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The long night in FFXV

The sky permanently clouded over.

Night Shows No Signs of Stopping
While the lengthening of the nights has been observed to occur at an irregular rate, scientists predict the process will not cease any time soon. Researchers have vowed to continue searching for a way to stymie the shortening of the daylight hours, but cynics have insisted on devising a plan of action in the event our star is plunged into total darkness.

Newspaper article in the Norduscaen Garrison in Final Fantasy XV: Comrades

The long night is an ecological disaster in the world of Eos in Final Fantasy XV caused by the release of light-absorbing miasma into the atmosphere. After sunlight diminishes, Eos will be plunged into a perpetual night where daemons will take over. The long night is a culmination of the light and darkness theme of the game. The phenomenon is named in Final Fantasy XV: Comrades, and is also known as the "Night when All turns to Naught", as foretold within Cosmogony, the religious book series on the origins and legends of Eos.

Story[]

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow. (Skip section)
Starscourge-FFXV

Artwork from the lore tutorial.

The coming of the long night is foretold in the prophecy of the True King who is said to bring light back to the world after it is veiled in darkness. Organisms infected by a mutant strain of Plasmodium malariaeStarscourge—disperse a light-absorbing miasma, which accumulates in the atmosphere and lengthens the nights. Daylight has gradually and sporadically been disappearing from the world for a long time, along with wildlife mutating and daemons proliferating, but it is not until the last Oracle dies that the effects accelerate to such a pace the general populace takes notice. After there is so little daylight left the daemons who thrive in the darkness can't be contained in one place, the Niflheim Empire collapses. Those who can take refuge in Lestallum, a city whose power plant is supplied by the meteorshards in the area. Angelgard is the last place in the world over which light shines, but once the sky above the island clouds over, the world is plunged into an eternal night.

Do you like what I've done with the world? I twisted it all...just for you.

Ardyn
The sun rises in FFXV

The end of the long night.

When Noctis Lucis Caelum returns to Eos after his ten-year slumber inside the Crystal, he finds a world of darkness where the sky is murky with dark particles floating in the air. Outposts have been abandoned, and trees and grass have withered. The waters around Galdin Quay that used to teem with fish are dead, and daemons roam the world. Noctis brings light back to the world by cleansing Ardyn Izunia's corrupted soul, the epicenter of the daemons and disease in the world. In Final Fantasy XV: Episode Ardyn, Bahamut explains that Ardyn's destiny was to become the embodiment of the darkness and bring about the long night as a "sacrificial lamb" for the True King to kill.

As miasma dissipates, the sun rises upon Eos once more.

The state of the world after the sun returns is unknown, but it is presumed that the populations of many life forms would have been severely decimated at best. Final Fantasy XV Official Works implies the world is rebuilt, as the tale of the True King bringing light back to the world is said to be passed down forevermore.[1]

Alternate ending[]

In Final Fantasy XV -The Dawn of the Future-, Ardyn, Lunafreya and Noctis rebel against the roles bestowed upon them by Bahamut, and combine their efforts to kill the God of War in both the physical and the heavenly realms. Before the Crystal shatters it absorbs the darkness and cleanses the planet. The world is said to become fertile once more, but the Astrals disappear.

Spoilers end here.

Gameplay[]

The lengthening of nights is shown by the game's day and night cycle. In the beginning the party wakes up from a rest at 6 AM. By Chapter 8 the party wakes up at 9 AM and the sun already starts to set after 2 PM. In Chapter 12 the party will get up at 10 AM, and Chapter 13 onwards, the day and night cycle stops and the player won't see the sun again. In Chapter 14 Eos's atmosphere is a grisly blackened sky lit by an obscured sun that sheds black dust particles onto the world, rather than the starry and moonlit sky portrayed in the natural night phase.

Necromancer-Grab-Attack-FFXV

Daemons spawn in the night.

Daemons spawn on the field after nightfall. They are powerful monsters that will aggressively target the party. Players may stay up to battle daemons, though they can shave off maximum HP. The game advises for players to make camp or to rest at outposts and towns due to the danger daemons pose to an underprepared party, and as obstacles that hamper the progression of travel at night.

If the player has finished Cindy's sidequests, they will get the Enhanced Headlights for the Regalia, which prevent daemons from spawning on the road when traveling at night. Ignis will not drive the Regalia at night until the player is at level 30, but the player can still fast-travel.

Behind the scenes[]

FFXV-Red-World-Long-Night

The world in red lighting.

FFXV-Episode-Duscae-Red-Moon

Episode Duscae red moon.

In pre-release materials, the world was seen clouded in a red hue with daemons circling the skies. This is likely an earlier version of the long night. Using an out of bounds glitch in Final Fantasy XV Episode Duscae also produced this effect, dubbed by many as the "red moon". In the final game, the moon is not visible when the entire sky is obscured. The moon being red to herald a cataclysmic event is a recurring theme in Final Fantasy, and also alludes to the real world blood moon prophecies.

The long night hearkens to the end of the world events of the past series. Whereas in most Final Fantasy games the player party averts the looming end of the world, in certain games the player can witness the disaster first-hand, such as in Final Fantasy VI with the World of Ruin, Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII with the Nova Chrysalia, and in Final Fantasy XV with the long night. Eos, upon the coming of the long night, is also known as the "world of ruin" as per the name of a main quest in Chapter 14, as an allusion to the World of Ruin from Final Fantasy VI.

Game of Thrones franchise dealt with a similar event with the same name.

References[]

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