How much time have passed since ARR?

[LyraKuroneko]

I was wondering how much time passed since ARR in game.

I have no idea and was curious.

[Anonymoose]

I'm actually impressed that it's almost been a year since the last time I had to copy/paste the last bubble post. We're making good progress!
(Some variation of "what year is it" / "how much time since..." used to be a weekly kind of question, lol.)

This is a dilemma faced by a lot of MMOs. To allow everyone that joins the game, regardless of when they do, to experience the full story, there simply has to be a stoppage of time. Okay, not really a stoppage, but more of a time bubble in which a span of about a year is contained. This is why that for the duration of 1.0, Eorzea was in a perpetual 1572. Think of it as the same thing that’s happening in the Simpsons. 23 seasons gone and Lisa’s still 8, Maggie’s still a baby, and the gummy Venus still tastes oh, so sacrelicious. Pushing time along would also mean changing 1000s of lines of NPC dialogue, updating quests, webpages, etc. with every patch. Meaning it would take more than double the time to release updates, and I’m sure most people wouldn’t want to wait. In a book, movie, offline game, a strict timeline can be set without too many complications. In an online title, there are just too many variables, so we ask that you bear with our bending of space-time. It’s for the greater good!

Anwyll
Long ago, you mentioned that 1.0 took place in a “Simpsons Time Bubble.” Are we still in a bubble? Or does time move now that we know Patch = Canon?

Koji Fox (Fernehalwes)
It’s still a bubble; you have to have a bubble. There are players joining in Heavensward that are starting at the beginning. The bubble’s just gotten bigger.

Time passes, but it does not move; it never adds up to anything. Even if you can prove that 5,000 days passed, the year does not change. It is, and will always be, 5 Seventh Umbral Era [into/also known as] 1 Seventh Astral Era. (Until they say it's not.)

You can find some lines in the game that make this confusing. Some NPCs will make meta-jokes about real-world time or deliberately say "How many moons has it been!? Oh, it doesn't matter!", but so long as the NPCs are still saying the Calamity was five years ago, the Calamity was five years ago. (Please look forward to the Rising!)

Even after spending months at sea, the Calamity? Still 5 years ago. Silvertear skies? Still 15 years ago. Ala Mhigo? Still 20 years ago. Doma? Still 25 years ago. (Aside from this one thing I don't even want to get into, lol.)

That said, feel free to make up your own timeline for yourself; no one's gonna stop you and no one can say you're wrong.

[LyraKuroneko]

Okay, thanks for your answer.

[Karthak]

I don't understand why there has to be a bubble. For example, time passes in WoW just fine. Just have the game say that the ARR content takes place 5 years after the Calamity, Heavensward 6 years, Stormblood 7 years, etc etc. Players aren't stupid.

Edit: At some point "it's five years after the Calamity" is going to look pretty dumb, given all we've done and are going to do. They mention the Simpson as an example, but then I can't stand that show. :P

[Cilia]

I don't understand why there has to be a bubble. For example, time passes in WoW just fine. Just have the game say that the ARR content takes place 5 years after the Calamity, Heavensward 6 years, Stormblood 7 years, etc etc. Players aren't stupid.

Edit: At some point "it's five years after the Calamity" is going to look pretty dumb, given all we've done and are going to do. They mention the Simpson as an example, but then I can't stand that show. :P

It's mostly a cost-saving measure. Updating key characters' models every expansion just isn't practical, and by keeping the year stuck at "7UE 5 / 7AE 1" that particular issue can be side-stepped. Now character models are only updated when key events occur, such as Raubahn losing his arm, instead of giving every character who appears in a major cutscene a model update every expansion. (WoW can get away with doing what it does because it never shows the PC in a cutscene proper, and what cutscenes it has (which were pretty recently implemented) are pre-rendered instead of being in-engine like here. Its lower graphical fidelity is also a boon in this case - because the graphics aren't as high-quality, it takes less time and resources to update or make a new model.)

If you really must have a concrete date, just take the starting date of ARR (7UE 5 / 7AE 1) and add all of the real-world time that's passed since then on, using the Rising as a year marker. Considering ARR launched in August 2013, that would mean we've had 5 Rising events with a few months tacked on, so it's been ~5.7 years since ARR.

... if you really must.

[Iscah]

The time bubble does mean they can to things like never update what NPCs are doing - they haven't been having the same conversation for five years, we're just permanently seeing them at "minute 1" of the time bubble and not progressing.

It does also allow for those optional quests to take place in their designated place in the timeline a little less strangely. It's still odd to play things out of order and see "earlier versions" of characters than you've previously been dealing with, but it make a bit more sense when you've just moved into a different zone of the time bubble. The overall world hasn't moved to a different state where that earlier story can't take place any more.

[Wyssahtyn]

(Aside from this one thing I don't even want to get into, lol.)

You mean that one NPC in the Enclave who says it's been a year since the failed rebellion or some such?

[Jollyy5]

Indeed, as the voice in Shadowbringers trailer says: "How many years have passed since that day?"

None, I started my journey as a fledgling marauder this morning, was slaying primals left and right by lunchtime and became a legend and a master or many forms of combat who has liberated several countries by afternoon.

[Floortank]

The bubble answer is logical on the surface, but gonzo when you look deeper. Why should a quest in Heavensward take place in the same span of time as a quest in ARR? Sequentially, one happens after the other. Saying B happens after A does not change the position or shape of A, not even if you're just learning how to read.

Having Shadowbringers take place eight years on shouldn't have any affect at all on past quests, or change them. Quests from the old expansions can be treated as having happened in the past. Players moving through those quests are moving forward through time, playing out events as they happened, and eliding over the necessary time skips.

If time can be a bubble, it can also be a foggy gray expanse inside that bubble. And bubbles that contain more mass do tend to get larger.

[RenewalXVII]

The bubble answer is logical on the surface, but gonzo when you look deeper. Why should a quest in Heavensward take place in the same span of time as a quest in ARR? Sequentially, one happens after the other. Saying B happens after A does not change the position or shape of A, not even if you're just learning how to read.

Having Shadowbringers take place eight years on shouldn't have any affect at all on past quests, or change them. Quests from the old expansions can be treated as having happened in the past. Players moving through those quests are moving forward through time, playing out events as they happened, and eliding over the necessary time skips.

If time can be a bubble, it can also be a foggy gray expanse inside that bubble. And bubbles that contain more mass do tend to get larger.

I mean, you're correctly interpreting the bubble: everything happens in release order, but the numerical amount of time it takes is left utterly ambiguous for simplicity's sake. Like, there's the infamous example of the CUL 50 quest that features Nanamo, which takes place in 2.0 but could be completed post-2.55, and thus logically must be set in the past before 255.