SE game is the fact that Cid's theme from Orbonne is actually taken straight from Vagrant Story, one of my all-time favorite SE games.

I pray it someday gets a remake.

I always enjoy seeing the Clever Girls fate up, in the Central Shroud, and other references to gen-x era pop culture. There are a lot around and they remind me that although I may be an "older" gamer now, I'm definitely not the only one.

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Originally Posted by KizuyaKatogami

There’s a very low level quest in the Shroud called Parasite Cleave, a reference to the ps1 best horror game of all time Parasite Eve. Overall though i’m not particularly a fan of the references unless it’s to other square games. Random pop culture ones just kind of take away from the world.

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Really good game. I liked the second one a lot but I never got around to finishing it.

My favorite reference in this game is, and will always be, during one of the moogle tribe dailies you have to slap a moogle. It responds with "H-How can she slap, kupo!?"

Mine is the "Passierschein a38" in the German and probably french translation. (Friend who plays in English does not remember this quest)
It's a joke from the french comic and movie series Asterix and Obelix.

My favorite (as a trekkie) is the Kobayashi Maru (a sunken ship in the Ruby Sea).

Dark Helmet mob that spawns in La Noscea. (Spaceballs, it even has a helmet on its head)

the stormblood quest befoe taking doma castle is a play on ont he song from hamilton witch is called the room where it happed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwfNRzCXsug

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Originally Posted by Vyrerus

Beyond Brute Justice being discount Bruticus... hmm.

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My husband is a huge Transformer fan and he plays XIV and he just lost it when I referenced this thread calling Brute Justice discount Bruticus.