Final Fantasy XI: Anyone still playing?
- Thread starter Drek
- Start date
Spiritreaver
Member
Pretty much the same case with me as Gattsu, except I haven't completely gotten out of the trouble yet. 
But don't think that because of games like WoW and whatno, that the servers will be barren. There's still Japan and Europe! No really though, I can't speak for the GAF community, but you're still going to find plenty of people in the game.
But don't think that because of games like WoW and whatno, that the servers will be barren. There's still Japan and Europe! No really though, I can't speak for the GAF community, but you're still going to find plenty of people in the game.SpiderJerusalem
Banned
Ya I still play too much. Theres a thread in the online forum if you get it and want on a certain server with some GA'ers or want a pearl or something.
shoplifter
Member
EQ2 forced me to cancel my sub, which i wasn't really using anyway.
johnjohnson
Member
I stopped a few months ago and cancelled my Content ID. Last sunday I tried start PlayOnline and it keeps telling me that the PlayOnline account is wrong. I double checked it, and I entered all the data correctly. I can't even create a new one, because it tells me that the PlayOnline serial number is wrong. 
I'll have to contact the customer service for this.
I'll have to contact the customer service for this.
I still have my account and character, but will probably cancel this month. WoW = crack cocaine. You actually play the game instead of sitting in front of an AH waiting for a party, wasting endless hours of your time. They need to implement a phone call system, where you get a phone call when you get an invite. 
That being said, I do miss the music and atmosphere of FFXI, plus the AH system. Luckily many of my LS members are moving to WOW.
That being said, I do miss the music and atmosphere of FFXI, plus the AH system. Luckily many of my LS members are moving to WOW.
Tortfeasor
Member
Moved on to WoW also after canceling my account.
I had fun with the game when I did play it. It was a bit too much of a time sink for me though. Once I got to around level 20 something, and finding parties became a major pain, I gave it up. If I were still in school, I might be playing it. Having a job, there's not much time for it. Those games are quite a commitment.
Some reasons why FFXI sucks and you shouldn't waste your money.
- To get anything accomplished in the game you need to play at least 3 hours at a time. Moreso once you get into the mid-high level range.
- The game has become so cookie cutter, if you plan on making your character original you will get shunned by other players.
- The game relies too heavily on certain jobs being needed to have a decent party. At low levels, it's white mage and at later levels its red mages and bards.
- if you choose to play a damage dealing class, expect to be looking for group for 4 hours and sometimes longer at higher levels.
- The japanese players are not so friendly and most of them will not party with english speakers at all. We are like 2nd class citizens in the game.
- Dont know if this is true anymore but when I left the economy was so screwed up.
- To get anything accomplished in the game you need to play at least 3 hours at a time. Moreso once you get into the mid-high level range.
- The game has become so cookie cutter, if you plan on making your character original you will get shunned by other players.
- The game relies too heavily on certain jobs being needed to have a decent party. At low levels, it's white mage and at later levels its red mages and bards.
- if you choose to play a damage dealing class, expect to be looking for group for 4 hours and sometimes longer at higher levels.
- The japanese players are not so friendly and most of them will not party with english speakers at all. We are like 2nd class citizens in the game.
- Dont know if this is true anymore but when I left the economy was so screwed up.
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/prod...dept=2636&path=0:2636:37874:118402#long_descr
Still playing and probably will be for a long time at my own pace.
Still playing and probably will be for a long time at my own pace.
Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
I am still playing.
Kai Dracon
Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
Still playing on Asura.
Die Squirrel Die
Member
I've only had it since Sept so I'm still playing, although not so much in the last month 'cause I've been trying to clear my backlog. Probably start getting serious again once that's become more manageable.
Playing WoW currently, but there's a small chance I might go back to it at a later date. WoW is a great game and all, but some of its seams are starting to show for me already and I don't know if its a game I'd like to continue playing for months on end. I mean, WoW does a lot right, but there's a lot of things I liked about FFXI that haven't shown up in WoW, at least not yet. I think both have their high points, personally, but one will have more lasting power, IMO, and that might be FFXI at this point.
Die Squirrel Die
Member
Belfast said:
See in some ways this is the nice things about Europe getting things later, we aren't the guniea pigs. By the time WoW hits here, I'll be knee-deep in finals so it'll be summer before I'd be able to give it a try and all the early 'OMG this is the best thing ever' newness will have worn off and a more accurate picture will have emerged. I think I'll still give it a try no matter what the extended impressions are, that's what free months and summer holidays are for.
Well, its not so much technical things that need to be ironed out as they are things inherent to the type of gameplay Blizzard has setup. For instance, the idea of getting XP for quests is a GREAT idea, and its one of those major things that I wish had been implemented in FFXI. Also, FFXI could use the number of quests presented in WoW and also not require you to go halfway around the world to complete it.
On the other hand, a good deal of the quests are already getting repetitive. Most of them that I've dealt with consist of going to a predetermined area and killing a certain number of enemies, or killing a certain elite enemy, or killing enemies for a certain number of item drops and then coming back to the NPC for the rewards. After you've killed your 500th Quillboar, it gets a little annoying. More mission variety definitely would've helped.
Its nothing that makes either game necessarily bad or not worth playing, but it shows that they both still have problems that could be resolved with some work. I still say my ideal MMORPG would be a cross between WoW and FFXI and they seem to represent certain extremes within the genre.
On the other hand, a good deal of the quests are already getting repetitive. Most of them that I've dealt with consist of going to a predetermined area and killing a certain number of enemies, or killing a certain elite enemy, or killing enemies for a certain number of item drops and then coming back to the NPC for the rewards. After you've killed your 500th Quillboar, it gets a little annoying. More mission variety definitely would've helped.
Its nothing that makes either game necessarily bad or not worth playing, but it shows that they both still have problems that could be resolved with some work. I still say my ideal MMORPG would be a cross between WoW and FFXI and they seem to represent certain extremes within the genre.
I stopped a few months ago and cancelled my Content ID. Last sunday I tried start PlayOnline and it keeps telling me that the PlayOnline account is wrong. I double checked it, and I entered all the data correctly. I can't even create a new one, because it tells me that the PlayOnline serial number is wrong.
Square invalidates your serials after three months. You'll have to buy a new copy of the game to get serials that will work. If it's been more than three months, your characters are gone too. Yes, completely retarded.
I played FFXI for a couple months after NA PC launch, gave it up for about 4 months, came back and my characters were gone and serial numbers invalid. It's spelled out in the manual, but it's nowhere on the outside of the box, and once you open the software you're stuck. I wasn't too bothered by it at first since I had picked up a PS2 hard drive on sale and thus had new serials to get back into the game, but then I had to give the game up again (had some personal issues a few months back that were eating up all my time). I've been tempted to start playing again, but now three months have passed, which means my characters are gone again PLUS I'd have to get new serials. This is a boneheaded move on Square's part to not at least keep your character info longer than three months. Lots of people come and go with MMOs, playing for awhile, leaving, then coming back later because they miss the game or want to check out new content (I'd like to see what Promathia added).
I'm playing WoW ATM and enjoying it, but as Belfast said I don't know yet if it will have the staying power of FFXI. Grouping was a major PITA with FFXI, but I also got a greater sense of accomplishment out of doing things in FFXI, and it was easier for me to make friends in FFXI since grouping was so necessary. However, the economy in FFXI was pretty busted by the time I left last summer; I can only imagine what shape it's in now. It was interesting to play the game again a couple months after NA PS2 launch to see how the community had changed. Not saying there was anything wrong with PS2 players, but by the time of the PS2 launch there was a ton of info about the game online. It was so much more entertaining at PC launch when far less was known about the game (only what beta players had discovered and what could be gotten from Japanese sites). Of course that's true for any MMO.
Nope. What you described is how I thought things worked as well. I did not cancel POL when I cancelled my content IDs. When I went back 4 months later and tried to use the serials and my old POL ID, I was told the serials were invalid. I called Square's customer support, and they explained that while a POL account is free (you can create one without having FFXI or any other POL games), once you activate a serial number and tie it to a POL ID, if you then do not have any active content IDs for 3 months, the serials would be invalidated. My POL ID was still there, but I couldn't use the serials from my old copy of the game. I bitched about it a bit since that scheme makes absolutely no sense to me, but I already had a PS2 hard drive with another set of serials, so I just used those serials with my old POL ID to reactivate my PC copy of the game. Again, I do not understand why Square has this convoluted system, but that's what happened to me when I tried to use my old serials again.
PC Gaijin said:
I would concur with most of those points about grouping. Its like WoW is good for soloing and FFXI is good for grouping, both of which I consider to be big parts of the MMORPG experience. Yeah, you group for Elite quests and junk in WoW, but most of the people I've grouped with were a bunch of chodes and it mostly boiled down to everybody mashing away randomly at the enemies. FFXI may force you to group, but it also forces you to work together in an intelligent way. If FFXI had provided ways to deal with the time in-between finding groups, then it would've been A LOT better. Implement a card game, make crafting more accessible, or allow you to at least have the luxury of going out and soloing a few monsters *without* them bringing your health nearly to 0 every time. Even if the XP for doing this was low, it'd still be something. As it was, you were lucky to get ANY XP off of soloable monsters. combine the solo elements of WoW with the party elements of FFXI and you'd have a great MMORPG.
And yes, I have done Elites, as I mentioned above. They're kinda neat and all, but people are still jerks. They're assholes about looting (first come first serve seems to be the mentality, instead of need before greed) and they're only concerned about completing *their* quests, not yours.
Die Squirrel Die
Member
See what I thought would be an idea for more soloability in FFXI would be to have at certain job levels gaining stat bonuses that'd be permanent to the character and would carry over if/when you changed job. Have a major and minor stat so that every 4/5 levels it would receive a bonus. Major stat would get a bigger bonus than minor stat. So, I don't know, at level 5, 10, 15 20, etc. a warrior would get +2 to strength and +1 to vitality, for example. So if you had a lvl20 war, and then changed to a monk say, you'd have +8 strength and +4 defence right off the bat. Obviously without that many stats there'd be overlap, so if you reach an impasse with a certain job, you could switch to a job which had complementary stats, to help bolster your original job.
will they ever lower the monthly rates? That's the main reason I dropped my account, because of the cost. I love the game and would become addicted again if I wasn't in college, it was cheaper, and I had no job. This game could consume a person's soul.
But will they ever lower the cost?
But will they ever lower the cost?