Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn
Final Fantasy XIV, an online MMO game that encompasses many aspects of the beloved Final Fantasy series. Within the world there is multiple options for people to play and build their own world. Character creations have five different races, and various classes including mages, warriors, paladins, bards and more. On top of this there is an extensive customization system. Things from freckles, tattoos, distance between the eyes, names, and even choosing birthdates and patron deities. In my expirence the character creation system alone provides an intense expirence that rivals that of some of the best games in the world.
The character system doesn’t end there either. Within the game, and after some time, there are various options that set this game apart. For example, a person’s disciple could be of War and their job could be a Paladin but the player also want the healing magic that comes with being a White Mage. This is something entirely possible to do. You simply have to start the beginner quest in the guild you wish to join, switch your weapons and then train under a new class while keeping your original. Then you simply combine known spells and techniques to build your own character and your own fighting technique. As if that wasn’t enough each person can start various jobs such as botanist, fisherman, carpenter, etc under the Disciple of Land or Hand offered in game. A person can join a one, a few, or even all the fields and use the skills learned to help aid them in their classes, and provide materials needed for amour, weapons, and quests.
If character creation isn’t something to gawk at the various worlds are. There are various places and worlds within the game that a person must go to and expirence to complete the quests. Each one of these worlds have different landscapes, scenery, buildings, people, and even culture.
Overall this game has to be one of the most successful and rather inventive MMO’s I’ve ever seen or played. However, this game did not start as this fantastic piece of work. Rather when Square Enix first launched the game in September 2010 until the servers closed in November 2012 the game was received negatively. The graphics and the music were considered great, but overall players thought the game was unfinished and there were issues with interface and gameplay. This caused the development team on the game to be replaced with a new team of about 270 people. In 2013 Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn was relaunched and was met with great reviews. People began flocking to the game, and till this day the game is popularly played, even releasing new content periodically.
Now something as large as this game must be organized and maintained diligently to work at the best capacity. This game can be played on PS4 and PC and is hosted by a large network of servers. Originally there were three servers North America, Europe, and Japan. However, as the players numbers grew they divided these servers into 6 for better game play. Elemental, Gaia, Mana, Aether, Primal, and Chaos. Beyond that the game was even divided into Legacy(before or during 1.0 patch) and New (2.0 patch) servers. Beyond that there is also specific data centers for Europe, and even many test servers being worked on.
Overall Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn is one of the best MMO games I’ve played. Between the fantastic storyline, gameplay, the exceedingly clean system, and the diligent work of the teams behind the game it has become popular worldwide and continues to be.
