Hi everyone! It’s Hama and Miyamiya from the Promotional team!
Y’know Hama, we may be new to the investigation scene, but we already interviewed five members of the FFXIV Development and Operations teams! ♪
That’s right! We heard a lot of new stories, and I’m always surprised by what we learn.
Let’s look back at each of our investigation logs so far!
★(No. 1): Main Scenario Writer Banri Oda
We interviewed Mr. Oda right after the Heroes’ Gauntlet dungeon was added in Patch 5.3, so his story about how Giott’s “dwarven decking” ended up in the dungeon was really memorable!
▲ A Japanese screenshot showing Giott’s “dwarven decking” attack, and dialogue which only appears when the player has completed the healer role quest series. The English version is: “A good old-fashioned dwarven decking, made mightier in exile!”
It was made possible through the Scenario team’s attentiveness to world building. I wonder if we’ll ever see that “Granson Kick!” (laughs)
★(No. 2): Lead Level Designer Arata Takahashi
It’s been a while since Mr. Takahashi and team enabled flying in A Realm Reborn areas. It’s been so convenient and there’s been so much more to explore! I hope new adventurers will join us in the skies once they unlock flying mounts! ♪
Their team designs everything that occurs inside a dungeon from the ground up. They also come up with new ideas for seasonal events and Gold Saucer activities for everyone to enjoy.
★(No. 3): Web Director Hiroyuki Takachi
Mr. Takachi is the one who established the current Lodestone website. He shared his experiences of repeated trial and error to add various features such as the Eorzea Database, Job Guides, and Community Finder.
Hey! This blog is part of the Lodestone, right? So if Mr. Takachi wasn’t around, wouldn’t that mean this blog series wouldn’t exist?
Now, now. Let’s not have our imagination run wild. (Perhaps she’s getting too smart for her own good…)
★(No. 4): Lead UI Artist Yoichi Seki
I was looking forward to interviewing Mr. Seki for a long time, so I made sure to ask him everything! To sum it up, it turns out that Medica II’s icon actually depicts four muscular silhouettes! What a shocker!
Your summary is… something else. *ahem* In addition to hearing about the UI team’s range of work, we were astounded to learn that they had to completely overhaul action icons when they made the new high-resolution versions. We got an exclusive look at some before and after comparisons, so be sure to check it out!
★(No. 5): Character Concept Artist Hiroyuki Nagamine
Our fifth interview was with Mr. Nagamine, the artist responsible for many impressive boss designs. His stories were obviously fascinating, but the concept art we got to see were almost worth the interview by themselves!
He even gave us special permission to showcase the concept art of Ryne and Gaia from the Eden series for the first time! It’s always a struggle to get a good look at them during battle, so seeing the detailed illustrations was a dream come true! ♪
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Having gone through each interview again, each one was packed with rich backstories, and you can really see the collective effort from the many team members that work on FFXIV.
We’ll be sharing more about the FFXIV Development and Operations teams, so let us know what you think or what you’d like to see next♪ See you in the next investigation!
Hama, Miyamiya
– Promotional team
