Yesterday Square Enix decided to use the Final Fantasy Fan Festival in Las Vegas as a platform to reveal new information about its upcoming Heavensward expansion for Final Fantasy XIV. You could say it was successful, because fans of the game can’t stop talking about it. Below we’ll go over what we learned during the live stream.
First up, the expansion’s new playable race is official. It’s called Au’Ra, and it’s a race of humanoids with reptilian traits. While the males are tall and muscular, the females are very thin and delicate. And yes, in case you’re wondering, this is Yugiri’s race, although it’s unclear if she will take off her hood in 2.5
Additionally, two new jobs coming in the expansion have been shown for the first time. While we previously knew that Dark Knight is coming, we’ve learned that Astrologian and Machinist will join it. Surprisingly, all three of these jobs will have no base class, meaning you can start them at level one by equipping their corresponding weapon.
The Astrologian is a healer equipped with a star globe that calls upon astrology to heal teammates. It has six different elemental cards that it can use to harm foes and apply buffs to teammates. If you played Final Fantasy Tactics, you can consider it to be an adaptation of Olan Durai, an NPC in the game that many, including myself, always wanted to play.
Further Reading: Ninja Job Gameplay Video
Meanwhile, the Machinist is equipped with a firearm and most similar to Mustadio in Final Fantasy Tactics. It will deal damage from afar, control the battlefield, and even deploy turrets making it a great defensive class.
We also now know that the first major raid of Heavensward will be called Alexander. Here is a quote from the presentation that details the raid and its new difficulty feature.
Alexander is the primal summoned by the goblins into a large abandoned fortress. Players will be exploring this fortress and battling Alexander from the inside, which will be explained at a later time. There will be a normal and hard mode. Normal mode will be more accessible to players, and won’t be as difficult as the binding coil was. Hard mode will be extremely challenging, more-so than the binding coil. Completion of the binding coil is not required to enter this raid, only completion of the new storyline.
Lastly, the Collector’s Edition has been confirmed. Yoshida called it “expensive” and it comes in a massive box that includes a figure of a dragon mount, an art book, some in-game goodies, and a DVD.
Also See: FFXIV Gold Saucer Revealed
Heavensward is scheduled to debut in Spring 2015. For now, check out the full HD gallery below.
FFXIV: Heavensward HD Screenshots
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