We recently spoke to Director Mizuki Ito about the new FINAL FANTASY XI expansion Seekers of Adoulin. We put forward some questions from the community to shed some light on what we can expect in the new expansion pack.


Can you please explain a bit more about the title, “Seekers of Adoulin”?

ITO: (I will reveal some details about the game itself in the later questions) but the following should shed some light on the meaning behind the title. The Adoulin part refers to the Sacred City of Adoulin Alliance which is on the East Coast of the Ulbuka continent which is to the far west of the Quon continent. For reasons unknown, the East Coast of Ulbuka is thriving with countless trees and the land has transformed into a vast jungle that has become so overrun it prevents anyone from entering. It is a jungle rich with hidden secrets and history and, in this expansion pack, the Adventurers have been asked to set out and explore the mysteries that lie within its depths.

Why did you decide to implement these particular jobs?

ITO: Actually, the idea of having a Geomancer had been raised many times before. We sincerely wanted to make this a reality and then finally got the chance to do this and incorporate a new play style. With the Rune Fencer, we wanted to increase the number of options for ‘tank’ jobs that are needed for creating a rounded party and also to increase the number of tactics players can adopt to withstand elemental attacks from monsters.

Are you planning to introduce new type of weapons in the game that will complement the new jobs?

ITO: The new jobs will gain access to two-handed swords and one-handed staffs as their specialist weapons when the expansion pack is released. We will also be adding some more versatile weapons and plan to gradually implement a number of extra specialist weapons over time. Although we do not intend to add any new types of weapons, we will add “Bell” instruments for Geomancers.

When previous expansion packs were released, not all areas were available at launch. Will it be the same situation with “Seekers of Adoulin” and, if so, can we expect to see its game world expand in the future instead?

ITO: Adoulin will follow the same pattern as previous expansions and the areas will gradually open up over time. In this expansion, the hinterland will get deeper and deeper, allowing players to undertake expeditions that go increasingly inward. Future additions will also include ruins that have never been seen before.

The main city where all players used to be was Jeuno, then it switched to Aht Urhgan Whitegate / Al Zahbi in 2006 and we are now back to Jeuno since the release of Abyssea. Are we expecting Adoulin to be the new “main city”? What kind of city is it going to be?

ITO: We plan to split the popularity between Adoulin and Jeuno, both of which will act as main cities. Adoulin will inherit all the functions previous cities had and provide easy access to and from Jeuno. Both cities will also share the same ‘Shout’ channel. Adoulin will encompass an area with several old, preserved stone buildings like those in San d’Oria and, to create a mix of old and new, there will be another section with new wooden buildings and extensions built on old stone structures. We have gone for a design that gives it a sense of history but also conveys a rough city that has been invigorated by trade. We have also introduced waterways to give it a nice touch and imagine it could be known as the ‘City of Water’.

Is there a direct connection between the main storyline of “Seekers of Adoulin” and any of the storylines players have experienced so far?

ITO: They are not directly connected, but we will capitalise on the details of Adoulin’s background that have been mentioned before. There is no direct link to the main story, but the quests will have some sort of connection.

What kind of adventure can players experience in “Seekers of Adoulin”? Will the content be mainly focused on the high level players or does the design also take new players into account?

ITO: As far as battling monsters goes, we recommend that you try to reach level 99 first. You do not need to be at that level for the quests and hunts issued by the guilds, but low level players who do not have any means of evading trouble will find it tough going (basically if you have started a new game it could be a struggle to get to Adoulin if you have only spent an hour levelling). Even though I say 99 is the recommended level, it is less about difficult battles than deep exploration, which becomes more advantageous for the higher level players.

Where does this upcoming expansion pack take its inspiration from?

ITO: I suppose most of the inspiration probably came from FFXI’s background. We looked for new situations that had yet to be explored in FFXI and the idea of introducing a jungle came to mind. Since we were building this into a MMO structure, the theme of exploring alongside other players came about naturally. We allowed our imaginations to give the project greater scope that evolved from when we first started work on the original plan, writing down everything as we went along. Perhaps, then, this is a natural culmination of everything we have tried to accomplish so far with FFXI.


Can we expect to fight entirely new and powerful notorious monsters?

ITO: Yes indeed. There will be large imposing monsters that are linked to the deep pioneering and exploration system and even the main story will feature some fierce battles.

Do you have a message for all the players looking forward to the adventure waiting for them in Adoulin?

ITO: “Seekers of Adoulin” allows for various styles of play. Our hope is that everyone takes part and develops their own play styles, therefore helping to contribute to the world in ways that everyone can benefit from. This will be a great MMO and community experience too, so I hope you all enjoy getting involved!

A month ago, Square Enix rocked the Gigas Socks off players during VanaFest 2012 by introducing “Seekers of Adoulin” the fifth expansion for Final Fantasy XI which is celebrating ten years of service. New jobs, new continent, new UI… even with all the information released at the event, people still wanted to know more! We had a chance to get some of our questions answered straight from the source.

Read on for our interview!

GE- It’s great to see that a new expansion is on the way! It’s been quite awhile since Wings of the Goddess came out. Why was there such a long period of time between expansions? When did development begin on Seekers of Adoulin?

SE- While we were planning the release of Wings of the Goddess, we realized that there wouldn’t be enough room in the future to create the amount of additional maps needed for a full disc expansion. With that in mind, we decided to do what we could by using existing areas for add-on scenarios and the addition of a few areas for the Abyssea battle area add-ons. During that time, we continued researching and revamping the system to allow us to increase the number of maps that we could implement, something that was previously impossible. With the revamp completed it became possible for us to increase the map capacity around the middle of 2011 and then we started planning for Seekers of Adoulin.



GE- In North America Seekers of Adoulin will not be available for the PlayStation 2. Can you tell us what lead to this decision? It seems a bit odd to increase HDD capacity for the game on the console then only release the expansion in one territory. Why not release the expansion digitally?

SE (Answered by Square Enix, Inc.)- In evaluating the North American release of the expansion across all platforms, we needed to consider multiple factors, including the number of players exclusively on the system, and the costs associated with publishing or developing a stand-alone download. Regrettably, these two factors greatly determined our final decision to support the PC and Xbox platforms exclusively. However, we remain committed to supporting FINAL FANTASY XI on the PlayStation 2 platform for the foreseeable future.



GE-How will players first arrive in Adoulin? Where will they depart from and what kind of prerequisite will need to be met before travel to Ulbuka is possible?

SE- For Seekers of Adoulin, we didn’t create a map for an ocean route, so we’re planning to make the main mode of transportation a teleport-like warp. We are planning to make this extremely convenient, and as players progress further with pioneering, the number of areas that they’ll be able to warp to will increase. We can’t say too much, but yes, there will be a quest requirement similar to the one to use the boat to travel to Aht Urhgan.



GE- How many types of Runes and Luopons will there be? Will they be a consumable item that players will have to carry around with them? Or will they be a spell or ability?

SE- Runes will be activated through the use of abilities. As mentioned at VanaFest, there are both offensive and defensive types of runes. Offensive runes will mainly be used against enemies dealing elemental damage and such, while defensive runes will mainly be used on yourself and party members to reduce elemental damage.

Rune fencers will also be able to utilize enhancing magic, so like paladins they will also utilize and consume MP.



GE- How will the new jobs play into current relic, mythic and empyrean weapons? Is it safe to assume that they’ll have relic and empyrean armor as well?

SE- Rune fencers and geomancers will have Artifact equipment, Artifact weapons, Relic Equipment, Empyrean equipment, and Mythic weapons.



GE- With Seekers of Adoulin, players will receive private islands that they can use like a farm. How similar will these be to the Mog House? Can other players visit your island? Will you be able to furnish any parts of the island?

SE- As there will be rental houses for players within the town of Adoulin, the islands will not be too similar to Mog Houses. Imagine the island as a specialized area for procuring materials. From a system perspective it is difficult to invite other players to your island, but that’s not to say that we have completely given up on it. Since you won’t be able to alter the layout of this area like you can inside of a Mog House, it won’t really be possible to decorate it. However, there will be visual variations that can be made, such as farmland expansions, in order to increase the amount of materials that you can procure.



GE- At VanaFest you said that you’re looking into changing some of the core coding for the game to deal with issues such as the limit on recast timers. Are there any other things that the coding will make possible that you can tell us about?

SE- We’re not actually changing the code itself but expanding on the character-related data. This update will enable the addition of new jobs, as well as the expansion of various other facets of the game, but we have not yet fully planned out exactly what we will be doing with this. To start out we will first be expanding job-related aspects, such as new jobs and recast timers.



GE- It’s been mentioned that plug-ins might be supported with the new PC user interface. Can you tell us more about what tools will be made available to the community, what type of plug-ins will be allowed or forbidden, and if there will be some type of approval process?

Using a tool we’re internally calling “Schemer,” we will be making it possible to freely customize and arrange existing functions with the graphics of your liking. We are currently looking into the overall approval process.



GE- Final Fantasy XIV has been picking up some steam lately while heading towards the launch of 2.0. Now, Final Fantasy XI has a new expansion pack coming out next year. Have you thought about a permanent discount or a bundled subscription to both games so that players don’t have to pick one over the other?

SE- This is currently undecided.



GE- This year marks the 10th anniversary of Final Fantasy XI. What are some of your favorite memories since the project began? Is there anything you would have done differently?

Mizuki Ito- Well, one of the most memorable things for me recently is the announcement of Hiromichi Tanaka’s retirement. While I was saddened by that fact that he is retiring, I feel very proud and fortunate to be a developer at the same company with a person who retired while being loved by many of the fans.

Yoji Fujito- When I think about memorable things in the history of the game, I would have to say the earthquake on March 11, 2011 and how its influence reached FFXI had a major impact on me. There hasn’t been an example in the past where service had to be halted for a long time and when I think about the fact that there were players who were affected by the disaster, I feel that this was a major event for both us and players alike.

Greetings,

We would like to provide further explanation as to why Relic Weapons will not be expanded to other jobs.
Relic weapons were created based on the current weapon types available in Vana'diel and not based on the available jobs. Since there are differences between which weapons certain jobs can equip, this is something that cannot be completely equal.



In addition to the aforementioned reason, in order to make it possible for these jobs to equip relic weapons, we would have to make changes to the current stats on relic weapons, and since this would affect other jobs as well it is not such a simple thing to do. This doesn't just pertain to only adjustments, the same can be said for if we were to add new weapons, as they would affect currently existing items.

After a thorough discussion, we have decided to keep Relic Weapons as they are in the case new weapons are added. These new weapons will be designed around their respective jobs.

Also, in regards to mythic weapons, these weapons are similar to artifact and relic gear as they are job specific, so we plan on releasing mythic weapons for any new jobs that are introduced moving forward.Okipuit;346860