The internet loves Moo Deng, a pygmy hippopotamus living in a zoo in Thailand. The small hippo has gone truly viral online and is so popular that SNL has even gotten involved. And all that popularity has led to high prices on virtual baby hippos in Final Fantasy 14.
I won’t waste too much time explaining Moo Deng here in this post as you likely already know who the popular pygmy hippopotamus is because you A.) use the internet and B.
) clicked this article. But the quick explanation is that earlier this month a zoo in Si Racha, Thailand posted some images of Moo Deng on Facebook and she quickly became a viral sensation. The zoo has had to implement time limits on viewing and installed cameras to watch out for fans harassing the tiny hippo. And now it seems a lot of people want their very own digital Moo Deng in FF14.
As first reported by GamesRadar, in-game prices for FF14‘s Hippo Calf minion have increased dramatically since Moo Deng became an internet star. On September 24, someone posted the prices of Moo Deng on one server in FF14. Before Moo Deng went viral, you could grab a Hippo Calf for around 30,000 Gil. Not too expensive. Now, you’ll have to pay nearly 300,000 Gil for a calf.
One thing that likely contributed to the calf’s rising prices was a tweet from the official Final Fantasy 14 Twitter account. On September 21, the official game account tweeted an image of the calf with the caption: “Unbothered. Moisturized. Happy. In My Lane. Focused. Flourishing.” The tweet also contained a short clip of the Hippo Calf opening its mouth and being splashed with water, which is classic Moo Deng behavior. So it was obviously a nod to the famous hippo and likely led to even more players hopping into FF14 to buy the minion.
Of course, if you check your server’s prices, you might not see such high price tags as they can vary from server to server. Still, as PC Gamer reports, in general, the price of the hippo in FF14 is up compared to other minions.
If you don’t want to buy a Hippo Calf pet, you can grind the level 84 Endwalker expansion dungeon Vanaspati. However, keep in mind it’s a random drop so you might have to run it a few times. Good luck. And if you do find one, you might be better off selling it for a few hundred thousand Gil while the internet is still obsessed with Moo Deng.
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