FFXIV player chronicles their journey inside an elaborate player-ran maid cafe

Mist, Ward 17, Plot 6 – Coeurl Server

People often disparagingly ask me why I play MMOs. After I reply that they’re cathartic for certain people, I usually wax poetic on all of the unique human moments that only the MMO genre can facilitate. Reddit user unstablereality had that same experience recently with an in-game Final Fantasy XIV maid cafe.

If you haven’t been to Japan or aren’t familiar with the concept, the core is that the establishment consists of servers typically in cosplay (something FFXIV players like a lot). A group of players managed to band together and not only build their own themed cafe, but become the servers. Found on the Coeurl server in Mist (a player housing zone), Ward 17, Plot 6, a group of players role-play (RP) their own maid cafe. 

This is the way they often choose to play the game: not by raiding endgame content mercilessly, but by entertaining other players and adding another dimension to FFXIV (the same could be said about the real in-game bards). Again, to clarify, these players actually had to buy this house with in-game money, purchase all of the furniture, and place/decorate it all manually. This is not a Square Enix designed location.

It’s incredibly wholesome and not uncommon in the MMO space, as I’ve played with RPers since the late ’90s in Ultimate Online, and many other RP outlets existed before that when the internet was young. You can find the whole photo series here, and hear Occams occasionally talk about what makes Final Fantasy XIV special to him on Podtoid.

I visited a Maid Cafe in game last night [Reddit]