Today Square Enix and Microsoft announced that Final Fantasy XIV is finally coming to Xbox.
The announcement was made after the reveal of the next expansion "Dawntrail" with Producer and Director Naoki Yoshida and Xbox Gaming CEO Phil Spencer standing together on stage.
The game will come to Xbox Series X|S with faster loading and 4K support on Series X. The release window is spring 2024, but the open beta will start with patch 6.5X, which should come rather soon. It'll be a digital-only release and it'll include all the expansions including Dawntrail when it launches.
Players will be able to go directly to the open beta to the full release when it becomes available.
Cross-play will be supported, so players on Xbox will be able to play together with those on PlayStation and PC. Incidentally, Phil Spencer teased further partnerships with Square Enix and the Final Fantasy franchise.
This comes after several years of back and forth in which the Xbox release was hinted but never fully confirmed. Yoshida-san has been expressing the will to launch on Microsoft's console for many years, so it's nice to see the plans finally coming to fruition.
Incidentally, Square Enix CEO Takashi Kiryu mentioned that this port wouldn't have been possible without Phil Spencer's support. He also added that Square Enix plans to bring its games to Xbox platforms "whenever possible" for players around the world to enjoy.
Final Fantasy XIV is currently available for PC, PS5, and PS4. The massively popular MMORPG has recently received the major 6.4 patch "The Dark Throne" and its follow-up updates. We already know that we'll hear more about update 6.5 during tomorrow's Letter from the Producer Live livestream.
Recently, Yoshida-san himself teased the possibility of a collaboration with Final Fantasy XVI of which he is also the producer. On top of that, Square Enix has recently made the third volume of the popular book series Encyclopaedia Eorzea available for pre-order for those who love the game's lore.
