Why Final Fantasy XIV Deserves a TV Series

By Casey DeFreitas and Mike Mamon

A Final Fantasy live-action TV show was just announced – specifically, a Final Fantasy XIV Online TV series. We don’t know when it will come out, or what specifically it covers, but we do know it’s directly inspired by the world of Final Fantasy XIV and will take place in Eorzea.

Casey DeFreitas and Mike Mamon, two of our Final Fantasy XIV fans, discussed why the fourteenth installment, an MMORPG, deserves a TV series. Read their conversation and speculation below, and read more details about the Final Fantasy XIV TV series here.

Casey DeFreitas Mike! Final Fantasy XIV is getting a freaking live-action TV show. This is so unexpected, but, I also think it’s pretty smart. First reaction: Go!

Mike Mamon I’m really excited about this. I was totally surprised, but the more I think about it, a live-action show is possible and likely with how much time and effort Sony put into the Kingsglaive movie and the Final Fantasy XV anime.

Casey  It’s funny considering we’re so excited about it because we’re fans of FFXIV, but a lot of first reactions I’ve heard so far around the office have been “What? Why XIV?”

Mike They don’t understand the amazingness that is FFXIV haha.  Every time someone asks me if they should start playing FFXIV, I always tell them to start from the beginning because the story is totally worth it.

But for real though, fans of the mainline series are missing out on some really high quality Final Fantasy stories by not playing FFXIV.

Official Final Fantasy XIV art.

Casey The scope of the world of Final Fantasy XIV’s Eorzea is absolutely incredible, and there is so much that happens, it’s basically impossible for me to neatly summarize its story. I’d love to learn more about the world. This may be going too far, but some of its plots rival the political and emotional intrigue of Game of Thrones. Would you say that’s true?

Mike That’s not going too far at all. The world of FFXIV like you said is vast and there are so many pockets of communities and cities that each deal with their own struggles whether it’s related to the all-powerful Garlean Empire or small conniving tradesmen.

So yeah,  I can totally see the relation between Game of Thrones and FFXIV. I only wonder if Sony will allow the showrunners to be that gritty and dark with the Final Fantasy IP in live-action.

Let’s be real. There’s not much baby making going on in Final Fantasy hahaha

Casey Okay, very true haha. It’s not as dark as Game of Thrones, but it has its moments… and that may change with Shadowbringers, amiright

Mike Was that a pun? Cause I’ll give you a thumbs up for that.

Casey But anyway. This new live-action FFXIV show will tell “an original story set in the fantastic world of Eorzea.” My gut reaction was to be excited about retelling the actual story of FFXIV, I mean, there’s so much story content. And I don’t know about you, but I played with friends who skipped everything they could, so I didn’t get a chance to fully enjoy it. Plus, it’s kind of difficult to keep up with a narrative as long as FFXIV’s when the major plot-points are so spread out between hours of gameplay. Especially when you can essentially spend more than 20 hours just leveling up a side job, like Culinarian.

Mike  That’s fair. Thankfully I wasn’t forced or goaded to skip through many of the story cutscenes too often in Realm Reborn. It’s been a while but I do remember some players wanting to skip cutscenes. Now in the game, main story quest cutscenes can’t be skipped anymore if you’re in an instance with random people. I’m pretty sure anyway cause those late-game story instances take forever now for the duty roulette/matchmaking…

Also as someone who prefers the story in MMOs anyway, Final Fantasy XIV does a great job keeping me invested in all these supporting characters. I’m bad with names and I remember almost all of the names of the Scions of the Seventh Dawn and how to pronounce them. I can’t say the same for other MMOs and their lore.

Speaking of the Scions by the way, I’m really looking forward to seeing what their live-action counterparts will look like. Cid is already confirmed which is great, but I really hope they include the Scions in some way since they are integral to the FFXIV story. Either way, I think fans will be split on the designs if they do decide to include them. What do you think about seeing FFXIV characters in live-action?

Casey I’m honestly a little nervous because some of their designs are so spectacular, it will be hard to do them justice in real life, as it usually is with anime-like characters. There’s something that always looks sort of off, right? But, I really hope we get Alphinaud and Y’shtola, they were integral Scions from early on. Of course, we’ll probably get to see the members of the Eorzean alliance as well. I’d be most excited to see Merlwyb, she’s such a badass.

Mike Yes! I’d love to see Raubahn and Nanamo too! So many great characters with interesting story arcs. The costumes and special effects makeup needs to be on point. Although they could go the CGI route. Either way, expectations will be high for fans.

Casey

It’s kind of crazy thinking about the scope of this project. They can’t even use horses. There are just chocobos – I wonder if they’ll stick to that?

And of course we’re excited and interested in those existing characters, but we’re getting new characters too. And one of the coolest things about FFXIV is that it pulls elements from all Final Fantasy games. It has magitek from Final Fantasy VI, and we’re getting the Viera race that first appeared in Final Fantasy Tactics Advanced, just as two small examples. So there’s kind of a buffet of Final Fantasy details that fans of every game will recognize, and it sounds like that’s one of the reasons XIV was chosen for a TV series.

Mike Oh definitely! There’s nothing more exciting as a Final Fantasy fan to catch a reference in-game. The new Shadowbringers expansion for instance will finally add playable gunblades to the game! Triple Triad is already in there. Maybe we’ll see more FFVIII influences.

Also I secretly want an episode of the show to be about the Warrior of Light trying to win a Triple Triad tournament at The Gold Saucer (Yes that’s in FFXIV) to get enough money to win a cool mount. Classic Tobey Maguire Spider-Man win a competition to impress friends or love interest plot.

Casey Yes! I kind of want it to get kind of anime, if you know what I mean. But I also know a lot of people wouldn’t want that, either! But, man, Final Fantasy XIV was probably the best choice for Square Enix. What other Final Fantasy game will still have new, relevant content releasing as the show is coming out? Not counting Final Fantasy VII Remake – though I love it, I feel like that thread has been done to death. But, because this is an original story, it won’t spoil anything major for people who decide to start playing FFXIV after seeing the show. I definitely see it as a marketing tactic.

Mike For sure, FFXIV is a prime candidate and one of Square Enix’s pride and joy. It totally makes sense that they’re looking to increase the mindshare for the game with this show.

But what if the protagonist is not the Warrior of Light and is instead just some random adventurer? Maybe the show never shows the Warrior of Light because we the players are the Warrior of Light. Like some companion show that just builds alongside our story.

So many possibilities.

Casey Ooh, that would make a lot of sense.

But, we could speculate all day – all we really know is that it “explores the struggle between magic and technology in a quest to bring peace to a land in conflict,” and that is so broad in the context of Final Fantasy XIV. Basically, I’m glad Final Fantasy XIV is getting a show and definitely think it deserves it – even if it may be part marketing ploy, I mean, did you see the Tom Holland FFXIV Shadowbringers commercial?

Mike Yeah, we’re definitely getting into the weeds about this hahaha

Whatever story they do decide to create, it’s very clear that we’re both excited to see a live-action TV series of Final Fantasy XIV so that more people can join in the love we have for this game.

TL;DR:

• Final Fantasy XIV’s base story is already incredibly expansive, and has an uncountable number of threads to pull from to create an original story. The side characters are memorable with interesting histories of their own.

• Because Final Fantasy XIV is driven largely by challenging gameplay and social aspects in addition to the story, there’s room to tell a story in a TV series that won’t be overshadowed by main characters that wouldn’t be able to share the spotlight.

• Final Fantasy XIV pulls elements from almost every Final Fantasy game in the franchise, so it has recognizable details, characters, tech, magic and monsters for every fan.

• Content is constantly added to Final Fantasy XIV, and most recently, the third expansion Shadowbringers is set to be released on July 2. What other Final Fantasy game will still have relevant content being added when the Final Fantasy TV series airs? This decision has to be half-marketing driven.

• Mike and Casey like Final Fantasy XIV a lot so of course they’ll think it deserves a TV show.

For more on Final Fantasy, check out our Final Fantasy VII Remake Preview and our Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Preview (or watch the video above). For more details on the show, here’s everything we know about the Final Fantasy XIV TV series.

Casey DeFreitas is an Editor at IGN who plays as a Miqo’te tank in FFXIV. Catch her on Twitter @ShinyCaseyD.

Mike Mamon is a Syndication Editor at IGN and level 70 Astrologian who’s looking forward to becoming the Warrior of Darkness. Follow him on Twitter @xpmnms