FF14 director Yoshida is ready to fix the MMO's difficulty problem, starting now

New Final Fantasy 14 deep dungeon Pilgrim's Traverse is set to be a landmark moment for the long-running MMORPG. Game director Naoki Yoshida introduced the feature, which will arrive in FF14 patch 7.35, as an experiment to test "a few things we want to change with FF14 overall." A big part of this is finding ways to make more content appealing to a wider range of players, so where else could we see this introduced? At Gamescom, we sat down with 'Yoshi-P' himself to discuss the upcoming variant dungeon, ultimate raid, and when we'll finally see the Beastmaster limited job.

While I wasn't able to make it to Gamescom this year, Jamie put my most pressing Final Fantasy 14 questions to Yoshida at the show, including how the team plans to learn from the Pilgrim's Traverse to help deliver the level of activity variety that the best MMORPGs need. Yoshida is quick to note that the team is not currently planning to implement any kind of new variable difficulty into previous content, but says it's certainly a key consideration moving forward.

"With patch 7.4 we are working on the next installment of the variant dungeon," Yoshida tells me [via a Square Enix translator]. "With the changes that we are implementing in Pilgrim's Traverse, we will also be implementing similar changes based on feedback in the new variant dungeon." If you didn't catch Live Letter 88, the gist is the difficulty starts out gentle and ramps up, with a top-end battle that you're able to modularly tweak the challenge of by using offerings to gradually increase the enemy's stats and mechanical complexity.

Patch 7.5 will bring the second installment of the Forked Tower raid, which has proven rather notorious. The first part is mechanically involved and requires a large player count, which is exciting if you're able to organize a high-end squad to come along, but means that most people will only experience it through watching videos for now. I love Occult Crescent's frantic battles, but I don't have the free time in my schedule to slide into a coordinated raid group and prog the fights, so Forked Tower has been off the table for me.

When the second Forked Tower raid arrives, Yoshida says a similar system to Pilgrim's Traverse "could be a possibility," and adds, "we are working on providing several difficulties of that content for players to enjoy. Moving forward, for content that we produce in Final Fantasy 14, it could be that we incorporate a scheme where there is a variable difficulty. Or it could be that we prepare a selection of difficulties in advance, and the players can choose which difficulty they want to challenge."

"This is the general direction that we've set for Final Fantasy 14 moving forward," Yoshida confirms. "And because of this new direction, it could be that the overall [amount] of content that we implement in the game goes down. But in doing so, we hope that many more players will be able to enjoy the content that we implement."

With FF14 8.0 and the next expansion still yet to be announced, Yoshida isn't ready to offer any hints there yet, although he's happy that the team is on the right road to achieving its stated objective for Dawntrail of offering more unique fights. He says "There's no set goal in mind" for how this might evolve, but adds, "It's always the case that we want to provide a unique battle experience, and I think, with the response we have had, we are making good progress with that, and we will continue to put in our efforts to make battle content unique as an experience for the players."

As for what's to come in the remaining post-Dawntrail patches, Yoshida gives us a slightly clearer schedule with a few key confirmations. "The next raid is going to be implemented in patch 7.4, and probably in patch 7.5 there will be a new ultimate. I think that will also be quite a unique experience, so players who really like to tackle high-end battle content should be able to really enjoy that." Those were already pretty expected, but one question that's long been on players' lips is when we'll get to play the second limited job, the Beastmaster.

"For 7.4 we are quite into the development and we are making good progress on this," Yoshida says. "For patch 7.5 the new limited job Beastmaster is going to be implemented, and also the new ultimate raid. Because of this, it is extremely hard on the development team - the battle team working on the development is really at a loss!" He chuckles. "For 8.0, we haven't even announced anything. So I would say, hypothetically if we are working on it, it is smooth."

Also arriving in October is the crossover with Monster Hunter Wilds, which will bring Guardian Arkveld to the MMO. Yoshida confirms that the idea came about when he went drinking with Capcom's Yuya Tokuda and Kaname Fujioka from the Monster Hunter team during Gamescom last year. However, he notes that they had to wait until Wilds launched and the FF14 team had time to play it and figure out how the collaboration would work, estimating that the development process ended up taking almost five months.

Yoshida reflects on the Rathalos fight implemented in Stormblood: "Final Fantasy 14 is not an action game, so the development of that battle was quite difficult." He says Arkveld has offered some new opportunities. "We have put a lot of work and detail into this, and the development process of this has been very intricate." We'll get more details in September, but he does hint, "One thing I can say is, 'Don't pay attention to the cast bar, but look at the monster's movement,'" something that certainly caught players out with the last crossover.

In closing, Yoshida really emphasizes his desire for players to get in and try Pilgrim's Traverse when patch 7.35 hits. "I want to get all of the feedback from players," he says. Whether you're a deep dungeon veteran, a complete newcomer, a hardcore solo enthusiast, or a savage and ultimate raider who might normally skip the feature, he wants to hear what you think of the changes.

If you've been thinking about returning to check out what's new, the latest FF14 free login campaign is a great time to do so. If you're getting a crew together to take on Arkveld, grab the best gaming headset in 2025.

Where do you think 8.0's new story will take us? Are we off to Meracydia, or somewhere else entirely? Join the PCGamesN community Discord server to chat FF14 and more with thousands of fellow readers.

Additional reporting at Gamescom by Jamie Hore.