Moo Deng mania reaches ‘Final Fantasy 14’

1 October, 2024

Moo Deng, the adorable hippo

The viral buzz around adorable baby hippo Moo Deng has reached the world of Final Fantasy 14.

Moo Deng is a baby pygmy hippo from Thailand’s Khao Kheow Open Zoo that has taken the internet by storm. A number of videos of her playing have gone viral, and there are now plans for a 24/7 livestream of her enclosure.

Gamers are wanting to get in on the action as well, with the demand for Final Fantasy 14’s own hippo calf minion sky-rocketing.  The price of the minion on the player-driven marketplace has increased from 17,000 gil at the start of September to 300,000 gil now and players are also using Final Fantasy 14 mods to create Moo Deng merch (via GamesRadar).

 

Players can get their hands on a hippo calf minion without spending hundreds of thousands of gold coins though. The adorable Moo Deng lookalike is a rare reward for completing the Vanaspati Dungeon in Endwalker.

Even developers Square Enix are getting in on the Moo Deng action. The official Final Fantasy 14 X account shared a gif of their hippo calf copying one of the viral Moo Deng clips alongside the caption “Unbothered. Moisturised. Happy. In My Lane. Focused. Flourishing”.

However, Moo Deng has found itself in some unexpected controversy. A Saturday Night Live sketch that used the baby hippo to mock Chappell Roan has faced heavy criticism since it aired over the weekend. “I honestly feel so bad for Chappell Roan because literally all she said was ‘please treat me like a human being’ and everyone is making fun of her constantly for that,” one fan wrote.

In other news, The Last Of Us co-creator Neil Druckmann has praised a fan-made recreation of the new season two trailer that only uses footage from the games.

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