The first Final Fantasy MMO is heading to maintenance mode with no new update scheduled

The team working on Final Fantasy 11 has been scaled down, meaning the game is essentially in maintenance mode now.

As revealed by the new Final Fantasy 11 producer Yoji Fujito (who will be taking over from Akihiko Matsui) in an official blog post, the development team working on the long-running MMORPG has been scaled down in order to give the team a chance to work on other projects and develop their careers. What this means is that there are less people working on the Final Fantasy game and that it's essentially going to be running in maintenance mode.

The blog post reads: "Most of our current Development team has served exclusively on FINAL FANTASY XI for many years. Remaining on the FFXI team full-time, however, would mean giving up certain opportunities in their careers as developers."

Rather than limit the developers to work exclusively on Final Fantasy 11 and its "decades-old technology," Square Enix has instead decided to slow down development on the game to "provide more leeway for our operations to continue." As a result of this, Fujito says: "The scope of our version updates will become quite compact as a result, but in exchange, we will focus on stabilizing our operations environment for the medium and long term."

Don't panic though, this doesn't mean the game is coming to an end just yet. In fact, the post also says that the team remains committed to "keeping Final Fantasy 11 an enjoyable environment where you can join fellow adventurers and our teams in their collective enthusiasm for the game."

Need something else to play now? Take a look at our best MMORPG list for inspiration.