What do you think the capital city of Garlemald would look like?

[AmemeAmeklin]

The last stage of Eureka

[Kusanagi7]

reduced to a dungeon.

[MetalSnakeXI1]

The Prima Vista is potentially a look at civilian architecture too.

A reversal of Midgar could be interesting - the poorer districts could be located on the upper portion of the city whilst the more opulent districts are protected from the harsh elements. I could see some sort of bio dome being common, too, to allow for diverse environments contained within them.

Well the Prima Vista is more or less a flying theater similar to Tantalus from FF9(even tho it houses all the FF Tactics/12 references xD) so personally I dunno if that necessarily reflects the architecture of highborn Garlean houses

A dungeon.

Lol I hope not.The only portion I could see as a dungeon is the royal palace where we might fight Varis but I hope it doesn't get the Ala Mhigo treatment

[Yasminou]

As many of you, I imagine it like Midgar. If we are indeed going there next expansion, I also see it behaving like outside zones with enemies, but maybe no flying (at release).
It could even stretch on more than one zone: one zone for the surroundings (accessible pretty early) and the outtermost part of the city (accessible later) and another zone for the innermost part of the city (this would be the last zone from an MSQ viewpoint, like Azys Lla and The Lochs).

[Zephanoa]

As much as I absolutely hate VII, I would imagine it like Midgar. Should be bustling with lots of technology draining the planet of life.

[LineageRazor]

Lots and lots of smokestacks spewing blue smoke. Perhaps not the whole city, but the center (and the palace, especially) will be tall, imposing metal structures like we see in the castrums. Red lights and searchlights all over the place, cruel-looking magitek aircraft buzzing around it like flies all hours of the day.

Farther from the city center, buildings might phase into more traditional structures, depending on whether the Empire made a habit of reserving technological improvements for its military and upper classes at the expense of the middle and lower class citizens. If they DID spread the wealth a bit, the outskirts might be more metal structures, just at a smaller scale. Ditto for whether we'd see the general populace (at least, middle-class and up) using magitek-style general-purpose vehicles (automobiles), and whether the roads are paved or not. Mass-transit services seem likely even if the outskirts are underdeveloped, specifically trains.

Given how much we've been told it's a desolate wasteland and cold in northern Ilsabard, I pictured it as a snowy Midgar.

Just as a point of interest - have we heard anything about the climate there, post-calamity? It'd be interesting if Ishgard and Islabard swapped climates, and the latter became temperate.

A dungeon.

Oooh, the SNARK!

[Bright-Flower]

I'm not sure if the calamity even affected the empire or not. I know it did Eorzea. (Did we ever get info on if or how it affected Gyr Abania?) But to the best of my knowledge it didn't affect the world beyond Eorzea.

[Remedi]

Probably it had some effects yes, but Eorzea was ground zero, since the lack of dalamud shards in Gyr Abania it's not unrealistic to think that the effect of the calamity on Ilsabard were shifts in weather conditions or climate changes.

[Ramesses]

Beside a few shots of the main throne room where Varis is and the Infirmary "Zenos" and Asahi were in,that's the only few bits we saw from Garlemald.

I always imagined it to be similar to Midgar from Final Fantasy 7 only a bit more advanced with the Royal Palace and its magitek research facilities towering over the rest of the city.

I dunno how it's gonna shape up in 5.0 but personally I'd love for Garlemald's captial city to be the largest one in the game so far in comparison to the other major citystates in the game.

Thanks for starting this thread OP... my meeting today got pushed back by over an hour and this gave me something interesting to sketch while waiting.

I've personally been VERY intrigued with this idea and since Stormblood's release, I've stared at the Garlemald's capital on new map so many many times... just constantly trying to image how it'd look like.

Thus, the sketch I made (see below) was to help illustrate my speculations. I initially started sketching this with a marker and then decided to take my time with it and switched to pencils so I get get some shading included. The hard part was trying to stay true to the three main "towers" shown on the Eorzean map.

• I suspect the lower "base" area beneath the "clouds" to look like Midgar; possibly dark, dank and maybe even polluted from all those decades of Ceruleum mining.
• There is a potential for this "base" area to also include the slum areas on the outskirts, just like in Ishgard and Archadia from FFXII... but maybe this is also the area with the best nightlife with lots of stuff going on... perhaps like Deling City from FFVIII, lots of neon lights.
• Which also leads me to suspect that there will be some sort of massive Ceruleum pipelines that run through the underground or lower levels and feed the city in general.
• These pipelines might also feed into a few ground level research facilities-- and I'd love to really see trains leading into them as well
• Then of course, there may even be an old "historic" area; perhaps its in ruins or preserved in great shape... dunno. Judging from the design of the Prima Vista airship (which looks like a floating coliseum), I reckon there will be some sort of Roman influences here.
• I remembered from history that when Empires expand, they sometimes like to maintain their old capitals as a reminder of their ancestry and then build massive grand spectacular styles of architecture as their new capitals-- as an exhibition of their wealth, power, might and to psychologically destroy the morale of any potential invaders.
• Above the layer of clouds is where I see the advanced research facilities, the treasury, some gardens, and wealthy Garleans living in those strange dark towers... with the peaks being where the imperial family, senate and legates reside. I can perhaps see this area looking somewhat of a mix of Eden (capital of Cocoon) from FFXIII and Archades (capital of Archadia) from FFXII
• I'd also wager that's where the barracks for the legions will be-- makes logistical sense for them to be near locations that are aerial so they can easily board onto the dreadnought airships. Which reminds me yet again of the Imperial palace area in Archades... watch this video (yes click this youtube link--->), Gabranth's Report To The Emperor -- Spoilers therein, so I strongly advise to watch only between 4.52 to 5.42 of the video if you have not played FFXII

I'd be solely disappointed if the Devs pulled another Ala Mhigo with this place... they have the potential to really push the envelope on this one and make something very unique.

[MetalSnakeXI1]

Thanks for starting this thread OP... my meeting today got pushed back by over an hour and this gave me something interesting to sketch while waiting.

I'd be solely disappointed if the Devs pulled another Ala Mhigo with this place... they have the potential to really push the envelope on this one and make something very unique.

You're welcome.Love the sketch ^_^

I really do like the ideas you presented....tho Eden from XIII is a bit too futuristic and personally I would imagine Eden's structure to be applied to an Allagan city rather than a Garlean one.

But yeah I really do hope they won't make it another Ala Mhigo.Heck I don't think they can turn it into just a dungeon cuz most likely the capital city of Garlemald would easily dwarf all major citystates we've been introduced to thus far

Sure storywise one could argue why would Garlemald allow the Warrior of Light and the scions to enter......well this ain't the first time where Garlean interested aligned with the scions.

Remember Regula Von Hydrus(I won't blame you if you didn't xD)?In the Warring Triad questline he made an alliance with us in order to stop Sophia/Goddess and Zurvan/Demon.

So I could imagine Varis trying to make some use of the Warrior of Light for a while similar to Thordan in Heavensward....especially with Alphinaud's current predicament in The Burn , all the civil issues going on between the Populares and the current government and maybe a potential mission in Dalmasca assuming the nation is expanded beyond the the current alliance raids we got.