A recent interview at Gamasutra asks Hiromichi Tanaka and Yasu Kurosawa about both FFXI and FFXIV. Final Fantasy XIV has been in the press a lot recently, and for good reason. Square Enix’s next MMO is due out in only a couple of months and information will start to come out of the floodgates. (Make sure to check out Eorzeapedia for more information pertaining to FFXIV as well as our FFXIV podcast!)

We learned last month that originally, the developers planned at minimum, five years of support for Final Fantasy XI. This interview reveals that the reason for that was due to the average lifespan of game consoles of the time. Tanaka is very surprised that the next generation (specifically the PlayStation 3) is here and Final Fantasy XI is still being supported by players.

Next comes what may be a sad realization for Final Fantasy XI players, or something they’ve been wanting to hear for the last couple of years. Tanaka says that FFXI has “passed its peak” or “reached its time”.

However, we do understand if FFXI players have special memories of FFXI, so there must be some people who will continue to play FFXI. So, we would like to keep of them happy, and we will try to introduce some bonus for our customers, probably from a monetary point of view.

However, of course, we will continue working on FFXI. Even after we launch FFXIV, we will still continue the development side. So, as long as the players enjoy the game, we will continue the service.

Players have been asking for some type of bundle subscription for FFXI and FFXIV since right after the game was announced at last year’s E3. It seems that Square Enix may be doing just that.