Square Enix launched their Final Fantasy XI Fan Festival 2007 early this morning. For those already here in Anaheim, some announcements have already been made.

The first thing they had to announce was that official windowed mode for Final Fantasy XI will be available this coming Tuesday. They showed that the size is completely adjustable, down to the size of the window on PlayOnline's site, if so desired.

The second thing was a long history of Vana'diel. Our apologies, but we were not able to get the information entirely, but we will do our best to piece it together as the information becomes available. A brief summary would be as follows:

The first race to gain influence on the world of Vana'diel is the Tarutaru. The current Star Sybil discovered magic many years ago. Using this power, she was able to lead the Tarutaru, expanding their influence across the Middle Lands. The Elvaan resented the Tarutaru, treating their presence as an invasion. They rose against them forcing them back to their own continent. The Humes and Galka, using the massive underground resources of the wastelands, rebelled against the Elvaan, breaking free to form their own nation as well. These three regions formed the Federation of Windurst, the Kingdom of San d'Oria, and the Republic of Bastok.

The beastmen were scattered during these campaigns, but came to form under new leaders. Organized, they were able to take back their lands and force the other races back to their homelands. This began the ongoing struggle that continued for many years. Lastly, these beastmen were empowered by the Shadow Lord. The battle against the Shadow Lord is the original story of Final Fantasy XI.

After the history lesson, the two new jobs were shown off. First was the Dancer job. A typical battle would be as follows: Attack a target to gain TP, then use Steps to gain Finishing Moves, all while enhancing your party with dances. The basic concept is a front line healer: a nice alternative to the typical healing job.

Scholars use Light and Dark Arts, which determine the magic sets that the scholar can use. The job also makes use of Stratagems. A Stratagem burns a charge, which takes four minutes to recover. However, if there are multiple charges available, they can all be used at the same time, but still requires a 4 minute cool-down for each charge. An example shown involved using a Stratagem, then the Gravity spell. The spell was enhanced to a Graviga-type spell. There was a spell seen called Firestorm, but despite chants from the crowd, it was not shown. This will be something to check out when the jobs can be played first-hand later today.