Hate to be a downer.

I've played nearly every major MMO under the sun. The girlfriend is starting up FFXI again and keeps bothering me to give it another shot (I played it for a couple months when it came out). I agreed and decided to play it, especially now that I have a better computer than I had back in the day (understatement of the year).

Anyways, as a n00b the game is incredibly unfriendly. I just spent 20 minutes wandering around Windurst trying to find the Jack of Spades guy. Ugh. Anyways, found him and got my 50gil (lol), and started leveling. Had to spend 10 minutes getting the controls the way I want them to me, everything feels completely different than other MMOs, including things that have no reason to be different (escape normally pulls up config... not this time, buddy). I'm a thief, so until level five I get sandwhich combat - attack, make a sandwich, guy is dead hopefully. Then the healing... oh jeez it takes forever to heal even at n00b levels.

I played a red mage, then a black mage on my girlfriend's account a while back, and admittedly neither were this bad. I just want to play a dude with a bow but this is rather painful. Not saying it isn't a great game, chances are I will get too frustrated with the newbie experience to play after my 14 day trial is up to ever find out. I'm not a big fan of games that force you to be bored as a newbie before you get to have fun.

No Doubt I'll get flamed to high hell for this. Oh well. I just feel like this game offers little incentive, even to a FF fan like myself, to play through the newbie levels.

Originally posted by Rotak

Hate to be a downer.

 

I've played nearly every major MMO under the sun. The girlfriend is starting up FFXI again and keeps bothering me to give it another shot (I played it for a couple months when it came out). I agreed and decided to play it, especially now that I have a better computer than I had back in the day (understatement of the year).

Anyways, as a n00b the game is incredibly unfriendly. I just spent 20 minutes wandering around Windurst trying to find the Jack of Spades guy. Ugh. Anyways, found him and got my 50gil (lol), and started leveling. Had to spend 10 minutes getting the controls the way I want them to me, everything feels completely different than other MMOs, including things that have no reason to be different (escape normally pulls up config... not this time, buddy). I'm a thief, so until level five I get sandwhich combat - attack, make a sandwich, guy is dead hopefully. Then the healing... oh jeez it takes forever to heal even at n00b levels.

I played a red mage, then a black mage on my girlfriend's account a while back, and admittedly neither were this bad. I just want to play a dude with a bow but this is rather painful. Not saying it isn't a great game, chances are I will get too frustrated with the newbie experience to play after my 14 day trial is up to ever find out. I'm not a big fan of games that force you to be bored as a newbie before you get to have fun.

 

No Doubt I'll get flamed to high hell for this. Oh well. I just feel like this game offers little incentive, even to a FF fan like myself, to play through the newbie levels.

Yeah, the first few levels in FFXI can be a real bummer. The game is as hard in the beginning as it is in the end basically. If you can put up with the frustrations of the early levels, you can pretty much take anything the game throws at you, which is where it differs from a lot of other MMOs. Most MMOs start off fairly easy, and then they get gradually harder. In FFXI, it starts off difficult, and stays just as difficult throughout the entire game. If anything, the earlier levels are more brutal than the later ones.

But the type of fun that FFXI brings to the table starts right away. There are plenty of other things you can do besides trying to kill things/level up. You could take part in some of your nations storyline missions, try and get your fame up for your nation by doing quests (and in the process, get quest rewards that are worth a lot of gil), do a few outpost runs, try and get your teleport crystals early. If you try and intermix all of that in to your leveling routines, it'll seem less tedious/boring/frustrating.

But yeah, the nooby experience in the game is fairly painful. The PC controls aren't the most intuitive either. Also, this game is frustrating about 80% of the time. But the feeling of accomplishement is really rewarding because of how difficult the game is.

If you ever get the urge to try the game again, try to intermix all of that stuff that I mentioned earlier in to your leveling routine. Also, if you have a PC gamepad laying around (Xbox 360 controller for Windows, Logitech Rumblepad, etc), try hooking that in when you run FFXI, instead of using PC controls. The controls are much more fluid with a controller than they are with a KB/M. Just a few things that would alleviate some of the frustrations of the game :P.

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Originally posted by Rotak

 
No Doubt I'll get flamed to high hell for this. Oh well.

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Oh you poor, poor man. You've been hanging around the wrong games, huh? ^^

No one in FFXI forums will flame you for not liking the game. That is one thing that is different in this game as well. Only the disrepectful get blacklisted in FFXI, somewhat like Quaker shunning, and get no party invites. But there's no insults because the population is quite a bit older.

It is a very tough game in the beginning. The mobs are not scaled down for ease like in anything else. If you do choose to fight the Easy mobs, you will win but you won't get much exp. The game rewards excellent, skillful play, although some thing its just stupid they make you do it that way. One has to pay attention to what they are doing while playing FFXI; really can't go afk while fighting or watch television; especially while grouping later on. You'll find if you ever could get the hang of it, you would never go back to any other PvE game and think they were tough.

Anyways, good luck. If you like PvE, you might try LOTRO.. very good storyline and the mobs are scaled down. The classes aren't as diverse as FFXI, but they are pretty good. Theres no BLM type, just a Hunter class that is the nuker with arrows. Vanguard, even though it had a bad, horrible, TERRIBLE launch does have many improvements and even more classes than FFXI. The community is not large, but its just as mature as FFXI and after joining a guild, you'll find you won't want for much help doing things.

HEY someone else in the same boat... But yea i went back to FFXI playing it on and off... at the moment off... but honestly there is nothing else like it... Even the new games don't compare... The graphics might be dated but the gameplay is legend.

If you are looking to just kill time... GO LEARN TO PLAY AN INSTRUMENT! ;) that's what I did... waiting for the next FFXI is taking a while but in this time I learned how to play electric/acoustic guitar and bass guitar... ;) so Go get healthy and mind ready for the next game. I'm sure SE won't disappoint... :D GL!

Originally posted by Qinshien

If you are looking to just kill time... GO LEARN TO PLAY AN INSTRUMENT! ;)

Its kinda funny because I am a musician. I play Bass and Trombone. I play other Brass instruments as well. I have been playing alot more lately though. I guess the wait for the next FFXI killer will be awhile then lol.

you could write a game which is different from wow by yourself. good luck.

Actually, my girlfriend is very defensive anytime I criticize FFXI. Between her and a friend who plays, I guess my luck with cordial FFXI'ers hasn't been so great. Love both of them (differently, obviously) outside of MMOs, but both were hyper-defensive. Neither has played other MMOs. I got flamed by them, I figure if people irl will flame me, well, the internet hardly brings out anyone's best.

As for those ideas of other things to do, they sound interestng and fun, and present some of the problem. A newbie has no idea how to do those things, or even that they CAN do those things. I am not a grinder, in the sense I don't love achieving levels just for that sake. I like having when WHILE I'm playing, so I love doing things that are "unconventional". I probably scaled more of Dereth (AC) than anyone else on any server, to be honest, and I never did make the max level after 4 years...

I am giving FFXI another 13 days to prove me wrong. I want to give it a fair trial, though it doesn't help that I also just started Ryzom (which is a unique experience as well, very friendly community and a unique leveling system and world) I signed up for the trial and want to play it through. I'm intrigued about trying it on my PS3, which I've read is possible, but I'd have to buy the PS2 so unless I see it at a good price probably won't happen... the PC controls do appear sluggish though. I just wish I had a PC controller :-/.

Actually came from Vanguard. The game has made gigantic strides from last year, it's a shame that Sony didn't wait to make it launch better because it simply never recovered. They took the EQ approach that they'd iron it out while people paid their dough, but games can't do that now-a-days. When EQ did it, it was pretty much the only game out there. Now, there are a bajillion. I left VG because, ironically, of something it was never made to be... I wanted SOME PVP/Faction struggle. It's not the central part of my gaming experience, but it's fun.

Anyways, I'm going to try to play and have fun. I really WANT to like FFXI, as I like the faction competition, classes, world, and even today still like the graphics... Anyways, I think the first game is special to everyone - my fonest memories are crushing Olthoi in Asheron's Call, or in my 3rd game DAOC shooting arrows at monsters 3x my level and running away frantically... One question though, I like to alt-tab at times, every time I do that it crashes my game, but I could've sworn in the past I'd played it and been able to do so. Isn't that possible in FFXI? It'd make the downtime in between combat faster as a n00b...

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Originally posted by Rotak

Actually, my girlfriend is very defensive anytime I criticize FFXI. Between her and a friend who plays, I guess my luck with cordial FFXI'ers hasn't been so great. Love both of them (differently, obviously) outside of MMOs, but both were hyper-defensive. Neither has played other MMOs. I got flamed by them, I figure if people irl will flame me, well, the internet hardly brings out anyone's best.

Actually came from Vanguard. ...... I left VG because, ironically, of something it was never made to be... I wanted SOME PVP/Faction struggle. It's not the central part of my gaming experience, but it's fun.

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Hehe... who doesn't get flamed by their boyfriend/girlfriend/friends? My wife flames me sometimes, and she doesn't even play MMOs.^^

It's always revealing when someone gives more and more information and then other's can start to see exactly why someone may/may not like a game.

Based on the new info you provided, you:

A) Left Vanguard, which is a full PvE game pretty much because you wanted to PvP more (not counting the bugs).

B) Don't really like the grinding type of PvE game, and would like to have more faction rivalries.

I am taking a guess, that if that is what you want, no matter how many times you try/retry FFXI, you are never going to like it unless, your personal tastes change.

FFXI is the ultimate group PvE game, first and foremost and last. (Which is weird you played Vanguard, as it was that type of game pretty much) While you played DAoC and realized there was PvE in it, it's primary purpose was to gather people together at endgame to kill... each other. Of course there are different means (zerging, sieging, duels, small scale battles, etc) but the end result is never in doubt; it was designed for you to kill other subscribers, first and foremost. Other than perhaps LOTRO, there is no other PvE game where every class is basically designed to work with every other class no matter what the race or "faction" to kill a common enemy.

FFXI is designed by the Japanese with the OPPOSITE intentions of any game that includes PvP as a side draw or main event. It is a wholly group experience which is designed to bring people together to kill mobs as a collective. That is the sole purpose. They achieve it by the mentoring, by dungeons, powerleveling, etc. The makers of this game have always had a different philosphy from day 1. It was never set up to be antagonistic like a PvP game or hybrid, where you spent your time devising how to fight other players, or go about your PvE life and kill other factions you haphazardly come across while doing quests. The PvP was put in simply as a reactionary thing to a much smaller component in the game, people who wanted to play around with PvP. The focus of this game has always been story, as evidenced by the cutscenes all throughout it and the progression of your character.

This is why gaming relationships in FFXI are deeper, because of the sheer amount of time you spend with a select group of people, yakking and chatting, while killing tons of mobs. The dryest experience in FFXI is when you get people who say... nothing or very little. It is perhaps the most social game out in the market, other than the Maple Story type games. Wow is social, but you really don't even NEED a group to do stuff, so you really don't have to communicate to others.. just go off by yourself. That's not a huge option in FFXI. You must communicate first for strategy so you don't all wipe, but then you find you communicate because you are spending hours with the same 5 people. In pvp games, people are your buddy for an hour or so. But usually the groups change so much, you don't really have to talk. Just hear/see some general directions on the chat, if that.

There is no faction problem in FFXI. As a matter of fact, the idea that all the different races come together to fight a common evil in the world is really a metaphor and why they never split world servers in the first place among Japanese, Americans, NA and EU. They wanted all subscribers to get along in a cooperative fashion, with no "We hate these guys", even if it was just make believe hate.

I fear you will probably never like this game unless you have an overwhelming desire to be part of a larger struggle in a gaming environment; namely, a much deeper social element and realizing that the game's purpose has always been to foster a spirit of cooperation between every single subscriber, while doing LOADS of PvE.