I’m surprised it’s taken 13 years to happen, but Final Fantasy 14 is finally bringing Final Fantasy 7 to the MMO in a big way. Upcoming expansion Evercold is getting an entire raid series dedicated to the remake trilogy—that’s 12 whole fights spread across three tiers which will trickle in over the course of Evercold’s two-to-three year lifespan.
It’s been a long wait, but as Rebirth and Revelation director Naoki Hamaguchi tells me, the stars finally aligned to make the crossover happen. “I was speaking to [FF14 director and producer Naoki Yoshida] about the fact that Evercold and Revelation release dates were actually going to end up being fairly close together,” he said. “And so, instead of having them as two separate things … let’s do something that can really energise the Final Fantasy franchise as a whole.”
As for what we can expect when the raid series lands? Well, that’s all very mysterious right now. Hamaguchi kept tight-lipped on what sort of fights we’ll see, though he did hint towards efforts being made to make a Final Fantasy 7 boss more suitable for Final Fantasy 14’s raids.
“We’re working with both teams to talk about lore and to make sure it’s well established,” Hamaguchi said. “At the same time, Final Fantasy 14 raids have their own way of working. For example, you’ve got to have quite big bosses for that to be able to work.