Season 2 Storyline (another 10 years) [discussion]

[Cilia]

The only pressing mysteries I can think of are -

What the hell was under Silvertear Lake?

and

Where the hell did Nidhogg go and what did he do between the end of 3.0 and the very end of 3.2?

Other than that... trying to guess what a question will be is nigh-on impossible and not the sort of thing I enjoy.

[Ignis_Fatuus]

"The rumored return of a certain fellow is planned for 6.1 onwards." Yoshi-p from most recent live letter.

The question is probably who is this certain fellow? Since they are returning, I assume we already know them? Since fellow was a translation, was that a confirmation they are male?

I don't know why but I'm thinking about Alpha.
And thinking about him make me remember Ishikawa's words about advicing doing Omega Raid.

[GoldStarz]

"The rumored return of a certain fellow is planned for 6.1 onwards." Yoshi-p from most recent live letter.

The question is probably who is this certain fellow? Since they are returning, I assume we already know them? Since fellow was a translation, was that a confirmation they are male?

Gosetsu tops my list, but could it be someone else?

I think we can best assess where the next part of the story is going once we know where the "rumored return of a certain fellow" has returned from.

He was talking about Hildibrand, apparently "fellow" could've also been translated as "gentleman" from what I've seen in some circles.

[FrightfulNight]

I hear a lot of talk about the Dragon Star and the Omega star and honestly these do not really interest me at the moment, we just had a shard hoping expansion and i would rather focus on the source for two or three more expansions, especially after the literal end of the world it will be interesting to see and deal with some of the aftermath. I have also seen some people mention they want to explore more of Eorzea and honestly I would like to move more away from it in the next expansions and explore more of the locations on the source we have heard about but not gone to. especially since most major archs there seem to be wrapping up with Endwalker. I also think it is heavily implied at this point that the Silver tear lake storyline will factor into the Mysteries of the Twelve raid series.

As mentioned on this thread part of the reason the zones in Endwalker are so hyped is because we have heard about Sharlyan, Garlemald, Thravnir, and even the moon for years now, it certainly makes me more hyped for them than zones I have never heard about before. At the top of my Wishlist and what I honestly think 7.0 should focus on is Ilsabard. Those clouds are still covering the world map and I honestly feel Ilsabard will suffer the most damage on the Three continents after the end of days as it was already devastated by the Garlean War of succession and now is disorganized compared to Eorzea which has formed the Grand Company and even Orthard which still has the budding Eastern Alliance. The fall of the Garlean Empire also leaves a power vacuum that could be filled by various new powers. I also want Landis to be a Hub city since I really want there to be at least one magiteck city in the game that is not destroyed. There are also various locations in Orthard that we still haven't gone to like the rest of Hingashi. Also as people have mentioned there is Meracydia which I would like to see explored more in the future since again, it has been mentioned for years.

[NoblePigeon]

I've never understand why people think "fantasy" only includes very specific tropes like no airships or guns, things that have been staples of those kinda settings for decades. You're playing the wrong game if you want a purely sword and sorcery experience, as another person said. The fantasy genre encompasses a massive range of tropes, and FF ESPECIALLY isn't shy of mixing starships and lasers with knights and dragons, even ones that lean more on the latter thematically. Those elements aren't "out of place", they fit into the setting as firmly as anything else.

In fact, I'm almost certain that if we go to Meracydia, it's going to be a post-apocalyptic combination of Conan the Barbarian with robots, with barbarians riding atop dragons, tearing apart Allagan warmachina with their "primitive" weapons and melting them with dragonfire. Dotting the wasteland are savage city-states that choke under the grip of deathless sorcerer-tyrants. The roads between these bastions of civilization are critical for trade, and so "road warriors" that ride atop techno-organic chimera with wheels for arms and legs are in high demand to escort travelers and trade caravans. Just to shoehorn in those Mad Max references.

...Okay I'm not certain that'll happen, in fact it's incredibly unlikely. But that would be metal as all hell.

[Iscah]

Course, I have a feeling the Sound is ultimately extraterrestrial in origin. And we were told by Ishkawa to complete Omega before Endwalker. So my brain is just naturally leaning towards that.

I think Omega might just be relevant to the concept of the aetherial rift, and also it updates things like Cid and Nero's story and Midgardsormr's current status. I don't think it necessarily has anything to do with the "extraterrestrial origin" element of the plot.

[Rosenstrauch]

Heck, one of the prototypical fantasy RPGs was Ultima, a game where you could, among other things:
- Purchase a space shuttle.
- Go into space and dock at space stations.
- Purchase star fighters and engage in dogfights to become a space ace.

One of my favorite authors, David Gemmell, also had a habit of writing lost futuristic technology as magic.

That said, as much as I wouldn't mind going to other worlds, I'd prefer they keep building on the world of Hydaelyn instead. Or pull a Final Fantasy V and merge all the remaining shards into one mega world, though that would also require writing around... 4 1/2 or so extra worlds' worth of locales into Hydaelyn.

[JeanneOrnitier]

I don't particularly want to see the Dragonstar or Omega's homeworld. As entirrly different planets they'd be too detached from the established setting. I care about Hydaelyn and don't want the story to stray too far from that, especially when we so many areas left unexplored.

[Vyrerus]

*Thinks about the Final Fantasy Series as a whole*

Yeah, it's always been a mix of sword 'n spells with sci-fi elements mixing in. Usually sorcerer civilizations also have high technology. This dates back to the first entry.

Final Fantasy = Lufein civilization making airships, an orbiting satellite fortress with computers, robots, warmachines, and teleporters. Also features the first mystical tower of the series with the Mirage Tower.

Final Fantasy II = No civ like Lufeinish, but the Empire of Palamecia has access to enough technology to make a battle ready supersized dreadnought style airship which bombs several towns. Overall has more fantasy than Final Fantasy 1, and also no convolution in the plot.

Final Fantasy III = Return to form with ancient civilization going as far as making the starting floating continent, and maintaining it with the mechanism housed in the Tower of Owen. Game also features submersible airship, dreadnought for heroes, and two other airships.

Final Fantasy IV = Not-so-Ancient Aliens bring their technology to the planet, along with magic, resulting in the construction of airships and the Tower of Bab-il. You literally get a spaceship they hid on the planet to go to their moon.

Final Fantasy V = Many ancient civilizations passed high technology through the void. There's also Bartz World's ancient civilization of Ronka. responsible for a floating city, airships, and a planet spanning subterranean factory city. Kind of like the Dwemer from Elder Scrolls when I think about it, except predating that idea lol.

Final Fantasy VI = War of Magi sets mankind back 1,000 years, but the game is set in the time where technology is rediscovered, putting the world at large in the industrial age. The Gestahlian Empire innovates by capturing Espers(Phantom Beasts/Eidolons) and using them to fuel Magitek. So high tech is everywhere, throughout the whole of the game. It even starts you off in Magitek armor.

Final Fantasy VII = Pretty obvious. Shinra is an electric company that's taken over the world. For the first time in the setting, the Ancients are anti-technology.

Final Fantasy VIII = Sorcereresses are hella powerful. They control civilization. Everywhere is advanced up to semi-modern tech with fantasy sci-fi vehicles. Then there's the futuristic place hidden by a cloaking device that Laguna runs or whatever. Spaceship Ragnarok etc.

Final Fantasy IX = A "return" to fantasy. Except Mist powered vehicles, namely airships, are common. They are later converted to steam power. Then there's the Terran civilization, echoing FFIV's Lunarians. This is probably about as close as Final Fantasy gets to keeping everything low tech though, since most of the world isn't and doesn't have its roots in it.

Final Fantasy X = High tech mixed with low tech mixed with magic. Seems somewhat modernized to me, but idk, like its own world with its own progress. /shrug

Final Fantasy XI = Ancient magical civilization leaves enough clues that modern civilization rediscovers their inventions and creates airships and cermet and stuff. There's guns. There's robots. There's a floating city.

Final Fantasy XII = Whole good empire of airships and dreadnoughts. Nethicite tech etc or whatever.

Final Fantasy XIII = Assault rifles. Modern flying ships. Space station/moon colony. Actually takes place on post apocalyptic Earth iirc.

Final Fantasy XIV = A cavalcade of references to the previous. Magitek has been involved in the game under different auspices since 1.0. Guns have been in the setting since 1.0. High tech has been even more prevalent since 2.0, imo(Ultima Weapon, Azys Lla, Gration, Resonance Procedure, BFG Tower). As far as SHB goes, Crystarium features a forcefield around the city. Laser canons given over to dwarves for the tank quests. The Crystal Tower itself is full of Magitek, Alexander tech, Allagan tech, and Omega tech. This contrasts with what was originally in Lakeland, but that was long before the apocalypse. Eulmore is a hedonistic jewel on top of a trash heap, and still sports an aerial armada of airships. The fantasy portions of SHB are all in ruins. They aren't what we interact with, buy and large.

FFXV = Forcefielded main city. Magitek robot imperials and dropships. Good guys drive around in a car that can eventually fly.

[Cleretic]

The only pressing mysteries I can think of are -

What the hell was under Silvertear Lake?

I would consider that the absolute polar opposite of 'pressing', actually. I feel like I've described this so often that I should just keep it in a notepad file at this point, but:

'What's under Silvertear Lake' was exclusively a 1.0 mystery. And when I say 'exclusively', I mean literally 'the question has never once come up in the live game'. It would be phenomenally shoddy writing to make that The Big Reveal when there hasn't been an ounce of buildup for it for so long that players can't actually find the buildup that was there anymore without really particular Youtube dives. It would actually be even more of an overly-narrow-cast flop than 'surprise, Gelmorra' would be, because at the very least everyone's been to Tam-Tara and Toto-Rak, and while Duskwight are a tiny sliver of the playerbase, they are one that's actively growing, while the amount of 1.0 fans in the playerbase is... well, not.

That's not to say that it's a mystery nobody should care about, it's that so little has been done about said mystery that it can't just suddenly be super important, and it's extremely unlikely that the current writing team actually cares. If an answer is ever given, it won't be important, and probably can't actually handle that sort of story load given how much work hasn't gone into it.

I still suspect that, if we ever get an answer, the truth of 'what was under Silvertear' will just be 'the Crystal Tower'. That's why it hasn't been talked about through all of the live game; it hasn't been the Thing Under Silvertear for years now, because it's been the Thing Over Silvertear.