Naoki Yoshida has been spearheading Final Fantasy 14 for longer than many Minecraft players have been alive. An odd comparison, but a valid one. In all his years at the helm, he’s never buckled under community pressure to hit the brakes on all those glamour restrictions, preferring to maintain a fairly strict standard on what can and cannot be worn by each of the game’s many-splendored job classes.
For PC players, this wasn’t such an issue once the Mare Synchronos mod hit the scene, as fans could fully bypass the system, showing off whatever garb they wished to wear to everyone who happened to have the same mod installed on their end. Alas, those days are now over, as the creators were forced to call it quits earlier this year.
Something big shook the FF14 scene this past Halloween. As of the upcoming Patch 7.4, most glamour-related restrictions will be severed. We’ll all wear whatever we feel like, whenever we feel like it. What changed? Why did Yoshi-P’s heart grow three sizes on that most festive of holidays?
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Live And Let Live
As part of a far wider chat with Famitsu (thanks for the spot, PCGamer), Yoshida reiterated his personal stance on glamour, which is that he wants to maintain an immersive quality when he’s playing the game. Letting everyone do what they want, wherever they want, can shatter things a bit; for his personal satisfaction, he conforms to various restrictions. To be honest, I totally get it; I often do the same.
“With this in mind,” however, Yoshida explains that he’s been “playing various other companies’ titles and checking their specifications.” Here’s where it gets real. “I have come to the conclusion that it’s fine to continue to hold on to my own personal principles as a gamer, but this is no longer the time to force them on players. […] I also play FFXIV privately, and since I roleplay my character as a Black Mage, I don’t think I’ll glamourise Knight gear. These are my own roleplaying rules, so I have decided them arbitrarily.”
“However, I reconsidered and thought that it would be pointless to impede the role-playing of people who say, ‘My character is the coolest and cutest in the world. I want to dress up even more.'”
Yoshi-P has relented. The cuteness reigns supreme. “It’s fine for me to be particular about my own style, and I’m sure there are many others who feel the same way,” he goes on, “but that doesn’t mean the system should restrict the motivation of people who are particular about dressing up.” Something of a life lesson, then, and a welcome one for hundreds of thousands of Eorzeans.
Interestingly, Yoshida goes on in the Famitsu interview to immediately tackle the issue of mods – again, the Mare Synchronos saga springs to mind. “While I’m tolerant of modding culture, I believe tools that impede business are absolutely unacceptable,” he says. “They violate the basic rule of modding, which is to gain the trust of the company and enjoy it within that framework. Going beyond that is no lonnger part of the culture.”
Regardless of where we as individuals feel such lines should be drawn, Naoki Yoshida’s word is law. It’s nice, at least, that the law has now been bent by the director himself to allow for a far more open and enriching glamour experience.
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