100 Fun Facts About FFXIV

The original 2010 Final Fantasy XIV ran on which engine, built for Final Fantasy XIII?

Crystal Tools — Yoshida later said it was made for console games, not for crowds of players sharing one world, so the relaunch got a new client, new servers and a new engine.

Which Final Fantasy XI producer also produced the 2010 Final Fantasy XIV and stepped down after its failed launch?

Hiromichi Tanaka apologised for the state of the game and took full responsibility for its problems when he left the post in December 2010, making way for a new team.

Naoki Yoshida had been planning chief of which game before taking over FFXIV?

Dragon Quest X is also an online RPG, so Yoshida arrived with MMO experience when Square Enix put him in charge of the struggling game.

What was the codename for the rebuilt game before it was titled A Realm Reborn?

Version 2.0 undersold it: behind the modest number sat a new client, new servers and a new engine, built in secret while the old game stayed online.

A Realm Reborn launched in August 2013 on Windows and which console?

PlayStation 3 — the console version promised for the 2010 original never shipped, so this was its debut; support lasted until 2017, when Stormblood left the PS3 behind.

Players who paid for three months of the failed original game earned which status, with cheaper subscriptions for life?

Legacy status also brought an exclusive chocobo mount and a place in the relaunch's credits, Yoshida's thanks to those who kept paying while the game was rebuilt.

Which elder primal escaped from the lesser moon Dalamud to trigger the Seventh Umbral Calamity?

Bahamut had been caged inside Dalamud, which was no moon at all but an ancient Allagan prison; it broke open above the Battle of Carteneau and he laid Eorzea to waste.

Which sage sent Final Fantasy XIV's 2010 heroes five years forward in time?

Louisoix Leveilleur failed to cage the rampaging primal, so he sent the adventurers 'beyond the reach of time' instead, which is how players' 2010 characters carried over.

Which Eorzean city-state is a thalassocracy on the island of Vylbrand?

Limsa Lominsa is led by an Admiral rather than a king, and most of its wealth comes from shipping, guarded by a navy that still has pirate crews to chase.

Which power, having conquered the continents to the east, invades Eorzea?

The Garleans cannot wield magic, so they built their empire on magitek instead: ceruleum-fuelled war machines and airships that outgunned their spell-casting neighbours.

The Scions of the Seventh Dawn are led at the start of A Realm Reborn by whom?

Minfilia, known as the Antecedent, folded her own Path of the Twelve into the new order, and she is the one who tells the player that their strange visions are the Echo.

The Ascians seek to awaken which dark god?

Zodiark is the god the Ascians worship, and every Calamity they engineer is one more step toward restoring him; players finally face him in Endwalker.

Which Allagan war machine does Gaius van Baelsar pilot in the Praetorium?

The Ultima Weapon absorbs the primals Ifrit, Titan and Garuda one after another, so the machine the player finally fights carries the strength of all three.

Under Final Fantasy XIV's Armoury System, what determines a character's class?

Their equipped weapon sets the class, so swapping a lance for a fishing rod turns a fighter into a gatherer and one character can level every class.

In Final Fantasy XIV, which two disciplines cover crafting and gathering?

Hand and Land are full classes, not side skills, yet unlike in the 2010 game nobody can start as one: a War or Magic class has to reach level 10 before one unlocks.

What is a four-player dungeon group called in Final Fantasy XIV?

A light party is one tank, one healer and two damage dealers, and the Duty Finder fills those four seats automatically with players from other servers, so nobody has to recruit.

Player-run guilds in Final Fantasy XIV are called what?

Free Companies are the guilds, and free-trial players can't join one; they can still join linkshells, which are only chat channels.

Heavensward, the first expansion, takes players into which city-state's thousand-year war against dragons?

Ishgard teaches that the dragons started the Dragonsong War. The expansion reveals its own first king broke the peace by killing a dragon for the power in her eyes.

Which three jobs did Heavensward introduce?

Dark Knight, Machinist and Astrologian gave the expansion a new tank, damage dealer and healer at once, and all three skip the early grind by starting at level 30.

Which movement ability did the Heavensward expansion introduce to Final Fantasy XIV?

Flying came with zones built far larger to make room for it, and a mount cannot take off until the player has attuned to every aether current in that area.

Stormblood has players lead rebellions in Ala Mhigo and which Far Eastern nation?

Doma had spent some 25 years under imperial rule, and the story sends the player across the sea to help its exiled prince win it back before returning to free Ala Mhigo.

Which Final Fantasy Tactics and XII veteran wrote Stormblood's Ivalice raid storyline?

Yasumi Matsuno, who created Ivalice, was a hardcore player of the game himself, which is how Naoki Yoshida came to bring him in as a guest to write the Return to Ivalice raids.

Shadowbringers takes place on which parallel dimension?

The First is a world nearly erased by a Flood of Light, so the player, a Warrior of Light at home, has to become its Warrior of Darkness and bring the night back.

Shadowbringers' new tank job, Gunbreaker, takes its gunblade from which earlier numbered entry?

Number VIII is where the gunblade first appeared, and Naoki Yoshida said the community had always wanted to wield that iconic weapon, so he built a tank around it.

What system introduced in Shadowbringers lets players run dungeons with computer-controlled companions?

Trust lets a player clear the expansion's story dungeons alone, fighting beside main characters from the plot instead of waiting to be matched with other people.

Which game director wrote the Shadowbringers alliance raid crossover with NieR: Automata?

Yoko Taro came aboard because players kept asking for NieR: Automata outfits, and Naoki Yoshida chose a full raid written by that game's own director over simply adding the costumes.

Endwalker's healer job Sage uses floating magical objects called what?

Nouliths are four floating foci a Sage steers with aether to shield and heal, and Naoki Yoshida introduced them as an original weapon rather than a callback to an older game.

What slowed production of Endwalker, which arrived over two years after Shadowbringers?

The COVID-19 pandemic sent the Tokyo team home in April 2020, and Naoki Yoshida warned players that lockdowns were holding up artwork, voice recording and testing around the world.

Which 'slow life' farming mode debuted in Endwalker patch 6.2?

Island Sanctuary was designed as a solo retreat free of competition, so its crops, animals and workshops run on rules of their own and need no crafting or gathering levels.

Dawntrail sends players to which continent across the sea for a rite of succession?

Tural is the 'New World' far to the west of Eorzea, where the player acts as champion for Wuk Lamat in the contest to decide who rules Tuliyollal next.

Dawntrail's paint-based mage job Pictomancer is based on the magic of which Final Fantasy VI character?

Relm Arrowny is Final Fantasy VI's young painter, and the job copies her right down to its gear; its lore even credits the art to an ancient mage called Archon Relm.

Dawntrail gave Final Fantasy XIV its first major what since the 2013 relaunch?

Graphical overhaul: sharper textures, shadows and lighting reached even the oldest zones, and Naoki Yoshida promised players their long-loved characters would still look like themselves.

Evercold, Final Fantasy XIV's sixth expansion, takes players to a new dimension known as what?

The Fourth is a world lost to ice, so its people fled to the sky and now live aboard enormous magical airships.

Which composer is credited with most of Final Fantasy XIV's music and also served as sound director?

Masayoshi Soken was the sound director on the failed 2010 original, whose score was chiefly Nobuo Uematsu's; for the relaunch he took over and wrote most of the music himself.

In 2017, Guinness World Records credited Final Fantasy XIV with the most original what in a video game?

Pieces of music: Guinness counted 384 songs across the game and its expansions, because every new patch brings fresh themes for its zones, dungeons and bosses.

In October 2021, Naoki Yoshida called Final Fantasy XIV the series' what?

Most profitable game in the series was Yoshida's claim at an Endwalker preview, as registered players passed 24 million; the 2010 original had been a costly flop that was shut down and rebuilt.

Which card game from Final Fantasy VIII can players collect and play at Final Fantasy XIV's Manderville Gold Saucer?

Triple Triad arrived with the Gold Saucer in patch 2.51, and players build a deck by beating characters around the world who each hold cards to win.

Which 'Limited Job' with its own specialised content was added during Stormblood's patch cycle?

Blue Mage learns its spells from monsters and is capped below the other jobs, so it is shut out of normal matchmaking and gets its own solo arena, the Masked Carnivale.

Final Fantasy XIV's Hrothgar race is based on which Final Fantasy X people?

The Ronso are Final Fantasy X's lionlike folk, and the Hrothgar launched in 2019 as a male-only race; female Hrothgar did not follow until Dawntrail, five years later.

Which Scion usually stands in for Final Fantasy XIV in crossovers such as Dissidia NT and Theatrhythm?

Y'shtola is a playable fighter in both, a fixed face for a game whose real hero is whatever character each player creates.

The 2017 Netflix drama Final Fantasy XIV: Dad of Light grew out of what?

A player's blog told how he introduced the game to his elderly father, which is why the series mixes live action with scenes filmed inside the game itself.

Which new platform did Final Fantasy XIV reach in March 2024?

Xbox Series X/S came after years of fan requests: Microsoft's Phil Spencer made a surprise appearance at the 2023 Fan Festival keynote to announce it beside Naoki Yoshida.

Which two Game Awards did Final Fantasy XIV win in both 2021 and 2022?

Best Ongoing and Best Community Support reward games that keep improving long after launch, a striking double for one whose first version was shut down and rebuilt.

As of April 2026, Final Fantasy XIV's free trial runs through which expansion and level cap?

Shadowbringers, level 80, with no limit on playtime: a trial that once stopped at level 35 now hands newcomers the base game and three full expansions for nothing.

Under what codename did the original Final Fantasy XIV begin development around 2004–2005?

Rapture was the working name from 2005 until the 2009 reveal, and in those four years Square Enix showed little more than a concept video of its next online game.

What did Naoki Yoshida begin writing to restore player trust after taking over Final Fantasy XIV?

Letters from the Producer ran to 27 instalments by April 2012, each laying out what was broken and what would change, and they later grew into live-streamed shows.

Why were sales of Final Fantasy XIV's Mac version suspended days after its 2015 launch?

Poor performance: the port ran badly and the wrong minimum specs had been published, so Square Enix pulled it from sale, offered full refunds and Naoki Yoshida apologised to buyers.

In Final Fantasy XIV, who leads Ul'dah's Grand Company, the Immortal Flames?

Raubahn Aldynn, the Bull of Ala Mhigo, arrived as a refugee, won a fortune as a champion gladiator and bought the Coliseum with it, which earned him a seat on the ruling Syndicate.

Which horned, scaled race became playable in Final Fantasy XIV with the Heavensward expansion?

Au Ra look like dragon-kin, but the lore says otherwise: their horns are organs of hearing and spatial sense, and the race hails from the far-eastern continent of Othard.

Why were A Realm Reborn's digital sales briefly halted at its 2013 launch?

Overloaded servers: far more players arrived than planned, a sharp turn from the 2010 flop, so Square Enix added capacity and gave every account a free week of play.

In 2010's failed Final Fantasy XIV, which humble object had as many polygons as a player character?

A flowerpot carried as many polygons and lines of shader code as a player character, a symptom of the original team's obsession with graphics over gameplay.

Which Hollywood actor trained to become a Warrior of Darkness in a 2019 FFXIV commercial?

Tom Holland sweated through strength training for the Shadowbringers advert while his roommate, comedian Hannibal Buress, complained that nobody needs to train to play a video game.

Which summoned god's planned battle was cut from Final Fantasy XIV after Japan's 2011 earthquake?

Titan and his beast tribe draw on the power of earth, so the team feared the fight would offend players and built a battle against Good King Moggle Mog instead.

Naoki Yoshida said the original FFXIV team should have spent a year playing which rival game?

World of Warcraft was his prescription because the developers lacked experience of modern online games; years earlier, the Final Fantasy XI team had spent a year playing EverQuest.

The personality of Final Fantasy XIV's villain Emet-Selch drew on which Johnny Depp film character?

Jack Sparrow influenced Emet-Selch's personality, though the writers took care not to make the Ascian too similar to Ardyn Izunia, the villain of Final Fantasy XV.

Which equipment slot vanished from Final Fantasy XIV when Endwalker scaled down the game's numbers?

Belts were removed and rendered useless in the expansion's stat squish, a down-scaling made because values such as enemy health pools were growing large enough to threaten overflow errors.

A TV show about what gave Naoki Yoshida the idea to end the original FFXIV with a calamity?

The 2012 doomsday prophecy, attributed to the Mayan calendar, inspired the Seventh Umbral Era storyline, which gave a story reason for the radical changes coming to the game and its landscape.

What unusual feature marks Gulool Ja Ja, the ruler whose succession contest drives Dawntrail?

Two heads, representing Reason and Resolve, give him fearsome strength and potent magic, and two-headed Mamool Ja like him were widely believed to be sterile.

What does Final Fantasy XIV call the team attacks that draw on a gauge the whole party shares?

Limit Break effects depend on the role of whoever triggers one: a healer's strongest form restores the group's health and raises fallen allies.

Which film villain inspired Lord Vauthry, the ruler of decadent Eulmore in FFXIV: Shadowbringers?

Jabba the Hutt was among the inspirations for Vauthry, who built his paradise of indolent luxury on slave labour and the exploitation of destitute refugees.

Which veteran series artist designed Final Fantasy XIV's logo around a wheel of adventurers?

Yoshitaka Amano drew the adventurers in a ring with their backs exposed, to show that they must rely on comrades and friends for support.

Which long-time series composer scored the 2010 FFXIV, his first full soundtrack for an online game?

Nobuo Uematsu hit a momentary crisis on the project when he lost most of the data for his completed tracks and had to hire a data recovery service.

Which singer performed Answers, the original FFXIV's theme song, and returned for Dragonsong?

Susan Calloway was picked by the song's composer, who had worked with her at the first Distant Worlds concert and was impressed by her singing.

Which rock band, formed by FFXIV's sound director, plays arrangements of its boss themes?

The Primals cover the battle themes of the game's summoned gods, and their rock arrangements shared the 2014 album From Astral to Umbral with piano covers of town themes.

FFXIV director Naoki Yoshida began his career at Hudson Soft as a designer on which game series?

Bomberman taught him persuasion: Hudson's programmers controlled productions and saw designers as useless, so he had to win them over, helped by having studied coding beforehand.

Which Square Enix president apologised for the 2010 FFXIV, saying it had damaged the brand?

Yoichi Wada apologised formally in December 2010, suspending monthly fees and replacing the project's leaders, and in 2011 said the launch had greatly damaged the Final Fantasy name.

Which imperial legatus tried to annihilate Eorzea by crashing the moon Dalamud in Project Meteor?

Nael van Darnus was defeated by adventurers who could not stop the moon's descent, and her shade later returns as a raid boss in A Realm Reborn.

When Final Fantasy XIV launched in China in 2014, how were players billed instead of monthly?

By the hour was how the Chinese release, published by Shanda Games, charged through micropayments, and it ran separately from every other language edition.

Which New Zealand comedian fronted spoof tourism commercials for Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail?

Rhys Darby played an Interim Deputy Director of tourism on a parody travel website that advertised the expansion's locations like a holiday brochure.

Which automated matchmaking feature did FFXIV add to suit busy players short of free time?

Duty Finder sorts players into groups for the content they select, drawing from across different servers, so nobody has to recruit a team by hand.

What do Final Fantasy XIV players extract from well-used equipment to boost the stats of other gear?

Materia can be extracted once a piece of equipment reaches 100% spiritbond, a bond that grows as its owner uses it in battle, crafting or gathering.

What are the hired assistants called who sell an FFXIV player's items on the Market Board?

Retainers are called by ringing a Summoning Bell, and besides selling goods they store items and gil and can be sent out on ventures to gather more.

What is FFXIV's vanity system called, which gives one piece of gear the look of another?

Glamour arrived in patch 2.2 and changes only how gear looks, never its stats, so players can wear any appearance they like over their strongest equipment.

In FFXIV, what does FATE stand for, the name of open-world events any nearby player can join?

Full Active Time Event battles let large groups share a task out in the world, from slaying notorious monsters to escorting characters and assaulting enemy fortresses.

What does FFXIV call its controller layout of four-icon sets cycled by the shoulder buttons?

Cross Hotbar sets arrange their icons in a cross shape to match the directional pad and face buttons, and PC players who use controllers can switch to it too.

What are the giant crystals called that FFXIV adventurers attune to so they can teleport?

Aetherytes let adventurers travel great distances in an instant, and Square Enix installed a replica of one at King's Cross in London to promote Dawntrail's release.

Which PvP mode, fought between two teams of five, replaced the Feast in FFXIV's patch 6.1?

Crystalline Conflict has each side fight to seize a crystal that starts in the middle of the arena and push it to a goal point.

What is FFXIV's first Deep Dungeon called, where every character starts again at level one?

Palace of the Dead took its cue from Chocobo's Mysterious Dungeon, and its reset to level one lets veterans team up quickly with friends who are just starting out.

Which Gold Saucer minigame in Final Fantasy XIV began as an April Fools' Day joke?

Lord of Verminion has players battle each other in real time with their collectable minions, and the joke it grew from was a parody of Lord of Vermilion.

Which city-state's Grand Company is the Order of the Twin Adder, led by Elder Seedseer Kan-E-Senna?

Gridania stands in the heavily forested Black Shroud, and its Grand Company is one of three that court the adventurer once an early victory makes them a hero.

Which sultana collapses from poisoned wine at a victory banquet in Final Fantasy XIV?

Nanamo Ul Namo had privately planned to dissolve the monarchy and make her city a democratic republic, and the poison turns out to have been swapped for a sleeping draught.

What is the surname of FFXIV's Cid, the imperial defector whose Ironworks supplies airships?

Garlond is his name, and he spends part of the story as an amnesiac before recovering his memories as an engineer and genius inventor.

What power lets FFXIV's hero see visions of the past and resist a summoned god's tempering?

The Echo marks the chosen representatives of the world's guardian deity, and it saves the hero when the fire god Ifrit tries to enthrall his captives.

Which Azure Dragoon hunts the wyrm Nidhogg in FFXIV: Heavensward and is later possessed by him?

Estinien draws his power from one of the wyrm's own eyes, and the Warrior of Light and Alphinaud later save him by tearing both eyes from his armour.

Which knight of House Fortemps dies shielding the Warrior of Light from a spear in Heavensward?

Haurchefant leapt in front of the spear with his shield, which broke, and his grieving father later gave that shield to the hero he had saved.

Which Scion, accused of heresy in FFXIV: Heavensward, names the Warrior of Light her champion?

Tataru, the Scions' coinkeeper, was accused alongside Alphinaud by the archbishop's honour guard, and the pair were cleared when the trial by combat was won.

Which gentleman detective stars in an FFXIV side quest chain with his faithful assistant Nashu?

Hildibrand's quest chain arrived in patch 2.1, and his legend has it that he once launched himself into the path of the falling moon and was never heard from again.

Which adventurers' hub in Mor Dhona becomes the Scions' base after A Realm Reborn's main story?

Revenant's Toll sits on neutral ground, which spared the Scions growing pressure to align with any one of the three allied city-states.

Which adopted daughter of Gulool Ja Ja recruits the Warrior of Light as her champion in Dawntrail?

Wuk Lamat sails to Old Sharlayan to find her champion, wins the contest and then names her adopted brother Koana to rule beside her.

Which job arrived in Final Fantasy XIV's patch 2.4 as the upgrade of the newly added Rogue class?

Ninja casts its ninjutsu by combining ritual hand gestures called mudra, and the job fights with the same daggers as the Rogue it grows out of.

Which Final Fantasy XIV class is unusual in leading to two different jobs, Summoner and Scholar?

Arcanist was the only new class added at the release of A Realm Reborn, and it splits between a damage dealer who commands summons and a healer.

Dawntrail's Viper joins two swords into one blade, a trick shared with which Final Fantasy IX hero?

Zidane does the same in his own game, and the dual-wielding Viper arrived in Dawntrail alongside the paint-based mage Pictomancer.

Which Monster Hunter: World wyvern became a boss battle in FFXIV during a Stormblood crossover?

Rathalos came to Eorzea while Behemoth went the other way, a swap rooted in an offer of help that Monster Hunter producer Ryozo Tsujimoto first made back in 2011.

Which rabbit-like people tend the moon in FFXIV: Endwalker, readying it as an evacuation ship?

Loporrits were created to prepare the moon for carrying people off the planet, but they knew so little of modern life there that their plans went awry.

Dawntrail's alliance raids revisit Jeuno, San d'Oria and Windurst, from which earlier Final Fantasy?

Number XI, the series' first online game, lends its world of Vana'diel to the raids, in which a villain summons that realm as a land of phantoms.

What is the name of Cid's lost airship, recovered from a Coerthas fortress in A Realm Reborn?

The Enterprise lets the heroes confront Garuda in her own domain, and in Heavensward it helps defeat another flying foe, Bismarck.

Which tokusatsu series, created by Keita Amemiya, had its armour added to FFXIV as PvP rewards?

Garo gear arrived in an extended crossover, and Amemiya went on to contribute monster designs to the Return to Ivalice raids.

Which English sea cliffs gave FFXIV's artists their visual reference for the region of Kholusia?

Seven Sisters shaped the coast that holds decadent Eulmore, while Angkor Wat and Mesoamerican civilizations inspired the Ronkan ruins elsewhere in Shadowbringers.

FFXIV localization director Michael-Christopher Koji Fox invented a language for which creatures?

Dragons received their own tongue during work on the 2010 release, and it was put to use again when Heavensward made them central to its story.

Which party game crossed over with FFXIV in 2023, bringing obstacle courses to the Gold Saucer?

Fall Guys inspired Blunderville, a special attraction that first ran from October 31 to December 31, 2023 and later returned for repeat runs.