Realizations About FFXI As A Game.

I was thinking about it earlier today, and noticed that the first version update with the level cap increase had came. Although that had some significance with what i'm about to talk about in this post, it's more centered on the game itself.

I haven't played FFXI in a few monthes now. I quit awhile back for various reasons (school, other interests, social life in the game), but back then I hadn't noticed one of the biggest (if not the biggest) reasons why I had decided to put the game down, which was the longevity of this game.

When you think about it, the primary reason you play a game is for fun, right? I suppose this is pretty solid across the board with all MMOs, but FFXI was really the only one that I have gotten into deep enough to relate, but what is the point of playing a game that basically offers nearly zero variability or value in gameplay? After playing and experiencing most of the things FFXI has to offer, it's kind of easy to understand that FFXI is a game of dreadful repetition and not much else. Take Salvage for example, which was probably the activity that I spent most of my time on while ingame. The whole system of it is as linear as possible: Get this item, kill this monster, hope for it to drop some other item, go here, repeat a few times, kill the boss, exit the zone, and come again the next day to do the exact same thing (Speaking in the sense of the exact same procedure for the four remnant areas.)

I've done Dynamis, HNMs, ZNMs, Einherjar, Sky, Sea, and some other stuff as well (Can't remember off the top of my head.) and it seems like it's the same deal all across the board. Most of the game's possibilities (if not all, bar new update stuff that will also eventually be documented) are completely laid out for you by way of sites like FFXIclopedia and what not, and once you understand that if a monster does X move, you employ Y strategy and deal with it, no questions asked.

After you get the drop you want, then it's great, now you go off to some other area and do the same thing and hope for the other monster to drop that other rare piece of equipment you, or a friend of yours, or even multiple people in your linkshell want.

This is basically what i've realized FFXI is, as an actual game. Sure, it's fun when you first get into that one endgame activity that you have no idea how to do, but after you figure it out, it's all repetition from there on until you get what you want and move on. This is, so far, the basic structure for pretty much everything inside of the game. There is (seemingly) no end either, which is the somewhat disturbing part of this all. With the level cap increase, SE gave the playerbase all sorts of new, powerful items that overshadowed most of the things that the community has been using for years, which is nice in a sense, because we are getting "new" things, but what's the point to all of these insane (omfg haste +7% more than speed belt! etc.) things if we're eventually going to have
things that will be even better than these. If this is what they are giving us with the first update, than it's just a matter of time before all of these items become level fodder in light of level 99~ equipment, and then the economy will again come to a standstill where we will have hagun, cuchulain, blau, etc. equivalents at level 99, then what? It's kind of strange looking at all the comments that people are leaving on these new items that consist of "omfg, this is amazing / i just came / wow SE finally didn't *** up their update to make us even more powerful"
With updates like this that just bring even more powerful items to the table that destroy previous ones, it just seems more and more apparent that SE is just toying with us with the carrot on the stick that we will never be able to reach, but still have incentives to follow(see: pay money) it.

When I think about playing a game and start playing, what I do is set a goal, or multiple goals for myself to complete in it, whether it be just beating the game's story, or collecting all the little extra gadgets on the side, or whatever. In a way, this factor is non-existant in FFXI.
Beyond accomplishing /your/ personal goals and accomplishments, the game literally has no end, or more like, that is what SE wants. To keep you playing(and playing) for as long as possible before you realize that there is no way to "finish/beat" the game. Is that really the type of game that you want to be playing?

There is also the community side of the game, where you can communicate and socialize with the other players, but is the 12.50$+ you pay every month really justifiable when there are things like messengers and ventrilo available for free that you could use to talk to those same people? If there's no more fun in playing FFXI as an actual video game and not a social gathering, than it just becomes a stylized facebook that requires you to pay money every month to keep using.

I know that people have been playing this game for many years, doing the same activities (Dynamis,Sky,Sea,whatever, and most likely the new WoTG endgame stuff once everyone figures out how it works in a month or two) everyday and still continue to do them, so i'd like to know what those people (and everyone who is still playing as well) see this game as and what drives them to continue on.

I didn't make this post asking people to quit or anything, but i'm just curious to see if the people who are playing are aware of the reality behind what FFXI is.

Oh I'm sure everyone is well aware of this.
It's just that, it sure beats the ***out of reality.

Oh and Ventrillo isn't free D:

tl;dr

tl;dr: "OMG FFXI is a MMORPG!"

I try not to get too mixed up in FFXI's materialistic gear grabby grabby gimme gimme.

For me, FFXI has always been about my social interactions with others, sure you could just use Skype, MSN, etc; I enjoy FFXI because it has a interesting way of pairing you up with strangers and creating relationships along the way.

Ive made Online friendships that have lasted for 5 years+ thanks to FFXI, and so many great memories.

FFXI is a lifestyle.

To the OP;

I've pondered this too. As more and more of my free time dwindles(the joys of being a grown up), I've stepped back and looked at this game, looked at the fervent people get in over endgame activities, and the preceding monotony of said activities, and I decided a long time ago I'm going to play this game the way I want, however I feel like playing it.

It is a little discouraging, that there are step-by-step guides to every single quest and mission, and to the exact "correct" gear builds for the absolute optimal setups, and it saddens me that these builds become the gospel of the players. Nobody experiments and just does what's best for their playstyle. "HOMAM OR GTFO" comes to mind.

So, I play for myself and my friends. I use the gear I want(and have access to), and do what I please. I do EG events with my linkshell when they come up, and I do my best to be effective at my job(gear "correctly"), but outside of events, it's my subscription fee, and I'll do as I please. I don't get hung up on getting gear too much, and I just enjoy playing a video game that I can share with some RL friends and family(my wife and I duo a lot).

Point being, I completely understand the "Hamster Wheel" effect of the repetitiveness of this game, but I do what I can to side-step that and find my fun.

You realize playing this game for 5 years, at the minimum price, not counting any interest you may accumulate not making the payment in time, that's at least $800.

So if we think about this, you're merely buying your friends right now, and all those memories, that's just the additional content bonus you get when putting that much money into a game :)

I DO IT FO DA E-PEENZ

It's still less than I would have paid for enough games to take the same amount of game time.

Well clearly you have never played pokemon snap :o

/enlightened **sarcastically**

tl;dr It's repetitive killing monsters to get better gear that allows you to be better at killing monsters to get better gear that... etc

To the OP, you know this is like telling a crack head "you know that crack is bad and can hurt your body, you realize its all just the same high over and over"

They just gonna tweek out and not care what you say.

You make sense completely. the biggest decision I have every day is "should i keep playing even though there is no end?"

At least most console games have a true ending, MMOs do not.

Most people spend more money on Soda than i did on this game. Think about it, .99 priced soda plus tax comes to 1.07, lets say you paid that price everyday, that seems reasonable to assume most people spend at least that much on soda. So 1.07 times 365 (days in a year) comes to 390.55 spent on soda alone.

So, basically what you're saying is that the game is too predictable, and you don't have any fun?

While I am far, far less experienced than a lot of people, this is my third go around - cumulatively, I've got a little more going for me than my character suggests. Whatever. Let me try to explain how I play, and why that's so much fun - to me, at least.

One of the most frustrating things about the game is that it's the way you say - employ whatever specific strat against whatever challenge. It drives me insane. A fair example is the Royal Jelly BCNM. I used to do it with a couple people kind of often, and this was around the time when none of us had a single 75, let alone multiple jobs. Our setup was PLD, WHM, MNK. And whenever we would run, if someone else was there, it seemed like there was all sorts of pointing, laughing, and from time to time no joke people would go out of their way to say something about us. Funny thing, though, is that after the first day, where we wiped 2/3 times, we never, ever failed. Is it a hard fight? Not even close. Did we set any records? Maybe the day of an update, but that's probably it. Did we have fun? Sure as ***we did.

That's still how I play. "Can we beat this?" "Let's find out."

I know this is turning too long... but if you don't like applying the most efficient strategies, searching for hours for the perfect job to fill a hole in your party, whatever, then just don't do it. It may not seem like it, but there are people who couldn't care less if your acc is capped against a certain mob, or if you aren't rocking full Usu. Lots of people are more interesting in you being fun to play with, and testing whatever hodgepodge group of friends you have at the moment to see if they can win. You clearly have plenty of... good feelings for the game. I mean, you posted this. So go back, get out of the hardcore rules based playing, and have fun again.

<Full Attack!>

Why do I play FFXI? There's no BLU in WoW!

Well here in canada, what I like to do is pay the 1.07 for a small refillable drink at Mcdonalds, then I just stick my face under the hose and funnel it into my mouth :D

Effective and efficient *Takes notes*

Of course FFXI has no end to it; that just has to be the nature of the game. If you get bored with one thing you can always pick up another and go from there. There doesn't HAVE to be any repetition in this game, unless you make a habit of doing the repetitive things over and over again. It does suck that a lot of the great equipment is based around those activities, but realize that the systems that we use as players to achieve our goals and work together are our creation. The way that we work together so that everyone can have a small slice of pie makes it harder to spread everything around, which will create a greater necessity for repetition.

Personally, I like to screw around in game the most. I hang with friends, kill things that need to be killed, level what I want and throw in some end game events here and there. Abyssea, from what I've read, is SE's attempt at breaking down that monotony: certain NM's drop different gear when a different strategy is used, but the drop rate will decrease if the same strat is used repeatedly. I think that this may show that SE never really intended the game to be like that with other EG events, it was just more of a player construct that evolved from our wants and needs.

So, to summarize what I really think about all this: the game has a lot to offer in the way of variety in activity. $13 a month isn't much for the activities that we're able to with others, even when you compare to ventrilo and other free forms of communication. The main point is that you're having fun, because even if this game feels like it's never going to end, it will eventually. This is all just temporary as is everything, and if repetition and that feeling of "same old, same old" are getting ya down, you have more options than ever now.

I don't post here often, so here's my 2cents. I'd just like to say, I agree with that. I play this game for the social side, I do some end game events, but I don't devote all my time. I haven't reached Lv 80 in a day, and I expect it will take me several more.

It's been said before me, but you bought this game, you play it how you want, if people say your gear isn't the best, then tell them their welcome to buy it or burn up their time for it getting it for you - and if they're a friend, they will.

To steal a line from a movie..

"It's a game that cannot be won, only played"

(Bagger Vance to Rannolf Jeunah - The Legend of Bagger Vance)

Yeah I have decided to do as another poster, I'm going to just play my way and enjoy the exploration. With all the new gear and battlefields (thats right, battlefields - not missions or quests), it's going to be kind of nice to figure stuff out for yourself. No veteran no-it-alls, no pre-written guide books...I like that.

Imagine all the hookers you've lost out on.

Depends if you go for quality or quantity :P

That isn't much if you compare what buying 1 $60 game each month for 5 years.Using normal sales tax in my area.(64.20x12=770.40x5=3,852.00) Now take into consideration that the average play time of a normal MMO player is around 24-25 hours a week according to at least one site, with some others claiming 90+ a week. Now if the average non MMO takes 30 hours to complete, you would have to buy almost 4 games a month to get the same amout of play time material.
That's 15,408.00. Yeah I'll take that 800 bucks over 15K anyday. ^^

I'm gonna teach you a solution to really cheap hookers.

Items you'll need:
Roll of Toilet Paper;
Condom;
Hand lotion / Lube;
Microwave.

Step 1: Take your roll of toilet paper and remove the little roll of cardboard that's inside it acting as a brace for the roll. You'll notice the roll of toilet paper collapses in on itself, at this point you're already thinking dirty things when you look at it.

Step 2: Take out the condom, and unroll it, then pass the condom through the collapsed roll of toilet paper, and then wrap the edges of the condom back around the roll. If you did this right, you'll notice the toilet paper becomes extremely compressed now, and you can stick your fingers inside it. The condom is used to protect yourself from possible chaffing, and it's easier to slide things into it.

Step 3: Take your hand lotion and or lube, put some inside the roll of toilet paper, or whatever you want to call it at this point.

Step 4: (Optional): Place the roll inside the microwave for no more then 5 seconds! Remember kids, touching it with the tip of your finger to see if its hot, and the tip of your penis are two different things. You will singe yourself.

Step 5: (reccomended): Now place the roll of toilet paper between your matress and your box spring, and have it her! Call her names, slap her around, remind her how dirty she really is.

And there you go, total cost of items, $4-$5 dependingon where you live. Much cheaper then a hooker, and you know the *** is clean.

Look at it from this point of view...


Do you smoke, drink, do drugs, go out to the bar, are you spendaholic/shopaholic??... and pay for it??

OR

DO you sit at home, go outside with your only child, and enjoy life... when hegoes to bed, you sip a coffee from Tim hortons and play this???

This is my enjoyment, and none of you better not piss on it.

I'll pay for this, as this is my vice.

Well said, lol

I tried =(

QFT. xD

That isn't much if you compare what buying 1 $60 game each month for 5 years.Using normal sales tax in my area.(64.20x12=770.40x5=3,852.00) Now take into consideration that the average play time of a normal MMO player is around 24-25 hours a week according to at least one site, with some others claiming 90 a week. Now if the average non MMO takes 30 hours to complete, you would have to buy almost 4 games a month to get the same amout of play time material.
That's 15,408.00. Yeah I'll take that 800 bucks over 15K anyday. ^^[/quote]


This is true... After I quit FFXI in march, I'm finding myself getting a new PS3/360 every 2 weeks (average). So instead of $60 for the monthly. its $480... hmm maybe I should come back