Wow; double nice catch. It's been a while since I've seen productive speculations! I guess there's no reason for anyone to show up shouting things like, "Beast tribes are not Final Fantasy! This game is becoming a WoWclone!" or "Humanoid mobs ruin my immersion!"

That said, I believe you're right - these are very likely Iron Giants. In actuality, FFXI's team (likely members that would later be swapped to FFXIV) were introducing Iron Giants for Abyssea in Septebmer '10 - perhaps they got to XIV and decided, "We need some of that s#!t over here, too." in December.

Iron giants, cycloptic ice monsters, the empire... man, we're screwed.