We posted an article yesterday with our thoughts and experiences of the five regions available in the open beta. Today we bring you the same, but for the six dungeons available. There are two in each of the three starting regions. La Noscea has Cassiopeia Hollow and Mistbeard Cove, Thanalan has Nanawa Mines and Copperbell Mines, while The Black Shroud has The Mun-Tuy Cellars and The Tam-Tara Deepcroft.
I had a difficult time traversing one or two of them, so expect some of the screenshots to contain death. It was fun, I explored all of these dungeons as a level 1 Conjurer so I had no hope of defending myself against any aggressive monsters.
I am also going to include my experiences on the ferry route from Thanalan to Limsa Lominsa.
Here’s a breakdown of each dungeon, along with our best six screenshots from each area. If you want the game to be full of surprises at launch, you may wish to avoid clicking on the screenshots.
Cassiopeia Hollow
Cassiopeia Hollow can be accessed from a tunnel in La Noscea near Camp Bloodshore in the east of the map. We have discussed this area before during the closed beta and after visiting the other five it remains my favourite. There is a wide variety of colourful plants, lakes and a surprisingly lack of aggressive monsters. It is easy to navigate but not completely safe. Yarzon Scavengers should be avoided, as you will see in the sixth screenshot.
Mistbeard Cove
Mistbeard Cove can be accessed from a tunnel in La Noscea near Camp Bald Knoll in the west of the map. This is by far the most dangerous and difficult to navigate dungeon I ventured into. The problem is that close to the entrance each path has multiple aggressive monsters. So unless you are high enough to be able to defeat these you are going to die, a lot. I certainly did. With persistence I still managed to bring you some interesting screenshots. I discovered an aggressive monster that looked like a Roegadyn, unfortunately I learnt the hard way not to get too close.
Nanawa Mines
Nanawa Mines can be accessed from a tunnel in Thanalan near Camp Black Brush towards the centre of the map. Here we have a typical mine filled with narrow passages, bridges and mining equipment. Of course the area would not be complete without some weird looking creatures and undead skeletons. The bridges were about as far as I could get before an aggressive creature ended my fun.
Copperbell Mines
Copperbell Mines can be accessed from a tunnel in Thanalan near Camp Nophica’s Wells towards the south of the map. There is the Formicary and the Mining Pits. I’m unsure whether I saw both parts of the area but I certainly saw a variety of terrain. I had my first experience with desert sand here. Surprisingly the scorpions are not aggressive, but the bombs certainly are.
The Mun-Tuy Cellars
The Mun-Tuy Cellars can be accessed from a tunnel in The Black Shroud near Camp Emerald Moss towards the north-west of the map. This area looks like it has not been maintained in a long time because there are rocks and trees blocking off some of the passageways. The area is not too difficult to navigate but you will dread getting too close to a Dreadwolf.
The Tam-Tara Deepcroft
The Tam-Tara Deepcroft can be accessed from a tunnel in The Black Shroud near Camp Bentbranch towards the centre of the map. There is the first ring and the second ring; I did not manage to reach the latter as the dungeon can be difficult to navigate at level 1. The design of the dungeon is very similar to The Mun-Tuy-Cellars, which is a little disappointing but it has two levels so perhaps we’ll see something more deeper in. The inhabitants are certainly different.
Exploring Eorzea
We have six very interesting and unique dungeons within Eorzea. We aren’t sure what purpose they all serve yet but we would expect some content to be centred around them in the way FFXI’s dungeons were used. We hope that the retail version of FFXIV will have even more dungeons to explore. We did not find any in the regions of Coerthas or Mor Dhona, but that does not necessarily mean there are none there.
Ferry Trip
We also took a boat ride trip from Thanalan to Limsa Lominsa to see how it works in this game. After arriving at the docks, you are automatically placed on the boat when it arrives. After a brief cutscene you are able to look at the view from the top deck. I had a very uneventful journey which took around 10 minutes. We’re unsure whether creatures can attack the boat like in FFXI.
