Final Fantasy XIV director/producer Naoki Yoshida is a pretty busy guy, and he’ll be even busier in the coming weeks before A Realm Reborn‘s beta phase kicks off. Next week Yoshi-P will be on a global media jaunt, visiting Los Angeles (North America’s HQ), San Francisco, and London. Similar to the Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII event, the team will be presenting new information about the game to different regions of the world. Once Yoshi-P gets back home, he’ll be recording another Letter from the Producer Live where we’ll undoubtedly get another sizable chunk of information!
In his latest written Letter, Yoshi-P updates us a bit on what to expect for Beta Phase 1. Zones that were previously available in alpha including the city-state of Gridania and areas of The Black Shroud will return. Other areas will not be available until subsequent phases. However, Legacy members who will have access to phase one mid-February will be able to take part in Full Active Time Events (FATE). These events will bring players together to tackle a variety of challenges like spontaneous grouping to slay a behemoth or to defend a hamlet from invaders.
One of the images below features a shot from the Official Benchmark in its final stages. Expected to release before beta, the tool is designed to test how well the game runs on your computer, a practice that is common for many large-scale MMORPG releases. Its output (a numerical score) will help give you a general idea of improvements you’ll need to make to your PC ahead of time — if you need any at all. A Realm Reborn’s engine is custom-built with techniques borrowed from Luminous, and can easily scale from high-end PCs to current-gen consoles.
