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Is it worth it?
ih8phatheads
Member Posts: 33
I have never played FFXI and i was wondering if it is worth the money to play. Ive heard things saying its the greatest to people saying it is boring. Can anyone tell me how it is?
Comments
AO, DAOC, AC, AC II
50 Bucks is a rip, especially since you have to subscibe too. And you dont even know if youll like it.
so really is the game worth buying or not cuz it looks like it has really good graphics but i didnt want to buy it just because that cuz i would spend alot of money on it for just graphics when i can spend my money else where.
this will be red P.I.M.P
"Everyone is intitled to there own opinions but doesnt mean its right!"
Like I said in other posts, the game is great and I'm a fan of fantasy anime, so that's a plus for me but
I've become really angry at the whole sub job thing. Unfortunately, unless you have the job combination
that other people want you to have, you'll have a hard time finding groups. For example, I started out
as a whm, but I ended up growing tired of playing that role so I just got him to lvl 30 for the adv job option.
If I decide to go warrior, I'll have to lvl monk as a sub job or some other job, that other people want me to
have as a warrior. So in the end, that's a tremendous amount of lvl grinding, just so that you can satisfy
other people. To tell you the truth, I don't want to lvl some job I don't like, just so that I can play the damn
game. In my opinion they should've left it with just single jobs, like all the other mmos. Also, the higher
you get, the longer it takes for you to joining groups. Sometimes it can take up to 2 and a half hours to find
a group.
from the sound of it you dont like the way you have to spend so much time on it? well that does suck cuz then you have to get this lvl high then your on to the next lvl and etc..
this will be red P.I.M.P
"Everyone is intitled to there own opinions but doesnt mean its right!"
Lvlin in this game is very stupidly slow.
But i gotta say the graphics are great and i liked the idea that when you talk to npc that gives u quest u see like a sort of CGI.
all current mmorpgs are sorely lacking in one area or another, it's just a matter of finding out whether or not you're willing to tolerate the flaws in order to have fun. so if you accept FFXI's inherent flaws and don't take everything too seriously, you'll enjoy it.
While I agree with Lonelyrobot to a point, I will list some of the things that bothered me about FFXI, since I think there are other, more fun titles out there, or coming soon.
1) Experience, especially at higher levels, becomes a painful grind, and dying at higher levels can set you back many hours of playtime.
2) The economy of the game is not like the console versions, where you could go kill things outside of town and have enough to fully equip yourself in armor and potions. The drop rate of Gil (the currency of FFXI), and other items of decent worth is very slow, with a few being worth semi-decent Gil, but only after waiting for them to sell in your limited Auction House (you get 7 slots to sell things in, that's it), or you can set up a Bazaar (selling things from your own inventory, which means you can't move or level).
3) Not all the classes mesh well with each other in parties, often leaving people without a group. There are a few classes that one could do without in their group, or that just do better on their own, but only for certain purposes. Beastmasters can solo in the game, but the party as a whole takes a penalty for Beastmasters if they use pets to aid in fighting.
4) Penalties for too big of a level variance in parties can drastically affect the experience that the party earns, and the level variance is really small. If you or your friends fall behind in levels, you screw the whole group, and this was one of my biggest peeves with FFXI, since only a few of us had more play time than others in our Linkshell (Guild), and after waiting around for them to catch up, we eventually left them behind against our will.
5) The intermingling of players from various nations also took it's toll on the game. When the U.S. servers finally went live, the Japanese players embraced the experience, and offered to help many of the first U.S. players that joined in. However, the tensions began to rise as some really immature players started joining in, bringing with them a racist attitude that spoiled relationships with many Japanese players. Soon, it was going both ways as higher level Japanese players would pull massive trains of monsters on lower level players, or just outright slaughter everything the lower level players were camping. It was a huge conflict of cultures, and eventually I found it difficult to find a party during the hours I played, because it was mostly Japanese players online, and they wanted nothing to do with English speaking players.
6) SQUARE/Enix seemed to have a console game vision in mind when they designed FFXI, and they designed the game to be EXTREMELY group dependent. For those of us that like to take a breather from playing with other people for a day, and just go farm for treasure or items, we found ourselves at odds with even the least difficult of monsters that actually still dropped something for us. Things that conned "very easy" could still tear us apart once we reached our 30's and beyond. On an Elvaan Dragoon, at level 32, trying to fight green conned monsters was a trick in itself, and Elvaans were the predetermined "melee" race. You would thing that a full party fighting something several levels beyond them should be relatively acceptable, and worth the experience. Unfortunately, in FFXI,m this wasn't true. A full party with two White Mages (healers), a Paladin, a Dark Knight, a Ninja, and a Black Mage would barely hold our own from battle to battle against things only several levels ahead of us. With two healers in a party, I expect a lot of chain pulling, but not in this game.
7) With the Japanese version of FFXI having been released a year before the U.S. version, the Japanese knew where to find, and when to find the rare spawns for everything in the game. This, combined with the servers being based in Japan, gave them an unprecedented edge when hunting for these elusive "Notorious Monsters", due in part to them continuosly camping the "NM's", and in part because of latency issues. IN one case, as an "NM" spawned in front of me, it had already been engaged before it even registered on my monitor, because the Japanese player saw it about a second or more before I did, and I use cable internet with a nice upload/download rate. I found many people saying the same thing. Mind you, some of these NM's spawned maybe once an hour if you were lucky, and since the highly coveted items they dropped were not "unique" items, the campers would continue to camp them all day. Literally, they would camp them all day. This was, in part, because these rare spawning "NM's" had a slim percentage of actually dropping the items they were supposed to drop in the first place.
8) Crafting was another HUGE let-down. Since the economy was already so much of a hassle in the first place, saving up enough for crafting was beyond frustrating. It got really expensive, really fast, and depending on which craft you took up, it was near impossible to gather enough of the materials you needed to gain any real progress.
All in all, FFXI has many things to offer the extremely dedicated player, but in my opinion, if I am going to pay a monthly fee to "play" something, I expect to actually enjoy myself while I'm doing it, and not feel like it's an endless chore. My Linkshell eventually fell apart, with everyone so focused on just keeping themselves caught up, and so deeply involved with TRYING to gain a level, we eventually all went our seperate ways, and many of us just quit FFXI altogether. We stay in touch through our guild forum now, and we're all awaiting World of Warcraft, which I have to say, was fun from day 1 when I played during the Stress Test. I hope this helps you in some way, if for nothing else, to be prepared for what you find if you do play FFXI.
Not one to flame other people's posts, I'll just add this:
What other MMORPG have YOU played where they only give you one character slot, and force you to try all the different classes on that ONE character even though it may or may not be suited for some of the other classes in the game? And, when you go to create a new character, you realize that for each extra character you "roll", you will be charged an extra dollar per month. When the game isn't fun, does this make FFXI worth it? I don't think so. And don't even think that you can just create one character, and if you decide you don't like it, you can erase it and "re-roll" another one, because you get charged extra for that as well.
I just spoke on the phone with a friend recently, who let his son create a character on his account. Unknown to him, his son kept creating characters, then deleting them and "re-rolling" another one. When he finally got the bill, he had payed over the amount he paid for the orginal software in fees.
I've played enough other MMORPGs to realize FFXI was not worth MY monthly fee, and nowhere near as fun as some others I have played in the past, which is why I don't play it anymore. Note the words "I" and "my". It's my personal experience with FFXI, but sadly, they've been echoed by many, many others that also left FFXI for similar reasons. Not that I hate the FF series. I still have most of my console version Final Fantasy games still in their original packages, and I treasure them. But I was deeply saddened to see FFXI developed almost more like another console title, but not nearly close enough to a real MMORPG, and it certainly didn't have the same fun-factor as others. To the original poster, if you had been in WoW's recent Stress Test, you would have heard the same sentiment over and over again; "This is a LOT more fun than FFXI." being broadcast in General Chat. People know when they're having fun. Isn't that what playing an MMORPG should be about in the first place, since you ARE paying a monthly fee to play it?
So, to answer the orginal poster's question; No, I don't think it's worth it. If they offered a free trial, I'd take advantage of that if I were you to see if the posts you've read are true or not. Otherwise, don't waste your time OR money on this one.
My wife and I just came back to the game ~ 2months ago and I don't really see why people say the leveling is slow. I have managed to get 5 jobs to level 30(which really isn't that hard, took me 1 week each with sleep, eat food, you know the needed things for life).
The economy of FFXI isn't based around mobs dropping tons of money when you kill them. In fact if you need money you find it buy selling the drops off mobs. Crystals hold new players over for a while then some start camping NM's(Which you can do ~lvl 20) which have some items which sell anywhere from 20K-70K. As you level the areas and creatures to camp become broader.
Crafting is fairly easy in FFXI, but still time consuming. I always practice cooking while waiting for the puller to bring back the next victim. The AH can give you access to most of the items you need to craft with, but more times then not you can go to a store in town which sells the items and get it for far cheaper.
People complain about the level range, but then most people don't understand it. Even after you leave the 2 level difference(ie lvl13-15, 30-32) you still make the same XP as you would have before but the lower member(s) get less. Last night was hunting with a person 5 levels out of our range and he was only getting 180 XP while the rest of us were getting 200. I wouldn't call that to bad. Now this works if the person is a spell caster, and still works to a degree as a melee. Problem with having a low level melee in the group is that its hard to hit IT mobs normally so when a melee is trying to fight he may not be hitting at all or hitting for 0's each time.
Combat is fairly fast compared to some games, and certain classes and end fights rather quickly just due to the ability to build up tactical points(TP). Its to the benefit of all FFXI players to learn to skill chain during their first party experiences. Will make it easier on them in the end. skill chains increase XP gained from the kill, and magic bursts increase XP gain even further.
Travel in FFXI is slow to start off with until lvl 20 when you first get access to the chocobo. Also white mages have the 'teleport: X' spells where they can teleport you to one of the 5 crags if you have that crystal. You will find numerous white mages offering these taxi services because thats their primary source of income.
Alot of games have days and hours and constellation, but in FFXI all these converge and become rather important. If you attack Ifrit on firesday he will be stronger then normal. If you attacked him on watersday he will be fairly weakened. Same works for spells and equipment with special effects. Crafting is also effected by the days of the week as well as environmental changes. Crafters find using crystals to craft on the day of the crystal(ie fire crystals on firesday, light crystal on lightsday) succeed more often the using crystal on other days.
here really is no reason to have numerous characters in FFXI simply for the fact of how easy it is to change jobs and equipment. I have a second character as my auction mule, and thats it. Now if you choose to have the extra characters then yes you will be charged extra.
My personal opinion is FFXI is worth the money. I was in the WoW stress test and I didn't care for it. It was FFXI with slower combat and with many of UO's items. I have played alot of MMORPGs and have yet to find one where I can put much dedication into one character as I do in FFXI. To me the graphics, gameplay, and grouping are far better in FFXI then in WoW. people complain about soloing...Yes FFXi is not the game for you. If you want to group and do missions and quests then FFXI pulls it off unlike any other game out there. Also comes to the field of what type of graphics do you like. I much prefer the graphics in FFXI compared to the graphics of WoW. WoWs just childish to me while FFXI seems to draw me more into the game.
--I just spoke on the phone with a friend recently, who let his son create a character on his account. Unknown to him, his son kept creating characters, then deleting them and "re-rolling" another one. When he finally got the bill, he had payed over the amount he paid for the original software in fees.--
I'm sorry but thats a blatant lie. You don't get charged by the character. You get charged by the content ID. I created characters for a second character ~15-20 times and my total bill was ~$17.00. Now if he kept using and deleting content ID's(which is a hassle to do and annoying to purchase a new one) then yes I could see that, but then thats not the games fault. You should NEVER have to cancel the content ID to recreate a character. You simply delete the character and then create new...it's that simple. There aren't that many variables in game to need to recreate characters that often anyway. You create a Taru then that taru only has 16 possible differences, but in the end male or female the Taru is just a Taru. In this case it's the kids fault not the games. It blatantly tell you that you will be charged by the content ID and gives a full warning before accepting the charges.
And just as a reference to the games I have played:UO (5years), AC2 (2.5 years), AC1(1 year), EQ(6 months), Risk your life(3 months,beta), Muonline(3 months, beta), DAoC(1.5 years).
Actually no MMORPG's are like that. FFXI blows hard. UI sucks, combat system sucks, cusomization... is none, mob variety... is none, cheezy telletubbie type mobs, weapon and armor variety... pitifully small... I could go on and on, just play it safe and dont waste your money.
Lying in bed, looking up at the stars, a single thought passed through my head. Where the fuc|{ is my roof.
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The problem I see with FFII, is the manual. It does not really have all the info in it it should be having.
Then the other problem is lack of different monsters. They just recycle the graphics, giving monsters at a higher level the same graphics but make them tougher to beat. That gets boring very fast.
And as far as items goes, I was expecting items to drop once in a while. Not in this game, items drop very rarely. And if they do, they are to low level to be usefull to you anyways.
And to end it, everything is very slow and repetitive. Very hard to play solo, you usually end up playing solo killing stuff way below your level. Then you end up with no exp, and since the drops are virtually none, you end up with basically nothing. Then you go back to grouping, waiting for party's, getting into bad party's, more waiting etc...
I believe they sometimes slow you down intentionally, just so you should stay online longer.
You should stay online because you want to, not because they force you to.
Oh, it also seems everything can be bought at the auction house. Then everything boils down to money, which is hard to get as a drop. So you have to get it some other way, like selling items. Oh wait, they don't drop often either. Lets try crafting, oh wait, you have to have money to buy supply's first. It's a big circle, and you often feel like you are taking the same circle you took yesterday.
I have played it for over 6 months, on a regular basis. But I am looking around to see what else is on the market. Only reason why I am still there, is because of the linkshell I belong to. We all migrated to FFII after ENB closed.
BatDaCat wrote:
Your friend must have deleted the contentID and created a new one many times, which is stupid. If you delete only the character and create a new one on the same contentID you are not billed one more time. I am sure about this since I have 2 extra contentID and sometimes I delete and create a new character when I need an alternate character in a diferent city to sell me stuff and I never got billed extra.
Anyway, I aggree that even so, the Square Enix billing system is crap and you really have to be careful with it. But if you are smart enough you will work around those problems and enjoy the game. The thing about having to pay for extra characters is sad, but after playing for a while I don't really feel the need to have any more than 3 characters which adds up to 15 dollars a month, which is the price of most other MMORPGs.
Well, to make it short. I am a fan of FFXI for many reasons. It is the only game I've played so far that doesn't crash on me after 6 play hours straight. The group system is hard, yes, you need to have a very good combination in order to succeed on EXP making or item hunt, but that only makes things more interesting to me.
About killing the same damn mob forever, I just have to show you some numbers: 120 different areas (160 with Chains of Promathia), and more than 60 families of monsters and humanoids and about 20 different monsters of each family. Of course, if you play the game from level 1-10 you will always see the same kinds of monsters, but as you go further you start seeing a big variety of monsters. There are some cute looking ones but some really bizar ones as you reach level 30+.
About UI? At the beginning I thought it was a little hard I must confess, but buy yourself a PS2 control and an adapter and you will be impressed about how you can do anything without taking your hands out of the control.
I would recommend anyone interested in the FF series and MMORPGs to buy the game and see for yourselves. It is defenitely not a waste of money.
Just like any other MMO, this game is amazingly addictive. It is true that finding parties and leveling takes forever, but the game is so addictive to me that sometimes i go hours without invites, and the whole time im sitting on the couch wide awake. During downtimes, I like to chat with my linkshell to help keep me interested, and it usually works. Heh, I have fallen asleep once before, and I was dead when I woke up. I actually enjoy playing with Japanese and international players, cus they are interesting to talk to. Japanese people who can barely speak English, when they talk, they have awful grammar and sound retarded, it gives me a laugh sometimes. If you are a true Final Fantasy fan with "some" spare time, definitely buy it. I like the graphics, music, and characters of the game, and the ever changing world always keeps me interested. One thing, if you like dueling other players in PvP, it is very restricted and turned into a game with rules called Ballista. Don't ask me why they call it that.
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Probably the worst game I have ever played.
Very childish, okay if your a pokemon fan.
Locked combat is just awful for kill stealing.
Now playing: VG (after a long break from MMORPGS)
Played for more than a month: Darkfall online, Vanguard SOH, Everquest, Horizons, WoW, SWG, Everquest II, Eve
SO you're saying that you LIKE Kill stealing? hmm.. and what does the game have to do with Pokecrap? Nothing.
I recently bought it (it's down to 30 bones), and am having FUN with it. That's the problem, most idiots forget to actually have FUN with a game. It's just a game. If you're not having FUN then by all means leave; there are plenty of other games for you to go grief and whine about.
"Is it worth it"? That all depends. I had to read a lot of posts to determine whether or not I would like it. Especially since I'm not a mmorpg player. I just don't like the control scheme (so I bought a gamepad for my PC), but that's trivial and not anything to do with the gameplay itself. It can be a liitle tough to "get into" at first, but once you get into how the combat goes and general gameplay, you'll find that it IS quite fun.
And don't listen to the constant negative posts by the kidz. If you actually read into their posts you'll see that a lot of them actually went up in high levels and then decided to quit. If they hate the game so much, why'd they play for so long? Also, the whole "it takes hours to find a party" bit is really old and so untrue. Just walking around leveling in the game (by my 4th day) I had already talked to several nice people and got tips from people and was even asked to party several times (I had to refuse, cuz I wanted to get a better grasp of the game first).
MY opinion: it's a fun game, graphics are the best for a mmorpg out right now (at least until EQ2), and there's a lot of variety of things to do besides leveling. The combat is a little quirky at first, as is the control scheme, but once you understand it it all makes sense. Really!
-=JAJ=-
I'm on Leviathan.
I completely agree with this guy , i think he is on the verge of becoming a genius.
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EQ2 Qeynos guild -
www.imperium-arcanum.com
Fourth day? Thats nothing. Sorry, but you have no idea what leveling horrors exist in the upper levels, especially 50+.
Finding parties is relatively easy even up until 40. But at mid-50's, if you have a unpopular class/subjob, then 4-6 hours before finding a party is not impossible. Heck, i know people who went days without a party, and it wasn't because of their equipment or reputation either. It could be simply bad luck.
Maybe its gotten better now that more English speaking players are higher level, but back when i stopped playing in early May '04, it was really horrendous. And once you get in a party it may take 30 minutes or an hour before you actually start fighting the first mob. Super time waster.
That is the question, "Is it worth it?"
I started playing this game back when it was firsted released on the PC, I was all excited and everything. Anyways, i played the game for a month, got really frustrated and just quit. I went back to Earth & Beyond, which was a great game, i miss it...stupid EA...and then around June of this year I gave FFXI another go, lvled warrior to 30 and then got my paladin job which currently i am at lvl62. I guess lvling is easy when you have a "convenient" job. I didn't do too many quests, i guess i enjoyed lvling alot. Waiting for parties varied for me, from 30 seconds to a day or 2.
The whole sub job thing is kinda cool, but having to lvl it just so you can use it, is kinda dumb, i think it should do it automatically, so if you have a lvl60 job, you should be able to choose what job, if you have done all the quests to get the advanced jobs, you want and automatically cap it at 30.
Money.....that's another issue. the monster in the game are very very stingy, which isnt really cool, cause monsters should drop items. I found that lvling thief to 15 that i could get better drops for treasure cause at lvl15 thief gets an ablility called, Treasure Hunter, which enables you to get treasure more often. But, why should i lvl a job just because its more convinent. It's all about the fun of the game.
Community.....the server i was on, Carbuncle, the people weren't very helpful, i got help eventually, but the immediate response was nothing, espescially with getting your Artifact Armor, a special set of armor for your job only starting at lvl52, and then 54, 56, 58, and 60. People seemed more interested in progressing themselves and never willing to help lower lvl players. But i guess it all depends on what server you get placed on, dont choose carbuncle though, its not that great...
Crafting, this confuses me.....why are the materials worth more than the final product, shouldn't it be the other way around?? granted, some crafted items are worth more than their materials but thats only some, it should be all... its kinda fun though, im currently working on cooking, and i have a few lvls in goldsmithing and leathercrafting. Fishing is slow and boring, but the items are pretty decent. Basically, if you're gonna do a craft, it requires dedication, nothing less...
So, is the game really worth spending 50 bucks on? I don't think so, maybe 30 bucks though lol
Final Fantasy XI - Carbuncle Server - Falconeris - 62paladin/31warrior
Earth & Beyond - Orion Server - Zamaan - 143 Jenquai Explorer
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Final Fantasy XI: Online
Falconeris - 75PLD, BLM, RDM
Carbuncle Server
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Earth & Beyond (No longer active)
Zamaan - JE140+
Orion Server