How Final Fantasy XIV Fans Found In-Game Popularity as a Band
The Songbirds take their stage, as they always do, on the white cobblestones of Limsa Lominsa. It's dusk in Final Fantasy XIV. Foot traffic around the city swells after the sun goes down, when students race home from school and grown-ups clock out from their day jobs. A faint, familiar MIDI melody leaves the band's violins and keyboards, and after a few bars I'm able to place it: "Kiss From A Rose," by Seal. A row of identically dressed bards — like a '60s Phil Specter girl group — weave together a miraculous harmony despite bandwidth and latency. Fans toss glow sticks in the air, warriors and mages lock into their dance animations on the periphery, it's Coachella with Chocobos. The Songbirds are the most famous band in MMO history, and their world tour of Hydaelyn is never going to end.
"It’s a surreal experience seeing our name out there," says Raven Ambree, a Canadian who serves as The Songbirds manager, and asks to be quoted by his in-game name. "Seeing our emotes being used in others' chats, seeing someone wear one of our T-shirts during a stream, or having other famous folks turn up at one of our concerts. It’s difficult to explain."
The Songbirds, via https://www.instagram.com/songbirdsffxiv/
The Songbirds formed in 2018, and at its core, the band is a partnership between Ambree and MewsicalMiqo. Both of them are MMORPG veterans — they've played everything from Runescape to Eve Online — and fell in love with Final Fantasy XIV because of the ingenious ways Square Enix purged the onerous grind out of the genre. There is a liberty in Square's modern classic that allows the community to play however they'd like without fearing any punishing throttles on their progress. (You don't ever feel like you've fallen hopelessly
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