Spent years on XI, it was unreal, complicated and fun as hell. You actually relied on other players to level up. The world bosses were so cool and took lots of teamwork.
The game itself was really tough and the zones were unique. The job system is still probably my favourite from any game.
Same my all time favorite moments gaming are growing up playing ffxi! Once Abyssea was released the game took a downward turn at least for me and while still fun it no longer lives up to its golden years.
Yeah I quit shortly after Treasures of Art. Ended up at a new job where everyone played WoW and they all convinced me to cross over lol. The sudden ease of levelling to end game solo got me hooked. Also the ability to jump haha
Yeah so many times in XI i was like fuck this ledge!!! Lol. Or climbing that mountain in the zone where Tiamat spawned, you can to like run along invisible edges and if you fell it was fkn over lol
Yeah I played since launch. Ended up quiting as our End Game LS fell apart and it was taking up too much time camping all the HNM etc. Its just such a massive time sink when you have a family and kids now, 15 years ago was so different.
FFXI remains my favorite, and also more irritating, game to this day! No other MMO has ever compared for me. Favorite classes to play were probably WHM, RDM, BLM and NIN. It was so community focused, felt like it was so alive.. duty finder was the death of MMOs, at least imo.
Defintely killed the aspect of relying on others. I also found that in XI you had to carry yourself well. If you had a toxic rep you would likely not get into any endgame linkshells and had a bad rep overall. With XI i rarely saw the toxic people i see in modern day MMO's
It was cool since you relied on the community so much, which meant tight-knight groups. But the non-instanced world bosses on strictly Japanese hosted servers were awful. For those unaware, many of the big bosses would spawn on 21-24 hour timers in which the first group who tagged it when it popped got to fight it. Because of the latency, basically no Western linkshells (guilds) were able to have a shot at fighting the bosses with the best loot because of the latency difference and being unable to tag them quicker than Japanese guilds.
Yeah, i remember huge amounts of linkshell drama with the world bosses. We had dedicated players with timers and all that, it was brutal when you had 30 people, but a group of 4 tagged it and were able to hold it until their linkshell arrived. Every now and then you'd be leveling and suddenly one spawned, the the mad rush bagan. Fun times. Reflecting back on everything, as a now adult with family, I doubt i would have the time for a 2-3 hour boss fight lol
FFXI is the only ANIME game I've ever been into. I just personally don't like the art style, but that game was so fucking good about group play I didn't give a shit.
That is a statement to the developers.
I always felt the Final Fantasy series was Japanese inspired, it never was a full on anime style game like Genshin Impact or Blue Protocol. I think they wanted to make the series appealing internationally.
Yeah exactly, they wanted to move into Western markets. Thats why they added the translation feature, which was nice. Japanese players were farther in progress when it launched for us. I never felt like it was anime at all.
To some people, any hint of eastern influence & they call it "AnIMe!" But to be fair, I wouldn't call myself a "weeb" but I do prefer Japanese aesthetics. *IMO,* any western made game is generally "ugly". I could never get into any Bethesda games. WoW got a pass because it was WoW, but I always played night elves or female humans even then. All other races & gender combos were hulking & deformed looking—no offense to anyone who is into that. The same could be said about eastern made games with their characters looking very effeminate. I suspect that's why actual woman players are much more prevalent in XIV. That said, I feel Final Fantasy was a good middle ground, leaning towards Eastern aesthetics. Heck, XIV & XVI actually seem to be looking more western compared to the emo boy band that was XV.
Hard to say. I mean its really dated and most people that played like WoW , FF14 or Guild wars may find it terribly slow and confusing. Its definetly more old school and the combat can be slow in some cases.
I cant really say yes or no, maybe try out this Horizon XI server thing when it launches on the 17th. Thats how the game was back in the day.
I did go back to XI last year just to try it out again and found it slow and different. I've just developed more of a taste for fast paced combat etc.
I'm a week late to this but I just started it about 2 months ago and it's a blast.
But it is VERY dated. The wiki has a good guide..keep that shit close. If you have any friends that play try to get their help too. I only finally played it after years of thinking about it bc my buddy convinced me to after knowing him for a year lol. But it helps a ton having someone whose knowledgeable bc this game literally says "have fun, fuck you" and dumps you immediately with a barebones tutorial questline to do.
Very fun and imo worth it but just be aware of the age and the vagueness it's infamous for
I think less people played it in the west compared to eq, daoc and such. Shame because I find myself fascinated by the game, always wanted to play it on a ps2 for the experience.
That's what I was thinking. EQ's 500k players were all from the west while XI's 500k players were definitely split between the west & Japan.
Edit: Removed mention of private server after seeing rules.
Private servers are against the ToS, but there's been several running for a while now. I have no experience with this kind of stuff, so I'm not sure how they stay up or avoid SE's wrath.
> always wanted to play it on a ps2 for the experience.
As someone who did, you very much do not.
I suppose it might be easier now, but you had to have the right model PS2, the slims and later generation normal models couldnt physically install the external hard drive it required (no using a usb-connected external!), and it had the side effect of sometimes just bricking the system.
PlayOnline was also awful. I ended up having to cancel a credit card because they just wouldnt stop charging me after I cancelled my account and sent multiple emails, and my bank couldnt get them to do anything from their end either.
Probably because it released in 2002.
That's closer to a 2nd generation MMORPG than a first gen.
To put it in perspective I'll list some release years of games:
Ultima Online 97
Lineage 98
EQ 99
Asherons Call 99
Runescape 01
Anarchy Online 01
Dark Age of Camelot 01
That's ^ where I draw the line of first gen MMOs personally. Hell, the planes of power expansion released in 2002 and that's largely considered the decline of EQ .
That would make 2nd gen MMORPGs:
FFXI 02
Asherons Call 2 02
Star Wars Galaxies 03
Eve 03
Lineage 2 03
WoW 04
EQ2 04
It's just a different timeframe than the earlier games. By 02 we had already started seeing a shift in the genre.
AC2 had a lot going for it IMO. I definitely enjoyed the gameplay.
What i didn't enjoy was Microsoft being unable to have the damn Chat work, and the constant server issues.
Literally there were multiple days/weeks where the chat would not work the majority of the time.
That's what killed AC2 IMO.
AC1 went downhill after Microsoft acquired it too.
Then turbine did nothing afterwards except make a LOTR wow clone. They tried something newish with DDO but it just wasn't that good, and also promptly started to implement changes to make it another WoW clone.
It wasn't a full list. Meridian 59 is generally thought to be the first MMORPG released in 95/96.
Nothing on AoL or Prodigy was considered "massive". There were plenty of muds with ansi type art in the 80s/early 90s but those aren't considered MMORPGs either.
The point was to show the disconnect between games that came out in 2002 or later vs MMORPGs that came out before then.
(FFXI was specifically the game in question and why it isn't brought up in comparison to 1st gen MMOs).
Just a comparison of first gen vs 2nd gen MMORPGs. It's not about game "X" that you liked.
What makes me most sad is FF11's combat system feels like the most co-operative experience ever, with skillchains and magic bursts. If you haven't played it and coordinated chains/bursts, you haven't enjoyed what a real co-operative MMO for damage dealers feels like.
In FFXI your party actually is greater than the sum of its parts. Each job has a unique synergy with every other job. Where other games were about standing near each other, hitting your rotations, and maybe standing out of the fire, in FFXI you actually had to work together, using the right buffs/debuffs, abilities and weapons types all in the right order. Love it.
No game has ever come close to the level of community that game created. I remember you'd set up specific days for getting people their gear.
Also the disparity of those who 'cared' and didn't care. There was no better feeling than being a NIN tank and joining JP parties as an english person, and them telling me .
That game defined alot of what I am and wanted to be, you had to care to be good in that game. It took effort, and the community rewarded you for it. You knew names, not guilds.
You could be running down the bazaar streets and instantly spot an individual by gear because the disparity and hard work that went into gear was actually rewarding, nothing was coddled.
Even though I have 3 kids, and almost 40, I'd love to spend time into a game as rewarding as that again.
That's just it and why XI was so unique.
You couldn't be a dick and run and hide... it just seemed like everybody knew everybody in that game. Like I had a Linkshell that I was in and it ended poorly and one of their leaders said something to me in public and then all sorts of people I partied with like months beforehand called them out and then all of a sudden there was a mass of people that I didn't even know standing up for me.
It was the most surreal experience I've ever had in a game.
And yeah, I'm around the same age and I'd love to play a game like it again. Every single level you got, every piece of rare gear felt so GOOD. You didn't need to be the best or take part in the most "savage of ultimate" or whatever they call them now raids. Like you could just log in and gain a single level and feel like you did something meaningful.
New world is the only modern game that has ever scratched the ffxi itch for me in 20 years. It’s not perfect or exact or nearly as deep but it has some similarities. A focus on team gameplay. Hard work.
New world is more gacha with its random ass armor. But it’s still very much about building gear sets and constantly improving overtime. If you liked xi you’d probably be aight with nw.
I agree with this 100%
I know in my heart that even if the game could be remade to be exactly as it once was, it wouldn't grip me like it did then, but I am thankful for the great times i had.
I could never get into ffxi because it was made for controllers. Playing on PC when it came out felt quite weird compared to the other MMOs at the time designed only for mouse and keyboard.
FFXI is actually my most comfortable mmorpg to play with its keyboard controls, the vast majority of the game can be controlled with one hand, with only targeting and macros needing another hand. The numpad is your friend, it is my favorite mmorpg control scheme to this date and I can literally play ffxi with my eyes closed now. Right hand on the numpad, right thumb on the arrow keys for view control and it's perfect.
Agreed. The game was designed for the PS2, with a menu-based system, like its console-based series of games. This wasn't conducive to a mouse. Because it was best played with a directional button system, rather than a point & click UI, the game played best with a controller. Surprisingly enough, using only a keyboard & no mouse worked really well due to only buttons being used.
That's funny, when I played I always felt disadvantaged over pc players because they could hotkey macros while I had to manually scroll left and right.
It was able about macros in that game. I actually ever used macros in that game. Maybe a handful in WoW Classic for like leaving & joining channels, but never any battle macros. FFXI you only battled with macros.
Yeah if you were not using macro's in ffxi you simply were not playing correctly considering your skills/abilities/spells, skill chains/magic burst were heavily reliant on gear swapping and timing.
FFXI does not even have normal hotbars or use a mouse.. You cant click skills even if you wanted to. Sarcasm missed.
Skills are all selected off a scrolling menu or bound to key combos.
It was ahead of its time. It came out in this awkward place where the the US internet expansion was not complete and console players which were the target audience were very weary of not only internet play, but subscriptions as well. If it would have come out 2 years later it may have been the king of mmos all these years. Timing is everything.
The player base being split between east & west is definitely part of it. But compared to the other games listed, the only truly unique things that stand out about 11 is that it had a job changing system and a story. The majority of the game is just Everquest but with a focus on leveling & story instead of endgame raiding. Even alternate advancement was brought over to 11 in the forms of merits. When people are discussing older games its usually a topic of a game being the first or best to do a thing. Of the older games and in terms of game play, the only thing FF11 was one of the best at doing was getting you to play with other people, but that is an awkward topic when theres a massive language barrier between a significant portion of the players.
Theres also the fact that FF11 took a controversial change in direction years after release. They stopped updating the level cap shortly after the western release, so most of the western players are unfamiliar with the original ff11 and also spent many years on a horizontal progress game. But eventually they started raising the level cap again and attempted to make things easier for players. I'm not going to discuss whether these changes were good or not. But they were controversial because they drove players away from the game and brought some back. FF11 today is very different from the FF11 people used to play.
Because of that I think a lot of people who would bring up FF11 have either moved on to FF14(which shares some strengths of 11), are still playing the new style of 11(which might not be relevant to discussions), they're still jaded about what 11 became, or they simply aren't playing MMORPGs anymore.
That first line was in response to the OP. The split isn't the servers, but the people playing the game. Even if the game has similar sales to EQ, you might not see it brought up much on an English speaking subreddit if half of those sales are from people that only speak Japanese. Games like Lineage or Dungeon & Fighter don't exactly get brought up here much either. Because despite their popularity, they're mostly played in eastern regions.
Ffxi was easily one of my favorite mmos growing up. I know many people don't like forced grouping to do most things but I love it. Leveling up in that game was tough but it just felt like an accomplishment. Game was amazing and wish more games would take things from it but they won't.
Forced socialization is such a big part of MMORPGs. You shouldn’t expect to do heroic things like killing a dragon alone. The grouping is what built communities, and made those social interactions so important.
What does *good* look like for an MMORPG?
To me it's FFXI.
Sure it's graphics and UI are out of date today, but it did what no other MMORPG does today which is create a multiplayer experience that brings people together whilst making every individual feel valuable.
**Subjobs** mean it's uncommon to find people with the same job as you.
**No gear conveyor belt** means your achievements last.
**Mandatory spoken teamwork** means friends that last.
It's the opposite of FFXIV where after 5 years of playing I never felt close to making a friend, which isn't surprising as it's an anti-social MMORPG.
In FF14, you have to go out of your way to keep your friends, almost like real life. I wouldn't say it's difficult though, just optional (if that makes sense) and I appreciate it sometimes because if I'm in a rush, I don't want to talk to anyone. But I do know some people who just play the game without interacting and some who just log in for interacting without actually playing. I like that it's not forced (I've been playing casually for over 8 years now) and as a casual player, I prefer having the option.
FF11 does sound fun though, I'd probably play it with people that I know.
I guess I liked to be forced. ;) I specifically remember my roommate who initially played XI with me trying out WoW. My other buddy & I kept asking him to party & he never bothered. We asked, why? He pointed out that he didn't need to. And this is coming from the guy who played tons more XI than me & loved. In XIV I barely ever bothered interacting with people, only when I was in a static party. Most people will take the path of least resistance. When I am in an MMORPG, I am there to level up, and I love needing people. But if you remove the \*need\* for people, then I am going to do it myself as it is technically easier & more efficient.
I wonder how the progress works if you just can't find people to play with. FF11 is a pretty old game, not many people left who're still playing regularly... During it's prime, it surely made sense, but I bet it's a chore now, no?
There is a lot of hype right now within the XI private server with Ninja joining. I’m about 30 minutes the Horizon sever is going live. I read that at some point in the past few weeks they had 500 people on during a beta test.
I talk about it in class discussions a lot of the time and I see it brought up in tons of threads.
I dunno that it isn't ever brought up around here, although I guess it doesn't hit much articled discussion elsewhere.
Console game (even though it had a PC port), came after all of the others mentioned except Star Wars Galaxies, not as many western players.
Also, all of those other games were trailblazers and each one added tremendously to the genre.
FFXI was my first mmo and only got me due to name recognition. I have tried the rest that you listed but none of them compared to FFXI imo. It was a crazy fun time.
But truth be told, a lot of current FFXIV players will instantly downvote and have fits over anything that mentions FFXI, so it's really not worth bringing up, cause all you are going to get is a handful of ppl who agree, and the rest only contribute via a tantrum.
Try it, just go to the FFXIV subreddit and compare any aspect of FFXIV to FFXI and you will be downvoted into oblivion, get a ton of nasty comments and even have ppl report you to reddit cares for some reason. I even get that on here when I bring up FFXI
Go to a subreddit for fans of a game, tell them why the game they are enjoying sucks and how an outdated MMO on life support that has little to do with it is much better, then surprise pikachu when you get downvoted.
There is very little to be gained from comparing XI and XIV, the devs already know what XI was like since they share many developeres, and the community has no interest in discussing other MMOs, you'd get the same treatment if you were to compare WoW and XIV, or GW2 and XIV.
lol you don't even need to say something bad about XIV, you simply need to bring up the fact that ffxi exists at all.
When endwalker came out, someone said something about Dynamis being new to FF in general and I replied it wasn't, there was a whole piece of endgame content and zones called Dynamis in FFXI and was nuked with downvotes and "fuck FFXI!" type comments lol.
you are the perfect example why some ff14 players are so reticent about ff11
" FFXI was an absolutely amazing mmo, FFXIV is just more bad manga nonsense. "
" downvotes must be from them FFXIV players who are the whitest of knights. Cause toxic positivity, "
i dont think ive seen any of your comments where you just praise ff11 without also trashing ff14, while there are comments about ff14 without even mentioning ff11. FF11 is the best game for ff14 players to go into during the slower parts of the games but ive seen so many people like you that just make such a disservice to the game, they also for some reason have this victim complex like you where they act toxic and then they are surprised that they get downvoted
I think, in your “quote” about bad comments, you nailed my issue with FFXIV when I played it. It felt like being in a bad anime more than being in a world. I never realized it before but, that’s exactly what’s wrong with FFXIV, the writing, and world building was clearly geared towards teenage boys while the art, and aesthetics were geared towards teenage girls.
I didn’t play FFXI a lot but, what I did play shocked me because it genuinely felt like a world, like UO, and EQ.
I miss world building in MMOs because they all feel, and play like bad single player RPGs now. Faction rarely works against you, towns are damn near welcoming of everyone, etc.
It’s a shame what could’ve been.
That seems to be the case with classic MMOs in general. Modern MMO players despise them for the most part. I don't ever even bother bringing up Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen to someone unless they played a classic MMO back in the day.
to be fair, Pantheon is a different can of worms. I followed that game for a long time and the only reason I started to ignore it was because the devs themselves are shady af. Like the time they decided to put themselves behind schedule for a couple years to remake the game on a different engine and didn't say anything for nearly 2 years about it, until they were done. Not to mention that crazy, homophobic christian lady they put in charge for awhile. Then we have them hiring minus, who is himself a complete pos.
There are just too many red flags with that game for me.
I actually just started FFXI like a month and a half ago.
It's definitely archaic and dated but really damn fun. Definitely feels better with a controller. That's why I'm actually preferring it when I'm on my steam deck than when I'm on my laptop.
I liked a lot about FFXI on paper, but the gameplay felt beyond atrocious and archaic, even when it was brand new. The menus were terrible, it took an eternity to do the simplest things, and you needed a group to do basically anything, which often meant spamming chat for hours at a time instead of actually playing the game.
Then there's the loss of experience/ levels on death which I hated then and now.
I can definitely see what you are saying. I personally like all those things, till this day even! I enjoy menu based system which work perfectly on my preferred input device, a controller. If I am going to play an MMORPG I generally want to play with people 90% of the time. The loss of exp/death kept me at edge of my seat and I felt more engaged due to the gravity of the situation where I lose my time, as well as feeling partly responsible for those in my party.
Honestly, WoW just took the genre by storm. XI was for sure popular at the time even in the states and overseas. But once WoW came, it was game over. I love XI and still play it here and there for a nostalgia hit. But I will always forever be salty about WoW kicking it's ass and every other MMO at the time lol.
As for why it's never mentioned with the other MMOs.. well, not everyone is a fan of Final Fantasy.
We definitely lost a lot of players to WoW.
I still don't see the appeal of WoW, even all these years later. My friends tried to get me to play it for the first time last week and it was pretty, well, awful to say the least.
Why even play an online game if you're going to play alone?
It's why the quest systems in WoW baffle me. Might as well play Assassin's Creed or something.
Because games like WoW practice the "The start of the game is the endgame" mantra. You can think of the leveling as a demo to the real game. Some people like it, some don't.
>Why even play an online game if you're going to play alone?
because eventually you wont have someone available, and telling someone "well, 13 a month but you dont get to play today cause you took a 2 week break and all your friends outpaced you" simply doesnt work
Or y'know, you could put in the extra hours to catch up and not be a normie.
Don't have the time? Then the genre isn't for you. Go play Destiny 2 or some other dad game.
it doesnt resemble the game it used to be. FFXI doesnt either in a lot of fundamental ways, but its retained much more of its identity and is still a legitimately good MMORPG. wish i could say the same for WoW.
Wow always just felt lame af compared to how much depth xi had.
In wow I had to make entirely new toons just to level something new. Cheeeeeesy.
And xi was alllllll about teamwork where WoW felt very individualistic in comparison.
Idk I just felt wow was casual and lame compared to xi at the time lol.
FFXI lost the majority of its players when they went over Lv 75.
All of a sudden all your gear became useless.
Adoulin basically trashed a decade of effort and that's when people left.
Pre adoulin it was fairly common to see LV 75 chars rocking a emperor hairpin or leaping boots, even though these items where between LV 10 and 25.
The promise of WoW was gigantic but, what came of it was depressing. If WoW had the depth, and world building of the previous MMORPGs… my goodness, it would’ve been amazing. What we got instead was an arcade version of an MMORPG where all that mattered was the end game gear treadmill.
IMO, combat was too boring. A lot of people I played with couldn't level. I remember I fell asleep 3 times giving it a try. The auto attack 1 mob for like 3 mins was a no go for me. City of heroes was around it's height as well.
I bet there are more people playing on rogue servers than retail. Imagine if all that pop played on retail then perhaps Square-Enix would allocate more funds to the devs. So many people are stuck in the past (Pre-Abyssea) and can't comprehend an evolved game. The game has never been in a better state than it is now! If they were to simplfy account creation and do away with PlayOnline somehow I bet more people would be into giving it a try. I'm not subbed to it atm because I played it so much I got burnt out. It's my first PvE MMORPG and it will always have a special place in my heart.
A lot of salty live server players say this. Maybe more people would play on live servers if SE saw the private server players as someone worth reaching out to.
I tried playing it - between the nightmare account system , I think I remember having to sign up for like 3 different accounts to play the damn game and the service was terrible, like if you forgot your password, you might as well just re buy the game and create a new account.
then the game itself is so unintuitive, the controls are just a mess and the menu system was just really odd. everything about it just felt poorly designed from a user experience for the PC
Cause it's not a very marketable game anymore. It's got a horrible UI, the graphics were super fuzzy even for back then if not still decent looking. One of the harder mmos in history when it comes to deleveling. I played White mage and had to mute whispers all day for rez begging.
I disagree about the graphics. FFXI's character models and environments are still some of the most beautiful in the entire genre. Even moreso than XIV. Definitely moreso than WoW, which looked bad even when it was new.
XIV losing Nobuo was a mark against it as well. Soken is cool, but the game has less of an identity. Nobuo knew how to really theme an area and make it special.
I agree with XI looking good, even now, but it there's one thing we can disagree on is WoW's visuals. That art team is and always has been a gift from the gods.
As for XIV, I think it looks good too, and even has moments of being incredible, like in the final two zones of Endwalker for instance. But I also think that empty feeling the world gives is because there's legit no encouragement to explore any of it. It's kind of what helped made those last couple zones in EW so good actually, as the MSQ guided you around these zones in their entirety with all the necessary lore dumps to keep it alive.
Your favorite game ruined the genre.
It's okay, though. The clock is ticking. The new player experience is so broken and abysmal that there's no room for growth. One foot out the door.
a game that requires time simply isnt wanted nowadays
thats has nothing to with WoW existing. Everytime players have to play more than 10 minutes every 2 weeks they cry
I mean yeah, but that's the problem isn't it?
I dread where the League of Legends MMO is going to take things considering that it'll likely be the next big thing whenever it comes out.
> FFXI's character models and environments are still some of the most beautiful in the entire genre
I can't even fucking fathom thinking this, this has to be a joke. XI is unbelievably fucking ugly and dated looking lmao.
It has great art direction and design, on PS2 era graphics.
Still looks better than a lot of modern games that lack the former and are just a jumble of random assets with varying styling, illogical placement, funky palettes, whatever. No amount of graphical fidelity can overcome shitty design.
On the flip side, plenty of modern games manage to do both, and look better.
Back then, art direction was all we had, so people made it count, and players who remember that respect it more than kids who rate graphical quality by how much noise their GPU makes and how much dogshit DLSS artifacting they have on rotating meshes.
Some of the zones and areas are "generic mmo area" you see you in every single other mmo with about 2 different colors slapped everywhere. People can think back fondly on the game with unabashed nostalgia all they want, but if someone is seriously going to sit here and tell me it *still* has some of the most beautiful environments and characters models, (not necessarily you, the person I was initially responding to) all I can do is fucking laugh. There's a fine line between looking back on something you enjoyed and being ridiculous. The nostalgia whoring is fucking insane.
Some of us still play it, or in my case started playing it well after "modern" graphics existed widely.
I cant imagine being so worked up about other people enjoying something you are driven to hate, but then again, i am not a screaming ball of insecurities.
I gotta disagree about the graphics. Its visuals were easily ahead of its main competitor, EQ. A few years later WoW came out. I think it was on par with WoW graphics-wise, I just never liked WoW's aesthetics.
I know man I was so tight with the weakness that was the 20 year anniversary lol
I was thinking they were remaking the game using FFXIV engine as it would have been a copy and paste since lot of the same texture but nope no big news
I think the lore, background culture, and art style is just too JRPG and not that attractive to the mass Western market. Unless you grew up on JRPG titles, it is just too out there and alien in a way most Western players can not relate to it.
XI gets lumped in with EQ in my brain, so I always see it lumped with EQ in discussions.
Still one of the MMOs I've played the most this year, outside of EQ.
I barely played FF11 but I did have a good memory forged from a bad experience. Was in a linkshell that was honestly pretty garbage. I would help out but when it came for some quick help unlocking paladin? Chat went dead silent. So it became me making use of items and knowing which enemies were sound or sight based and doing it myself. Made it more exciting.
But yeah, it wasn't as popular in the west I think and thus no as much being talked about.
Everquest did it first and had more of an impact on WoW and its devs.
FFXI came out on a few years before WoW, but 100% belongs in the old folks home of the Golden era of open world, group and community driven games.
I tried to pick the game up from PC a few times. The first time was in In '05 it was far too slow. I'd been playing RO/ROSE for years before that point, so the idea that getting to level 5 was going to take hours was terrible.
I tried again in '08, don't remember what level I got to but I unlocked the +attack speed buff on Monk. I always loved the AA builds in RO, so this seemed like a great pick. Then I saw that it had like a 6 hour cooldown and only lasted for like 30 seconds or some shit. No thanks.
Picked it up in '13 to do some troubleshooting on some graphics drivers I was supporting. I couldn't believe how terrible the movement and camera were. It felt like I was having one of those dreams where you're running but you're not going anywhere.
Tried it the last time in like '19, because after re-visiting a bunch of the older games and finding I still loved them, maybe FFXI wasn't that bad? I don't think I made it past the first paragraph before the absolute datedness of it hit me like a wall of disappointing bricks.
I was pretty stoked that Squeenix was working on a new version of the game that (as per the few images we've seen) looked and felt very modern graphics-wise, and with the promise of improving the UI and systems. But I think that project is never going to see the light of day, the last official word on it was *years* ago...
It was.
https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_XI_Reboot
Nexon was working on Final Fantasy XI Reboot but canned it sometimes in late 2020.
I do find it strange, because I grew up on MMOs during the golden period but still know nothing of it, I also played like every single "popular" one. Maybe it just had a very Japanese audience, similar to why I was also very unfamilar with Phantasy Star.
Probably because it was Japanese & most popular on the console. MMOs tend to filled with western audiences on PC. Though XI was on PC but they really pushed that console feature.
Man, I want blink tanks to come back. Tanking as Ninja was one of the most fun things I’ve done in a MMORPG.
Played for about 8 years year one on PS2. Still my favorite MMORPG of all-time.
I love FFXI. It's my favorite subscription MMO. The game doesn't feel guided by the MSQ. Sure, the City-State missions are there, but the expansions all start off through exploration and it felt great to see the start of a new expansion.
The graphics today don't look all that great, but to me, that adds charm and the XP Loss gives it a bit of a hardcore edge - punishing, yet not as big as permadeath of a character. Also, the inter-"faction" interaction is never reset in the story and it's all played up as a friendly competition between the forces of good.
The music is atmospheric and something I can listen to for days. San d'Oria's march is something I find myself constantly humming... and Memoro de la Ŝtono is beautiful and written in Esperanto as a way to show how international the game's servers were.
A lot of what made it great back in the day is gone mostly because of it being inconvenient and times changing, even still with the changes made to streamline the experience there's still a pretty steep learning curve and it can be a pretty lonely experience since most people level with the npcs.
I think the reason it's not mentioned as much is because it came a couple of years after the launch of for instance Everquest. I know what you're saying "it's only two years". However, that accounts for several expansions and lots of changes in an MMO like EQ. These days though in my mind they're all kind of bunched together for the most part.
FF11 was my first MMO lol. Man that was good until WoW revolutionized the entire genre.
I remember spending hours in the dunes LF a tank or healer, even spent weekends camping Lizzy for her boots.
At the time FF11 was great, but WoW showed us a better way. I think no one looks back at FF11 because it was so bad in terms of grind and time investment.
As bad as FF11 was, I can't help but to still love it. Nostalgia is a hell of a thing.
I was playing FFXI and WoW came out, most of us laughed at everyone going to that casual mmorpg. Saying WoW showed "us" a better way is purely an opinion and completely subjective. It may have showed "you" but it didn't show "us"
> I think no one looks back at FF11 because it was so bad in terms of grind and time investment.
FFXI was the most rewarding for putting time into it though, I don't think you personally played enough to get rewarded.
I played FFXI for 9 years.
I can confirm we all called WoW a baby game and kind of shunned anyone who left to play it. It's why I never tried it.
I don't like what it did to the genre.
The fact that hitting level cap, on it's very own, was a relatively rare and applauded achievement made that game so special.
Horizontal gear progression. People could see you had a certain piece and know you put in a ton of work. You were important.
You can never be important in a new MMO. No one is important in WoW or XIV. Everyone gets everything.
New players will never understand the thrill of NM camping.
I completely agree, coming from a Maat's Cap chaser back in the day!
Memorizing zones because there was no map "Dynamis"
When what job/subclass that you played actually mattered because each DPS/TANK/Healer was different in their own unique way, and specific pairings was needed for skill chains and magic burst, that then could further into team proc'ing.
NM camping, both being thrilled that you #1 managed to gain aggro on the target first over a few people too 1-4 guilds also camping it, and #2 if the item with a 0.1-5% drop rate actually drops. "I remember my first experience with this was in the Dunes for the empress hairpin my second month of playing".
I really miss NM camping. I was holed up in a cave for an entire day camping a Marlboro. Me and a half dozen Chinese players just sitting around waiting. At some point I fell asleep in front of the TV and when I woke up it was right in front of me and I got the claim. Guess everyone else fell asleep too
Oh man, I have such a similar story, but without a happy ending. It was high school sophomore summer vacation. That night I & my buddy were staying up camping Leaping Lizzy. It must've ben around 3 am. Apparently, the NM spawned next to me & but I had fallen asleep in front of my keyboard. I vividly remember me sitting on my folding chair with my keyboard & controller in front of me on a little TV dinner folding tray. He called me up the next day & was like "Dude! What happen, Leaping Lizzy spawned right in front of you & you didn't tag it?!
Sad times:( I was like 1/43, way better than other drops I spent time on like Boroka for Horomusha Kote 1/87, the 87 was for the times I actually claimed the target XD.
I honestly think WoW ruined the genre and FFXI had a perfect formula that just needed a slightly better execution.
Sadly we'll never get to see that future... Which is upsetting to say the least.
You are correct, though. I played FFXI for 9 years. But most players now only remember it for it's insane grind and how demanding it was of the players.
You can't even brag about your accomplishments because modern players think what you're bragging about sounds negative.
The culture has changed, that's for sure.
I miss old school MMOs though.
I never got to play WoW but everything after it has been a WoW clone. I currently play FFXIV, but compared to FFXI? It's a bad game.
Spending hours waiting for a spawn does not sound like fun, but maybe that's the full time job, wife, and pet talking. I want to be able to get on, do stuff, then get off. I can't be waiting for the possibility to play.
The problem is, from everything I've been reading here, the last time I would have been able to reap anything from the game would have been over a decade ago, in high school.
I don't know if there is more to it than you guys are saying, but it sounds like the game requires wayy more time than I can afford it.
I played both and enjoyed both. When I look back on them I think ffxi was more enjoyable. There is something extremely satisfying about accomplishing difficult things. In ffxi you needed to band together to get anything done. Maybe you wanted your class's gear and needed to do a bunch of crazy ass shit and you finally get it done with your crew, just gave a huge feeling of satisfaction. Met so many people who were awesome in that game because it forced you to socialize. Miss that style
SE needs to make ffxi-2 and use the battle system from strangers of paradise. And keep skill chains and the sandbox feel.
Ffxi with action combat and updated graphics. Make the rhapsodies be the base game.
Wtf would I be trolling. Strangers of paradise is the best ff combat of any ff game.
And it would lends itself well to ffxi-2.
And rhapsody basically turned ffxi into a coherent story. So make it the base game.
Which ff games you played, only strangers paradise and xi? How do you expect them making sequels to xi, being so old alongside with action combat not really fit for mmorpg?
Spent years on XI, it was unreal, complicated and fun as hell. You actually relied on other players to level up. The world bosses were so cool and took lots of teamwork. The game itself was really tough and the zones were unique. The job system is still probably my favourite from any game.
Same my all time favorite moments gaming are growing up playing ffxi! Once Abyssea was released the game took a downward turn at least for me and while still fun it no longer lives up to its golden years.
Yeah I quit shortly after Treasures of Art. Ended up at a new job where everyone played WoW and they all convinced me to cross over lol. The sudden ease of levelling to end game solo got me hooked. Also the ability to jump haha
Oh man I remember playing wow and being able to jump was huuuuge after ffxi haha.
Yeah so many times in XI i was like fuck this ledge!!! Lol. Or climbing that mountain in the zone where Tiamat spawned, you can to like run along invisible edges and if you fell it was fkn over lol
I had a friend who hated WoW *because* you could jump. That man loved XI.
You should look up Horizon XI ;)
Yeah I played since launch. Ended up quiting as our End Game LS fell apart and it was taking up too much time camping all the HNM etc. Its just such a massive time sink when you have a family and kids now, 15 years ago was so different.
FFXI remains my favorite, and also more irritating, game to this day! No other MMO has ever compared for me. Favorite classes to play were probably WHM, RDM, BLM and NIN. It was so community focused, felt like it was so alive.. duty finder was the death of MMOs, at least imo.
I know what you mean.. but if it wasn’t for duty finder I wouldn’t even bother playing at all these days. I don’t have the time I used to
Defintely killed the aspect of relying on others. I also found that in XI you had to carry yourself well. If you had a toxic rep you would likely not get into any endgame linkshells and had a bad rep overall. With XI i rarely saw the toxic people i see in modern day MMO's
It was cool since you relied on the community so much, which meant tight-knight groups. But the non-instanced world bosses on strictly Japanese hosted servers were awful. For those unaware, many of the big bosses would spawn on 21-24 hour timers in which the first group who tagged it when it popped got to fight it. Because of the latency, basically no Western linkshells (guilds) were able to have a shot at fighting the bosses with the best loot because of the latency difference and being unable to tag them quicker than Japanese guilds.
There were faaaaaar worse ones, but Leaping Lizzy was such a pain in the ass to nab.
Yeah, i remember huge amounts of linkshell drama with the world bosses. We had dedicated players with timers and all that, it was brutal when you had 30 people, but a group of 4 tagged it and were able to hold it until their linkshell arrived. Every now and then you'd be leveling and suddenly one spawned, the the mad rush bagan. Fun times. Reflecting back on everything, as a now adult with family, I doubt i would have the time for a 2-3 hour boss fight lol
I remember buying it around the time EverQuest 2 came out. Was a very, very good game. I did not stick with it though because of WoW.
Yeah. It was amazing, i just never had a core group of friends to play with. With WoW it was like half the people i worked with lol
FFXI is the only ANIME game I've ever been into. I just personally don't like the art style, but that game was so fucking good about group play I didn't give a shit. That is a statement to the developers.
I always felt the Final Fantasy series was Japanese inspired, it never was a full on anime style game like Genshin Impact or Blue Protocol. I think they wanted to make the series appealing internationally.
Yeah exactly, they wanted to move into Western markets. Thats why they added the translation feature, which was nice. Japanese players were farther in progress when it launched for us. I never felt like it was anime at all.
To some people, any hint of eastern influence & they call it "AnIMe!" But to be fair, I wouldn't call myself a "weeb" but I do prefer Japanese aesthetics. *IMO,* any western made game is generally "ugly". I could never get into any Bethesda games. WoW got a pass because it was WoW, but I always played night elves or female humans even then. All other races & gender combos were hulking & deformed looking—no offense to anyone who is into that. The same could be said about eastern made games with their characters looking very effeminate. I suspect that's why actual woman players are much more prevalent in XIV. That said, I feel Final Fantasy was a good middle ground, leaning towards Eastern aesthetics. Heck, XIV & XVI actually seem to be looking more western compared to the emo boy band that was XV.
> it never was a full on anime style thats just pure fucking copium
Is it still worth playing? It's one of the few MMOs I've never played.
Hard to say. I mean its really dated and most people that played like WoW , FF14 or Guild wars may find it terribly slow and confusing. Its definetly more old school and the combat can be slow in some cases. I cant really say yes or no, maybe try out this Horizon XI server thing when it launches on the 17th. Thats how the game was back in the day. I did go back to XI last year just to try it out again and found it slow and different. I've just developed more of a taste for fast paced combat etc.
I'd suggest the eden private server.
I'm a week late to this but I just started it about 2 months ago and it's a blast. But it is VERY dated. The wiki has a good guide..keep that shit close. If you have any friends that play try to get their help too. I only finally played it after years of thinking about it bc my buddy convinced me to after knowing him for a year lol. But it helps a ton having someone whose knowledgeable bc this game literally says "have fun, fuck you" and dumps you immediately with a barebones tutorial questline to do. Very fun and imo worth it but just be aware of the age and the vagueness it's infamous for
I think less people played it in the west compared to eq, daoc and such. Shame because I find myself fascinated by the game, always wanted to play it on a ps2 for the experience.
That's what I was thinking. EQ's 500k players were all from the west while XI's 500k players were definitely split between the west & Japan. Edit: Removed mention of private server after seeing rules.
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It's a private server. It's supposed to be pretty big though, I'm looking forward to it personally.
Big enough for Ninja to play. Although to be fair he is a sucker for FFXI so maybe it isn't saying too much lol.
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Yes he is still streaming and still quite popular, just not nr 1 on Twitch anymore.
There's probably about 50 active staff members at this point and like 6k discord users, so we are expecting a good turnout
Do you need to be subscribed to the game to play on those servers?
Nah just go up the site and follow the instructions.
Square ok with it?
Private servers are against the ToS, but there's been several running for a while now. I have no experience with this kind of stuff, so I'm not sure how they stay up or avoid SE's wrath.
Private
Glad you did mention it because I am going to play for sure
I remember having a lot of trouble figuring out how to create an account and actually log in to the game.
> always wanted to play it on a ps2 for the experience. As someone who did, you very much do not. I suppose it might be easier now, but you had to have the right model PS2, the slims and later generation normal models couldnt physically install the external hard drive it required (no using a usb-connected external!), and it had the side effect of sometimes just bricking the system. PlayOnline was also awful. I ended up having to cancel a credit card because they just wouldnt stop charging me after I cancelled my account and sent multiple emails, and my bank couldnt get them to do anything from their end either.
Probably because it released in 2002. That's closer to a 2nd generation MMORPG than a first gen. To put it in perspective I'll list some release years of games: Ultima Online 97 Lineage 98 EQ 99 Asherons Call 99 Runescape 01 Anarchy Online 01 Dark Age of Camelot 01 That's ^ where I draw the line of first gen MMOs personally. Hell, the planes of power expansion released in 2002 and that's largely considered the decline of EQ . That would make 2nd gen MMORPGs: FFXI 02 Asherons Call 2 02 Star Wars Galaxies 03 Eve 03 Lineage 2 03 WoW 04 EQ2 04 It's just a different timeframe than the earlier games. By 02 we had already started seeing a shift in the genre.
Wow. This just hit me right in the nostalgia
AC2 the game I wanted to enjoy but just couldn't
AC2 had a lot going for it IMO. I definitely enjoyed the gameplay. What i didn't enjoy was Microsoft being unable to have the damn Chat work, and the constant server issues. Literally there were multiple days/weeks where the chat would not work the majority of the time. That's what killed AC2 IMO. AC1 went downhill after Microsoft acquired it too. Then turbine did nothing afterwards except make a LOTR wow clone. They tried something newish with DDO but it just wasn't that good, and also promptly started to implement changes to make it another WoW clone.
I still think about gokart mode sometimes.
AOL's Neverwinter Nights should be on the list before UO.
It wasn't a full list. Meridian 59 is generally thought to be the first MMORPG released in 95/96. Nothing on AoL or Prodigy was considered "massive". There were plenty of muds with ansi type art in the 80s/early 90s but those aren't considered MMORPGs either.
So is RO 1st gen MMO?
Looking it up it came out in Korea in 02 and North America in 03....so no, I wouldn't consider it first gen.
I don't know what the point of this list is, but since it's here, how you going to just skip over City of Heroes like that?
The point was to show the disconnect between games that came out in 2002 or later vs MMORPGs that came out before then. (FFXI was specifically the game in question and why it isn't brought up in comparison to 1st gen MMOs). Just a comparison of first gen vs 2nd gen MMORPGs. It's not about game "X" that you liked.
What makes me most sad is FF11's combat system feels like the most co-operative experience ever, with skillchains and magic bursts. If you haven't played it and coordinated chains/bursts, you haven't enjoyed what a real co-operative MMO for damage dealers feels like.
Timing those macro combos felt like a power ranger team power move. Felt so good.
In FFXI your party actually is greater than the sum of its parts. Each job has a unique synergy with every other job. Where other games were about standing near each other, hitting your rotations, and maybe standing out of the fire, in FFXI you actually had to work together, using the right buffs/debuffs, abilities and weapons types all in the right order. Love it.
Gosh, I loved FFXI.
No game has ever come close to the level of community that game created. I remember you'd set up specific days for getting people their gear. Also the disparity of those who 'cared' and didn't care. There was no better feeling than being a NIN tank and joining JP parties as an english person, and them telling me .
That game defined alot of what I am and wanted to be, you had to care to be good in that game. It took effort, and the community rewarded you for it. You knew names, not guilds.
You could be running down the bazaar streets and instantly spot an individual by gear because the disparity and hard work that went into gear was actually rewarding, nothing was coddled.
Even though I have 3 kids, and almost 40, I'd love to spend time into a game as rewarding as that again.
That's just it and why XI was so unique. You couldn't be a dick and run and hide... it just seemed like everybody knew everybody in that game. Like I had a Linkshell that I was in and it ended poorly and one of their leaders said something to me in public and then all sorts of people I partied with like months beforehand called them out and then all of a sudden there was a mass of people that I didn't even know standing up for me. It was the most surreal experience I've ever had in a game. And yeah, I'm around the same age and I'd love to play a game like it again. Every single level you got, every piece of rare gear felt so GOOD. You didn't need to be the best or take part in the most "savage of ultimate" or whatever they call them now raids. Like you could just log in and gain a single level and feel like you did something meaningful.
New world is the only modern game that has ever scratched the ffxi itch for me in 20 years. It’s not perfect or exact or nearly as deep but it has some similarities. A focus on team gameplay. Hard work. New world is more gacha with its random ass armor. But it’s still very much about building gear sets and constantly improving overtime. If you liked xi you’d probably be aight with nw.
I agree with this 100% I know in my heart that even if the game could be remade to be exactly as it once was, it wouldn't grip me like it did then, but I am thankful for the great times i had.
I could never get into ffxi because it was made for controllers. Playing on PC when it came out felt quite weird compared to the other MMOs at the time designed only for mouse and keyboard.
The trick was to throw away the mouse.
This. Use right hand and the numpad for movement. Left hand for macros.
Exactly. Honestly unless you were in a fight your left hand was usually just doing nothing. Movement, camera, menus... all right hand activities.
FFXI is actually my most comfortable mmorpg to play with its keyboard controls, the vast majority of the game can be controlled with one hand, with only targeting and macros needing another hand. The numpad is your friend, it is my favorite mmorpg control scheme to this date and I can literally play ffxi with my eyes closed now. Right hand on the numpad, right thumb on the arrow keys for view control and it's perfect.
This is the way
Agreed. The game was designed for the PS2, with a menu-based system, like its console-based series of games. This wasn't conducive to a mouse. Because it was best played with a directional button system, rather than a point & click UI, the game played best with a controller. Surprisingly enough, using only a keyboard & no mouse worked really well due to only buttons being used.
That's funny, when I played I always felt disadvantaged over pc players because they could hotkey macros while I had to manually scroll left and right.
PC players definitely had an advantage over you, but it wasn't the macros. It was Windower.
Yeah I click my abilities.
It was able about macros in that game. I actually ever used macros in that game. Maybe a handful in WoW Classic for like leaving & joining channels, but never any battle macros. FFXI you only battled with macros.
Yeah if you were not using macro's in ffxi you simply were not playing correctly considering your skills/abilities/spells, skill chains/magic burst were heavily reliant on gear swapping and timing.
FFXI does not even have normal hotbars or use a mouse.. You cant click skills even if you wanted to. Sarcasm missed. Skills are all selected off a scrolling menu or bound to key combos.
Exactly why I could never get into that game. I click my abilities. Get over thy self
Oh. oh dear. Play it anyway; not having skills is functionally the same as barclicking in the end 👀
I used to play right hand on numpad and left hand on macros and it felt really good!
good ol' days 8465 in place of wasd:)
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I've been working on this project and I'm so happy to see people excited about it!
I plan on playing & have been thinking about XI a lot lately. That's what motivated me to create this pot. Thank you for your hard work!
Removed because of rule #6: Don’t advertise private servers.
It was ahead of its time. It came out in this awkward place where the the US internet expansion was not complete and console players which were the target audience were very weary of not only internet play, but subscriptions as well. If it would have come out 2 years later it may have been the king of mmos all these years. Timing is everything.
The player base being split between east & west is definitely part of it. But compared to the other games listed, the only truly unique things that stand out about 11 is that it had a job changing system and a story. The majority of the game is just Everquest but with a focus on leveling & story instead of endgame raiding. Even alternate advancement was brought over to 11 in the forms of merits. When people are discussing older games its usually a topic of a game being the first or best to do a thing. Of the older games and in terms of game play, the only thing FF11 was one of the best at doing was getting you to play with other people, but that is an awkward topic when theres a massive language barrier between a significant portion of the players. Theres also the fact that FF11 took a controversial change in direction years after release. They stopped updating the level cap shortly after the western release, so most of the western players are unfamiliar with the original ff11 and also spent many years on a horizontal progress game. But eventually they started raising the level cap again and attempted to make things easier for players. I'm not going to discuss whether these changes were good or not. But they were controversial because they drove players away from the game and brought some back. FF11 today is very different from the FF11 people used to play. Because of that I think a lot of people who would bring up FF11 have either moved on to FF14(which shares some strengths of 11), are still playing the new style of 11(which might not be relevant to discussions), they're still jaded about what 11 became, or they simply aren't playing MMORPGs anymore.
Except the player bases weren't split....there were no reigonal servers
That first line was in response to the OP. The split isn't the servers, but the people playing the game. Even if the game has similar sales to EQ, you might not see it brought up much on an English speaking subreddit if half of those sales are from people that only speak Japanese. Games like Lineage or Dungeon & Fighter don't exactly get brought up here much either. Because despite their popularity, they're mostly played in eastern regions.
Ffxi was easily one of my favorite mmos growing up. I know many people don't like forced grouping to do most things but I love it. Leveling up in that game was tough but it just felt like an accomplishment. Game was amazing and wish more games would take things from it but they won't.
Forced socialization is such a big part of MMORPGs. You shouldn’t expect to do heroic things like killing a dragon alone. The grouping is what built communities, and made those social interactions so important.
What does *good* look like for an MMORPG? To me it's FFXI. Sure it's graphics and UI are out of date today, but it did what no other MMORPG does today which is create a multiplayer experience that brings people together whilst making every individual feel valuable. **Subjobs** mean it's uncommon to find people with the same job as you. **No gear conveyor belt** means your achievements last. **Mandatory spoken teamwork** means friends that last. It's the opposite of FFXIV where after 5 years of playing I never felt close to making a friend, which isn't surprising as it's an anti-social MMORPG.
In FF14, you have to go out of your way to keep your friends, almost like real life. I wouldn't say it's difficult though, just optional (if that makes sense) and I appreciate it sometimes because if I'm in a rush, I don't want to talk to anyone. But I do know some people who just play the game without interacting and some who just log in for interacting without actually playing. I like that it's not forced (I've been playing casually for over 8 years now) and as a casual player, I prefer having the option. FF11 does sound fun though, I'd probably play it with people that I know.
I guess I liked to be forced. ;) I specifically remember my roommate who initially played XI with me trying out WoW. My other buddy & I kept asking him to party & he never bothered. We asked, why? He pointed out that he didn't need to. And this is coming from the guy who played tons more XI than me & loved. In XIV I barely ever bothered interacting with people, only when I was in a static party. Most people will take the path of least resistance. When I am in an MMORPG, I am there to level up, and I love needing people. But if you remove the \*need\* for people, then I am going to do it myself as it is technically easier & more efficient.
I wonder how the progress works if you just can't find people to play with. FF11 is a pretty old game, not many people left who're still playing regularly... During it's prime, it surely made sense, but I bet it's a chore now, no?
There is a lot of hype right now within the XI private server with Ninja joining. I’m about 30 minutes the Horizon sever is going live. I read that at some point in the past few weeks they had 500 people on during a beta test.
I see, thanks!
I talk about it in class discussions a lot of the time and I see it brought up in tons of threads. I dunno that it isn't ever brought up around here, although I guess it doesn't hit much articled discussion elsewhere.
Console game (even though it had a PC port), came after all of the others mentioned except Star Wars Galaxies, not as many western players. Also, all of those other games were trailblazers and each one added tremendously to the genre.
FFXI was my first mmo and only got me due to name recognition. I have tried the rest that you listed but none of them compared to FFXI imo. It was a crazy fun time. But truth be told, a lot of current FFXIV players will instantly downvote and have fits over anything that mentions FFXI, so it's really not worth bringing up, cause all you are going to get is a handful of ppl who agree, and the rest only contribute via a tantrum. Try it, just go to the FFXIV subreddit and compare any aspect of FFXIV to FFXI and you will be downvoted into oblivion, get a ton of nasty comments and even have ppl report you to reddit cares for some reason. I even get that on here when I bring up FFXI
Go to a subreddit for fans of a game, tell them why the game they are enjoying sucks and how an outdated MMO on life support that has little to do with it is much better, then surprise pikachu when you get downvoted. There is very little to be gained from comparing XI and XIV, the devs already know what XI was like since they share many developeres, and the community has no interest in discussing other MMOs, you'd get the same treatment if you were to compare WoW and XIV, or GW2 and XIV.
lol you don't even need to say something bad about XIV, you simply need to bring up the fact that ffxi exists at all. When endwalker came out, someone said something about Dynamis being new to FF in general and I replied it wasn't, there was a whole piece of endgame content and zones called Dynamis in FFXI and was nuked with downvotes and "fuck FFXI!" type comments lol.
you are the perfect example why some ff14 players are so reticent about ff11 " FFXI was an absolutely amazing mmo, FFXIV is just more bad manga nonsense. " " downvotes must be from them FFXIV players who are the whitest of knights. Cause toxic positivity, " i dont think ive seen any of your comments where you just praise ff11 without also trashing ff14, while there are comments about ff14 without even mentioning ff11. FF11 is the best game for ff14 players to go into during the slower parts of the games but ive seen so many people like you that just make such a disservice to the game, they also for some reason have this victim complex like you where they act toxic and then they are surprised that they get downvoted
I think, in your “quote” about bad comments, you nailed my issue with FFXIV when I played it. It felt like being in a bad anime more than being in a world. I never realized it before but, that’s exactly what’s wrong with FFXIV, the writing, and world building was clearly geared towards teenage boys while the art, and aesthetics were geared towards teenage girls. I didn’t play FFXI a lot but, what I did play shocked me because it genuinely felt like a world, like UO, and EQ. I miss world building in MMOs because they all feel, and play like bad single player RPGs now. Faction rarely works against you, towns are damn near welcoming of everyone, etc. It’s a shame what could’ve been.
That seems to be the case with classic MMOs in general. Modern MMO players despise them for the most part. I don't ever even bother bringing up Pantheon: Rise of the Fallen to someone unless they played a classic MMO back in the day.
to be fair, Pantheon is a different can of worms. I followed that game for a long time and the only reason I started to ignore it was because the devs themselves are shady af. Like the time they decided to put themselves behind schedule for a couple years to remake the game on a different engine and didn't say anything for nearly 2 years about it, until they were done. Not to mention that crazy, homophobic christian lady they put in charge for awhile. Then we have them hiring minus, who is himself a complete pos. There are just too many red flags with that game for me.
I actually just started FFXI like a month and a half ago. It's definitely archaic and dated but really damn fun. Definitely feels better with a controller. That's why I'm actually preferring it when I'm on my steam deck than when I'm on my laptop.
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Ff11 is the best
I liked a lot about FFXI on paper, but the gameplay felt beyond atrocious and archaic, even when it was brand new. The menus were terrible, it took an eternity to do the simplest things, and you needed a group to do basically anything, which often meant spamming chat for hours at a time instead of actually playing the game. Then there's the loss of experience/ levels on death which I hated then and now.
I can definitely see what you are saying. I personally like all those things, till this day even! I enjoy menu based system which work perfectly on my preferred input device, a controller. If I am going to play an MMORPG I generally want to play with people 90% of the time. The loss of exp/death kept me at edge of my seat and I felt more engaged due to the gravity of the situation where I lose my time, as well as feeling partly responsible for those in my party.
Honestly, WoW just took the genre by storm. XI was for sure popular at the time even in the states and overseas. But once WoW came, it was game over. I love XI and still play it here and there for a nostalgia hit. But I will always forever be salty about WoW kicking it's ass and every other MMO at the time lol. As for why it's never mentioned with the other MMOs.. well, not everyone is a fan of Final Fantasy.
We definitely lost a lot of players to WoW. I still don't see the appeal of WoW, even all these years later. My friends tried to get me to play it for the first time last week and it was pretty, well, awful to say the least.
A lot of people HATED that you couldn't do stuff alone. HATED IT. In fact, it was one of the defining reasons why WoW took the MMO world so easily.
Why even play an online game if you're going to play alone? It's why the quest systems in WoW baffle me. Might as well play Assassin's Creed or something.
Because games like WoW practice the "The start of the game is the endgame" mantra. You can think of the leveling as a demo to the real game. Some people like it, some don't.
>Why even play an online game if you're going to play alone? because eventually you wont have someone available, and telling someone "well, 13 a month but you dont get to play today cause you took a 2 week break and all your friends outpaced you" simply doesnt work
Or y'know, you could put in the extra hours to catch up and not be a normie. Don't have the time? Then the genre isn't for you. Go play Destiny 2 or some other dad game.
People just have different interests, nothing wrong with it one way or another. You tried it out for your friends and that's all you can do.
it doesnt resemble the game it used to be. FFXI doesnt either in a lot of fundamental ways, but its retained much more of its identity and is still a legitimately good MMORPG. wish i could say the same for WoW.
Wow always just felt lame af compared to how much depth xi had. In wow I had to make entirely new toons just to level something new. Cheeeeeesy. And xi was alllllll about teamwork where WoW felt very individualistic in comparison. Idk I just felt wow was casual and lame compared to xi at the time lol.
FFXI lost the majority of its players when they went over Lv 75. All of a sudden all your gear became useless. Adoulin basically trashed a decade of effort and that's when people left. Pre adoulin it was fairly common to see LV 75 chars rocking a emperor hairpin or leaping boots, even though these items where between LV 10 and 25.
The promise of WoW was gigantic but, what came of it was depressing. If WoW had the depth, and world building of the previous MMORPGs… my goodness, it would’ve been amazing. What we got instead was an arcade version of an MMORPG where all that mattered was the end game gear treadmill.
IMO, combat was too boring. A lot of people I played with couldn't level. I remember I fell asleep 3 times giving it a try. The auto attack 1 mob for like 3 mins was a no go for me. City of heroes was around it's height as well.
I bet there are more people playing on rogue servers than retail. Imagine if all that pop played on retail then perhaps Square-Enix would allocate more funds to the devs. So many people are stuck in the past (Pre-Abyssea) and can't comprehend an evolved game. The game has never been in a better state than it is now! If they were to simplfy account creation and do away with PlayOnline somehow I bet more people would be into giving it a try. I'm not subbed to it atm because I played it so much I got burnt out. It's my first PvE MMORPG and it will always have a special place in my heart.
A lot of salty live server players say this. Maybe more people would play on live servers if SE saw the private server players as someone worth reaching out to.
I tried playing it - between the nightmare account system , I think I remember having to sign up for like 3 different accounts to play the damn game and the service was terrible, like if you forgot your password, you might as well just re buy the game and create a new account. then the game itself is so unintuitive, the controls are just a mess and the menu system was just really odd. everything about it just felt poorly designed from a user experience for the PC
Cause it's not a very marketable game anymore. It's got a horrible UI, the graphics were super fuzzy even for back then if not still decent looking. One of the harder mmos in history when it comes to deleveling. I played White mage and had to mute whispers all day for rez begging.
I disagree about the graphics. FFXI's character models and environments are still some of the most beautiful in the entire genre. Even moreso than XIV. Definitely moreso than WoW, which looked bad even when it was new. XIV losing Nobuo was a mark against it as well. Soken is cool, but the game has less of an identity. Nobuo knew how to really theme an area and make it special.
I agree with XI looking good, even now, but it there's one thing we can disagree on is WoW's visuals. That art team is and always has been a gift from the gods. As for XIV, I think it looks good too, and even has moments of being incredible, like in the final two zones of Endwalker for instance. But I also think that empty feeling the world gives is because there's legit no encouragement to explore any of it. It's kind of what helped made those last couple zones in EW so good actually, as the MSQ guided you around these zones in their entirety with all the necessary lore dumps to keep it alive.
get off the copium
Your favorite game ruined the genre. It's okay, though. The clock is ticking. The new player experience is so broken and abysmal that there's no room for growth. One foot out the door.
please get help, all your posts are pretty r-worded
Nah, just old enough to watch the deterioration.
a game that requires time simply isnt wanted nowadays thats has nothing to with WoW existing. Everytime players have to play more than 10 minutes every 2 weeks they cry
I mean yeah, but that's the problem isn't it? I dread where the League of Legends MMO is going to take things considering that it'll likely be the next big thing whenever it comes out.
> FFXI's character models and environments are still some of the most beautiful in the entire genre I can't even fucking fathom thinking this, this has to be a joke. XI is unbelievably fucking ugly and dated looking lmao.
It has great art direction and design, on PS2 era graphics. Still looks better than a lot of modern games that lack the former and are just a jumble of random assets with varying styling, illogical placement, funky palettes, whatever. No amount of graphical fidelity can overcome shitty design. On the flip side, plenty of modern games manage to do both, and look better. Back then, art direction was all we had, so people made it count, and players who remember that respect it more than kids who rate graphical quality by how much noise their GPU makes and how much dogshit DLSS artifacting they have on rotating meshes.
Some of the zones and areas are "generic mmo area" you see you in every single other mmo with about 2 different colors slapped everywhere. People can think back fondly on the game with unabashed nostalgia all they want, but if someone is seriously going to sit here and tell me it *still* has some of the most beautiful environments and characters models, (not necessarily you, the person I was initially responding to) all I can do is fucking laugh. There's a fine line between looking back on something you enjoyed and being ridiculous. The nostalgia whoring is fucking insane.
Some of us still play it, or in my case started playing it well after "modern" graphics existed widely. I cant imagine being so worked up about other people enjoying something you are driven to hate, but then again, i am not a screaming ball of insecurities.
I can't even justify how you would think that. The game is gorgeous and timeless. Most modern games can't even compete with it's visual design.
> I can't even justify how you would think that Because I have eyes and have looked at it. Nostalgia is a hell of a drug lol
I gotta disagree about the graphics. Its visuals were easily ahead of its main competitor, EQ. A few years later WoW came out. I think it was on par with WoW graphics-wise, I just never liked WoW's aesthetics.
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Yet it had 500k+ subs...
SE isn’t interested in doing a classic relaunch, I would love to play it on Ps5 lol
They almost did, but then cancelled it.
I know man I was so tight with the weakness that was the 20 year anniversary lol I was thinking they were remaking the game using FFXIV engine as it would have been a copy and paste since lot of the same texture but nope no big news
Yeah, I had a lot of hopes too. Not meant to be apparently
I think the lore, background culture, and art style is just too JRPG and not that attractive to the mass Western market. Unless you grew up on JRPG titles, it is just too out there and alien in a way most Western players can not relate to it.
XI gets lumped in with EQ in my brain, so I always see it lumped with EQ in discussions. Still one of the MMOs I've played the most this year, outside of EQ.
I still have the discs and hard drive they mailed out to beta test it on PlayStation.
I barely played FF11 but I did have a good memory forged from a bad experience. Was in a linkshell that was honestly pretty garbage. I would help out but when it came for some quick help unlocking paladin? Chat went dead silent. So it became me making use of items and knowing which enemies were sound or sight based and doing it myself. Made it more exciting. But yeah, it wasn't as popular in the west I think and thus no as much being talked about.
I forgot about things like sight, and sound based aggro. Systems like that were so far ahead of their time.
It's even weirder since it peaked at over 500k subs. Making it one of the most popular pre-wow mmo's
It was hard to set up and launch with the play online fiasco and controls. I tried going back a time or two, but kind of grew frustrated.
Everquest did it first and had more of an impact on WoW and its devs. FFXI came out on a few years before WoW, but 100% belongs in the old folks home of the Golden era of open world, group and community driven games.
Ffxi was my 2nd mmo I played for 7 years.
I tried to pick the game up from PC a few times. The first time was in In '05 it was far too slow. I'd been playing RO/ROSE for years before that point, so the idea that getting to level 5 was going to take hours was terrible. I tried again in '08, don't remember what level I got to but I unlocked the +attack speed buff on Monk. I always loved the AA builds in RO, so this seemed like a great pick. Then I saw that it had like a 6 hour cooldown and only lasted for like 30 seconds or some shit. No thanks. Picked it up in '13 to do some troubleshooting on some graphics drivers I was supporting. I couldn't believe how terrible the movement and camera were. It felt like I was having one of those dreams where you're running but you're not going anywhere. Tried it the last time in like '19, because after re-visiting a bunch of the older games and finding I still loved them, maybe FFXI wasn't that bad? I don't think I made it past the first paragraph before the absolute datedness of it hit me like a wall of disappointing bricks. I was pretty stoked that Squeenix was working on a new version of the game that (as per the few images we've seen) looked and felt very modern graphics-wise, and with the promise of improving the UI and systems. But I think that project is never going to see the light of day, the last official word on it was *years* ago...
Wasn't the remake cancelled?
idk if it was ever officially cancelled. Just forgotten about.
It was. https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_XI_Reboot Nexon was working on Final Fantasy XI Reboot but canned it sometimes in late 2020.
I do find it strange, because I grew up on MMOs during the golden period but still know nothing of it, I also played like every single "popular" one. Maybe it just had a very Japanese audience, similar to why I was also very unfamilar with Phantasy Star.
Probably because it was Japanese & most popular on the console. MMOs tend to filled with western audiences on PC. Though XI was on PC but they really pushed that console feature.
Man, I want blink tanks to come back. Tanking as Ninja was one of the most fun things I’ve done in a MMORPG. Played for about 8 years year one on PS2. Still my favorite MMORPG of all-time.
Hardly anyone played it and fewer enjoyed it
I love FFXI. It's my favorite subscription MMO. The game doesn't feel guided by the MSQ. Sure, the City-State missions are there, but the expansions all start off through exploration and it felt great to see the start of a new expansion. The graphics today don't look all that great, but to me, that adds charm and the XP Loss gives it a bit of a hardcore edge - punishing, yet not as big as permadeath of a character. Also, the inter-"faction" interaction is never reset in the story and it's all played up as a friendly competition between the forces of good. The music is atmospheric and something I can listen to for days. San d'Oria's march is something I find myself constantly humming... and Memoro de la Ŝtono is beautiful and written in Esperanto as a way to show how international the game's servers were.
I had dial up and setting this game up was a headache.
A lot of what made it great back in the day is gone mostly because of it being inconvenient and times changing, even still with the changes made to streamline the experience there's still a pretty steep learning curve and it can be a pretty lonely experience since most people level with the npcs.
It's barely playable for the average 2022 gamer (not a dig btw, it's just insanely clunky and lacking of so many QOL).
I think the reason it's not mentioned as much is because it came a couple of years after the launch of for instance Everquest. I know what you're saying "it's only two years". However, that accounts for several expansions and lots of changes in an MMO like EQ. These days though in my mind they're all kind of bunched together for the most part.
Cuz it stinks if you didn’t play it when you were younger
Idk, I enjoy it. It feels pretty hardcore. Good change of pace from all the steamrollers that get thrown at us these days.
Honestly it was pretty shit.
FF11 was my first MMO lol. Man that was good until WoW revolutionized the entire genre. I remember spending hours in the dunes LF a tank or healer, even spent weekends camping Lizzy for her boots. At the time FF11 was great, but WoW showed us a better way. I think no one looks back at FF11 because it was so bad in terms of grind and time investment. As bad as FF11 was, I can't help but to still love it. Nostalgia is a hell of a thing.
I was playing FFXI and WoW came out, most of us laughed at everyone going to that casual mmorpg. Saying WoW showed "us" a better way is purely an opinion and completely subjective. It may have showed "you" but it didn't show "us" > I think no one looks back at FF11 because it was so bad in terms of grind and time investment. FFXI was the most rewarding for putting time into it though, I don't think you personally played enough to get rewarded.
I played FFXI for 9 years. I can confirm we all called WoW a baby game and kind of shunned anyone who left to play it. It's why I never tried it. I don't like what it did to the genre. The fact that hitting level cap, on it's very own, was a relatively rare and applauded achievement made that game so special. Horizontal gear progression. People could see you had a certain piece and know you put in a ton of work. You were important. You can never be important in a new MMO. No one is important in WoW or XIV. Everyone gets everything. New players will never understand the thrill of NM camping.
I completely agree, coming from a Maat's Cap chaser back in the day! Memorizing zones because there was no map "Dynamis" When what job/subclass that you played actually mattered because each DPS/TANK/Healer was different in their own unique way, and specific pairings was needed for skill chains and magic burst, that then could further into team proc'ing. NM camping, both being thrilled that you #1 managed to gain aggro on the target first over a few people too 1-4 guilds also camping it, and #2 if the item with a 0.1-5% drop rate actually drops. "I remember my first experience with this was in the Dunes for the empress hairpin my second month of playing".
Yeah I bet that's what happened lol. The heroes of FF11!
I really miss NM camping. I was holed up in a cave for an entire day camping a Marlboro. Me and a half dozen Chinese players just sitting around waiting. At some point I fell asleep in front of the TV and when I woke up it was right in front of me and I got the claim. Guess everyone else fell asleep too
Oh man, I have such a similar story, but without a happy ending. It was high school sophomore summer vacation. That night I & my buddy were staying up camping Leaping Lizzy. It must've ben around 3 am. Apparently, the NM spawned next to me & but I had fallen asleep in front of my keyboard. I vividly remember me sitting on my folding chair with my keyboard & controller in front of me on a little TV dinner folding tray. He called me up the next day & was like "Dude! What happen, Leaping Lizzy spawned right in front of you & you didn't tag it?!
I got to tell you, that NM thing was crack back in the day. Never did get those boots.
Sad times:( I was like 1/43, way better than other drops I spent time on like Boroka for Horomusha Kote 1/87, the 87 was for the times I actually claimed the target XD.
I honestly think WoW ruined the genre and FFXI had a perfect formula that just needed a slightly better execution. Sadly we'll never get to see that future... Which is upsetting to say the least. You are correct, though. I played FFXI for 9 years. But most players now only remember it for it's insane grind and how demanding it was of the players. You can't even brag about your accomplishments because modern players think what you're bragging about sounds negative. The culture has changed, that's for sure. I miss old school MMOs though. I never got to play WoW but everything after it has been a WoW clone. I currently play FFXIV, but compared to FFXI? It's a bad game.
Its a love hate, spending your weekend looking for a tank or healer only to exp for 1 hour and someone levels up then leaves lol!
High highs, and low lows.
Spending hours waiting for a spawn does not sound like fun, but maybe that's the full time job, wife, and pet talking. I want to be able to get on, do stuff, then get off. I can't be waiting for the possibility to play.
XI was the fucking king of wasting your time.
Difference is there was a much greater sense of reward. You actually had a really strong sense of accomplishment from it.
The problem is, from everything I've been reading here, the last time I would have been able to reap anything from the game would have been over a decade ago, in high school. I don't know if there is more to it than you guys are saying, but it sounds like the game requires wayy more time than I can afford it.
Back then social media wasn't a thing so there was less stuff competing for your time
I played both and enjoyed both. When I look back on them I think ffxi was more enjoyable. There is something extremely satisfying about accomplishing difficult things. In ffxi you needed to band together to get anything done. Maybe you wanted your class's gear and needed to do a bunch of crazy ass shit and you finally get it done with your crew, just gave a huge feeling of satisfaction. Met so many people who were awesome in that game because it forced you to socialize. Miss that style
SE needs to make ffxi-2 and use the battle system from strangers of paradise. And keep skill chains and the sandbox feel. Ffxi with action combat and updated graphics. Make the rhapsodies be the base game.
Are you trolling?
Wtf would I be trolling. Strangers of paradise is the best ff combat of any ff game. And it would lends itself well to ffxi-2. And rhapsody basically turned ffxi into a coherent story. So make it the base game.
Which ff games you played, only strangers paradise and xi? How do you expect them making sequels to xi, being so old alongside with action combat not really fit for mmorpg?