The annual Final Fantasy FanFest convention, the quintessential gathering for Final Fantasy XIV players from across the globe, has gotten well underway in Las Vegas. It’s an especially important one this year, as head developer Naoki Yoshida (aka “Yoshi-P”) flew in from Japan to reveal the highly-anticipated, first official trailer for the upcoming 7.0 expansion — Dawntrail, and provide many new details for what to expect with its release in Summer of 2024.
Yoshi-P started things off with the premiere of the teaser trailer itself, seen above. It provides a vibrantly colorful glimpse of the world players will be traveling to in the upcoming 7.0 expansion, which is being called Tural. As the Warrior of Light travels by ship we also see plenty of familiar faces, from Estinien looking comically out of place, to Alisaie and G’raha Tia exploring markets, to Y’shtola perusing texts about a mysterious throne, to Urianger kicking back with a tropical drink.
While little is revealed in the teaser about the actual new story going forward, the overall aesthetic coupled with the expansion’s name definitely evokes that of a bright and exciting new adventure for the Scions of the Seventh Dawn. The firsthand look closes out with a release window of Summer 2024, right around a year from now.
From there, Yoshi-P gives a more detailed presentation about what players can expect with 7.0. He starts off with what will be a significantly thematic shift from the darker, foreboding elements of previous expansions like Shadowbringers and the subsequently Endwalker. With the years-long story of Hydaelyn and Zodiark having come to its formal close, the Scions are set to embark on an entirely new journey to a much brighter setting.
As Yoshi-P calls it, this “Journey of Discovery” will take the Scions far West to the land of Tural, where there apparently is a fabled “City of Gold”. It seemingly connects to some sort of “contest”, possibly for the throne that Y’shtola is seen investigating in the trailer. However, Yoshi-P kept details fairly vague about the storyline, but promised a full-blown RPG experience like never before seen in FFXIV and asked for the audience to “keep their expectations high”.
Going forward, Yoshi-P revealed the new Hub City of Tural, which is called Tuliyollal. It serves as the seat of the federal nation-state of Tural, in the northern area of the Western continent. Artwork depicting the town both from above and down on its streets shows what will be a colorful and diverse civilization for players to explore. The silhouette of the city’s skyline is also part of the logo for the new expansion.
Along with plenty more major cities to come in future content, furthermore, there will be an abundance of new characters introduced, such as Tuliyollal’s ruler Gulool Ja Ja, who is a two-headed Mamool Ja. To get an even better sense of the city’s look, Yoshi-P showed some screenshots of various areas, such as the harbors. It also gave a chance to see what to expect with the game’s much-improved graphics, including better lighting, expanded color schemes and a more interactive environment with more objects.
New areas to explore around the city of Tuliyollal include Urqopacha, which is apparently home to the biggest races of Tural, such as Giants, as well as its smallest races. It should definitely prove for an interesting dynamic on that front, as well as the anticipation of what type of new races will be seen. Judging by the artwork and screenshots shown, it will be a very geographically diverse region, with what looks like mountains overlooking sweeping grassy cliff plains and some very colorful meadows.
Another major area shown off with artwork and screenshots is the dual-leveled region of Yak T’el, which is apparently home to the Mamool Ja as well as Tural’s Hrothgar population. It will feature a dense forest area down below, with underground wells and springs, as well as what looks like the city that lives above it all.
The presentation then moved on to Allied Tribes coming in the new expansion, with just one being spoiled off the bat. Known as the Pelu-Pelu, they inhabit the area of Urqopacha and are one of the smaller races particularly notable for their face masks. They’re avid entrepreneurs that specialize in certain goods such as coffees and teas.
Also, if you’ve played Final Fantasy X as well as its direct sequel FFX-2, you’ll remember one of the most infamous characters named Tobli was a very fast-talking Pelu-Pelu.
Next Yoshi-P revealed the expected level cap increase to Level 100, which is a definite milestone in itself for the game. He thanked the audience for allowing them to reach that point, as he wasn’t sure it would ever happen. After that was one of the biggest tease reveals of the entire livestream — new jobs.
Yoshi-P noted that the expansion will start with two new jobs, per tradition, and they will be one Melee DPS job and one Magic Caster DPS job. Of course the jobs themselves weren’t revealed just yet, but Yoshi-P graciously bestowed a cryptic hint of what at least one of them could be by unveiling his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles shirt.
He asked the audience to brainstorm ideas based on that shirt, so players will have to wait until the next major livestream event coming this October to find out. Our best guess so far is that it could allude to another “scouting” Melee DPS role, which so far has only been Ninja. Perhaps it’s time for another to join the club.
Next on the docket was new Dungeons, with one major artwork shown above. He noted that said dungeons are still very much under development, so there were no screenshots or footage to show yet. However, he decided to show at least one of the boss threats players will take on at some point in the story, known as Valigarmanda. It appears to be a mythical serpentine-bird hybrid creature, and it will definitely make for a formidable fight when the time comes.
Further on, Yoshi-P mentioned there were will be plenty of new updates to Duty Support, countless new gear sets and recipes for all classes, as well as “expansive new lifestyle content”. This hearkens back to the introduction of the very well-received Island Sanctuary content, and he promised that more new content within the same vein will be added in 7.0.
Alongside all of that will of course be new Variant Dungeons, new Alliance Raids, plenty of new 8-player Raids, and at least one new Ultimate Raid.
In addition, there will definitely been updates to the Blue Mage job class, more Hildibrand adventures as there can never be enough of those, at least one new Deep Dungeon planned, and plenty of new content for the Gold Saucer. Likely new GATEs as well as a new game of some sort to join the likes of Triple Triad and Mahjong.
One of the biggest moments of the stream was the formal presentation of the graphic overhaul for player characters, giving before and after transitions of every playable race in the game. The change overall is quite significant and definitely an improvement after many years of graphical limitations. Of course this means that the file size of the expansion and the game overall will increase dramatically, so that will be something to keep in mind, depending on your console of choice, or PC for that matter.
Further system updates include some notable changes like being able to dye gear pieces two different colors instead of one. Glamour savants will definitely be happy for that, as well as the ability to wear glasses along with a headpiece. The limit cap on furnishings for homes will also increase.
Raiders can now rejoice as there will be a new Strategy Board system introduced that allows raid groups to map out the mechanics of difficult battles before diving into the fight.
Winding down on the livestream was the hilariously cute mention of an upcoming Fall Guys & FFXIV collaboration event that will span between both games. The Fall Guys game, which is free to download, will see the collab first on August 22. Then a special Gold Saucer event with a Fall Guys-like GATE event will come in the 6.5 content patch.
Finally, last but not least, Final Fantasy XIV will soon finally be coming to the latest tier of Xbox consoles. A Beta version of the game will launch on Xbox Series X and Series S with Patch 6.5’s release, and then fully release in Spring of 2024.
That wraps up everything mentioned in today’s livestream of the upcoming Dawntrail expansion for Final Fantasy 14. If you would like to watch the actual livestream of the FanFest event, it can be viewed here.
Another livestream event later this October will give even further details about Dawntrail, including the actual jobs hinted at by Yoshi-P, as well as likely some interactive gameplay in new areas, possibly a pre-order date, and more.
Published: Jul 28, 2023 06:39 pm