.jpg?q=50&fit=crop&w=1100&h=618&dpr=1.5)
Final Fantasy 14 has become an MMORPG known for its wholesome community. Players are generally kind to one another and can typically be found dancing or playfully casting random abilities in the city-states of Eorzea. Every player has stories about the community, from joining a follow train in the Crystarium to purchasing bread from a roleplayer in Ul'dah. The game has the best kind of mob mentality, one that invites its players to gather and/or imitate one another.
Among these shenanigans is music, particularly music played by those that get their Bard job to level 30. At level 30, Bards unlock instrument playing and can go wild hitting drums, strumming harps, and honking horns. For most players, it is a fun button-mash performance tool. There are players out there, though, that master the music mechanic and go as far as to have live concerns in the city-states for all to see.
What Bard Concerts Are Like
While soloists can play songs randomly at any location, concerts in Final Fantasy 14 are far more community-driven. The concert players have meet-ups, practice sessions, and even their own social media handles to share where they will be playing live next. One example of this is the Bardic Weapons, a completely Lalafell band that have their own Twitter page and Youtube account to share their music. Some concerts are more privatized, playing in Free Company houses that have audiences only come in via invite or through some in-game gil payment. In such cases, there can even be rules for no recording or streaming in order to keep the event special.
A lot of active bands actually exist, each with its own unique name and aesthetic in terms of clothes and choice of music. Other bard groups that perform in the MMORPG include The Songbirds, The Moogle Troupe, Mosh Mosh, and The Wiggles. These groups perform across various servers and typically pick one of the three starter city-states to garner the most audience. They make playing music on bard instruments look easy, but playing together takes work like real music in terms of timing, finding the right notes, and pacing. What makes it different from real-life music, though, is that these bands can rely on macros and keybindings to simplify the process.
Other Kinds Of Live Music
.jpeg?q=50&fit=crop&w=1500&dpr=1.5)
Band concerts are not all there is, as Final Fantasy 14 is full of all kinds of musicians. Not all musical groups are organized, and sometimes one bard will start doing a solo with more slowly chiming in. There are even sudden groups that are not playing music at all but are having a button-mash party with their bard instruments. A common example of this is drum circles, which are an easy activity for a bunch of strangers to do together.
Typical of the kinds of people that play Final Fantasy 14, a lot of music that these players often choose to play come from video games. Much of the music comes from Final Fantasy titles, but also games like Kingdom Hearts, Undertale, World of Warcraft, Nier: Automata, Pokemon, and Secret of Mana. Outside of video games, it is not unusual to hear bards play songs from Disney films, holiday classics, and anime shows and movies. On Youtube, many players have performed these songs along with sheet music, actually making a band using one character playing the different parts and compiling them together in a video. Final Fantasy 14 does have copyright warnings for third-party songs, but there has been no iron hammer to stop players from their musical expression.
While players do their business, be it waiting for a dungeon or managing inventory, they may bump into a bard or entire band jamming out with an audience forming. There is peace to joining the mob and cheering on the musicians, especially in the safety of a video game setting. Such instances remind all to slow down and enjoy the world of Eorzea, and what players have made of it.
Final Fantasy 14 is available now on PC, PS4, and PS5. Endwalker launches on December 7.
