Final Fantasy fans take over Las Vegas as thousands gather to celebrate game
Thousands descended for two days of incredible costumes, music and to meet their development heroes -- and an event to remind everyone about what makes gaming great
FOR thousands of video game fans, this is the weekend they've been waiting all year for.
Endless hours spent making intricate costumes, weapons, signs are all part of the build-up to the opening North American leg of Final Fantasy XIV's fan fest series, now in its third year.
Gamers who are usually found huddled behind glowing screens, interacting with their friends virtually, jump at the chance every year to meet up in Las Vegas with fellow fans.
For many it's the only time in the year they get to hang out and share a drink with people they will talk to every day and play hours fighting alongside with every week.
But it's not just about that -- it's also a chance to interact with the very people who make the game they love and hear the latest announcements about what's next.
Current series director and producer Naoki Yoshida, roams the halls like a rock star, and every time he stops for a chat a line spontaneously forms for selfies.
It's easy to understand why. Yoshida put his career on the line when he took over Final Fantasy XIV, as he explained to Sun Online at this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles.
At the time it was a game that had spectacularly failed to live up to the hype. It had been utterly slated at launch by players and critics alike, and was haemorrhaging the few players it still had.
He single-handedly led a project to turn the game around, and did so in spectacular fashion.
While keeping the original game running and players engaged, his team completely rebuilt it from the ground up before launching A Realm Reborn, which saw the in-game world literally destroyed before a new one rose from the ashes.
Five years on and the thousands of fans literally cheering his name as his keynote speech finished all attest to that -- as do the fans online who are now playing the game in their millions.
What could have been career suicide turned into a career-making move. Yoshida now sits on the board of Square Enix, the company behind Final Fantasy and now also Tomb Raider, Just Cause and Kingdom Hearts franchises.
WHAT IS FINAL FANTASY XIV?
FINAL Fantasy XIV is an online role-playing game that is on both PC and PlayStation 4.
It is 'massively multiplayer' which means that thousands of people are playing in the same virtual world at once.
The world is part of the Final Fantasy universe, which has been the setting for some of the most successful Japanese-style role-playing games of all time.
Players create characters who inhabit that world, and then split up into groups of four, eight or 24 to the game's monsters together.
There are also plenty of things to do in the game by yourself, whether it's just following the main story through, gathering resources or crafting items to improve your character.
It was launched in 2010 but completely remade over the next two years before it was re-launched in 2012 after being slammed at launch by critics and gamers alike.
Since then it's gone from strength to strength, with millions of players all over the world inhabiting this Final Fantasy World and working together.
The new expansion, called Shadowbringers, which was launched at this event is due out next summer, and will bring more 'jobs' -- the game's combat sub classes -- as well as expanded options for single-player action in both new and older story content.
Yoshida even persuaded the company's president to make an appearance at this year's show in a wizard robe and wielding a magic wand, such is his pull internally.
Despite all the success, he still happily sits for hours answering questions from fans, listening to their concerns and delivering full and frank responses to their questions and observations.
He even helped close the show with the ultimate piece of fan service -- lending his vocal talents to The Primals.
They're a rock band led by the game's music and sound director who play re-arranged rock versions of the game's mostly-classical score, and the fans love it.
Yoshida has said that the moment he heard the cheering fans at the first Fan Festival that he knew his re-launch had been a success, and his drive to personally keep them engaged is a huge part of what keeps him and this game going.
While the four thousand or so fans at the Las Vegas event are dwarfed by the crowd at the Japanese equivalent which is ten times the size, there are many more who would have made it if they could, with the ticket allocation selling out in minutes.
The enthusiasm these fans have for the game they love is palpable everywhere you go. From the standing ovations for announcements during the keynote to every visible stitch in one fan's lovingly crocheted replica of an in-game outfit.
That love is infectious, and the game's troubled development journey means the community feels almost entirely free of the entitlement that plagues other gaming groups.
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Fans are willing to give developers the benefit of the doubt, because they've earned it and continue to live up to it.
And as Square Enix is finding out, while you can't buy that sort of loyalty, it definitely helps you pay the bills.
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