Thread: 8.0 speculation

Originally Posted by Cleretic

I think the next one going in on X would be a safe and strong bet, but I think VIII is an interesting vein they haven't done much with before, and I wouldn't be surprised to see that one take the lead. Or go absolutely wild and we hit, like, Type-0.

VIII has it's iconic Triple Triad as an almost omnipresent part of the game, GNB which is pattered after Squall and Seifer's combat techniques, and Eden which is an abridged adaptation of VIII as a yuri romance instead of het. (You can't convince me otherwise.)

Outside of some cosmetics and the "obscure even to most X fans" Pelupelu randomly showing up in Dawntrail, what does X have? I'm drawing a bit of a blank...

I'd still prefer an original plot, I'm just saying.

Originally Posted by Cleretic

I feel like X's had a lot of what I'd call 'undercurrent referencing'. It's rarely the main thing getting overtly referenced but it's clearly a prominent part of the pool. Like the Pelupelu, but also the Ronso being an inspiration for the Hrothgar (including being named that on the First), Bismarck basically being a Sin trial, Shadowbringers Amaurot DEFINITELY being based on Zanarkand, and I suspect the pilgrimage was an inspiration point for Dawntrail's rite of succession. It definitely has taken center-stage at some points, probably most prominently with Anima, but I feel like overall it's very rarely not in the mix. At the very least I feel like, if you did knuckle down and write out a 'FFX Expansion' you'd hit a lot more moments of 'huh, I guess they did use that before' than you'd expect.

I'd put VIII and X pretty much on par in terms of how many times XIV has 'done' them, with both of them being surprisingly rare for how prominent they are and both pretty well-positioned to be the next 'core' game for an expansion to riff on. It's just that VIII has gotten one or two more tentpole references you can very easily point to.

...come to think of it, patterning Halmarut on Edea/Ultimecia would be a pretty natural pick for an Ascian that's still fairly fresh.

Valid points, though personally I wouldn't consider Bismark a riff on the Sin fight. I have a bad habit of forgetting about the Hrothgar ("Ronso") because like the Pelupelu they're pretty small in presence even in X other than Kimahri (who is... not the most popular character), and Anima... wound up being shockingly minimal in presence for the hyped-up fight against an iconic summon. It's easy to forget; and yeah, I know it's because they mashed the "Garlemald War 2: Electric Boogaloo" expansion into Endwalker.

I don't know if I would consider the first act of Dawntrail as being a take on the Summoner's Pilgrimage; the characters are still a bit too patterned after IX characters and the goal is nothing alike. I feel it's got shades of IX's Mist / Outer Continent sections, but it's just a little too truncated to fully commit.

With my memory jogging, I figure... maybe we already "did" "The X Expansion" back in Heavensward, or at least poked at it's narrative premise (albeit with a lot less angst and fake laughing).

I doubt we'd get another take on Ultimecia, though. Her character is already decomposited into Gaia (time magic, E12S boss) and Mitron (real name Artemis, referencing Ultimecia's JP name "Artemisia;" shares her goal of time compression, summons Griever / Fatebreaker, forcibly junctions (fuses) a protagonist to herself, etc.) so I'm skeptical they'd do that; and in my opinion Edea doesn't have enough character on her own to carry that kind of role.

We can kick around ideas all day, but at this point I think there's still just not enough information to make even an educated guess. At 7.45 we should start getting some information soon, though we didn't get the impetus to venture to Tural until 7.55 so who knows.

Hate to double post, but this is important stuff.

Live Letter XCI dropped the first hints at 7.5 and beyond.

Patch 7.5 will be titled Trail to the Heavens. The first part (7.5) is scheduled to release April 28, while the second part is slated for early September. There are two pieces of patch key art: one showing Endless Sphene (eyes closed) holding real Sphene's hand, with Calyx to the left of Endless Sphene and the WoL to the right of real Sphene; and another showing Krile, Y'shtola, Alphinaud, the WoL, Estinien, Alisae, and G'raha arranged clockwise with the moon in the background. Released screenshots so far include Shale looking back over her shoulder at a screen, Urianger kneeling down and talking to a loporrit, the WoL speaking to Calyx in his new Mica plush vessel, and the WoL looking up at the moon.

The new dungeon is "The Clyteum," which appears to be a bombed-out district of the Garlean capital. I guess we were never gonna be without Alphinaud and Alisae's company for very long, huh.

The new trial is Enuo, a background character (superboss in updated rereleases) from V who learned to wield the Void. This is a very interesting choice, since we don't have any context regarding his appearance. Is he just a side trial unrelated to the MSQ that's accessible through the Occult Crescent story (as Varis EX was part of Bozja)? If not, why is a big V homage showing up, and what role could he have to play (other than, after being beat into submission, serving as a conduit to other reflections)? I suppose he's a natural fit for a story that increasingly looks to be about hopping across alternate realities, but it still feels odd in light of Occult Crescent already being a V homage vehicle in the same expack. Oddly, he has some kind of sigil hovering behind him his V incarnation lacks... I tried to compare it to the esper glyphs from XII since Ascian glyphs are parts of those flipped upside down, but I can't figure out which it is if any. Maybe Chaos or Zeromus.

There's a lot more coming up (Windurst: The Third Walk capping off Echos of Vana'diel, Occult Crescent: North Horn and Forked Tower: Magic concluding the Occult Crescent and Phantom Weapons, an Allied Society capstone quest, the conclusion of Dawntrail's Hildibrand questline, the final Cosmic Exploration planet Auxesia, which appears to be an urban area that's been heavily reclaimed by nature, Beastmaster finally being added, and other bells and whistles like a new PvP arena and housing updates), but those are the big "What's happening in 8.0?" tidbits so far which is to say... without context, a whole lotta nothing.

Originally Posted by Cleretic

The interesting thing to note here is that, despite looking very Garlean in structure, style and climate, and Yoshi-P specifically pointing out that it's Garlean, there's not a single reused Garlean asset. Even the street lamps are a different design. Which is a weird amount of effort to go to; if it's part of Garlemald, either the city or the nation, why not reuse a building or two? Why rebuild everything from scratch? I don't have an answer for that, but I do think the elephant in the room for answering that is 'maybe it isn't Garlemald'.

[...]

And no, the symbol behind [Enuo's] head isn't an Ascian thing, honestly doesn't look that much like one anyway, and I'm really hopeful that theory goes nowhere fast. If this fanbase has a worst habit when speculating, it's finding the first answer that lets them say 'Ascians' and then never accepting any other theory until that one is COMPLETELY dead; we saw it with the Arcadion's symbol, we saw it with Endless Sphene's crest, and I really hope we don't see it a third time soon.

The lack of reused assets is something I noticed; while the Clyteum appears to use the brutalist architectural style the Garleans are known for, it doesn't look anything like we've seen out of them before. That could be for various reasons, but more noticeable to me was the fact the Garlean emblem they love to plaster on every available surface is completely absent. For a capital district not seeing it anywhere, combined with the architectural differences, is raising a lot of questions.

I'm not of the "It's obviously an Ascian glyph" school (the Arcadion emblem never looked at all like one to me), but we know they're back in play after 7.4 so looking for a match is just due diligence. It's just a noticeable difference from Enuo's V incarnation, which may or may not be relevant to his role in whatever plot he shows up in. (Sounds MSQ, but like I said, with Occult Crescent already being a V homage vehicle in Dawntrail...)

Originally Posted by Cassar

Highly doubt this trial is anything other than an MSQ trial. We of course don't know the context of it but I can't imagine them making people do Occult Crescent just to be able to do the trial.
Also, by the way, does anyone else find it extremely weird (and ugly) that the trial name is the same as the boss name? We always have cool titles like "The Ageless Necropolis", "Hell on Rails", but this one is just... "Enuo"? I want to believe this was somehow a mistake in the live letter, or maybe they don't wanna reveal the real title for spoiler reasons

[...]

I definitely subscribe to the idea that we'll be beginning the process of opening the way to other reflections. Looks like 8.0 might not be in the source after all, although I wonder if they'll do the entire expansion in the same reflection, or if half the zones will be in one, and half in another. Of course, this is all speculation.

What do you think?

Originally Posted by Zero-ELEC

They don't always show the name of the trial the first time they mention it in a Letter from the Producer LIVE, especially since the Japanese titles of trials are just "[name of boss] showdown".

Basically, yeah. JP trial names lack the eloquence of EN's, so just "Enuo" makes sense. EN's tend to provide context since they're named after the location more often than not, so not having that known is sensible enough.

As to whether Enuo will be an MSQ trial... if I remember right they said he would be, but it's weird putting him in the MSQ with Occult Crescent being a V fanservice vehicle already. Worth noting that the Varis EX fight wasn't advertised, but all of the Bozja content is, to my knowledge, accessible without clearing earlier segments of the storyline, so having him easily accessible through Occult Crescent makes sense enough and resonates with the V fanservice. There's also the possibility of him being a part of the Hildibrand storyline as Asura was in Endwalker, but I dunno; Hildibrand's stuff is always out of left field (which is part of his charm) but...

It's just weird to put a V homage boss in an expack that already has a huge V homage vehicle as an MSQ fight, even if it's thematically resonant with the direction the plot seems to be headed. (And no, I don't think we're going to explore outer space; we're already doing that with Cosmic Exploration.)