Wark Digest #217 - More Words In Edgewise

Welcome back to the Wark Digest, your weekly newsletter of new developments and historical insights from the Final Fantasy universe. I’m Chris, aka Hoogathy, and this week we unpack more news from The Ivalice Chronicles while one of the active FF games struggles with success all over again…

This week’s newsletter is 1445 words, a 6-minute read.

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Getting New Words In Edgewise

We’re almost two months away from our next history lesson in Final Fantasy Tactics: The Ivalice Chronicles, and the interviews with devs keep coming. This week director Kazutoyo Maehiro spoke to the PlayStation Blog about the “updated version”’s design choices. Let’s take a look at what’s new in these latest remarks:

What they’re saying:

• Like many other Square Enix devs, FFT holds a special place in Maehiro’s heart, having worked on the original as Event Planner: “It was Final Fantasy Tactics that inspired me to dedicate my life to becoming a game designer. Even now it serves as an emotional underpinning for me, so it’s very dear to my heart“

  • Replaying it recently reminded him of the game’s impact, but he lamented that it was becoming inaccessible

  • “I strongly felt that I wanted to revive this amazing game so that new players of the current generation could experience it“

• With the project underway, the lack of source code was an obstacle, and the team considered emulating the game but “this method wouldn’t have allowed us to make granular refinements even if the objective was to recreate the original game”

  • “We felt the best way to ensure the game met modern playability standards while staying true to the original was to rebuild it“

• They rebuilt the original into the Classic mode, then used that to build the Enhanced version, so both halves of The Ivalice Chronicles are intrinsically linked

• Dialogue that had to be cut from the original, to Maehiro and Matsuno’s great disappointment, but they’ve fixed this in Enhanced—adding lines when sending specific characters (“like Agrias, Cid, and Mustadio”) into specific battles

  • “Some of these dialogues aren’t just exchanges between characters, but also complement the narrative, or touch on the heart of the story, such as why war veteran Marquis Elmdore chose the path he did“

• The Errands system is dear to Maehiro’s heart, as a system he was trusted with the responsibility of incorporating them in the original, even as a rookie—and the Enhanced version has “been recreated with higher definition artefacts and wonders alongside graphically overhauled UI for a more approachable experience“

• Producer Shoichi Matsuzawa chimed in: “[FFT] incorporates many series staples of Final Fantasy, such as the Jobs and Summons, but it’s also a complete, standalone story. This is a great game to start with if you’re new to the Final Fantasy series, so I hope you will give it a go“

What we thought:

• There’s more new info or insight here than expected, after the initial interviews retread some of the same ground

• Maehiro’s team almost certainly made the right choice in the “emulate vs. rebuild” debate—emulating gets the job done, but the rebuild will allow them to present the original version without some of the little issues that have held the game back over the years, instead of presenting the warts all over again

• Adding new conditional dialog is every bit as welcome as entirely new scenes would’ve been—it was always jarring that certain characters would just sit there after a certain point, even if something relevant to them was occurring on-screen

  • This and the return of the voiced spell incantations may just be the most exciting aspects of this update for me, personally; this does a lot to compensate for having no additional scenes in the “main scenario”

• A little more depth to the Errands system sounds nice as well, above and beyond the basic “send some units you aren’t using to do busy work” approach

• Maehiro seems to be handling this project well, and I’d interested in seeing what else he can come up with if he’s given the chance to develop something new after this game launches

What’s next? We’re still waiting for the (nigh-impossible) confirmation that the fabled sound novels will be included in the English edition this time, but with the need to rebuild the game virtually from scratch, this is an absolute pipe dream.

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New Life Through Tourism

It’s 2025, and not only is Final Fantasy XI still online, it’s… so popular that its servers are getting congested?

What’s going on:

• Current Final Fantasy XI Director Yoji Fujito issued a statement regarding player congestion on the Asura server, necessitating a temporary ban on having players use the World Transfer Service or create new characters on that server

• Fans have been relating their recent experiences, with one person commenting “I haven’t seen this many people since the early 2000s”

• Fujito took a moment to thank players for keeping the game alive, and even increasing the population overall:

  • “Thanks to you, Final Fantasy XI recently welcomed its 23rd year of service and continues to be enjoyed by numerous players around the globe. In fact, thanks in part to players that are new to the game, as well as those that are returning home to Vana'diel after being away for a while, the overall player population has been trending upward recently.”

• Since the problem could happen again elsewhere, the team is also “considering other potential measures that will help equalize the populations across Worlds”

What we thought:

• This must be the most pleasant of inconveniences the team could receive

• Asura is one of the biggest servers in the game, so it’s both surprising yet unsurprising that it was the first to be so afflicted—if it’s going to be any server, it’s the most popular one

• In fact, FFXI has reached some decade-long highs in player count in recent months, largely helped by those new features announced back in May, the free login campaign, and a plethora of easy goodies

• It’s also possible that players are longing for the “good old days” of early MMORPGs, when it was less about the grind (or at least, the grind was different)

• A temporary spike in player count may prove to just be a “temporary spike;” the question is, how long can this really be sustainable?

  • If it does prove to be long-lasting, it just might lead Square Enix to invest the resources into new content, which is a wild thought in itself in 2025

  • Chances are, however, that it’s something of a fluke; free loot can lure players out, especially with no real effort involved, but would the same people turn up an actual new chunk of story or endgame content? Would newcomers sign up if they saw a flood of veterans coming back?

What’s next? If the community is flooding back after all this time, it bodes well for FFXI staying online longer. It’s harder to justify pulling the plug when there’s this many people in the pool, even if the majority of them are just visiting. Time will tell, though, if they actually do anything to make the game more friendly to newcomers (or alter that subscription fee!).

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Around the Union

Coincidentally, after our discussion on Yuna last week, we’ve tuned our gaze a little wider to the “7 Best-Written Characters of All Time!” This one may be surprising for a couple of reasons—did your favourite character make the list, or do you think we made a big omission? Sound off in the comments either way!

Meanwhile, over in the Kupo Chronicle, we examine the complicated legacy of Final Fantasy XIII through the lens of remarks from its creators. How did it become so maligned, and how did it influence those who came after? We attempt to make sense of it all in our latest premium newsletter!

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