Season changes in Eorzea

[LineageRazor]

I think it would probably be too complicated to implement (not to mention time consuming now to go back and redo zone textures in different 'seasonal' variations), so SE probably won't see the justification.

They could go the subtle route, like they did in FFXI. That game had seasons, but the changes those seasons brought were hard to spot unless you were looking for them. It mostly affected weather (areas that got snowy weather would get it more often in winter, and less often in summer, for example), but in some areas trees would change color, or patches of snow would appear.

It's probably too late, now, even for subtle changes, though. Seasons pretty much need to be built in from the ground up, and given the insane time and money budgets they were under to make ARR, it's not too surprising that seasons weren't taken into consideration. Honestly, we should consider ourselves fortunate that we got any kind of weather at all, given that it has very little impact on gameplay outside of fishing.

[Naunet]

the more 'autumn' looking foliage in the North Shroud is actually fire damage still lingering from the Calamity that the forest has not recovered from yet).

Where's the lore that the very distinctly autumn-colored leaves in the North Shroud is due to "fire damage"? Curious. Though I don't think SE needs you making their justifications for them. xD

@OP: Seasons would be cool in climes where it's appropriate.

Well, I just assume that Hydalin has no axial tilt nor does her distance to the sun change throughout the year. Therfore no seasons.

No axial tilt has a lot of other implications that would make it very challenging for life to have evolved, though SE has not shown they understand science (and especially ecology and biology) particularly well in the game.

[SigmaOZ]

~

Why do you even bother!?... Weather is not the same as seasons!...

We do have weather in Eorzea but I also want seasons, detractors like yourself just make me want to leave the game, but I won't, I just hope to never meet you!...

[MistyMew]

Agreed! I too have suggested this in the past, a few of us have over the years.

I wish our suggestions would be implemented or at least forwarded to the dev...the English forums have made a huge amount of good suggestions with no input from ...anyone at se...unless to delete threads.

These forums need a lot more direct se interaction/representation like the jp receive on an hourly basis. smh.

Anyway, it is still a cool idea, even if just a couple zones could have this feature it would add a lot in atmosphere to the zones.
I understand if it cant be achieved but personally I would really like it.
/support!

[Yasmina]

I would love the season changes, even they could give life back to the ARR / HW areas.
There could be achievements, challenges, quest, titles and more things that could be achieved only during a specific season!

[Jpec07]

Now that PS3 limitations are gone, I'd actually be very curious to see what they could do in terms of adding season changes.

Could get expensive resource-wise, but examples of things I'd like to see in terms of seasons:

• Rain being replaced with sleet/snow in some regions.
• Flora (and flora-based monsters) changing: flowering, blooming, shedding leaves, leaflessness, etc.
• Adjust ground covering depending on season/weather.
• NPCs dressing warmer/colder depending on weather/temperature.
• Enemy presence changes: many animals hibernate during winter, become more aggressive during mating season, migrate to different regions, etc.
• Change the path of the sun through the skybox.
• Change which stars are visible at night, and their orientation.

There's lots of subtle changes they could make that would make seasons non-intrusive (just ignore anything about mob behavior above) but also add another layer of immersion.

[Gemina]

Why do you even bother!?... Weather is not the same as seasons!...

We do have weather in Eorzea but I also want seasons, detractors like yourself just make me want to leave the game, but I won't, I just hope to never meet you!...

WTF is your problem? With a crappy attitude like that it's best you stay the hell away from me as far as possible anyways.

Thanks to everyone else knowing how to contribute to the thread.

[Stormfur]

Well, their justification will probably be:

1) La Noscea is on the coast, it doesn't snow there
2) Coerthas is always covered in snow
3) Thanalan is mostly desert and hot/dry

That doesn't leave much in the way of areas to actually show all 4 seasons.

[LineageRazor]

Why do you even bother!?... Weather is not the same as seasons!...

We do have weather in Eorzea but I also want seasons, detractors like yourself just make me want to leave the game, but I won't, I just hope to never meet you!...

Did you quote the right person? As far as I can tell, Gemina was AGREEING with you, and not a detractor at all!

Seems as though you made an enemy, and very pointlessly, at that. XD

[SendohJin]

Well, their justification will probably be:

they don't need a justification. it's obviously too expensive to implement and not worthwhile since most of the content isn't even on the world map.