Final Fantasy 14 redesigns an icon to stop triggering players' phobia of holes

Final Fantasy 14 developer Square Enix has revealed it will redesign the logo for new job sage following fan feedback that for some, it triggered their trypophobia - a phobia of holes.

Taking to the official website to explain the changes, Final Fantasy 14's producer and director Naoki Yoshida said that the team didn't think the job's icon was a "particularly big" deal, but soon "received feedback from players all over the world" that the icon "made them uncomfortable or fearful".

"This aversion is known as trypophobia, and those who have it feel disgust and fear when they see clusters of small holes or bumps," Yoshida explained (thanks, PC Gamer). "The severity of the reaction varies between people, and what triggers it in some may not do so in others.

"But regardless of such differences, you have given us your earnest feedback, and there's still time to change things. Considering also the fact that job icons are prominently visible in the game, and that they also appear on merchandise, we've made the decision to redesign the sage icon."

After a lengthy thread on the official website (Japanese language), the new icon now only features one small hole at the bottom, with the three other blades depicted in the image now fully filled in.

"The design concept is unchanged, with the icon being based on the four nouliths which form the sage's armament," Yoshida adds. "The holes in the original design were added for detail, but they ended up appearing as a cluster. To address the problem, the new icon reduces the holes while accentuating the design concept. Now, comparisons will inevitably be made, and some of you may prefer the original. But we believe that designs like this are things that grow on you as you play the job, and ask for your understanding as we head into Endwalker."

As Matt summarised earlier this week, a record number of players have flocked to the now-decade-old MMO in recent times, with Steam recording an all-time peak of 67,019 concurrent players. While good news for the game, the unexpected spike has resulted in lengthy queue times as servers struggled to keep up with demand.

On Tuesday, Yoshida apologised to Final Fantasy 14 players for the ongoing technical woes, and insisted Square Enix was looking to improve things, and released a patch to automatically logout AFK players as an "emergency measure to combat congestion". The team also increased login caps on North American servers.

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