The Alpha test has just closed up and we now wait for the Beta test to begin. Those players who qualified for the Legacy promotion () will be able to join in the first phase of Beta testing scheduled to begin in the middle of February.
Information on the individual phases can be found here () in detail, otherwise there are to be 4 phases. The first is scheduled to last 2-4 weeks followed by a small intermission to append any bugs or changes due. Phase 2 will be slightly shorter with a pending intermission for fixes, followed by phase 3 which will allow the use of pre-existing characters from the original game, and allow all players who have an account registered with FFXIV to join in. The final phase, 4, will be an open beta phase lasting only a short time and leading to the retail launch of the game.
This thread will be updated as more information is released and we will begin to consider what server we'll be congregating on.