69-year-old Final Fantasy 14 streamer loses it as the series creator shows up to cheer her through one of the MMO's hardest raids

The Anabaseios: The Twelfth Circle raid boss in Final Fantasy 14 raising their hand to the camera — (Image credit: Square Enix)

If you’re struggling with some of Final Fantasy 14’s most challenging content, know you’re not the only one.

The creator of the series and self-admitted FF14 fan, Hironobu Sakaguchi, has stopped by the stream of a 69-year-old whittling their way through the Savage version of the Anabaseios: The Twelfth Circle raid. After hanging out for a bit, Sakaguchi notes that his team is working through the same phase as the streamer and, well, should really get going with that.

Around the two-and-a-half-hour mark of the stream below, Sakaguchi’s name pops up in the chat. The ensuing exchange is quite wholesome, with our elder streamer - called Pokochii BigMum on Twitter - freaking out alongside their chat at the appearance of the father of Final Fantasy.

As for Sakaguchi, he’s fairly chill. After introducing himself, he talks about doing the raid himself and being nine years younger than the streamer cracking on with the content. When asked if it’s really him, he simply replies with a 'yes.' It’s not the most convincing argument, mind you, though Sakaguchi has gone to tweet about the encounter if you have much doubt about how authentic it was.

The tweet itself is equally chill, with Sakaguchi talking about visiting the stream to find that the 69-year-old is at the same point of the raid as himself, before noting that he needs to “keep working hard, too” before going off to get a fresh haircut – I personally raid my best when boosted by a fresh trim, so I can only imagine Sakaguchi has done the same.

As for the raid itself, the Savage version of the Anabaseios: The Twelfth Circle was introduced in patch 6.4, which launched on May 23. It’s the final encounter of the four-part Anabaseios series, itself a part of the wider Pandæmonium raid series. Basically, it’s one big story with oodles of raid boss fights dotted between each narrative beat.

The latest Final Fantasy 14 update, patch 6.45, is out now.

Final Fantasy 14 player beats five-year-old speedrun record, only for the original holder to retake the crown a day later.

I joined GamesRadar+ in May 2022 following stints at PCGamesN and PocketGamer.Biz, with some freelance for Kotaku UK, RockPaperShotgun, and VG24/7 thrown in for good measure. When I'm not running the news team on the games side, you'll find me putting News Editor duties to one side to play the hottest JRPG of 20 years ago or pillaging the depths of Final Fantasy 14 for a swanky new cloak – the more colourful, the better.