With the Tokyo Game Show 2024 coming to an end, Naoki Yoshida and Toshio Murouchi have sat down and provided viewers around the world with the first sneak peak of what’s to come inFinal Fantasy XIV‘s patch 7.1.
We now have a name for the patch, Crossroads, and as usual there are more MSQ quests and a new dungeon, Yuweyawata Field Station, to be completed. With its release planned for “mid-November”, Crossroads is jam-packed with new content and features, so without further ado, let’s dive into today’s reveals.
Note: The stream was in Japanese only, and information here comes from presentation slides (which were thankfully translated) and live translations provided by Miuna in theFFXIVOfficial Discord server.
Echoes of Vana’diel details revealed
Revealing that he has undertaken the first play test with 24 players, Yoshida proudly showed off some screenshots of the upcoming Echoes of Vana’diel Alliance Raid quest line:
Part one of the quest line will be called ‘Jeuno: The First Walk’, and the locations will be familiar to anyone who has playedFinal Fantasy XI.According to Yoshida, the same artists and designers who worked on these locations inFFXIhave also worked on them inFFXIV, so they’re true to the source material.
It was also revealed that, to remain in-keeping with the fact that boss names inFFXIwere not translated into Japanese, they also won’t be translated inFFXIV.
Embrace the chaos
The first ever savage tier 24-man raid is to be added in patch 7.1, aptly named “Chaotic Alliance Raids”, although they may not be what you’re expecting.
Rather than going through an entire Alliance Raid with beefed up trash mobs, Chaotic Alliance Raids will instead be 24-man encounters with the final boss of the raid. The first of these will be The Cloud of Darkness (Chaotic), which will see players face off against a now very familiar enemy who has a whole new range of mechanics to throw at us.
That explains why she’s on the official Crossroads patch art.
A surprising, although not unwelcome reveal from today’s Live Letter was the fact that the Hall of the Novice is getting additional lessons for people to complete once they hit level 49.
These lessons will be about specific mechanics, including and not limited to:
It was noted that these lessons aren’t compulsory, but were added after issues were raised, particularly from “overseas players”, about those graduating from Sprout status being unaware of how some mechanics are supposed to play out.
Dawntrail’s first Allied Society and Custom Deliveries
The first ofDawntrail’s Allied Society quest lines will take us to Urqopacha, and put us back in contact with the Pelupelu who reside there. Few details were given about what the quest line would entail, but it was revealed that this would be an Allied Society for Battle jobs.
We were also introduced to our first Custom Deliveries NPC forDawntrail, Nitowikwe, who looks to be based in Shaaloani. According to the screenshots, we’re likely to be working alongside the reflections of the train crew who helped us force our way into Heritage Found.
Byakko’s making a comeback
The first ofDawntrail’s Unreal Trials has been revealed, and it will see players face off against Byakko once again in The Jade Stoa (Unreal). Little was revealed about the mechanics that players can expect, but I’m looking forward to taking another freefall down the tunnel of doom.
Yoshida also noted that now that we’ve seen the first of the Unreal Trials forDawntrail, we can gather which direction they’re going to go in for the rest of the expansion. It’s likely that we’ll be taking on a few more Auspices before the expansion reaches its conclusion.
Trials and Raids
The onlyDawntrailTrial to not have an Extreme version, The Interphos, will now get its more difficult counterpart in the shape of The Minstrel’s Ballad: Sphene’s Burden.
We were also shown some new glimpses of the next Ultimate Raid, Futures Rewritten (Ultimate), including more new screenshots of the foes we’re set to face, including what appears to be Gaia in a much more powerful form. Futures Rewritten (Ultimate) is not set to be released when the main 7.1 patch is implemented, but is expected to come one or two weeks later.
And of course, Hildibrand
Love him or hate him, at this point no expansion would be complete without him (exceptShadowbringers, which seems to have done just fine without him). Either way, the gentlemanly detective is back for the Inconceivably Further Hildibrand Adventures.
From the screenshots shown, it’s clear to see that Hildibrand and co. will be heading to Solution 9. How and why remains to be seen, but there are sure to be fireworks, and bombs.
But wait, there’s more!
There were so many new additions and updates mentioned in the one hour long Live Letter, and it’s impossible to gather them all together in order to pass them on. Rather than try, here’s everything else that was mentioned, as well as any relevant screenshots:
