Final Fantasy 14‘s next expansion will be Dawntrail, and it’s coming next year.
Revealed at this weekend’s Final Fantasy 14 Fan Festival in Las Vegas, producer and director Naoki Yoshida confirmed that the fifth expansion is set to launch in summer 2024 (or Q3 2024, if you’re in the Southern hemisphere and your summer is usually in January) and bring “an abundance of fresh content”, including a boosted level cap from 90 to 100, new jobs, new areas, tribes, and dungeons.
You can see the action for yourself in the all-new teaser below:
Players can also expect to see “new core battle content” such as FATEs, Hunts, Treasure Hunts, and sidequests, as well as the stunning New World, Tural, with its capital Tuliyollal, the mountainous Urqopacha and the forest of Yak T’el.
But there’s more, too. Dawntrial also introduces the “game’s first graphical update for both character and world visuals”, including “improvement to screen-wide aesthetic appeal, higher resolution textures and shadows, and improved material qualities”.
But the best news was saved until last.
In a surprise appearance, Xbox boss Phil Spencer joined Yoshida onstage to confirm that the fan-favorite MMO is finally coming to Xbox Series X/S in Spring/Q2 2024, just in time to get the new expansion. Xbox players can expect an open beta before then, although there’s no concrete date for that just yet.
“What I really appreciate about you and your team is that you put the player in the centre of everything you do,” Spencer said to Yoshida during the presentation.
Did you hear the news that a 69-year-old Final Fantasy 14 streamer just received an in-game visit from the series’ creator?
Pokochii Bigmum was tackling the final fight in Pandaemonium Anabaseios, the latest and last raid in the current expansion, Endwalker. The 69-year-old was attempting the Savage difficulty of the raid, an extremely tough challenge that requires extreme precision and team coordination to complete.
A few hours into the stream, Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi stopped by to offer words of encouragement, much to the elation of Pokochii and those watching their stream. And in case you’re wondering that it may be a case of mistaken identity (or catfishing), Sakaguchi took to Twitter to confirm it was indeed him who popped by.