Fashion is the name of the game in, well, any video game, and that goes for Final Fantasy XIV as well. When you’ve maxed out every single combat, crafting, and gathering job in the game, what else is left? Your fashion, of course.
FFXIV started as a fantasy MMORPG with a primarily medieval look. There were castles, villages, and little towns that all fit into a cute fantasycore setting. However, as the game has evolved, Square Enix has released increasingly outlandish clothing options for players who are obsessed with creating the perfect Glamours for their characters.
Before I knew it, I was seeing Harajuku-style trendsetters walking around the high-fantasy streets of Ishgard. Players were prancing around in their cozy knit jumpers when December came along. And perhaps most egregiously, Square Enix also released the Tomestone emote, which has the Warrior of Light whipping out a Tomestone-themed mobile phone and taking influencer-style selfies with it.
Umm. Hello, Square Enix? There are only linkpearls in this universe, thank you very much. Get those pedestrian phones out of my fantasy game. Think about my immersion!
Anyway, after angrily stomping around my room for an hour and deciding against sending a very strongly-worded email to Naoki Yoshida himself, I got over it and continued obsessively playing FFXIV for, like, another five years.
With the release of the Dawntrail expansion, however, there is finally an actual in-universe reason for there to be so much tech and modernity in FFXIV. And I couldn’t be happier.
Solution Nine serves as Dawntrail‘s new endgame hub, and it’s basically a tech heaven. You see, the in-universe explanation for Solution Nine is that it’s actually part of another Reflection (read: world) in FFXIV, and this Reflection just so happens to be a lot more technologically advanced than anything we’ve seen in the game’s expansions so far. There are people walking around with neat little headsets that literally revive them when they die, and everything just has this cool, clean, sci-fi aesthetic.
For the fashion, think Tron or Cyberpunk 2077. People are walking around in fashionable hoodies with bright neon colors, and I have to say, I’m a fan of the techy look. FFXIV certainly made it a point to contrast Solution Nine’s futuristic setting with the more traditional sensibilities of Tuliyollal, and I loved watching the characters get to grips with its modern conveniences.
See, Square Enix? All I needed was some flimsy in-universe reason for FFXIV players to look even remotely modern or fashionable. That wasn’t that hard, right?
The point is, not only am I glad that I no longer have to feel like my immersion has been broken whenever I see someone use that Tomestone emote, Solution Nine also opens up quite a few possibilities for the future of the game.
Now that modern-ish technology is a part of the FFXIV canon, who’s to say we won’t get more techy combat jobs in future expansions? So much of FFXIV has been rooted in medieval fantasy, but with Dawntrail marking the start of a new adventure for the Warrior of Light, I wouldn’t be opposed to the game trying wild, new ideas and taking the story in a completely different direction.
