The Data Center Travel feature in FFXIV is getting a new expansion that allows players to visit different regions from their physical location. From the testing period onward, players can visit the Oceanian Data Center from wherever they are, be it North America, Japan or Europe.
Data Center travel was introduced back in 2022 in FFXIV, a few months after Endwalker was released. It was the first time players from different Data Centers could interact without having to make an alt character to play together. However, travel was somewhat limited at first as players from NA-based Data Centers could only visit other NA-based DCs, and so on for different regions.
It all changes starting on March 24 at 8:00 PM (PDT) as players from all other three regions will now be able to visit the Oceanian Data Center until the arrival of the 7.0 patch with the Dawntrail expansion. This period will serve as an Open Beta for the feature, and it aims at alleviating congestion during the expansion’s release. Seems like they learned their lesson following the 4k+ player queues we faced when Endwalker was first released.
The feature should eventually be permanently added to the game in no time, assuming no big problems arise. And considering how smooth the introduction for regular DC Travel went, it’s safe to expect no huge issues. More info can be found in the official announcement.
As of now, travel will be one-sided (i.e. OCE players can’t travel to EU but EU players are free to visit OCE), but this restriction should be lifted in the future. Players are also expected to experience lag when playing in Data Centers physically distant from where they live.
The feature intends not only to further connect the community but also to breathe some life into least populated DCs, as players will now be able to directly influence its population, economy, and much more. However, as demonstrated by the current DC Travel system, many new problems could arise.
Party Finder for some Data Centers has dried out as players have quietly decided to gather into a single DC for clearing High-End content, for example. Party Finder for Extreme/Savage/Ultimate content is basically dead in Primal, while you can find hundreds of ongoing recruitment posts in Aether at basically any moment of the day. Endgame raiders are not the only victims, as regular content in the Duty Finder is also affected.
A wider Data Center Travel system could make these problems worse, even though it brings many benefits. A solution would be to implement a Cross-DC Party Finder/Duty Finder, but it seems like this won’t be the case for now. But let’s see what else Square Enix has been cooking for the next updates. We have a whole expansion ahead of us, so there’s still much to come.
