Final Fantasy XIV has today launched a new microsite for the 5.3 patch, arriving August 11, 2020. The site confirms the new content coming with the patch – the Heroes’ Gauntlet dungeon, Mystery Trial, The Puppets’ Bunker alliance raid dungeon, Bozjan Southern Front battlefield, and more – with screenshots and the new Reflections in Crystal trailer to boot.
Square-Enix also sneaked in a few changes to the A Realm Reborn main story quest requirements. The change requires two additional sidequests to complete the main atory quest, one of which involves getting your Grand Company Chocobo, while the other looks to be a bit more involved. Overall, the changes don’t look too dramatic.
Finally, there’s the fun news swirling around the subreddits this week: the claim that the game has 1.2 million active players. The “active players” number comes with caveats, though, as it counts anyone whose seen an increase in level or experience value, added new mounts or minions, or newly created a character since the last survey as an active player. Astute Redditors point out that the this number can be misleading because of the criteria and the different lengths of time between surveys (the survey period for this most recent survey was from April until August). Regardless, 1.2 million active players is nothing to shake a stick at. It’s safe to say that Final Fantasy XIV is enjoying the same pandemic bump in active players we’ve seen in other games.
