Final Fantasy 14's best meme won't stop following Naoki Yoshida around

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Those grapes just won't give up

Final Fantasy 14
(Image credit: Square Enix)

Final Fantasy 14's beloved low-polygon grapes are still following Naoki Yoshida around, nearly two years later.

Poor old Yoshida, he just can't escape those grapes. When Final Fantasy 14's Endwalker expansion launched in December 2021, fans quickly adored its grapes, with their few polygons and very PS1 aesthetic. Unfortunately, Square Enix fixed the grapes by adding more polygons, much to the despair of millions of fans worldwide.

Now, Final Fantasy 16 producer and Final Fantasy 14 director Naoki Yoshida has faced the grapes again. One fan has taken the opportunity to ask if Final Fantasy 16 will also feature grapes.

"Yes, there will be grapes," Yoshida responds in the interview above, once he'd got over the sheer magnitude of the question from a fan. 

"There's a region of Final Fantasy 16 where they make a lot of wine, and so you're going to have those vineyards that are in-game," the director continues. "We did get a lot of feedback about the low polygon grapes in Final Fantasy 14, so the first thing we did is, we went in and checked the grape quality in Final Fantasy 16 and made sure it was perfect."

"I looked at it and said, 'yeah, this is not going to be good enough. We need to, you know, raise the polygons in those grapes,'" Yoshida concludes.

So yes, if you were worried about Final Fantasy 14's strange grapes making their way into Final Fantasy 16, rest assured that this won't be the case. I'm sure this revelation has won over a lot of sceptics for Square Enix's new game.

Final Fantasy 16 launches next month on June 22 exclusively for PS5. 

Check out our big Final Fantasy 16 hands-on preview for what we made of the new game when we played it earlier this year.

Hirun Cryer
Hirun Cryer
Freelance Writer

Hirun Cryer is a freelance reporter and writer with Gamesradar+ based out of U.K. After earning a degree in American History specializing in journalism, cinema, literature, and history, he stepped into the games writing world, with a focus on shooters, indie games, and RPGs, and has since been the recipient of the MCV 30 Under 30 award for 2021. In his spare time he freelances with other outlets around the industry, practices Japanese, and enjoys contemporary manga and anime.