Akihiko Yoshida is easily my favorite game artist as well. He established the look of Vagrant Story, FFT, FFXII, FF:4HoL, and (almost) every Yasumi Matsuno game. Having him as the art director for FFXIV is next best thing to having this game set in Ivalice.

Though Amano and Nomura have been the main influences in the FF games in the past, Akihiko Yoshida's work represents is the essence of Final Fantasy (IMHO) and I hope that he will be the driving artistic force for it in the future.