Though it was subject to a tumultuous start, Final Fantasy 14 has grown, evolved, and shaped into one of the finest MMO experiences on offer. It began life in 2010, and was heavily criticized for its poor performance, iffy combat, and a user-unfriendly interface that made it a chore to play. Instead of making tweaks, Square Enix instead pulled the plug on what is now referred to as 1.0, and began again. What resulted was Final Fantasy 14: A Realm Reborn in 2013, which has been going strong ever since with regular updates and a strong community.
Endwalker was the latest expansion that kept players coming back, but as it is the last chapter in the Hydaelyn story arc, there will soon be theories about what's next, and how it will improve on what has come before. This may not be a new numbered entry in the series like 14 or 11, but change is good, and Square Enix is unlikely to be done with the genre when the dust settles on Final Fantasy 14's story. The future is still a mystery, but one thing is clear: it has to live up to one of the developer's biggest successes, and one of the MMO genre's greatest triumphs.
Final Fantasy 14's Successor has to Succeed on Two Fronts
While it may be one of the most popular and beloved MMO's of all time, Final Fantasy 14 is also fundamentally a fantastic entry in the long-standing JRPG franchise. Its expansions make it more than just one narrative as the characters and lore transcend into multiple stories, locations, and gameplay additions, and in terms of quality, it outdoes Final Fantasy 13 in almost every avenue. Its combat is diverse once its given room to develop, its characters are some of the best in all of Final Fantasy, and the tense, touching, or thrilling narrative moments rival those presented during the series' singleplayer PS1 heyday.
The MMO successor has to not only compete with properties like World of Warcraft, Guild Wars, The Elder Scrolls Online and even new games like Blue Protocol, but it has to find a way to adhere to the high standard of JRPG that Final Fantasy 14 manages to achieve. Its multiplayer elements are deep, and do well to make traveling through Eorzea feel like a collaborative effort, but just as much fun can be extracted from experiencing it alone, as players can fully submerge themselves in the fantastic storytelling.
Final Fantasy 14 Set the Bar for MMORPG's
To maintain its reputation as a fantastic MMO option as well as the dominant name in the JRPG genre, the successor to Final Fantasy 14 has to achieve the heights of what has come before, which means being a game that even other genre titans look to for inspiration. A Realm Reborn and its subsequent expansions did well to keep players coming back when a handful of other MMO offerings weren't keeping the users happy with regular new content of quality. Final Fantasy has, for the most part, been consistent, and the diversity of storylines for each class and job means that there are dozens of hours of content even after catching up in the main campaign.
The shoes that Final Fantasy 14's successor has to fill are huge, and growing by the day. It's a game that brings the series to a whole new genre and fan base, extending the reach of the Square Enix property to people who otherwise wouldn't have given it a second look. It also achieves the same prerequisites that fans of singleplayer offerings expect, making it the best of both worlds and one of the most replayable games ever made, ensuring that whatever comes next has a very high bar to get over.
Final Fantasy 14 is available now for PC, PS4, and PS5.