Sydney Gaymers brought a bit of Eorzea to last weekend’s Sydney Gay & Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade thanks to a collaboration with Final Fantasy XIV, which became the first video game to be represented as a float in the annual celebration. The float featured three of Final Fantasy’s most iconic creatures — a Moogle, a Cactuar, and a Cherry Bomb — accompanied by “80 marchers made up from members of both the Final Fantasy XIV Online and Sydney Gaymers’ communities” who “celebrated around it under the banner ‘Realms United.'”
When the collaboration was first announced last month, Sydney Gaymers organizer Peak Distapan enthused over the collaboration and commented on the impact that MMORPGs can have on the lives of queer players, saying, “For many LGBTQI+ people, online communities provide a space for the journey and exploration of personal identities. They allow us to connect, and celebrate, and they reinforce that we are not alone” — a sentiment for which I can certainly vouch. FFXIV Producer and Director Naoki Yoshida also expressed his pride in the game’s community, saying, “To see [the collaboration with Sydney Gaymers] makes me very happy indeed, both as the person in charge of FFXIV and also as just another player of the game.”
