An Alpha Report featured in Dengeki Magazine.

From FFXIVCore:

Recently a new Dengeki magazine appeared with brand new FFXIV information, among those an updated alpha report. The FFXIVCore translation staff has begun translating it, you can find what we've translated so far below. The whole translation will be published as soon as possible, keep checking back!

The New Encounters to Come in the land of Eorzea
Adventuring Guilds: players take on the role of adventurers, who will join up with a variety of guilds!

We’ll also introduce the faces and facilities you’ll encounter in the town of Limsa Lominsa!

Limsa Lominsa’s Elegant Cityscape
FFXIV is not only the newest addition to the franchise, but it has also garnered a lot of attention in the realm of MMORPGs. We’ll discuss alpha test reports, along with a look at a town that will act as a hub for adventurers, followed by a developer interview double feature. All this new info delivered to you across eight pages!

Introducing the cityscape and guilds of Limsa Lominsa, the sea capital! And don’t miss the developer interviews!
About a month has passed since the start of alpha-testing, and the beta-phase is already being painstakingly tweaked in response to player feedback. This time we’ll be taking a look at Limsa Lominsa’s view and its various guilds, followed by an interview with the developers!

Dengeki Alpha Report, Vol.2010/05: Login has been stabilized. On to adventure!

As stated in previous issues, the alpha test takes place once or twice a week. Perhaps because there was such a vast amount of players trying to log-in simultaneously, it seemed like the server was down more often than not. The situation was slowly remedied, and as of now the server hardly ever goes down. However, there are still some log-in issues remaining. At the start of an alpha test, logging in is easy. But as the server population increases, so does the waiting time for those trying to log-in. That being said, wait-time is now around ten minutes or less, much shorter than before.

Most players finish what will become the main storyline and focus on leveling up via Guildleves and defeating monsters. The search for party members for such adventures mainly takes place at the Aetheryte closest to Limsa Lominsa, Camp Bearded Rock. Higher level players search for battles at another Aetheryte east of there by the name of Cedarwood. At the start of alpha, there was barely any lag, and battles and Guildleves were going off without a hitch. However, two weeks following alpha launch as the population increased with time, many were experiencing lag in battle. These problems should be fixed by the time beta rolls out, though.

Eorzea Behind the Scenes: The editing department also had the opportunity to participate in the alpha test. Let’s take a look at their experiences.

The start of a journey is indeed exploring the world!
By Kitty

Finally! I was a little later to the game than the rest of the editors, but I finally joined in on the alpha test. I finished the opening cutscene and tutorial as fast as possible and made my way to Limsa Lominsa. Oh, the things to do once I arrived! Should I talk with NPCs and move the story along? Or shoud I, in classic MMO fashion, group up with fellow adventurers and start leveling up? No, no.

After all, I have to see this world with my own eyes! Even then, it felt as if I had already walked across this entire strange new world. A memory of a former life, perhaps? So I wished my best to my fellow editors as they happily began their leveling, and I started on my journey. Since it would be a waste to wander aimlessly around, I decided to visit the Aetheryte in each area.

Once you have been to an Aetheryte, you can teleport back there via the Teleport command in the menu. Thus I headed northeast from town straight along the road toward Camp Bearded Rock. The surroundings gave the impression of being out in the peaceful countryside. I arrived safely in under five minutes. From there I tried heading northwest to Camp Skull Valley, but since the scenery wasn’t much different from before I arrived in about five minutes. Upon talking to an NPC, I was told of a nearby place called the Valley of Whispers.

I immediately looked at my map and spotted it east of Skull Valley. Speaking of which, I think I saw what looked like a cave entrance on my way here. I quickly doubled back. Advancing northeast through the cave I encountered various creatures, such as hyenas and bomb-like napalms. As I fended off hyenas, I spotted it to the south. The Valley of Whispers! Here I found what looked like a small Aetheryte. When I asked my fellow editors, they said it was something called an Ethereal Gate.

Once touched, it allows you to warp back and forth between it and a specific Aetheryte, in this case probably Skull Valley. Once I finished looking around, I decided to avoid all the danger I had passed on the way and took the Ethereal Gate back. Finally back at Skull Valley, I opened my map again and spotted Camp Bald Knoll (not sure of the spelling). This time my travels took around ten minutes. If you leave the path a bit, you’ll see some old familiar faces…cactuars! Despite their lovable little pose, I remembered the dreaded 1,000 Needles and ran off before I could fall prey to it. Onward to Bald Knoll.

Without so much as a break, I turned southward and made my way to the Mirage Archipelago. As I continued south, I eventually found myself in a wide-open plain. According to the map, if I continue south I’ll find a bridge to the archipelago. However, I found no such bridge. I consulted my map once more. Well, if there weren’t two entrances to caves marked on it! Surely I’ll find my way to the island if I pass through the cave to the east!...or so I thought.

I still couldn’t quite make it to the island. The bridge to the island was still somewhere else underneath the shore. It seems like this area, like Limsa Lominsa, is divided into upper and lower pathways. I guess the correct path was further south of the cave (*this part was hard to make out due to the scan).

(caption) During the alpha test I tried to make my way eastward. Further east of here there’s a desert! More on that to come.

I tried a Rank 10 Guildleve!
By Broschan

I had already tried many different things on the alpha. Since I finally reached Rank 10 with spears, this time I thought I’d report on the Guildleves available at Camp Skull Valley. In terms of enemy strength, it comes right after Camp Bearded Rock, a Rank 1 area designed for two fighters. Guildleves here are for two players Rank 10 and up.

If you’re unsure of your ability, setting the difficulty on 3 stars as a test should be just right. If it’s too easy, you can up the difficulty more. If you come out thinking, “That was pretty tough…” then all you need to do is lower it a bit. On this particular day, we had a group of three consisting of a Lancer (myself) and two Conjurers. Since I was the only one in melee range, we set it on 3 stars. A typical battle consisted of me dealing damage while the two Conjurers kept me healed up with Cures. Typical by anyone’s standards.

One Guildleve caught my eye, ‘Purging Cedarwood’. Our targets were three Carrion Chiglets, four Wingrats, and one Boggart. I was a little daunted at first, but soon we began to fell beasts one-by-one. However, the final fight with the Boggart proved to be an uphill battle. You’ll remember Boggarts from the opening movie, looking a lot like a flying jellyfish.

With high attack power, it took me and my paper-thin armor down in two hits. After that, it was a quick wipe. But just because we wiped doesn’t mean this fight is over! The beautiful thing about Guildleves is that you can keep retrying within the time limit. In this case, we had fifteen minutes of our thirty-minute time limit left. We used the Warp command to return to Cedarwood, found the Boggart’s stomping grounds and waiting for our weakness to wear off. This time the two Conjurers blasted me with Cures while I pummeled the Boggart before I could be taken down.

There were a few accidents, but we scraped by! Unexpected accomplishments are a part of the fun of MMOs. After clearing the Guildleve, I received my reward of 2750 Gil and a Canvas Beret. Just by looking at the icon I could tell that not only did it look cool, but it also had a nice set of stats! But alas, it required me to be Rank 17 before I could even equip it. That seems so far away, but just by getting new gear my motivation to level up has increased exponentially!

Well, since we still had some time left, we decided to try another Guildleve, The target was Bukki (a whitish version of FFXI’s imp family) only, so I figured I had plenty of leeway. That was before I knew that Bukki would flee when he was low on health! He fled right past two night wolves, two more beasts I would have to add to my list. I killed the night wolves while pondering this, when we suddenly cleared the mission! I didn’t receive a reward since I wasn’t the one who took the Guildleve, but it was still one exhilarating fight! The real reward is the progress saved to each player’s Guildleve Plate. The better the contents of your plate, the better the reward it seems. Thanks to them, I’ve managed to save up quite a bit of Gil. I think it’s about time I try my hand at crafting.

(caption) Night wolves in the path of a runaway Bukki! Is enjoying such situations just part of the charm of Guildleves?

I finally stood at the alpha test’s starting point…I think?
By Ceren

Lately the server has been pretty stable. There haven’t been any problems like server errors or inability to login like there were when alpha testing first started. I been focused on playing as a Thaumaturge, but everything moved so slowly I could hardly cast a spell. Now that those problems have passed, playing has become a lot easier.　

I particularly liked one ability they have, “Hex Missiles”. They don’t use MP and are single-target attacks, so you don’t have to worry about catching the attention of surrounding enemies. Unfortunately, spells like Banish and Scourge do hit multiple targets, so they can be difficult to use in situations where you’re surrounded. Even then, it is said that FFXIV’s battle system focuses on group fights, so it seems like we’ll definitely be seeing more use out of such abilities.

I’ve been walking around quite a bit but have yet to find many zone changes. It seems like everything is connected, so the world feels wide open! Aetheryte allows you to travel to places you’ve visited before (a la teleport crystals in FFXI), so traveling is a breeze. Right now it seems like I can travel anywhere on a whim, but it does take some work to get there first.

I’ve run across various monsters while hunting out Aetheryte, but the ones that stand out the most would definitely be Peistes. Compared to the other beasts, they’re huge! Then there are the cute Spriggans. Well, cute but still defeatable.

In Limsa Lominsa, I checked out Hawkers’ Alley, where I found a shop selling three different circlets. But what made them different? It turns out the materials with which they were made affects their elemental alignment. Those made of sunstone were fire-based, those of sphene were earth-based, and those made from fluorite were lightning-based. You’ll be able to tell an item has received special enhancements from such items by a graphic on the item description. I feel like this will have a big effect on gameplay…

There were various stands from all over the world, but the one that really caught my eye was the Qiqirn Mutual Aid Society. Anyone who has played FFXI will remember Qiqirns and their peculiar way of speaking. I wonder how they’ll be involved in FFXIV!

There have been seven or eight rounds of alpha testing, but there are still many things I have yet to do! It seems like I’ve finished most of the quests, but there are still many areas I have yet to see. I also need to work on my Physical Level and various class ranks! I want to switch weapons around a bit and try out the other classes. Since I can only play during allotted times, my desire to play is doing nothing but increasing.
(caption) The cute round-eyed Spriggan. If you look closely at its mouth, you can see a frightening set of sharp teeth…

For Every Class There is a Guild!
Marauders’ Guild

Leader of the Pirates, Carvallain de Gorgagne

An Organization of Pirates in Search of New Recruits
In one corner of the harbor rests a galleon, the Astalicia, claiming to be a trade ship. However, it is common knowledge that it is in fact a warship commanded by One-eyed Hyllfyr. In order to attract new recruits, he has made the vessel the Marauders’ Guild for those wishing to wield an axe. The ship itself is rather large, containing three floors.

(caption) Docked in the southwestern part of Limsa Lominsa, it seems like a normal trade ship but is in fact the headquarters of the Marauders’ Guild.

NPC Item Check!: Pirate Fashion
When looking at the NPCs of the Marauders’ Guild, one cannot help but notice how maneuverable their clothing seems. Giant two-handed axes carried on the back are also a key characteristic.

There are axes hanging all over the walls, even ones that appear small enough to wield with one hand.

A Roegadyn of the Marauders’ Guild. (*illegible, something about gloves)

A Miqo’te wrapped in chainmail. The ear area of the helmet is very reminiscent of a Viking design.

Fishing Guild

Wawalago Momolago, Founder
A Small Assembly of Fishermen Turned Huge Organization!