Guide to Potentially Disturbing or Upsetting Content

Introduction

Final Fantasy XIV contains several scenes that may be disturbing, upsetting, or frightening to some players. This guide is intended to provide warning of what to expect and when to players who wish to be warned in advance, while trying to avoid spoiling more than is necessary to provide said information. This guide is a work in progress, so feel free to add more.

Please note that everyone is different; what disturbs one player may leave another unaffected. Many players will be able to view all scenes listed below with no significant distress. Players who are not particularly susceptible to being affected by dark, heavy themes are advised to not read further, as some important plot points will inevitably be spoiled.

Final Fantasy XIV is rated as follows:

• ESRB (North America): T (Violence, Blood, Sexual Themes, Partial Nudity, Language, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco)
• PEGI (Europe): 16
• CERO (Japan): C

A Realm Reborn

Level 50 dungeon  The Tam-Tara Deepcroft (Hard): Horror

The duty is set in a crypt where a dark ritual is in progress, as creepy music plays throughout. The final boss is a voidsent (demon), and upon defeating it, a character falls into a pit after candles light her robe on fire.

Heavensward

Level 60 White Mage job quest Hands of Healing: Racism

A character recounts crimes committed against her people because of their race.

Stormblood

Level 70 patch 4.3 endgame quest Fruits of Her Labor: Implied Sex Slavery, Murder

In a vision granted by the Echo, a character is implied to have been sold into sex slavery. Later, a character murders two other characters by stabbing.

Shadowbringers

Level 70 quest in Amh Araeng The Time Left to Us: Body Horror

A character is transformed into a monster in a very graphic, disturbing, and painful way. The transformation is explicitly shown onscreen in all its horrific detail. You later have to hunt down and slay said monster in the level 71 dungeon  Holminster Switch.

Level 73 quest in Il Mheg The Lawless Ones: Jump Scare

The player witness a vision in which a character monologues before a dark background, with fake static and other effects similar to a horror movie. The scene includes jump scares that may startle the player and be particularly distressing to players with anxiety.

Level 80 Alliance Raid  The Tower at Paradigm's Breach: Photosensitive Seizures, Eyestrain, Motion Sickness

Several players have reported symptoms such as motion sickness, eyestrain, double vision, nausea, headaches, dizziness, vertigo, migraines, and vomiting from this raid, and a few have even reported seizures. The game has since been patched to mitigate these issues, but caution is still advised for vulnerable players. See the warning at the top of the linked page for the raid for more information.

One section has the players riding up an inclined lift, as the background scrolls by at high speed.

Endwalker

The Endwalker main story campaign is all about the end of the world and has a very dark tone throughout.

Level 83 quest in Garlemald Alea Iacta Est: Suicide

A character commits suicide by gunshot. The act itself happens offscreen and is not shown to players, but the lead up shows the character loading a single bullet and pointing the gun at his head, before the game cuts to a different scene. It later cuts back to show a blood-splattered banner, the body, and the smoking gun.

Level 83 dungeon  The Tower of Babil: Motion Sickness

In the first section of the dungeon, the players ride an underground subway train as the background scrolls by at high speed. This section is short. Later, the players ride up a large elevator that stops at several points.

Level 85 quest in Radz-at-Han Beyond the Depths of Despair: Body Horror, Violence

Several characters are transformed into monsters. One is transformed into a small monster, and is almost immediately crushed by a large one.

Level 85 quest in Thavnair Warm Hearts, Rekindled Hopes: Violence, Infant Endangerment

A mother and her infant are attacked by a monster and thrown into a body of water. The player character is forced to dive in and rescue them, and finds that the infant survives but the mother was killed on impact.

Level 86 quest in the first Endwalker secret zone Verdict and Execution: Animal Euthanasia

An animal is deemed a threat to the ecosystem and has to be euthanized. The animal simply disappears into aether, so the scene is not graphic.

Level 87 quest in the first Endwalker secret zone Thou Must Live, Die, and Know: Existential

The story touches on themes such as the purpose of life and the inevitability of suffering and death, particularly in cutscene that concludes your visit to the first Endwalker secret zone.

Levels 89-90, pretty much the entire final Endwalker secret zone: Existential

As with Thou Must Live, Die, and Know, the zone's storyline touches heavily on existential themes.