Been a long time since I've translated anything...work's been ridiculous the past six weeks and will continue to be for the next month or so, but I felt like checking in on some of the details from the Tokyo Fan Fest which happened a few weeks ago (edit: and then I spent way too freaking long translating every article that was posted, heh). In this post and the following several posts, I've translated summaries and interview transcripts garnered from a few articles on the Game Watch site written about the Fan Festival 2014 event that happened in Tokyo on December 20 and 21. All original Japanese language sources are linked at the top of each post.
Post #1: Summary of Keynote Announcements (all things Heavensward)
Post #2: Developer Panel: Part 1 (item design), The Minion Alliance
Post #3: Developer Panel: Part 2 (creation of ninja)
Post #4: "Welcome to Naoki's Room" (interesting Q&A session between fans and Yoshida)
Post #5: Producer Letter LIVE XIX (focused primarily on patch 2.5 details), Developer's Corner with Soken (Q&A about FFXIV sound design)
Post #6: Japanese Fan Festival Summary (general overview of the event), Closing Interview with Yoshida
As stated above, for all articles below - original copy is from Game Watch (with occasional input from Famitsu in cases where the transcriptions or summaries from Game Watch weren't clear), images are also from Game Watch.
Translations are mine, so any inconsistencies between the original copy and the translation are on me.
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Source: http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs...20_681289.html
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Keynote - Heavensward Announcements
The Latest Information about Final Fantasy XIV Heavensward from FFXIV Fan Festival
New race Au Ra, new jobs astrologian and machinist, and new raid Alexander are among the highlights.
The latest information about Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward was released during the keynote presentation at the Final Fantasy XIV Fan Festival Tokyo 2014, currently being held at the Big Sight in Tokyo.
The keynote presentation was made by Naoki Yoshida, producer and director of Final Fantasy XIV, who also served as the keynote speaker at the previous two fan festivals. He started by showing off a digest trailer summarizing the content that was already discussed.
Yoshida said that for Heavensward, the graphics style is darker and worn compared to the brighter field areas in Eorzea. The previously announced highlights were shown at a quick pace - the new story will begin with the Dragonsong War. For the first time in four years, counting the original FFXIV, the level cap will finally be raised to level 60. There will be new dungeons and raids, new equipment, new beast tribes, new primals, and flying mounts.
Announced for the first time at the Tokyo Fan Festival was the composer of the main theme of Heavensward - Nobuo Uematsu. Uematsu was selected to follow-up his original composition "Answers," the main theme of Final Fantasy XIV. In a pre-recorded video message, Uematsu appeared with his face swollen from a toothache. The main theme of Heavensward is a "slow composition with primarily piano, and will end on a good note so please look forward to it."
From here on out came new announcements. First, the sixth playable race, Au Ra, was announced with a trailer. This race is distinct with the horns on its head and hardened scales on some parts of their skin. According to Yoshida, many different patterns and shapes were prepared for the faces, so distinct new looks can be created. Men have a strong character from lean to burly physiques, while women have a mysterious beauty to them.
The looks have roots from Doma on the Othard continent, where Yugiri's tribe comes from in the main scenario of A Realm Reborn. It seems that Yugiri's face will be revealed in patch 2.5. The Au Ra male character was shown as a dark knight, and it was a pretty good match to the face patterns available. Yoshida said that playing dark knight as Au Ra looks pretty good as they tank and fight using the forces of dark magic.
After that, it was announced that Alexander will be the new raid dungeon to follow the Coils of Bahamut which came to an end with patch 2.4. Since Alexander is a familiar summon in the Final Fantasy series, groans were heard from across the crowd. According to Yoshida, while the content is meant to be played after completing the main scenario of Heavensward, you'll probably be able to enter a bit earlier than that. He did not mention the specific location, but he said that its presence would be visible from the field areas.
Speaking of the setting, we were told that the primal Alexander is an unusual one who was summoned by the Goblin beast tribe and assembled from debris. Warriors of Light will gradually go deeper and deeper into the mechanical beast. The reasons behind the summoning of the primal will be revealed in the main scenario of Heavensward.
As far as the specifications of the Alexander raid were concerned, two modes will be provided: a normal difficulty and a hard difficulty. Normal difficulty is scaled to be easier than the Coils of Bahamut, specifically mentioned to be about the same as the Binding Coil after application of the echo buff, while hard difficulty will be more difficult than the Coils of Bahamut. Yoshida mentioned that not enough players were participating in the Final Coil of Bahamut, so by creating a "normal" version, everyone should be able to participate.
Next, Yoshida reviewed the long-anticipated new jobs to be implemented. "You can't make a party with only tanks," he said, "you'll also need support." From here, the talk suddenly cut to video. This was probably unintentional because it seemed like he intended to talk first before the video.
"The second new job of 'Heavensward' will be Astrologian," Yoshida said with a laugh, "and it doesn't shoot guns," quelling the rumors that the second new job would be a gun wielder. As a healer, the main weapon used is the Star Globe, which will allow recovery of allies using the power of the stars. It will normally be folded up compactly on the character's back, but when the stance is changed, the astrolabe will emerge from their hand. Their abilities are card-based, like Corsair from Final Fantasy XI, and it seems like a variety of support effects can be brought to the battlefield by drawing from the constellation-based divining deck. The astrologian's design was shown with the mysterious female Au Ra, with healing animations different from those used for White Mage and Scholar.
At this point, Yoshida finally announced details about a Collector's Edition of Heavensward. So far it was only announced that a Collector's Edition would be released with the only other detail known that there would be some kind of figure along with the game. The collector's edition of Heavensward will have artwork featuring illustrations of the Dragonsong War from Yoshitaka Amano decorating the package, and it will come in a large box which contains a figure of the flying dragon mount. In addition to the game software, there will also be an art book and a bonus video disc. Additionally, there will be an exclusive in-game griffin mount, a helm reminiscent of the dark knight Cecil's helm from Final Fantasy IV, and a wind-up Kain minion. A digital version of the collector's edition will also be available for gamers who aren't interested in the physical exclusives.
The previously announced Spring 2015 was mentioned again for the release date, and it seems that development has been moving along at a rapid pace in parallel with the patch 2.5 series.
At this point, the keynote was about to end, when a familiar voice was heard from backstage. Square Enix President Yosuke Matsuda, nicknamed "Uncle Headshot," took the stage with a rifle in his right hand. The third new job was then unveiled as a surprise.
The third job is a firearm-wielding DPS called Machinist, with no corresponding class. Unlike Corsair from FFXI, it will be exclusively a gunner. In battle, it will be a physical ranged attacker which can manipulate the strength of its firearm using attachments and deploy mechanical turret-type field installations.