In the latest of many heartwarming Final Fantasy 14 stories, a 69-year-old streamer for the MMORPG just received an in-game visit from the series' creator.
Japanese Final Fantasy 14 streamer Pokochii Bigmum was tackling the final fight in Pandaemonium Anabaseios, the latest and last raid in current expansion Endwalker. The 69-year-old was attempting the Savage difficulty of the raid, an extremely tough challenge that requires extreme precision and team coordination to complete.
A few hours into the stream, Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi stopped by to offer words of encouragement, much to the elation of Pokochii and those watching their stream. Afterwards, Sakaguchi took to Twitter to confirm it was indeed him. (via GamesRadar)
Sakaguchi, an avid Final Fantasy 14 player himself, also mentions that he's at the same point as Pokochii in the raid tier, saying he needs to "keep working hard, too" if he's to complete one of the game's most demanding pieces of content.
Pandaemonium is the 8-man raid series for Final Fantasy 14's latest expansion, Endwalker. Its normal difficulty is tuned to be beaten by casual players, and is where the raid's story takes place.
However, each raid tier (consisting of four fights, released in every other major patch over the course of the expansion) also provides a Savage variant, which massively ramps up the difficulty and demands players know their Jobs inside and out while weaving through supremely demanding mechanics. If that wasn't enough, each Savage fight bears an 'enrage' timer, which causes a party-wide wipe should it not be beaten in a certain amount of time.
In that sense, I can't think of any better source of encouragement than from Sakaguchi himself. The series creator hasn't directly worked on Final Fantasy 14, but has appeared alongside the MMO's director and producer Naoki Yoshida during official livestreams.
Final Fantasy 14's latest patch, 6.45, went live on July 18. Additionally, the game's first in-person Fan Fest since before the Covid-19 pandemic is happening on July 28 in Las Vegas. Here, we expect the first details and trailer for the MMO's next expansion to debut.
Final Fantasy 16 is the latest game in the legendary RPG franchise. If you're on the fence about picking up the PS5 title, its free demo lets you carry over your save data into the full game.
