{"id":86016,"date":"2026-04-28T19:47:37","date_gmt":"2026-04-28T19:47:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/the-best-deal-in-video-games-just-got-even-better\/"},"modified":"2026-04-28T19:47:37","modified_gmt":"2026-04-28T19:47:37","slug":"the-best-deal-in-video-games-just-got-even-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/the-best-deal-in-video-games-just-got-even-better\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Deal in Video Games Just Got Even Better"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/gizmodo.com\/app\/uploads\/2026\/04\/final-fantasy-xiv-free-trial-shadowbringers-1280x853.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>There were already few deals better in video games than the free trial to\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em>. Over the past few years, to the point of meme-ery, Square Enix\u2019s MMO has slowly opened up past content to let newcomers try for free\u2014first, the base game\u2019s revamp from 2013 as <em>A Realm Reborn<\/em>, then eventually its award-winning expansions, <em>Heavensward<\/em> and\u00a0<em>Stormblood<\/em>, all without restrictions on playtime. But it turns out your steak can get juicier, and your lobster can get further buttered.<\/p>\n<p>In the midst of announcing the game\u2019s latest expansion, <em>Evercold<\/em>, last week at the <em>Final Fantasy XIV <\/em>Fan Fest convention in Anaheim, Square Enix also confirmed that, starting today,\u00a0<em>XIV<\/em>\u2018s free trial would grow even further. Now trial players could experience 2019\u2019s <em>Shadowbringers<\/em> too\u2014and with it, access to what might be one of the most beloved <em>Final Fantasy<\/em> stories in the franchise\u2019s entire history.<\/p>\n<p><em>XIV<\/em>\u2018s free trial was already an absurd amount of bang for your buck (which, again, is zero bucks!), essentially the equivalent of three entire JRPGs\u2019 worth of content\u2014complete with a lot of the quality-of-life changes that have come in the years of the game since its launch\u2014being handed over with fairly minimal restrictions compared to a paying subscriber to the MMO. But if <em>A Realm Reborn<\/em> reforged\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em> out of the ashes of its disastrous launch, and\u00a0<em>Heavensward<\/em> started to get some people\u2019s ears pricked up about the narrative strength of the MMO, then\u00a0<em>Shadowbringers<\/em> arguably is what made\u00a0<em>XIV<\/em> into the titan of the field it is today.<\/p>\n<div class=\"not-prose video-container\"><noscript><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"FINAL FANTASY XIV: SHADOWBRINGERS Full Trailer\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/4tyuIh12_HU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/noscript><\/div>\n<p>The expansion sees your player character, the heroic Warrior of Light, cast aside their usual mantle and become the Warrior of Darkness, travelling to a different \u201cshard\u201d of\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em>\u2018s splintered universe and to a harsh world on the edge of obliteration, a land subsumed by overwhelming and corruptive light. It takes on a much more brutal overtone than much of what came before in the game, further expanding your understanding of the game\u2019s overarching narrative in interesting ways while also telling tons of smaller, intimate stories within that broader struggle.<\/p>\n<p>It introduces more challenging questions towards what players knew and expected of <em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em> up to that point, introducing more complex narrative ideas and politics into its story of good versus evil. It\u2019s where you meet Emet-Selch, not just <em>XIV<\/em>\u2018s most interesting villain, but arguably one of\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy<\/em> at large\u2019s all-timers, a tragically villainous figure that can flit between pure evil and an understandably compelling foil when necessary to create remarkable tension with the player (including an incredible performance in the game\u2019s already-very-solid English-language dub, by Ren\u00e9 Zagger). It\u2019s perhaps just as importantly where you meet Jonathan Bailey in what remains one of his standout roles even after his big Hollywood breakout, a cat boy who is both filled with unyielding, adventurous hope and also absolutely down bad for you in ways few MMORPGs ever allow a supporting NPC to be.<\/p>\n<p><em>Shadowbringers<\/em> remains a high watermark for\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em> that it arguably still, well, exists in the shadow of. Its follow-up, 2021\u2019s <em>Endwalker<\/em>, managed to put an end cap on\u00a0<em>XIV<\/em>\u2018s overarching narrative up to that point and live up to the massive expectations (and mass influx of players) <em>Shadowbringers<\/em> laid out. While its successor and current expansion, <em>Dawntrail<\/em>, has had a somewhat more mixed reception in comparison, even our brief glimpse of\u00a0<em>Evercold<\/em> last week and its parallels to <em>Shadowbringers<\/em>\u2018 premise has players feeling like even the developers are longing to bring back the kind of vibe and reputation <em>Shadowbringers<\/em> carried with it. Even when it came time to represent\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em> to a new audience in\u00a0<em>Magic: The Gathering<\/em>\u2018s tribute to the franchise last year, it was\u00a0<em>Shadowbringers<\/em> that formed the bulk of that representation.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s perhaps fitting, then, that if so much of <em>XIV<\/em> is still defined by what it achieved in\u00a0<em>Shadowbringers<\/em>, then now <em>Shadowbringers<\/em> can speak for itself and be experienced by anyone who wants to jump into Eorzea and see what all the fuss is about. <em>Shadowbringers<\/em> isn\u2019t just\u00a0<em>Final Fantasy XIV<\/em> at its best and most emblematic, but <em>Final Fantasy<\/em> at large\u2014and anyone who wants to understand that can now do so with very little in the way of restrictions. Well, after completing the aforementioned hundreds of hours of content that lead up to that point, of course, but when it\u2019s free, who\u2019s complaining?<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what\u2019s next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote><\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There were already few deals better in video games than the free trial to\u00a0Final Fantasy XIV. Over the past few years, to the point of meme-ery, Square Enix\u2019s MMO has slowly opened up past content to let newcomers try for free\u2014first, the base game\u2019s revamp from 2013 as A Realm Reborn, then eventually its award-winning [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":86017,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_daextam_enable_autolinks":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-86016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/final-fantasy-xiv-free-trial-shadowbringers-1200x675.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diyhaven858.wasmer.app\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}