The MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV is steadily growing on Steam and has set a new record for the second time. For a short time, it even had more players than one of the all-time favorites: FFXIV overtook the loot shooter Destiny 2.
What kind of MMORPG is it? Final Fantasy is one of the most famous role-playing game series in the world with dozens of spin-offs, and even movies. With Final Fantasy XIV, the game has had an MMORPG for eight years that regularly attracts hundreds of thousands of players.
Over the years, new content and expansions have steadily arrived. Currently, Final Fantasy XIV is in its third expansion “Shadowbringers”, but the next expansion “Endwalker” is already set to be released in November 2021.
Similar to its competitor World of Warcraft, the MMORPG from Square Enix uses a subscription model. Final Fantasy XIV can be played on PC, Mac, PlayStation 4, and PS5.
After a failed launch in 2010, Final Fantasy XIV was re-released worldwide in 2013 and has been growing since then. Enough to surpass Destiny 2 on Steam. For a short period, the MMORPG had nearly 2,000 more players than the loot shooter.
This is how it looks now: The numbers for both games have fallen again as of July 18 at 1:00 PM. Final Fantasy is again about 11,000 current players behind Destiny 2 (via Steam). However, the peak numbers of the MMORPG are now almost catching up to Destiny 2.
After Final Fantasy XIV recently set a new Steam record, it has already been broken again. With 61,375 peak players, a new record was reached, only a few players short of Destiny 2 (peak: 62,223).
The current trend is upward. Final Fantasy might soon completely overtake Destiny 2 with a new peak player record and continue to catch up on Steam.
Keep in mind that this is only about the numbers on Steam. Other sources like PlayStation, Xbox, or their own launchers are not taken into account.
Final Fantasy attracts thousands of new players
Where are all the players coming from? A large part of the new players is likely coming from WoW. There has been a certain dissatisfaction among parts of the community there for a while.
The biggest WoW streamer Asmongold has finally played FFXIV live on Twitch and triggered a real wave. His community followed him, attracting more players who wanted to check out Final Fantasy.
Final Fantasy XIV has been so overwhelmed by new players, that it was even temporarily sold out digitally.
Whether the player numbers can hold remains to be seen. Final Fantasy and WoW differ greatly in many respects, and whether the MMORPG from Square Enix can retain the Warcraft fans in the long run is hard to say.
At least temporarily it seems to be working – Final Fantasy XIV is currently a real refuge for WoW players.
