Final Fantasy 14 Mobile is starting at the beginning, but not necessarily the beginning you might be hoping for
You'll need to keep holding out hope for a classic mode, I'm afraid.
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Final Fantasy 14 Mobile will bring players back to the beginning of the popular MMO, just not the beginning some of you might be after.
Earlier this week after months of rumours about such a thing being in the works, Square Enix finally announced that a mobile version of Final Fantasy 14 is on the way from Tencent-owned developer Lightspeed Studios (who you'll know best from PUBG Mobile). A few details were shared upon the announcement, like how many jobs will be available to start off with, and the fact it'll be available in China ahead of a global release, but obviously the big question for many was where would it start? The hugely successful MMO has had five expansions, but new players can't start at the end of course - thankfully, in a Q&A video released yesterday featuring producer Naoki "Yoshi-P" Yoshida, the air has been cleared on that one.
Whenever the mobile version does launch, you'll be starting at the beginning, with A Realm Reborn. "Players who are already familiar with Final Fantasy 14 will be able to relive the story on mobile, while newcomers will have the opportunity to embark on a new adventure and experience the narrative in its entirety," Yoshi-P explained. According to the producer, "a vast amount of content and narrative has already been developed," and developer Lightspeed Studios plans to "release this content gradually and at a steady pace. We may adjust the release schedule based on player feedback, potentially speeding up the update cadence or maintaining the tempo we start with if that is what players find the most suitable."
One thing to note there, though, is that A Realm Reborn isn't technically the beginning, as there is the infamous 1.0 release that is completely unplayable now despite having story content that is actually relevant to the revamped MMO's main story. Some fans have been hoping a World of Warcraft Classic situation might manifest at some point so they can go back and play 1.0, and this mobile version certainly would have been a good opportunity for that. For now, it seems like those who do want it will just have to look back at old YouTube videos of it.
The full video is worth a watch for those of you curious about the mobile version, as it does go into a little bit of detail about how monetisation will work which doesn't sound all that bad, considering it'll be free-to-play, but that does remain to be seen.