#yoshi-p

Dawntrail Week - Wandering Minstrel

Seeing people talk about issues that have been in the game since Stormblood and have only gotten worse overtime was so refreshing.

We can winge and bitch about how "X would have done the story better" but here's the thing and this is going to piss off even more people: The entire fucking reason the game has not innovated at all since Heavensward is because of Yoshi-p.

Yoshi-p is a Project manager. For those who don't know what that means it means he is there to make sure the pipeline of "Concept->profit" IS MAINTAINED. Someone even asked him in a dev/CC interview during a fanfest if they would ever consider doing stuff beyond what they would normally do for an expansion and was told, point fucking blank, that that would never happen. (For context the specific question was about adding something into the game similar to Mythic+ from WoW or a similar feature.)

The guy isn't a game designer and he never WAS. His entire job is to keep the hamster wheel spinning, adding some new bells every so often that are just out of reach that the hamsters keep paying to run on the wheel.

This is also why the story hasn't truly evolved since Shadowbringers either. Think about how the dungeons are laid out, about how the final X.0 dungeon FOR THREE EXPANSIONS IN A DAMN ROW NOW have been some dungeon made from that expansions big bads memories. This is a prime example of Yoshi-p and the creative team taking the wrong lesson from how the players engage with the game. They saw all of us collectively screaming about Amaurot and took the wrong lesson by thinking "Thats what we need to do to make money. Look at the public reception, the player counts, the fact that the community is doing our marketing for us."

Yoshi-p literally saved FFXIV. 1.0. It was a disaster and he has made it so that FFXIV is now Squares fucking only lifeline. Without FFXIV Sqaure Enix would be not be making money. He was brought in to take the entire team behind 1.0 and wring their fucking necks to make the game even functional. It was a hail mary that actually worked out.

(Yoshi-P reveals that Alexandria is from the Ninth.)

"Yeah, no shit, this was obvious. Everyone saying it was the Twelfth were being stupid, since that Shard has been Rejoined. It's gone, and it can't be reached anymore."

Me: "They weren't being stupid. It's still possible to travel to a Shard that's been Rejoined. Both the Ninth and the Twelfth had equal chances of being Alexandria's origin."

"No, traveling to a Shard that's been Rejoined is impossible."

Me: "G'raha did it."

"Um, that's because he used the Crystal Tower + Alexander + Ironworks tech."

Me: "Yes, so it's possible."

"Well, the writers can't use that strategy again cuz G'raha's body is still in there, and the future is now different!"

Me: "Then the writers can come up with something new. I'm not concerned about the details."

"Well, they shouldn't."

Me: "I'm just saying that if the writers did want us to go to a Rejoined Shard, they easily can, because it's been proven to be possible. If Yoshi-P had confirmed Alexandria to be from the 12th and not the 9th, it still would've made 100% sense."

"Well, that's not what Yoshi-P said, so you're still wrong. What Alexandria did is completely different from what G'raha did, anyway."

Me: "Okay. I'm not concerned with the in-universe mechanics. I'm just saying that the story has proven it's possible to travel to a Shard that had been Rejoined."

"G'raha didn't even go to a Rejoined Shard anyway. He went to the past and got to the First before it was Rejoined."

Me: "Yes, he went to a Rejoined Shard. Because it's possible."

"The only way Alexandria could've been the Twelfth is if the gate to Alexandria also had time-travel properties."

Me: "So you understand that it's possible."

"No one has ever traveled to a Rejoined Shard, they've only traveled to the ~past version~ of a Rejoined Shard."

Me: "Yes, traveling to a Rejoined Shard is possible."

"You're being too vague."

Me: "I'm saying that traveling to a Rejoined Shard is possible."

...Like, I feel like I'm going crazy???

And of course all my posts are getting downvoted, and the guy who said no one's ever gone to a Shard that's been Rejoined is getting upvoted like crazy despite that being objectively wrong and disproven by canon.

i’ve been a Final Fantasy fan for most of my life- almost 30 years now. the vast majority of that time has been spent grappling with the fact that the franchise never felt particularly welcoming to me, as a black man. this isn’t anything new- anyone who grew up black and interested in anime, video games, or anything in that sphere could tell you that it’s a pretty common sentiment no matter where you go.

Final Fantasy was always the one place where i felt i could safely self-delude, though. the stories were about diversity, after all- they were about the acceptance of life in all its forms, regardless of color or creed. “diversity is strength, and our differences won’t divide us”- that was the rallying cry and founding principal of Final Fantasy. and if the game’s playable cast itself wasn’t always so great at making that point evident, well, i could just sweep that thought under the rug, because at least the game was trying, wasn’t it?

and the fact that the fandom tended to skew overtly white and hostile to other races, especially black people- i could put that aside, too, because in my heart, i knew that they weren’t real fans. they didn’t understand the real Final Fantasy. not the way i did. even if they said i didn’t belong, even if they did everything they could to make me feel that way, i could bear it all, because Final Fantasy was on my side.

Final Fantasy, the game franchise whose first playable black character was an absentee father who literally grafted a machine gun onto his arm.

talk about selective blindness, huh?

this interview Yoshi-P’s given has been a wakeup call to everything that’s been staring me in the face for years, and i’m finding it’s testing my resolve in a way i’ve never felt before. for the first time, i’m starting to think that FF is a franchise that doesn’t deserve my support anymore.

and the feelings that come with that realization are so, so complex. i’ve been an FF fan for so long... who am i without it? i’m not altogether sure.

all i know is that i can’t support a director who believes that the existence of black people is too controversial, too unrealistic, too “distracting” to be considered. i cannot support a man who openly dehumanizes me and others like me.