Dengeki Onlinepublished a lengthy interviewwith Yasumi Matsuno and Naoki Yoshida. Yasumi Matsuno is the Director ofFinal Fantasy Tacticsand theOgre BattleSagaseries. Naoki Yoshida isFinal Fantasy XIV’sDirector. The interview has the duo looking back on the Return to Ivalice raid content of theFinal Fantasy XIV Stormblood, which was created with the help of Matsuno.Note that the interview contains spoilers on Return to Ivalice andFinal Fantasy Tactics.

Matsuno and Yoshida went over most of the Return to Ivalice story content in the interview, chatting about how it’s based on the idea of a what-if scenario whereFinal Fantasy Tactics' Ramza and his companions couldn’t defeat Ultima. Matsuno included many meta references and elements to fuel fan speculation in Return to Ivalice. One of these is the possible connection betweenFF XIV’s Palace of the Dead and the Necrohol of Mullonde appearing inFinal Fantasy Tactics.

Matsuno:I asked theFF XIVteam to make the Palace of the Dead look similar to the Necrohol of Mullonde. I thought I’d be nice if players imagined that maybe, you can reach the Necrohol if you go benearth the Palace.

Matsuno also spoke about how he included references toOgre Battle Sagagames while stressing out that the world of Ivalice (FF Tactics, FF XII,etc) and the world ofOgre Battle Sagaaren’t related:

Matsuno:A lot of small references like that are in Return to Ivalice. Another one is what happens after players defeat Holy Knight Agrias at Orbonne Monastery. There’s a magic circle warping to Mullonde that appears and Fran mentions a Chaos Gate. Chaos Gates appear inOgregames. The magic circle’s design in that scene inFF XIVis the same as the one inTactics Ogre The Wheels of Fate(the PSP enhanced port ofTactics Ogre Let Us Cling Together). Of course, both games aren’t officialy connected, it’s just a meta-reference. I thought that players who playedOgregames would notice and think “maybe it’s connected toTactics Ogre’s Palace of the Dead”.

Later on in the interview, Yasumi Matsuno also spoke about whether he’ll ever make a newFinal Fantasy Tacticsgame or a newOgre Battle Sagagame:

Matsuno:Rather than looking back at the past,I’m the kind of person who loves trying out new things. But when you reach my age, you start having thoughts like “How much time do I have left to keep making games?”. And I’m not talking about retirement, I’m talking about death. Recently, I’ve been to more funerals than weddings, and it made me aware of how limited our time is. On places like Twitter, fans sometimes send me messages like “I really wish you’d make a newOgreorFFT!!”. When I see messages like this, a part of me thinks “I probably need to make one before I die”.

Through the interview, Matsuno reminded everyone thatFinal Fantasy Tactics’s story has been completed in the original game, and the events of Return to Ivalice are completely unrelated. Return to Ivalice is based on a what-if scenario where Ramza and his friends met their end in the final battle. However, he explained that he already mentioned in the past that Ramza and his friends survived the ending ofFFT. Matsuno also mentioned howLord of Vermillion 3’s collaboration event withFinal Fantasy Tactics included small details about Ramza’s life after the original game’s events.

Matsuno:Lord of Vermillion 3mentioned how Ramza and his companions survived the events ofFFT. They left Ivalice and decided to go explore new lands. When I still worked at Square, even Square employees would often ask me “Did Ramza survive at the end ofFFT?”. I always regreted that I was too inexperienced when making the original game to make it clear that yes, Ramza and his friends definitely survived.

The interview includes many small development stories like these, mostly aimed atFinal Fantasy XIVplayers. There are also bits on howFinal Fantasy XIIinfluenced Return to Ivalice, but it’s overallFF XIVtalk. As I never playedFF XIVmyself, and seeing the extreme length of the interview, it would require way too much time and research to summarize all of it. You should definitely check it out if you like Matsuno and know Japanese though.

Final Fantasy XIVis available on PC and PS4. It’ll receive itsthird expansion, Shadowbringers,on July 05, 2025.The expansion will add Vieras,among other things.

BesidesFinal Fantasy XIV, Naoki Yoshida is also currently at the helm of anew Triple-A project at Square Enix.