In light of some recent controversy to come out of The Omega Protocol (Ultimate) raid, Final Fantasy 14 producer and director Naoki "Yoshi-P" Yoshida issued a statement regarding his stance on the matter. The news came almost a day after Final Fantasy 14 players saw posts on social media regarding footage taken from the Omega Protocol raid itself.
The Omega Protocol (Ultimate) raid was released last week with Final Fantasy 14 Patch 6.31. The raid was the fifth Ultimate raid to be added to the game, and the second to come within the Endwalker expansion. The Omega Protocol (Ultimate) raid was designed years after the original Omega raids were featured throughout the Stormblood expansion, which in turn featured callbacks and references to past Final Fantasy games. With bosses such as Neo Exdeath, Kefka, Chaos, and even Omega itself, the Omega raids stood out as some of the most memorable in Final Fantasy 14 to date.
However, as social media celebrated the potential world first clear of the Omega Protocol raid, new details surrounding the team in question challenged the legitimacy of their achievements. Hours after the Japanese team called "Unnamed_" posted screenshots on Twitter of their clear, a YouTube video was posted from the fight that showed one of the team's members zooming out their camera past the game's intended boundaries. This was a clear indication that they installed an add-on to make such a feat possible, ergo violating Square Enix's terms of service. After the clip made the rounds on social media, players condemned the team's use of third-party tools to gain an unfair advantage in the fight, which prompted Yoshida to comment about the incident the following day.
In his statement, Yoshida reiterated that he and Square Enix do not condone or endorse the use of any and all third-party tools or modifications used within Final Fantasy 14. Furthermore, Yoshida stated that the development team may find it hard to continue creating Ultimate raid content if third-party tools continue to be used by teams to clear the fights. Following the release of Dragonsong's Reprise last year, Yoshida released a similar statement regarding the use of third-party mods to trivialize specific parts of the fight.
Yoshida stated that he and the development team are looking into what penalties will be administered to the players that participated in the controversial clear. Yoshida then added that it will not be disclosed by himself or Square Enix whether some of the penalties will be temporary or permanent bans from Final Fantasy 14 for using third-party tools. However, Yoshida stated that he and the development team are keeping an eye on the teams still progressing through the fight, and urged them to take care of themselves. Only time will tell which of the remaining teams still progressing will claim the true world-first clear of the Omega Protocol.
Final Fantasy 14 is available now for PC, PS4, and PS5.
Source: Square Enix