Why I Quit FFXI For The 100th Time.

Why I quit FFXI again….
This game feels outdated.
This game seems like it’s still meant for a party system and it shouldn’t. This notion coupled with the game’s visual graphics and low population makes it feel old. It is difficult to establish parties let alone to find help for older content. Even for newer missions which include rewarding armor and weapons it is still difficult to find help. Other players and linkshell players also have a tendency to totally ignore your pleads of help. This often infuriates, and makes you feel helpless and pathetic…Ultimately the game because of this feels old, unfinished, and unadjusted with the times.
The game seems more like work then play.
A lot of missions and quests are complicated obnoxious and/or boring (For instance, the Assault mission “Lost and Found” is extremely unpleasant). Missions and quests seem this way because often time terrains in mission based areas are puzzle-like and confusing. Another reason why missions seem more like work then fun or play is because the information in the game given to accomplish them is often time very unsubstantial, which always(not sometimes) leads to a player looking up the information for the quest or mission at hand. This shouldn’t be the case, missions and quests should be obviated.
The plight of the players leads to cheating.
Ultimately , this has led to an unbalanced community between console players and p.c players. And this is Because P.C players in lieu of the game’s difficulty can and have turned over to third party programs for help. These third party programs can be extremely helpful and honestly not fair. Thusly some players call it cheating. APradar comes to mind (I love the program and don’t care to argue It’s validity). Saddly even with “Cheating” the game is still extremely difficult because of the crazy-puzzle-like maps(Tu’lia A.k.A SKY), obnoxious quests, and strange mission barriers like fame quests(one fame quest had me trading dozens of millicorns to a NPC). Some players like myself have even because of the notion of trying to catch up have ended up buying in game money, weapons, and armor.This is what I honestly think players do to get relic weapons, empreayan weapons, mystic weapons, etc… I don’t necessarily disagree with this instead I present this for evaluation.
Long story short the game play feels like work and instead of being paid for your time you end up paying someone else for their time to help with your time.
The game feels very slow.
The walk speed, pace of fighting, and mission requirements that make you zone all over the world make the game feel very sluggish. HNMs of any valuable sort also come with tremendous time wasting abilities(think AV or PW circa level 75)….If U want something good, U have to make a party(wastes a lot of time), and fight a HNM(wastes a lot of time)which on top of all that may not drop what you want(think byakko haidate days). Yes, I understand this is the case with all MMorpgs, but with FFXI this seems extremely profound because of the after mentioned thing we spoke about (puzzle maps, obnoxious-tedious quests, and mission barriers). There is also a tremendous amount of item swapping and movement in players’ inventories. Which coupled with all the obliviousness of the game leads to ppl keeping things they don’t even need.
Don’t get or play this game it’s no longer fun, overtly complicated, and old.

What I did on my summer vacation.

I'd prefer an explanation as to why you think people care.

Will be quiting in April myself. Going for FF14 or Skyrim. I don't have nice things in game anymore. But I am having fun still. If I could just get Josi to help me get a wing so I can toss this sparks dagger, lol.

i wrote it for cathartic purposes.

Enjoy your post FF11 life Dark!

FFXI for all case and purposes is indeed "old". However, it still has some good points. Sure FFXI is not the same game I fell in love with back in 2005 but it's still a great game. This is my last year playing the game through as once the final RoV chapter is finished, I'm hanging up my account and saying farewell. But since I still have plenty of time before that day comes, I'm gonna enjoy the game, spent time with my linkshell, and just well...PLAY THE GAME.


Sure it seemed like "work" back in the day, but nowadays it's so easy to catch up on things. This game has a lot of memories for me since I was 17 (27 now) so it will be a little tough to part with the game, but I know I will be leaving with fond memories and the memories of the awesome friends I made during my time on the game.

Josi> than B3! I watched them. Very cool! And thanks in advance good sir!

Best game ever :)

Draylo.. Best BLU ever!

maybe if you've only ever played 3 games in your life, sure

You know level 75 days are long gone when someone's complaint about sky is the maps.

Only game I've played for over a decade, can't say that about anything else.

that's because other games have an ending.

also before you try to pin this as another attack on FFXI, I actually like FFXI but I don't think it's anywhere near the best game ever at all

That's your opinion then, I can have one too.

Needs a "Why I came back to FFXI for the 100th time" thread, so we get the complete picture.

There's a psychology behind these threads and comments. They want to take a veiled jab at the people still playing this game as it somehow gives them satisfaction and justifies their choice to themselves. People can't just leave the game and be at peace. They linger around forums or make negative comments about it in different places. I haven't figured it out yet as to why but anyone can pretty much see it happening. As we near the end we'll see more and more disgruntled people.

It's a shame for an awesome game that people grew up with and had a lot of fond memories with. You'll see people who spent years of their life on this game just bash it relentlessly after they quit. Probably won't stop until the end or into their phone game port lol.

I never bash the game when I leave. I just come back here to P&R.

Might even play again come Sept one last time.

I don't think it's a jab at people playing, I see it as more of opening discussion about the game's social and design issues. The social issues kinda revolve around the fact that it's not easy to find people who you'd want to spend your time with. Some players have no LS or crew or whatever, and can only catch a break with a lucky pick-up group, or if they offer a reward (ie: mercs for clears). What's fun about a social game where the only people who you can socialize with are dickish and self-interested?

The design issues, well, yeah some shitty ideas and systems made their way into this game, but you generally don't think about them as much when you're having a fun with friends. That aside, I get a lot of satisfaction making my own .bgws and models, and more so seeing them work in the game. I know that's a bit extreme for everyone, but I'm getting more outta the game when every zone has a tune now, and I can fight Balamor to this Jenova cover.

It's not everyone obviously, but you can't pretend you don't see it. It's there whether people wanna acknowledge it or not, its unprecedented as this is one of the few MMOs to last this long and go through what it is. Only other thing I can think of is Star Wars Galaxies but I didn't frequent any of its forums to see the behavior patterns in its players and people who have quit. It also had a new MMO that came out to replace it and I don't recall the atmosphere of the game around that time.

What are fighting games.

That's the only thing that comes to mind right now, but SFII is still played competitively and still has a community, and not a small one.

So many games are endless and are still alive and well nowadays whether we like them or not.

Hell, you could still be farming on PSO (yeah, the first one on DC) if you wanted to, or any similar game. There are a lot of endless games, but at the end of the day, the only ones that are deemed relevant are the ones that match one's subjectivity.

You're right, but I think it also has to do with people thinking that they "matter that much". It's a lack of humility, to sum up.

Sharing an opinion is fine, but depending how it is shared, it demonstrate people's feel toward their importance in the grand scheme of things. Some people do not want to accept that, at the end of the day, they were nothing.
It leads people to want to prove that the X years they spent doing Y led them to reach a status where their words and opinion can actually shape anything.

At the end of the day, those people shouldn't even upset anyone, they're just people you ignore.

I have to agree with you on several point and I think that objectively, you're right. However, many of your points are either "not an issue" (as in, it's your issue, not a game issue) or are just 50/50 and you simply chose to see the bad side over the bright one.

Basically, you're right that the game despite a lot of efforts, a lot of changes, is still behind.

I resubbed after over a year of not playing a couple months ago. I really enjoyed the changes, the game has become something completely different and is really enjoyable, especially with friends. It gave me the feel that I could play calmly, without stress over gear and what not, and things went that way while I was catching up to Vagary stuff.

But then, the game appeared "empty", in the same way that FFXIV does, funnily enough.
You are basically faced with two options, and only two, to progress. And unfortunately, while people have been mostly generous, some people don't understand that we're not 14 anymore and that the game is dying, so they keep being *** as if HNMs were still something relevant (the mentality, at least).

Overall the game is good, though, but it's lacking this huge thing that is "catering to solo play fully". I've tried building groups for AAs, Delve (any), I've been part of Vagary shouts and a lot of other things, and it's a chore. A big chore.

I've been playing Heavensward since it came out, but it's giving me the same feel. It's fun and enjoyable while you catch up/level up, but then you'll be stuck with the same two things to do in order to progress, unless your friends are up to do that thing nobody want to do, for fun.

I think a lot of people are hoping for November to launch the game in a way where it'll last months if not years, and I'm part of those people. But the update that came out 2 days ago I believe, was such a disappointment that I'm full of doubt now.

I'll keep playing as the game isn't bad, it's not terrible, it doesn't make me feel like I need to leave it, but it clearly has this feel that I need to make a lot of effort and gather a lot of motivation to grind the gear I'm missing for even one job.

All in all I don't really care, games like Street Fighter and LoL allow me to take breaks without feeling them, I just wish they'd merge servers already and allow more solo possibilities. Only then will the game properly stand up.

For real here OP. I feel you right in my XI feels. I know you gave up sleep, went a little hungry, just to keep chain, get claim on NMs all those years.

This aint an XI-bashing thread guys. This is a pro-XI thread. Acceptance and love ;|

You quit 2 years ago according to your purchase history and youre just posting this now?

I dont know about best game ever, but if we go by length of time playing 1 specific game, easily my favorite of all time. Just about 10 years of playing before I quit in March. I still lurk on these forums and find out whats current in game even though I no longer play. People who bash it easily forget all the good times they had while playing it. If it wasnt for 90% of my friends quitting the game and the other 10% joining up with linkshells that you have to app for just to play a job you dislike for as long as you play they game, I'd more than likely still be in Vana'Diel 6-8 hours day.

This game is not for the weak.

FFXI died about 5 years ago some people are just afraid to accept the truth !

I don't care that FFXI is an older game.

I've been playing RPGs since I was seven, watching my best friend's dad playing the original Final Fantasy on NES, then begging him to let me borrow it. He did, and I've been playing the series ever since.

Some of it's nostalgic, I suppose. There's a lot of old-school elements in the game, some good, some bad. Fetch quests in particular are really annoying but those have been in RPGs since the dawn of the genre. There's always going to be pointless things; however, going through those generally nets great rewards.

Population has gone down some, and I personally dislike soloing. Trust may do a job, but they don't crack jokes or lot against you when a desirable piece of gear drops. Sometimes just seeing who gets it is exciting.

Part of the reason I like this game is being able to interact with others. I've made friends I'd never have been able to meet through any other means, and that's a wonderful thing. Yeah, there's gonna be douches. That's a fact of life. I don't let them ruin my game, though; I ignore and move on.

I took a two month break not long ago and when I came back, everyone did their best to make me feel welcomed and helped me get back up to date.

Yeah, it's just a game. The entertainment I get from such a small amount of money is more than worth it. For the price of one midrange dinner out, I get hours of fun (and frustration, but sometimes that's part of the challenge!).

If a player finds that they're finding it more like work than fun, then they shouldn't be playing. That's a personal decision. I think no more or less of people who drift away from FFXI.

Some of them I miss. It's always saddening when a friend quits.

I'll personally be around for awhile. I find plenty to do, sometimes more than enough, lol. A lot of my time is spent helping other people, mainly returnees who lack clears for newer content. I get a lot of satisfaction from that, and 99% of the time they're grateful and shocked that someone would take the time to help without expectations of payment.

People helped me get what I have. A good friend of mine just came back to the game after almost two years away. He'd helped me with my LB5, loaning me gear and giving me the strategy needed. Now I'm more advanced than him, and I've been assisting him with what he needs now. He says now I'm his mentor, as he was to me long ago.

That sort of thing is worth staying around for.

(TLDR version: if you enjoy the game, play if. If you don't, then don't.)