After greater than a decade since its launch, Last Fantasy XIV okeeps gamers coming again with often launched expansions and updates. With the newest enlargement, Dawntrail, the continuing epic sends gamers throughout the ocean to a brand new continent impressed by Latin America.

Not too long ago, we had the chance to talk with Last Fantasy XIV’s Lead UI Designer, Kei Odagiri. We realized so much about his future targets for the sport, the UI characteristic of his desires, and the way UI adjustments and adapts over the course of a decade.

BUT WHY THO: Last Fantasy XIV is thought for having nice accessibility UI options, equivalent to a closely customizable UI, and full gamepad help. Gamers on a number of platforms may even switch their settings from one platform to a different, like from one PC to a different and even to console variations of the sport. Sadly, it doesn’t appear doable to switch your settings from an present character to a brand new one; are there any plans to implement this characteristic?

KEI ODAGIRI: We’re conscious of the problem, and we’re truly in the midst of experimenting with a system that would probably alleviate these points. We’re hoping to share extra info within the close to future. There’s a workaround on PC the place you possibly can copy your native settings info and switch it over, however with the console the participant facet is unable to overwrite the native recordsdata and issues like that. We try to think about what could be characteristic to deal with that, and we’re making an attempt to see- as a result of so as to obtain the answer that we wish, we’d in all probability should create a system that will permit for that kind of overwriting. We’re experimenting, and we’re hopeful that we will discover some form of method to deal with it, hopefully within the close to future.

BUT WHY THO: UI Design is an iterative and ongoing course of. What’s your subsequent massive mission or aim you’d like to attain in Last Fantasy XIV?

KEI ODAGIRI: It’s form of a long-term aim of types, so we don’t know when it can truly come into impact, however we understand that onboarding gamers with dealing with the quantity of UIs which might be obtainable for the sport is slightly tough. We form of throw the gamers into the sport and anticipate them to have the ability to handle their HUDS and their UI components. We’re hoping that maybe we will make it extra intuitive, if not permit for extra tutorial kind of settings to permit for gamers to grasp the completely different UI components which might be obtainable to them in order that we will help them in making an attempt to determine the perfect configuration for themselves. In order that’s the present exploration that we’re doing by way of UI methods.

BUT WHY THO: When you might implement any characteristic you needed with none restrict, what wouldn’t it be?

KEI ODAGIRI: We’re making an attempt to determine, you talked about “with none kind of restrict”. So will we need to give attention to UI components or are we speaking like ‘pie within the sky’ like, say ‘I would like it to be playable in VR’

BUT WHY THO: Haha, a give attention to UI.

KEI ODAGIRI: If we need to slender it all the way down to UI-related issues – and apologies, this isn’t essentially a brand new perform – however as a result of we’ve got so many features obtainable proper now, we’d like to have some form of intuitive system the place gamers might say – and this type of pertains to what we had been saying concerning the tutorial – like “I need to do that” and a UI Wizard will recommend “Okay let’s use this configuration” or one thing like that to make it extra accessible for gamers to make the most of the UI to its full capability and make it simpler to grasp for individuals who might not have deal with on the completely different components which might be obtainable.

Form of like an Alexa or Siri, we’d have a information base or a handbook that’s set, and gamers might intuitively ask the sport and it could advocate to you the correct perform that will assist alleviate their ache factors.

Dawntrail - Final Fantasy XIV - Kei Odagiri

BUT WHY THO: What UI characteristic do you would like extra gamers had been conscious of, that already exists?

KEI ODAGIRI: Sure, haha. We perceive there’s a variety of UI components that go unnoticed so we work with The Lodestone internet workforce to create a UI information outdoors of the sport however in fact we’d like to let gamers know in-game additionally. Some particular examples embrace the motion mode, you possibly can change between legacy mode [and standard mode].

And along with that, the digital camera settings which might be related to switching to Legacy Mode have additionally been expanded over time, together with having your digital camera stationed away from the character. Or, say, in case your character had modified instructions, the digital camera would form of observe you. A few of these features have been added afterwards however I’m afraid we didn’t announce it sufficient in-game so gamers may not be acquainted with these issues. So I feel that’s one of many issues that we need to convey to gamers’ consideration. We’d love for gamers to look into character configuration to see what you possibly can tweak by way of a few of these refined particulars.

Some further examples could be the character nameplate. You may set the colour coding so it’s simpler to see the completely different roles the occasion members are in. We even added the characteristic of getting a job icon obtainable in entrance of the participant’s title. So these are a number of the little particulars which might be in there.

BUT WHY THO: With the current graphics overhaul, has there been any dialogue about endeavor an identical replace for UI?

KEI ODAGIRI: Sadly, we don’t have any large-scale plans for UI updates right now, like what you’ve seen with the graphical updates for 7.0. That mentioned, there had been a comparatively massive replace by way of UI textures as of 5.5. We form of up-ressed a number of the UI textures once we launched the PS5 model so we’ve already undergone one main replace, so I don’t assume we’ve got a lot deliberate by way of accommodating for that up to date excessive decision within the graphical updates. As we talked about it’s a really iterative course of so with each patch there’s all the time one thing to replace and we obtain a variety of suggestions and we attempt to take heed to these, so we’ve been pushing exhausting each time.

BUT WHY THO: After 10 years, Last Fantasy XIV has modified considerably, finally dropping help for the PlayStation 3 consumer. Do you are feeling like your work on UI Design is held again in any respect by persevering with help on PlayStation 4?

KEI ODAGIRI: There’s all the time going to be limitations, and also you’re proper once we point out consoles and particularly just like the PlayStation 4. It is perhaps thought of decrease on the spectrum, however on the similar time we’ve got our PC gamers, and so they is perhaps utilizing an older machine. There’s all the time a matter of accommodating for the lower-spec machines, so I don’t assume there’s a limitation simply because it’s on a console. If we didn’t have to consider lower-spec machines, yeah, it could be superb to do some form of tremendous texture replace, however I feel we’re used to working in that kind of “Okay, what can we do and what can we accommodate within the scope of what’s obtainable” so I feel that’s the place we need to give attention to. There’s no actual fascinated about “As a result of it’s on a console, we’ve got limitations.”

Last Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail is offered now.