Ingame Fanfest? (Alternative Fanfest Idea)

[Guardian]

Reading through the newest letter from the producer I could not help but feel saddened by the decision to cancel this year's fanfest. I always enjoy watching the livestream to get the newest updates coming to the game, especially if a new expansion is on the way. When reading into the possibility of looking into how to hold the event digitally my mind instantly went to the online nature of Final Fantasy XIV itself. What if the fanfest could be held in the game itself? With that thought in mind I began thinking through how something like that might work.

1) A new area: Fanfest Hall
2) PVP arena
3) Fans could submit art that could be placed on interactive wall points that could be clicked to view.
4) A main hall area could be setup for live stream where cutscenes could play for anyone in the area.
5) Gold saucer style minigames could be setup
6) Special npc vendors could be available for limited time ingame items
7) Set as a dungeon instance or each server have instanced zones to prevent overcrowding?

[Krotoan]

while this sounds incredible.. they're already behind on an expected patch. I don't know if this would be plausible on top of what they already have on their plate.

[Dustytome]

It said they were looking to do a NA fanfest in 2021 didn't it? So it just got offset a few months?

[Guardian]

It said they were looking to do a NA fanfest in 2021 didn't it? So it just got offset a few months?

They did also mention they were looking into ways of hosting the event digitally
"As such, we are not only exploring a physical event, but also looking into alternative ways to realize the event digitally. We will share news of our progress as things start to take shape, so please stay tuned for more information."

[Shougun]

A darkmoon faire but actually sort of a fanfest in game event could be really cute, and just reuse here on out even if there are physical events too (that way the development isn't seen as a big waste, and perhaps new mini-games are added sometimes). Can also utilize and repackage some of the golden saucer games to get a head start (as you suggested). A few potential negatives beyond the obvious development costs though might be reduced viewers on the stream unless they found some way to hook that through the game (so you count as a viewer), reduced chat (unless again they did something funky there), and perhaps less stable servers which could make a moment that should feel good get negative press instead.

I've always thought hanging out in game watching the stream could be fun (with the ability to full screen the stream when desired), but I've also wondered how much worth it would be to make lol. If you lose a lot of viewers or if it takes a lot of effort and only 100 people use it over the live stream.. maybe doesn't feel as worth.

Still darkmoon faire event, I feel that could always be cute but we do also have golden saucer- perhaps they can tie em' together a bit. Golden Saucer goes Cirque Du Soleil mobile with extra rewards like the raining MGP (perhaps also make the event items that are special unique to that event but also return each year, with like one item, game, or concept new each year).

[DrWho2010]

They did also mention they were looking into ways of hosting the event digitally
"As such, we are not only exploring a physical event, but also looking into alternative ways to realize the event digitally. We will share news of our progress as things start to take shape, so please stay tuned for more information."

this basically means - "we talked about it once at a zoom staff meeting, thought it might be a good idea but we'll look at it a bit later once we get 5.3 QA started, until then that's all that's going to be done about it".

[LunaJoy]

It said they were looking to do a NA fanfest in 2021 didn't it? So it just got offset a few months?

Yeah, I’m just hoping for this. A digital version would be better than having nothing, but I’ve been to the last two fanfests, and there’s nothing that can really replace the fun of actually getting to go!

[Iscah]

I think it's more likely that "digital delivery" would mean webcasts of the scheduled talks and maybe adaptation of other events (eg. cosplay contest getting people to send in photos/short video then compile it into a webcast) but if they were going to do something in-game then I could see the Gold Saucer as really the only plausible venue.

Either take over the Event Hall or assemble a new "Conference Hall" side space out of recycled pieces of the main building model. Though I'm not sure how much you could do within the existing game framework - it's probably not built for linking to livestreams.

[VictorTheed]

I just hope they still deliver the expansion news to us, that's all I'm concerned about with fanfests, I hope they don't delay the expansion news.

[MsQi]

In-Fest for short!