Revelations from Patch 6.1

[kaynide]

Perhaps. Just to note that in the FFXIV galaxy where Etheirys is at least, we had a full sci-fi civilization that possibly possessed multiple worlds and spread a common language among them. It's interesting how we went from a fantasy somewhat bows and arrows to being in the same setting as interstellar empires.

Kranel_San touched on this, but this is very much a part of the genre; Spelljammer (from D&D) has been a thing since 1989, and that was late to the show. I think my first encounter with this was Krull.

Re: Omega: I was under the same conclusion as Silver Arrow.

M17 transferred to Omega
then Sir transferred into M17's empty Frame.

Kinda like hermet crabs....kinda...not really.

[Cleretic]

Kranel_San touched on this, but this is very much a part of the genre; Spelljammer (from D&D) has been a thing since 1989, and that was late to the show. I think my first encounter with this was Krull.

My first encounter with it was Final Fantasy 1; the Floating Fortress was always intended to be 'sci-fi in a fantasy world'. It's been around the series ever since in various forms; FFIV had the Lunarians, V had the Ronkans. VI was the first one to go in the other direction, with the present society as the sci-fi and the 'neighbors' being magical fantasy.

Hell, sci-fi and fantasy being neighbors is debatably older than them being separate; back in the early 20th century there were plenty of tales of fantasy warriors meeting robots and aliens, or your scientist types studying magic as another form of knowledge; John Carter of Mars and Conan the Barbarian were both very much in that space. It was only later on that you started seeing more separation.

[Iscah]

Im gonna be "that guy" and say that Pan-Galactic could simply mean that the language is used across the galaxy, not across multiple galaxies, meaning that it could just be a language used by one or several civilizations conquered by the Omicrons in the Galaxy.

Exactly – "across the galaxy". To form a common language across a galaxy, there needs to be interaction between multiple planets in that galaxy, and the way it's talked about suggests that it is more than just "Omicrons invaded everywhere and took their language with them".

Prior to Endwalker we only knew about the Omicrons and dragons being at war with each other, which essentially needs only the one invading civilisation to be capable of space flight (though the dragons seem to have that naturally); now we may have an entire galaxy of spacefarers.

[JeanneOrnitier]

If the Omicrons were conquering other planets then it'd make sense they'd impose a unified language for the peoples of their various colonized worlds to communicate with each other.

[Iscah]

If the Omicrons were conquering other planets then it'd make sense they'd impose a unified language for the peoples of their various colonized worlds to communicate with each other.

I feel like Omega should talk about it differently if it is Omega's people's own language versus a generic one shared by multiple societies. We know that the proto-Omicrons feared being conquered and that's why they turned around to be the conquerors instead, so they must have been in communication with other planets worth fearing.

On a side note, curious news that Omega is mentally no different to the humanoid Omicrons. Seems an odd thing to frame it that way instead of it being a special war machine thing created by them.

And on a side note to that side note, it is a strange sort of mental effort to remember to refer to Omega as "it" and not default to "he". "It" just isn't a pronoun we use with a sentient being and it sounds wrong, plus – I keep struggling even as I write this – we use it (the word) as a placeholder for so many intangible things as we write about them. But Omega has no gender and the quests are using "it" for ...it. I just defaulted to "him" again there even as I drafted the sentence in my head.

[Alleo]

And on a side note to that side note, it is a strange sort of mental effort to remember to refer to Omega as "it" and not default to "he". "It" just isn't a pronoun we use with a sentient being and it sounds wrong, plus – I keep struggling even as I write this – we use it (the word) as a placeholder for so many intangible things as we write about them. But Omega has no gender and the quests are using "it" for ...it. I just defaulted to "him" again there even as I drafted the sentence in my head.

In the german version Omega is seemingly a female. At least they used "sie" a lot. I am not sure why they did that.

[Cleretic]

In the german version Omega is seemingly a female. At least they used "sie" a lot. I am not sure why they did that.

It makes sense. German is an extremely gendered language, to the point where you just kinda can't structure most sentences about a subject without applying some kind of gender. French is the same, and hit the same thing with Mitron in the all-roles capstone quest, gendering them with female pronouns---which was actually a decision from on high and not considered a mistake, which we now know to be because Mitron was in some way female-identifying.

Incidentally, a fun way to see this is in the Tales from the Shadows story around Azem fighting a volcano; in English there's no gender applied to Azem, and in Japanese all gender is implied so there's no sweat. But if you swap the website language to French or German, they have the 'WoL's gender' option for that story because they actually can't write the same scene without gendered pronouns.

All of this is actually done with collaboration with the original Japanese writers, as a way to avoid the situation they hit with Nael back in 1.0, who in Japanese was completely ungendered, and the localization teams didn't learn her gender until well after they'd all started defaulting to male pronouns for ease of writing (this specific problem is actually why FFXIV's localization team works so closely with the writers now). So in this case, for whatever reason, Omega apparently identifies as female, at least in that story. Good for her! Although I have no idea if that's also true in the new quests, I know neither French nor German, so it might be a bit presumptuous to call Omega that in the present day, but if you struggle with 'it' then she/her pronouns are probably the better option!

I actually had heard 'Omega identifies as female in that story' before, but nobody had explained why they drew that conclusion until now, so thanks for that!

[SentioftheHoukai]

It makes sense. German is an extremely gendered language, to the point where you just kinda can't structure most sentences about a subject without applying some kind of gender. French is the same, and hit the same thing with Mitron in the all-roles capstone quest, gendering them with female pronouns---which was actually a decision from on high and not considered a mistake, which we now know to be because Mitron was in some way female-identifying.

Incidentally, a fun way to see this is in the Tales from the Shadows story around Azem fighting a volcano; in English there's no gender applied to Azem, and in Japanese all gender is implied so there's no sweat. But if you swap the website language to French or German, they have the 'WoL's gender' option for that story because they actually can't write the same scene without gendered pronouns.

All of this is actually done with collaboration with the original Japanese writers, as a way to avoid the situation they hit with Nael back in 1.0, who in Japanese was completely ungendered, and the localization teams didn't learn her gender until well after they'd all started defaulting to male pronouns for ease of writing (this specific problem is actually why FFXIV's localization team works so closely with the writers now). So in this case, for whatever reason, Omega apparently identifies as female, at least in that story. Good for her! Although I have no idea if that's also true in the new quests, I know neither French nor German, so it might be a bit presumptuous to call Omega that in the present day, but if you struggle with 'it' then she/her pronouns are probably the better option!

I actually had heard 'Omega identifies as female in that story' before, but nobody had explained why they drew that conclusion until now, so thanks for that!

I mean, I've always considered Omega female based on the simple fact that the cutscene before she "dissipates" she's taking a female form and the himbo is nowhere to be seen. Seems natural enough to me to assume she prefers that identity, so that's how I'll refer to her. Though, tbf until they assign a canon gender (I doubt they will) I think individual players have the right to refer to Omega as whatever gender they're most comfortable with. Seeing as how they hurt nobody non-fictional by "misgendering" someone with no stated gender preference.

[Iscah]

In the german version Omega is seemingly a female. At least they used "sie" a lot. I am not sure why they did that.

I've only got long-ago high school German lessons and a pocket translation dictionary, but "sie" is flexible. From school I know it can be used for "she", "they" or (capitalised as Sie) a polite form of "you"; the dictionary tells me it can also be used for "it", but I'm not sure of the technicalities. Still, it doesn't definitely translate to "she" in Omega's case.

[Alleo]

I've only got long-ago high school German lessons and a pocket translation dictionary, but "sie" is flexible. From school I know it can be used for "she", "they" or (capitalised as Sie) a polite form of "you"; the dictionary tells me it can also be used for "it", but I'm not sure of the technicalities. Still, it doesn't definitely translate to "she" in Omega's case.

As someone native in german it really sounded like them calling Omega a female. The formal version of "Sie" makes no sense in that case and for it we have the word "es". I sadly dont remember how they talked about Omega before that quest. Maybe its a little hint that they saw her as more "human" after giving her a voice?

Anyway I thought that was a bit of a interesting information.

It makes sense. German is an extremely gendered language, to the point where you just kinda can't structure most sentences about a subject without applying some kind of gender. French is the same, and hit the same thing with Mitron in the all-roles capstone quest, gendering them with female pronouns---which was actually a decision from on high and not considered a mistake, which we now know to be because Mitron was in some way female-identifying.

Oh yeah we are like that. Its not easy to learn the language thanks to this. But still we do have the "es" which basically means "it". So if they saw it as a thing they could have easily used that. So I just headcanon it that they cant see Omega as just a toy anymore thus they needed to adress her in a way. (Maybe the things hanging down there reminded them of breasts)