Valefor.Sketchkat said:
Funny how the same reasons are given for both being in favor of returning and being against it. I'd fall into the "against" category...as interesting as Abyssea was at first, I quickly got tired of the entire game taking place in a couple of zones. And as I have mentioned before, it would've been different if these zones had co-existed with the previous 200 or so zones in FFXI, but to have the entire world shoved aside for the sake of these few areas? Not my cup o' tea. If, however, this sounds like a good time to you, go for it.
The strength of abyssea is in it's design. Where as the old FFXI had you working incredibly hard for one, abrupt payoff, Abyssea design philosophy is all about Quantifiable progress. The Empyrean weapons are a fairly good embodiment of that. Contrasting The kings system with the Empyrean (And most of the EAF system) you can see the sudden shift.
The design change is hopefully a foreshadowing of the direction of gameplay FFXI will take into the next Years, but that doesn't, nor will it ever, excuse the copy-pasta zones of Abyssea. Should there be another expansion, the team would do well to actually take us somewhere new, something like what Aht Urghan and Chains of Promathia did.