There has been a lot of excitement over the past couple of weeks. Here’s a recap of the recent events.

• Dec 12: FFXIV music was performed at Distant Worlds concert in Chicago.
• Dec 16: FFXIV beta sign-ups began.
• Dec 18: The official FAQ was updated with more beta related information.
• Dec 18: Three screenshots were accidentally released early on the European FFXIV site.
• Dec 22: Famitsu magazine article leaked 1 day early with all of the upcoming information.
• Dec 23: All official Final Fantasy XIV sites were updated with new screenshots and information.

It’s been an exciting past few weeks. Final Fantasy XIV is now one step closer to entering beta testing, which means it is one step closer to being released. We will be keeping an eye out for any new information and will be sure to share it with you right away, so keep checking back!

A majority of gamers that have participated in online gaming in the last few years have been introduced (for good or for bad) to voice chat. Voice chat is a rather simple concept, all people that are interacting connect to a central server with some type of chat program. They can then use a microphone connected to their computer to talk with everyone else that is in that same server or channel. While voice chat has been around long before 2004 in the online world, it became mainstream with the release of Halo 2 for the Xbox360. Many have heard of the verbal abuse that came from the mouths of the Halo 2 punks.

When applied to MMOs, voice chat can be an extremely useful tool. In the world of Final Fantasy XI, voice chat was not popular when we played. We attribute this to the slow paced action of the game. For people that played World of Warcraft, it was required by a large number of end-game content guilds that you be able to participate in online voice chat (listening at a minimum, while others required you had a microphone). When action is fast paced, it is easier and faster for leaders to give directions to everyone when compared to typed out commands. Voice chat tends to only be needed when quick decisions need to be made and delegated, something normally only needed for end-game type content.

While we are uncertain the pacing of Final Fantasy XIV, you can be certain that players from around the world are going to want to be able to talk to one another in FFXIV. With Final Fantasy XIV being a cross-platform game, it may be useful for Square-Enix to include voice chat functionality so PS3 players can vocally communicate with the PC friends and vise-versa. Weather Square-Enix decides to include this feature or not, many will fall back to using services such as TeamSpeak or Ventrilo.

For many, Ventrilo has become the voice chat program of choice on a PC for the past few years. Currently TeamSpeak is in beta testing for their next version (4-5 years in the making), which is looking to be a great voice chat application for gamers to use. For the admins out there, make sure to evaluate TeamSpeak 3 when considering your voice chat solution. If you have your own dedicated hosting, there is a good chance you can setup a TeamSpeak server for free on your host.

With the start of the Final Fantasy XIV beta sign-up, you might be wondering what is going to happen next and what you can do to prepare. For the time being, the most important thing is that you remain patient. Square-Enix is being tight lipped about when the beta is going to start, so all we can do is wait for more news from them. But there are a few dos and don’ts you can follow:

Dos:

• Make sure you sign-up for the beta.
• Keep whatever email address you used to register for the beta active.
• If you don’t use your Square-Enix ID regularly, make sure you have the username and password written down somewhere (don’t lose this login information).
• Watch FFXIV fan sites (like us!) to see when the Final Fantasy XIV beta will start.
• Be patient.

Don’ts:

• Don’t build a new computer in preparation for the beta. If your computer works for your current needs, don’t bother getting a new one. Wait until FFXIV is in beta or near release before buying a new computer.
• Don’t do anything that will prevent you from playing. This could range from starting your own business, pissing off your parents, or enlisting in the military.
• Don’t register for the beta multiple times. You can attempt to register multiple times from the same Square-Enix ID (it will just tell you you’re already registered), but don’t attempt to cheat the system by creating multiple accounts.
• Don’t lose your patience.

Keep in mind that Final Fantasy XIV is 6 months away if we’re lucky, but it is more likely 11 months away. Be sure to keep checking back and we’ll be sure to report any beta news as it makes itself available.

We were missing-in-action during the Tokyo Game Show when Square-Enix graced the world with a wonderful trailer. But we are attempting to make up for it by giving you screenshots from that trailer. That’s right, 70 high-resolution screenshots (1920×1080) for your viewing pleasure. Because of their size, they can make great desktop wallpapers. This trailer was released on September 24, 2009. Click that “Continued” button to see the screenshots.

The Final Fantasy XIV community has been abuzz with the latest updated to the official FFXIV website. One of the more interesting discussions has come from the screenshot pictured above, which contains a map. The forum goers have cooked up a few interesting ideas on what the World Map may look like for Eorzea (and the world at large). Check out the rest of the write-up after the break.

(Also be sure to check out our new Gallery page, a link can also be found at the top of this site).

I was poking around the NA (North American), EU (European), and JP (Japanese) official FFXIV websites to make sure I caught all of the images and noticed something interesting.  The Japanese website organizes their photos a lot differently than the NA and EU websites.  Specifically it groups images together by their context/scene, unlike the other sites that group them by date released.  The other interesting piece is that the EU website does not have all the images the NA and JP ones do.

Checkout all of the official FFXIV screenshots as they are organized on the JP site after the break.

I’ve updated the screenshots in the “New Screenshots” post with higher-resolution ones. Nothing really new, just better.

A lot of great information was released with yesterday’s website update. I wanted to share some interesting points from this information:

• The Final Fantasy series isn’t known for its diversity in skin color, the inclusion of a black skin tone is something new for Square. (Previous FF games do include a few black people, but it tends to be limited to 1 or 2 characters).
• While the Famitsu article leaks came ahead of the website update, the North American website was updated a few hours ahead of Japan and Europe. I’m hoping Square continues to randomize which locale gets updates first (or releases them all at the same time). Not showing favoritism to their Japanese crowd will go a long way.
• Customization was the big piece of this update. The customization of underwear’s color and material is definitely something original for a MMO (does Square intend us to stand around in our skivvies?).
• We’ll have to see how far customization can go. Customization was so limited in FFXI due to PS2 support (it could only display a limited number of textures). The PS3 is definitely a more powerful machine, but I’m wondering if it will hold back the level of customization we are able to do.
• Square did not explicitly spell out what we will be able to customize. The screenshots they provided give us some clues, but it is uncertain how much control we will have during character creation.

I wouldn’t expect any more FFXIV news for the remainder of this year. If any new information does appear, expect to see it posted here.

The official FFXIV website has been updated to include a slew of new screenshots and details. Go explore to see what is new! Be sure to check out:
WORLD -> RACES -> Character Creation.
WORLD -> STORY -> A Realm Divided.

Update 9:06pm (CST): now including some images from Race customization.
Update 9:41pm: the background song on the official website has changed, download it here (7.6MB)
Update 2009/12/24 12:46am: FFXIVCore has someone in Japan that grabbed the latest Famitsu magazine and provided high-res scans of the article (see below). They have blocked out the text while their team translates it.
Update 2009/12/25 8:10pm: Kotaku got their hands on some higher-resolution screenshots, I’ve updated the “FFXIV Websites” screenshots with the ones from them.

Screenshots From FFXIV Website:

Race Customization images:

Famitsu scans:

With more information making its way to the internet from the upcoming Famitsu magazine article, there is a good write-up at andriasang covering some new details of the story behind the FFXIV universe. Give it a read if you have some time.