As the Coronavirus continues to rage outside, players are staying in and pouring more hours into their favorite games to pass the time and relieve stress. For many, that stress relief comes from Final Fantasy 14, which not long ago dropped Patch 5.2 to huge success, bringing a continuation of the Shadowbringers story line, new things to unlock, and powerful new bosses to conquer.
The success that Final Fantasy 14 is currently enjoying would be completely unbelievable to anyone whose knowledge of the game stopped with its disastrous 2010 release. Since being recreated and rereleased with Final Fantasy 14 2.0, the game has had massive success over the last seven years, and has showed no signs of slowing down. Unfortunately, with the ongoing threat of the Coronavirus, that has changed for the near future.
The Coronavirus has slowed work to a crawl across most sectors, and the game development sector is no exception, being hit especially hard in Japan. Square Enix producer Naoki Yoshida recently announced that due to the pandemic, the next patch for Final Fantasy 14, patch 5.3, will not be dropping in mid-June as planned, but later on down the pipeline. Yoshida explained that this was done to prioritize the health and well-being of Square Enix’s employees, who are currently working from home to minimize the risk of becoming infected. The devs in charge of Final Fantasy 14 are also giving consideration to players during the crisis by suspending home evictions in the game for the foreseeable future, meaning those who cannot find the time to log in will not return to see their hard-earned houses reduced to rubble.
While the push of patch 5.3 is known, Yoshida has stated that the length of the delay is not currently known, and that it could be anywhere from a few weeks to a full month. Obviously it behooves Squre Enix to put the health of its employees before some new content, and it has been good about that so far, not just now but with the pull of its employees from PAX East over health concerns. The upfront announcement, honesty, and humanity of Yoshida’s statement has been met with approval by fans of the game, who are content to wait for additional content if it means Square Enix’s employees will stay healthy.
Nevertheless, the anticipation and delay no doubt disappoints many fans, especially considering Final Fantasy 14’s content has been very high quality with its last few patches, and 5.3 promises to continue that trend.
In the meantime, there is still plenty for players to do in Final Fantasy 14, as all the costumes and legendary weapons are not going to collect themselves. The extended time before patch 5.3 drops is the perfect time to work on getting the Final Fantasy 14 wall lean emote, reserved only for the coolest of the cool.
Source: Kotaku
