Following feedback on the difficulty of content patched in since the release of Heavensward, Final Fantasy 14 director Naoki Yoshida has announced that patch 3.2 will be a major rebalance. The message to the community is more of a tome, but adjustments will focus primarily on the Alexander: Gordias (Savage) raid, Exploratory Missions, and the Anima weapons that were added in patch 3.15.

Regarding the raid, Yoshida states that while the aim was to introduce a greater challenge at the request of players, the devs may have gone too far, the result being that:

• The difficulty was high to the point that players were transferring to different Worlds in search of groups to beat it.
• The difficulty was high to the point that players were unable to clear the content, and the time in which they were unable to obtain items grew too long.
• Due to the severity of DPS checks, it s not possible to supplement with item levels only.

The difficulty of the encounter will be lowered with patch 3.2, in addition to rejigging the item level of the Savage weapon concerned.

Exploratory missions were a change of pace for Final Fantasy 14, but they've lead to friction between players who prefer to gather and those who prefer to fight. To address this, the following changes will be hotfixed in:

• More chances for exploration.
• Make a system for matching routes with different objectives such as battle and gathering focused.
• Add variation to the exploration objectives, and make it more fun to explore as an individual party.
• Create set rewards and make it so that farming is not the only objective.
• Reduce the content time, and turn it into content that does not rely greatly on player skill.

Finally, though Yoshida wants Anima weapons to remain time-consuming to obtain, the development team will no longer be using "difficult content" to gate them off. We'll need to wait until patches 3.25 and 3.3 to discover their full meaning, but any future boss requirements will certainly be limited to normal difficulty.

Patch 3.15 hits Final Fantasy 14: Heavensward today, brining with it a four-part quest series titled Saint Endalim s Scholasticate, which will set you sleuthing into the worries of the Holy See's clergy. More important than that, though, is the introduction of Anima weapons, which look like they're sticking the finger up at Warcraft: Legion's Artifact weapons.

Anima weapons are job-specifc and can be "enhanced as they progress". To pick up the quest line with An Unexpected Proposal, you'll want to speak to Rowena in Idyllshire. You'll need to have completed the main Heavensward story, mind.

In a turn I find equal parts amusing and endearing, Square has added the footnote, "Only the first quest title for Anima Weapons will be released with the patch notes. To learn more about Anima Weapons and how to enhance them, please consult and exchange information with other players as you progress through these quests."

Oh, if only that was the way of things.

The unabridged patch notes can found right here.

Maintaining a subscription-based MMO these days seems like an awful lot of work. Many fall in love with their worlds, but who has the time to make a job of the grind to justify that monthly expense? I swear we all used to, but at peak Warcraft mum was still cooking my dinners, so I can't really talk about responsibility. If you had a fleeting affair with Final Fantasy 14's Eorzea, Square Enix is out to tempt you back with four days free at any point this month.

The offer is only valid for past subscribers, and it's important to note that it's four calendar days from the date on which you first login and not four days of playtime. The latter is a tad unclear on the FF14 website which claims you get 96 free hours, but that won't happen without intravenous caffeine.

Be warned: if you're still logged in when that 96 hours is up, the terms and conditions state that you will be "forcibly logged out". Who can say what that entails, but I'd advise investing in a good solid deadbolt for the front door.

If that sounds like your kind of gig, you can download the client right here.

Thanks to Destructoid for the heads-up.

As game updates go, "patch 3.1" is not the kind of title that's liable to set your imagination racing. Nonetheless, the next update to Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward is a big one, with highlights including a new 24-player raid and a "real-time strategy attraction" that will pit players and their minions against one another in one-on-one battles. A preview trailer released today covers all the relevant points, and it's a big one too, clocking in at more than seven and a half minutes long.

The patch will also add new content that will follow on directly after the main Heavensward storyline, publisher Square Enix said today. "Exploratory Missions" set in distant islands accessible by airship will offer the opportunity to score rare gear and items, and there's a pair of new high-level dungeons, Saint Mocianne's Arboretum and Pharos Sirius (Hard), plus beast tribe quests featuring Vanu Vanu and new sidestory quests.

The update actually has a subtitle that's a little more stirring than simply "3.1," although it's almost willfully cryptic: Known in full as Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward Patch 3.1: As Goes Light, So Goes Darkness, it will go live on November 10. More info about what's coming can be found on the Final Fantasy XIV developers' blog.

Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn now has five million registered accounts, publisher Square Enix announced at the weekend. The news comes only weeks after the release of the MMO's first major expansion, Heavensward, which PC Gamer's Daniella Lucas called a "hugely enjoyable addition to the world of Eorzea".

Five million registered accounts sounds like an impressive figure and it is but crucially, registered accounts does not mean 'active subscribers'. If it did then Final Fantasy XIV might be threatening to dethrone World of Warcraft as the most popular MMO in the world, since Blizzard's effort only boasted 5.6 million subscribers as of early August. Square Enix hasn't announced how many active subscribers the game has, and chances are it won't.

Still, it's a very positive time to be playing FFXIV. If you need incentive, check out our recent virtual tour of Eorzea.

There are a lot of expectations to live up to when your game bears the Final Fantasy name. They all need to have epic, twisting storylines, magical landscapes, and plenty of Moogles. It s all part of the the series DNA. But despite possessing all of these things many still don t consider the MMOs of the collection to be proper Final Fantasy games. Those people are missing out.

FFXIV has long balanced the trappings of a traditional Final Fantasy game with the demands of the MMO format to great success (let s forget about its very first iteration; A Realm Reborn erased all of that bad blood long ago). Its first expansion, Heavensward, adds a huge new section to the map of Eorzea, the power of flight and several new classes without tipping those finally balanced scales. Where TESO fails to marry the expectations of single-player Skyrim with a world filled with other people, FFXIV and its expansion succeed.

Taking you into the heart of the once sealed-off city of Ishgard, Heavensward opens on a solemn note. Given the pre-expansion revelations in the city of Ul Dah that saw your friends in dire straits, it s a fittingly frosty start, but to see it you ll have to have complete the main questline of A Realm Reborn and all of its subsequent patches first. It will take you a while if you re starting as a completely new player, but the journey is well worth it, and boosts can help first timers level-up quickly and cut dungeon queue times. Unless you really want to play as the new scaley Au Ra race, you can wait until you re ready before spending your cents on Heavensward.

The new areas are vast and designed to take full advantage of the new flying mounts. Camps pepper the snow-besieged hills of Western Coerthas, while the Sea of Clouds swims with tiny Islands waiting to be explored. It s a real shame that you can t take advantage of that flight-based design straight away though. You re stuck on foot until you unlock all of the aether currents in any given area to learn what the surrounding winds are like. Some are dotted around the hills and obscure high points, while others are unlocked during quests. It does start to feel dull as you run from one end of the map to the other doing classic MMO busywork—slaying five Bandersnatches here, setting three chocobo traps there—but once you get them all and you finally take flight all of that tedium is forgotten. Taking to the skies is glorious: the trees of the Chocobo forest and the fluorescent pompoms of the Churning Mists make for splendid spectacle. Flying makes even the most mundane of delivery quests a real joy.

The fighting is equally grand. The new classes—gun-toting Machinist, sword-wielding Dark Knight and globe-spinning Astrologian—add a nice mix to party line-ups, as do the new skills for the existing classes that accompany the level cap rise to 60. With every new move comes a new layer of strategy to consider. While many players are still finding their feet over what works best in any given situation, it s the newfound sense of greater choice that s most exhilarating. Currently Dark Knights, with their ability to heroically leap ahead into battle, seem to be winning in the popularity stakes. I don t tend to play defensive classes, but I can see the appeal of swinging a greatsword in people s faces, dark magic emanating from my body in a weirdly stylish fashion.

Instances have gone from bare-bones punch the boss until it falls over before getting the next bit of story affairs, to multi-part stages filled with tension and purpose. Early on in the Heavensward story you return to the dungeons of halatali for a rescue mission (no spoilers), but instead of having to face the full gamut of obstacles, a section of it has been cordoned off and filled with new challenges for you and your AI partners to complete. It s a simple but effective twist, that gives all of your sword-swinging actions a greater sense of impact on the story.

The new dungeons are all welcome additions, each adding further environmental twists. Instead of smacking mobs into submission and then moving on, there are now dragons changing the field with their burning breath, or secret passageways hidden behind bookshelves to contend with. It s the little changes like this to an already successful formula that keep the new dungeons fresh.

There s a lot on offer here, and while I sunk over 40 hours into the main story line I have yet to see the end of it. The amount of new things to do on offer is equal to that of the base game, which is a huge feat for an expansion, and there s still plenty more on the way. The new Alexander Raid is yet to be added, and substantial updates have been promised further along the line to keep adding to the story.

If you already play FFXIV then Heavensward gives you even more of what you know and love. For those that have been eyeing up those chocobos from the sidelines, well, there s no escaping the catching up you ll have to do, but that shouldn t put you off. The base game has changed a lot over the last year and has effectively transformed itself into the ultimate Final Fantasy themepark. Even if you don t know your Tonberrys from your Cactuars it s well worth playing for the sheer variety of adventures on offer. Now is definitely the time to get involved.