Eorzea Academy is home to both light and dark classes, but headmaster Tataru has a plan to bring everybody together. This looks a lot like competition, however, so come spend a year with beloved characters from the world of Final Fantasy XIV. And Asahi.
Despite the fact that you could read this book having not played FFXIV, I can’t genuinely imagine why you’d ever feel the need. It is absolutely designed for a very, very specific audience and exists entirely to please them.
Luckily for me, I am exactly that audience. Though I am on a break as I write this, I have played all of the series that these characters spawned from up through its current expansion, so I am quite familiar with their personalities.
And there are oodles of in-jokes for even the casual player, but the person well versed in the lore is about to have a field day picking out the silly gags. When they made reference to the jokes about calling Y’shtola mommy, I knew I was in good hands.
Almost every major and minor character gets page time, although most of the action is seen through the eyes of Alisaie and her twin brother Alphinaud. Alisaie’s brash nature makes her the perfect foil for the taunting of the dark class, especially when combined with Alphinaud’s fussiness.
The story basically just hits literally every trope of a school manga - they have sports day, run a lunch place at the beach, do their summer homework, and manage to get the festival in there too. The point is to enjoy seeing the characters outside of the regular fantasy Eorzea.
Like I said, there are dozens of manga covering these exact story beats and, to a certain extent, better. But if you want the silliness of this setting with these specific characters, it acquits itself quite well.
It really captures the general personalities in a fun way. Urianger still can’t say anything in a straightforward manner, Zenos is annoying, Asahi is both annoying AND has a sister complex, and Tataru sort of has a plan for things. There is barely enough context for the non-playing reader, honestly, which is a definite barrier to entry.
But if you know, as they say, you know. I especially loved that they even kept in Ryne and Gaia’s very obvious relationship (Gaia is hopelessly gay for Ryne). Despite it, you know, all being derived from a raid series that I doubt all the players have even seen. That’s the kind of deep dive they do with this one and there are still deeper ones if you look for them.
This is silly fun. It achieves pretty much every one of its goals and I had a really good time with it, even if it’s paper thin as a premise. It is that other type of fan service, through and through. To its benefit and detriment. Could have used more Y’shtola though.
3.5 stars - it’s fluff, but I really enjoyed spending time with old friends, basically. I don’t think it’s essential, but if you like the game you’ll enjoy it. I don’t honestly know that it’s worth your time if you’re not, however, as you’re kind of literally missing the point. Probably a 3 stars at best for the non-fan.