Viera Race "Confirmed" for 5.0! Are you gonna change races?

[Wolfyboy]

This

Also what's "too cute" about those released concept pictures we saw? They looked downright badass??
I'm just hoping that it's because that's an old, outdated interview that doesn't have the context of those rad arts.

Despite I'm pretty certain that there will be Viera males, I would not discount past interviews. Keep in mind what they said about what they would do with BLU in 2014 (5 years ago with link below), and that is exactly what they're doing with it now. The art of Viera is also on the link of the interview. There is evidence that the concept art is the main point of discussion because in that link it says,

https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/the-x-button/2015-07-29/heaven-sense/.91021

A couple months ago, you showed off the new race, the Au Ra… but you also showed concept art of the Viera, who appeared in Final fantasy XII and other games. Why did you decide against their inclusion as a playable race?

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/threads/191993

A: I think that blue mage is an interesting job because you can learn spells from enemies, but honestly I don't think that it really fits MMORPG party settings. If anything, I think it would work solo and it would be really fun to implement it as a job where you go around and learn abilities from every monster, so I'd definitely like to try and do this, but I'm concerned when it comes to playing in a party players would put up barriers if you haven't learned certain abilities. Additionally, in the event you are able to use abilities forever once you learn them, the difficulty of learning abilities would be high, and we wouldn't be able to balance the system so it wouldn't revolve around procuring your abilities instead of equipment. This wouldn't be practical enough to fit in an MMORPG party setting and conversely if you are swapping in only certain abilities you've learned, the true image of a blue mage would diminish, so this is something that I am concerned with.

[Ariane]

The art of Viera is also on the link of the interview. There is evidence that the concept art is the main point of discussion because in that link it says,

Yeah, they showed off the au ra at a fanfest, and it was the same time they showed the concept art for the au ra along with other races they had considered (one of which was that viera concept art). The interview was published on Jul 29th 2015, which is after Heavensward's release. He even says in his answer "I was actually strongly against showing the Viera concept art at the event we unveiled the Au Ra at. I knew that people would be like “why didn't you include them?!” [laughs]" He's definitely referring to those arts there.

[Duskane]

One thing I've thought about is maybe what it is there is male viera but they are so beastly that look extremely different than female viera to the point they may as well be a different race.

Since they dont Know a viera gender till some time after birth
That must be one HELL of a change.

[Ayer2015]

Yeah, they showed off the au ra at a fanfest, and it was the same time they showed the concept art for the au ra along with other races they had considered (one of which was that viera concept art). The interview was published on Jul 29th 2015, which is after Heavensward's release. He even says in his answer "I was actually strongly against showing the Viera concept art at the event we unveiled the Au Ra at. I knew that people would be like “why didn't you include them?!” [laughs]" He's definitely referring to those arts there.

I find it amusing that on one hand he knew the player base would love the concept art yet he didn't like it personally.

[Iscah]

Since they dont Know a viera gender till some time after birth
That must be one HELL of a change.

I had the same thought... but curiously enough there's actually a real-world precedent for this! (Whether the writers are aware of it, or they're making it up and reality is just stranger than fiction...)

In a science documentary I watched a while ago, there was a segment about a village where an otherwise-rare condition has become common enough to be an unremarkable thing that happens to some people: they can be biologically male but appear to be female until they reach puberty, at which point the extra testosterone that would normally drive those changes also triggers them to develop male anatomy in the first place.

So it's conceivable (at least within fantasy genetics) that something like that could spread to the entire population, and they really can't tell which gender the children are until they reach puberty. It would be normal for them... but yeah, still probably a pretty weird thing to go through.

[Jandor]

One thing I've thought about is maybe what it is there is male viera but they are so beastly that look extremely different than female viera to the point they may as well be a different race. You might as well say they aren't really viera. This would fit with Yoshi-P comments on not liking the male viera, and that he thought the concept art of them was too cute and not beastly enough. This would also explain why the leaker thought he was looking at two races, but the fanfest points to only one. It could even explain why the NPCs think they never seen a male viera before. They had but they couldn't recognize them as viera with them being so different than the female viera.

Yeah I was thinking about this too, could be that male Viera basically barely resemble a Viera as we know them.

Maybe males are more beastly Viera, with shorter ears and a big fuzzy lion like mane on their neck. lol, neckbeard race.

[Daralii]

Since they dont Know a viera gender till some time after birth
That must be one HELL of a change.

The draumaturge says it happens at 13. You know, about the same time humans undergo puberty.

[Alleo]

"A little too cute" is such a weird phrase in the context of a Final Fantasy game, Dissidia's male cast is an army of bishounen lol

Also completely funny because Lakshimi needed a change in appearance because she was not cute enough in Yoshidas eyes...but seemingly only females are allowed to be cute...

Still if we get Vieras like Fran then I wonder why they went back on their "its just too similiar to other races" since they are just Elezen with bunny ears (or at least Fran is).

(And yes I am still a bit sad that we wont get Lupin. They would at least have much more differences to other races)

[Jandor]

This

Also what's "too cute" about those released concept pictures we saw? They looked downright badass??
I'm just hoping that it's because that's an old, outdated interview that doesn't have the context of those rad arts.

Absolutely adorable .

[Corue]

Yoshi's complained about male Viera being too cute.
The gender of a Viera isn't known until 13 (Implying some kind of drastic change in form).
If they're using real-life rabbits as a source of inspiration, male rabbits are normally smaller than female rabbits.

We're getting this, aren't we?