And here is the stunning new teaser trailer released today at the FFXIV Fan Fest 2016...
And the Stormblood site is already up (although information is still minimal)--- CLICK HERE.
Wicked, innit? We finally get a new Legatus antagonist named Zenos Yae Galvus. Which (by Garlean naming conventions) essentially makes him a member of the Imperial House of Galvus...
As you can see from the comments I added on Zenos' picture above, I'm already buzzing with a dozen lore questions...Is he the younger brother or cousin to the new emperor Varis? Or could he be the son of Varis' uncle (the one who was vying with him during the war of succession)? Oh wait... better still, what if he is the direct son of Varis???
And why would I think this...?
Allow me to tentatively explain.
Varis (as shown in the picture above) is now the head of the royal family... and he should be around 44 years old. This assumption I'm making about about his age is due to the fact that the newly released Eorzea Encyclopedia explains that his best friend since childhood is none other than his most loyal Legatus... Regula Van Hydrus.
Thus, since Regula is said to be around 44, I tentatively deduce that it makes Varis to be around the same age. Which potentially opens up the third option that Zenos could be the son of Varis and would suggest that he is possibly in his early 20's. Also note the long golden hair in Zenos' picture which he apparently wears in the same lengthy style as Varis... is that a Galvus family thing?
I instinctively feel (and hope) that Zenos will be a very complicated character... and I suspect that he will be very handsome beneath that mask. I want Stormblood to make me feel very conflicted about this guy and not just make me kill him off like we did to Gaius in 1.0. I'm still extremely pissed about that. More importantly, I am once more getting this "FFXII vibe" from Stormblood, and that makes me very excited about the possibilities of this expansion.
Till this day, one of the elements I loved most about FFXII's story was the relationship between the two brothers of House Solidor (Vayne and Larsa) including the well-crafted allegiances of all the Judges. The dynamics between these two brothers was both strange and equally heartwarming. Vayne's incredible cunning and utter ruthlessness sometimes made me fear for Larsa's life thus, his protective gestures towards his younger brother was quite surprising.
On the flip side, Larsa's overwhelming intelligence and brilliant sense of perception also made him the perfect potential candidate as an emperor (with youth and inexperience being his only weaknesses). By the way, a while back I found this excellent picture of Larsa and Vayne (artist unknown)...
And I believe Zenos has the potential to be a "Larsa" kind of character. I tentatively deduce that outwardly he will be a cold ruthless person mainly because he is constantly struggling to live up to his father's expectations. And that will reflect in his governance of Ala Mihgo.
However, on the inside, I want to hope that he is a very compassionate young man who seeks peace and wishes to see the end to his empire's conquest to rule the whole planet with an iron grip. He could eventually turn out to be a close ally to the Warrior of Light... and this could potentially set up the foundation of the story for expansion 5.0.
So Devs, don't give me another awesome villain that I have to kill off after 50 hours of playing through Stormblood. Make him integral to the 5.0 expansion, make him complicated, make him intriguing while still being a pyscho... I dunno... just don't lemme kill the guy before I even get to know what makes his mind tick. Plus, I want to also speculate that he may very well have been a past student of Gaius... now, won't that be an interesting twist?
And please make his arrival as wicked (or even better) than this cutscene from FFXII which shows Judge Gabranth arriving at the imperial palace in Archadia...(skip the video to 4.56 mins. Here's the direct link... https://youtu.be/UJ5IPg7gCkw?t=4m56s)
And speaking again of the Imperial family, just how many children did old grandfather Solus Vos Galvus (the previous Emperor) have? He at least had two sons, the eldest (his appointed heir apparent and father to Varis) is known to have died, which ignited the war of succession between Varis and his uncle (the younger son of Solus). But what other children did old man Solus have besides those two? Any more sons or daughters?
Let's not forget that Gaius killed off nine aspirants to the Crown, so Solus must have had a much larger family at some point. But anyway, back the the big reveal from Yoshi...
The Highlights:
And the Stormblood site is already up (although information is still minimal)--- CLICK HERE.
Wicked, innit? We finally get a new Legatus antagonist named Zenos Yae Galvus. Which (by Garlean naming conventions) essentially makes him a member of the Imperial House of Galvus...
As you can see from the comments I added on Zenos' picture above, I'm already buzzing with a dozen lore questions...Is he the younger brother or cousin to the new emperor Varis? Or could he be the son of Varis' uncle (the one who was vying with him during the war of succession)? Oh wait... better still, what if he is the direct son of Varis???
And why would I think this...?
Allow me to tentatively explain.
Varis (as shown in the picture above) is now the head of the royal family... and he should be around 44 years old. This assumption I'm making about about his age is due to the fact that the newly released Eorzea Encyclopedia explains that his best friend since childhood is none other than his most loyal Legatus... Regula Van Hydrus.
Thus, since Regula is said to be around 44, I tentatively deduce that it makes Varis to be around the same age. Which potentially opens up the third option that Zenos could be the son of Varis and would suggest that he is possibly in his early 20's. Also note the long golden hair in Zenos' picture which he apparently wears in the same lengthy style as Varis... is that a Galvus family thing?
I instinctively feel (and hope) that Zenos will be a very complicated character... and I suspect that he will be very handsome beneath that mask. I want Stormblood to make me feel very conflicted about this guy and not just make me kill him off like we did to Gaius in 1.0. I'm still extremely pissed about that. More importantly, I am once more getting this "FFXII vibe" from Stormblood, and that makes me very excited about the possibilities of this expansion.
Till this day, one of the elements I loved most about FFXII's story was the relationship between the two brothers of House Solidor (Vayne and Larsa) including the well-crafted allegiances of all the Judges. The dynamics between these two brothers was both strange and equally heartwarming. Vayne's incredible cunning and utter ruthlessness sometimes made me fear for Larsa's life thus, his protective gestures towards his younger brother was quite surprising.
On the flip side, Larsa's overwhelming intelligence and brilliant sense of perception also made him the perfect potential candidate as an emperor (with youth and inexperience being his only weaknesses). By the way, a while back I found this excellent picture of Larsa and Vayne (artist unknown)...
And I believe Zenos has the potential to be a "Larsa" kind of character. I tentatively deduce that outwardly he will be a cold ruthless person mainly because he is constantly struggling to live up to his father's expectations. And that will reflect in his governance of Ala Mihgo.
However, on the inside, I want to hope that he is a very compassionate young man who seeks peace and wishes to see the end to his empire's conquest to rule the whole planet with an iron grip. He could eventually turn out to be a close ally to the Warrior of Light... and this could potentially set up the foundation of the story for expansion 5.0.
So Devs, don't give me another awesome villain that I have to kill off after 50 hours of playing through Stormblood. Make him integral to the 5.0 expansion, make him complicated, make him intriguing while still being a pyscho... I dunno... just don't lemme kill the guy before I even get to know what makes his mind tick. Plus, I want to also speculate that he may very well have been a past student of Gaius... now, won't that be an interesting twist?
And please make his arrival as wicked (or even better) than this cutscene from FFXII which shows Judge Gabranth arriving at the imperial palace in Archadia...(skip the video to 4.56 mins. Here's the direct link... https://youtu.be/UJ5IPg7gCkw?t=4m56s)
Let's not forget that Gaius killed off nine aspirants to the Crown, so Solus must have had a much larger family at some point. But anyway, back the the big reveal from Yoshi...
The Highlights:
- Stormblood (as predicted by everyone) will obviously be in the Ala Mhigo area
- The core of the storyline will be the liberation of Ala Mhigo from the Garlean Empire
- A time period of approximately twenty 20 years have passed since the Garleans seized their land
- Main new legatus is Zenos Yae Galvus, XIIth Legion Legatus and "Governor" of Ala Mhigo
- The lady in red shown in the trailer is likely to be revealed in future 3.X patches and her resemblance to Yda denotes its either her or her sister
- Warrior of Light's main job class will be Monk
- That area shown in the trailer is called Rhalgr's Reach, which serves as the headqurters of the Ala Migho's main resistance.
- Information on multiple new jobs to be released later
- Level Cap now to be 70, with several more streamlined battle actions for each job class and new classes likely to be announced later (perhaps we finally get Samurai?)
- From the minor hint given, could we also expect to see Red mage as a new job?
- Several new regions and areas to be introduced and the size of the lands will be similar to the Heavensward regions
- More primals to be released, new dungeons, new raids, new residential area, and finally we will get inventory expansion (Finally!!!)
Lots of other stuff announced and it is really exciting to see how much the game is leaning towards intensifying its ever impressive graphics
More information incoming as I get them...