What will have to had been a birthday party of a bunch clearing probably the most difficult imaginable content material in Ultimate Myth 14: Endwalker has was controversy, as the first actual workforce to transparent the newest FF14 raid has been accused of dishonest.
Aside from…additionally it is roughly no longer dishonest? Relying on who you ask.
The gist is that closing week, FF14 patch 6.31 launched, together with a brand new, super-hard model of an current raid: The Omega Protocol. An ordinary race to be the primary raid workforce on this planet to transparent it ensued, with a bunch referred to as Unnamed_ taking the crown on Monday via posting screenshots in their victory. Alternatively, no longer lengthy after, an unlisted video started to flow into appearing considered one of their individuals the use of a mod to zoom the digicam out a lot farther than it in most cases will have to be capable to do, probably to get a greater view at the mechanics. There also are some less-obvious UI mods displayed within the video monitoring quite a lot of parts of the battle.
In keeping with FF14’s phrases of carrier, mods of any type don’t seem to be accepted within the sport. Unnamed_ has since been disqualified from the race and had its kill revoked both in-game and by a popular logging site. Moreover, a long remark was once published on the official FF14 news board from FF14 director Naoki Yoshida, reiterating Sq. Enix’s stance on third-party equipment (none in any respect accepted) and that unspecified punishments can be enacted for the use of them. The submit moreover condemns the recording and movement of positive in-game cutscenes and different pictures that’s not meant to be recordable.
“Without equal raid collection is probably the most tough struggle content material inside of FFXIV, and we liberate this content material after trying out that it may be cleared with out using any third-party equipment,” Yoshida wrote. “Alternatively, if the presumption is this content material can be tackled and cleared with using third-party equipment, then any reason why to expand high-difficulty struggle content material appears to be misplaced. It’s very tough for me to grasp as a gamer what the that means at the back of the use of a large number of third-party equipment to compete to transparent first can be.
“…If the illicit use of third-party equipment is made transparent thru our investigations, I, on the very least, is not going to acknowledge that workforce as the actual Global First.”
In case you are unfamiliar with FF14, this reads like a sport rightfully cracking down on cheaters, however the fact is a lot more difficult. 3rd-party equipment, mods, add-ons, no matter you name them, are in reality extraordinarily not unusual in MMORPGs with raid content material, together with FF14. A big portion of top-end gamers will use mods to trace boss mechanics, customise their UI to be extra useful, or in a different way make the sport extra user-friendly. FF14 rival Global of Warcraft, a sport with identical “Global First” races round its maximum tough content material, has an lively high-end raiding scene the place everybody publicly makes use of dozens of mods – in case you are no longer, you might be dragging the gang down. Whilst FF14’s scene is not rather that pronounced, it is nonetheless no longer a secret locally that many of us enjoying on the most sensible ranges are the use of them. They are simply no longer broadcasting that use as a result of, smartly, things like this keep happening.
However all that stated, additionally it is true that given the crackdown, it is most probably there are a variety of groups looking to transparent the content material with out the use of mods in any respect. Given the specter of punishment round it, it is challenging to mention exactly how not unusual mods are throughout FF14. So around the group, participant reactions appear to be break up between individuals who really feel the ban was once justified, and others pissed off that this kind of harsh punishment was once doled out for one thing that they understand as not unusual. Some are suggesting that whilst some mods (such because the aforementioned small UI equipment) are superb, the digicam zoom was once what crossed the road. All informed it is a messy state of affairs, unhelped via the truth that there are not in reality any anti-cheat measures fighting this from taking place.
Whilst the group might most probably by no means come to a consensus, modding in FF14 is more likely to proceed until Sq. Enix’s crackdown grows extra critical to the purpose of impacting common gamers en masse. That stated, having this kind of prize actively taken away is more likely to discourage severe global first hopefuls from making an attempt this kind of factor one day.
Rebekah Valentine is a information reporter for IGN. You’ll in finding her on Twitter @duckvalentine.
