Final Fantasy XIV Interview about the Battle Screen

Are you familiar with the screenshot below? Yes, it's Final Fantasy XIV's battle screen which was released days ago. If you look at it carefully you will find there are some tags and bars on the picture, you must be eager to know what they mean. Read the Dengeki interview translated by ffxivcore.com you will find the answer.

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Mini map

The top right place shows mini map which tells you surroundings. In FFXI, you have to switch the screen to check the map, but in FFXIV, you can always have a map on the screen. Perhaps, areas shown on the map would vary according to the class.

Player's name

You can see that there is a space in between. This is not possible in FFXI. Apparently, in FFXIV, you can have surname and given name.

Skill on work and the enemy's information

The icon being currently used pops up, and the aimed enemy's HP is shown under it. It makes things easier to figure out the situation.

Log message

Log message has two tags; General and Battle. It seems several messages can be shown at the same time. The battle message sometimes says "attack from the behind", and it seems like direction of attack is very important. It is not clear if messages such as those from party members other than battle messages can be shown separately. Moreover, since the frame of the window is gone, the screen looks bigger. Also, those signs may be changed through options.

Icons

During battle, you can set abilities you want to use in action menu at the bottom of the screen. If you choose this icon while fighting, action gauge will get enlarged and you can use it when it is MAX. Icons got bigger and TP gauge is shown at the bottom.

Other icons

1. Mode button: Switch "Passive" with your armories closed, and "Active" which your weapons are out.
2. Battle regimen button: switch to skill which takes multiple players
3. Item list button: open the list of your items and use them
4. Emote button: open the list of emotional expressions like /bye and choose.
5. Main menu button: open the main menu which can summon screens like equipment screen

Q&A about the the battle screenshot and beta test at next page.

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