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Final Fantasy XI and Nostalgia
13 years ago
General
We pen our fate to the parchment of time...
Been awhile since I wrote a journal so I figured I'd write this one!
Everyone has something they remember fondly; a book, a movie, or a video game. Years ago I was a far greater weaboo than I am today. I was glued to most things Final Fantasy (Note: This was back when the franchise still had good story telling) and Final Fantasy XI was right around the corner. I remember clearly that I upgraded my silly old computer back in 2003 for the express purpose of playing this game and had my Dad get my copy of the game from the GameStop on his way home from work.
I spent years in Final Fantasy XI and have some amazing memories. I've met and maintained some awesome friends in that game that have actually transcended it and the adventures I'll have in there are looked back on with a sense of epic awe. "Did we really take a WHOLE alliance of level 30 players up Delkfutt's Tower?!" "Did we really run a whole Alliance around the world to get the items for your Airship pass?"! "What, a whole alliance to get my pimp hat?!"
That's one thing I miss from current MMORPG's. The sense of community has been removed. While I understand it's a good business practice to reduce the difficulty and focus more on solo content, it's painful sometimes. There were a lot of boring times in Final Fantasy XI, such as standing around looking for a party in Jeuno, but there were some amazing adventures too. In today's games there just isn't the same feel. Going to a dungeon and fighting bosses for loot is fun but its such a different dynamic then older games. Part of the fun, sometimes, was going across the deadly landscape, casting Sneak + Invisible and running through deadly tunnels to that one sweet camp site. People had secret spots and a good group could get you leveling so very fast. (Rangers, anyone?).
I was recently talking to a new friend about his own experiences in the game and yes, we share a lot of things, and it did inspire me, briefly, to try and return to the game. However I realized that if I went back I would never capture what I felt back then. Nostalgia is a powerful thing and I feel like if I did venture back into the history-rich world of Vana'diel again it would be different. An expansion and various add-ons have come out since i left the game and the world has undoubtedly changed. Friends are gone and the landscapes where I used to venture forth with friends for experience points are probably void of life. The game has moved out of it's peak and is on a slow and subtle decline, but I will always remember my time in that game.
Why do I remember such memories fondly? The whole idea of an MMORPG is a fictional sense of accomplishment but when compared to modern MMORPGs the accomplishments in FF XI were a lot more extreme and harder to achieve. It took effort to get to Jeuno, get your chocobo, airship pass, your ranks, your missions, and if you wanted the full story of the game you had to work at it. When you did something amazing like defeat a Prime Shiva or Ifirit with a balanced party you felt epic. You stormed a volcano to fight the g'damn thing!
Oh well. I've decided to keep Final Fantasy XI in my memories. I'd rather look back and remember it as a vivid world full of friends and challenges. Not the empty shell it has probably become.
Everyone has something they remember fondly; a book, a movie, or a video game. Years ago I was a far greater weaboo than I am today. I was glued to most things Final Fantasy (Note: This was back when the franchise still had good story telling) and Final Fantasy XI was right around the corner. I remember clearly that I upgraded my silly old computer back in 2003 for the express purpose of playing this game and had my Dad get my copy of the game from the GameStop on his way home from work.
I spent years in Final Fantasy XI and have some amazing memories. I've met and maintained some awesome friends in that game that have actually transcended it and the adventures I'll have in there are looked back on with a sense of epic awe. "Did we really take a WHOLE alliance of level 30 players up Delkfutt's Tower?!" "Did we really run a whole Alliance around the world to get the items for your Airship pass?"! "What, a whole alliance to get my pimp hat?!"
That's one thing I miss from current MMORPG's. The sense of community has been removed. While I understand it's a good business practice to reduce the difficulty and focus more on solo content, it's painful sometimes. There were a lot of boring times in Final Fantasy XI, such as standing around looking for a party in Jeuno, but there were some amazing adventures too. In today's games there just isn't the same feel. Going to a dungeon and fighting bosses for loot is fun but its such a different dynamic then older games. Part of the fun, sometimes, was going across the deadly landscape, casting Sneak + Invisible and running through deadly tunnels to that one sweet camp site. People had secret spots and a good group could get you leveling so very fast. (Rangers, anyone?).
I was recently talking to a new friend about his own experiences in the game and yes, we share a lot of things, and it did inspire me, briefly, to try and return to the game. However I realized that if I went back I would never capture what I felt back then. Nostalgia is a powerful thing and I feel like if I did venture back into the history-rich world of Vana'diel again it would be different. An expansion and various add-ons have come out since i left the game and the world has undoubtedly changed. Friends are gone and the landscapes where I used to venture forth with friends for experience points are probably void of life. The game has moved out of it's peak and is on a slow and subtle decline, but I will always remember my time in that game.
Why do I remember such memories fondly? The whole idea of an MMORPG is a fictional sense of accomplishment but when compared to modern MMORPGs the accomplishments in FF XI were a lot more extreme and harder to achieve. It took effort to get to Jeuno, get your chocobo, airship pass, your ranks, your missions, and if you wanted the full story of the game you had to work at it. When you did something amazing like defeat a Prime Shiva or Ifirit with a balanced party you felt epic. You stormed a volcano to fight the g'damn thing!
Oh well. I've decided to keep Final Fantasy XI in my memories. I'd rather look back and remember it as a vivid world full of friends and challenges. Not the empty shell it has probably become.
While it's not terribly bad, and the new things that they have added can actually be quite fun when things go well, if the last thing you remember was ToAU, then you'd be in for a bit of a shock. People don't even party up for experience anymore, it's all about alliances in abyssea now. Man, I miss the old days. D:
Wait... no one parties for experience?? What about the lower leveles? Qufim, Selbina, Yuhtunga, Yhoator... ; ; Oh man, so many memories.
The economy is.. well, it's hard to say really because it's not something that I've honestly put a lot of time or thought into. Gil is particularly easy to make these days if you know how to and for the most part equipment isn't all that expensive unless you're shooting for the top tier HQ gear that's actually buyable.
As for the earlier leveling parties, they're mostly done with 'Book Burns'. Which is kind of hard to explain but easy to understand if you've done it, but basically zones have books that offer training regimes usually consisting of kill x amount of a certain mob within that zone and upon doing so you earn an experience bonus and automatically start it over again. The bonus increases the more you complete the task, usually giving around 2000 extra experience for every 5 mobs. Most people just get a high level buddy to kill higher leveled mobs while the low level just hangs back and reaps the benefits, at least until lv30 and access to Abyssea becomes available.
Because I don't really have any more low level jobs I can't be 100% sure that there's no more regular leveling parties out there, but as far as I can tell, I've never seen a shout for one, nor do I see them in their usual places like, Valkurm Dunes and the like.
It's all about getting to lv99 as fast as possible these days.
Qufim, Selbina, Yuhtunga, Yhoator almost always have 0-2 people in them.
I do miss the old times, but what the game is now isn't terrible, it's still has that core gameplay that I enjoy, the battle system I've found to be my favorite part, I like the way battles and abilities are used, Skill chains and the such. Combat still has that same FFXI flavor, which is probably why I stick around.
If you liked it before I would give it a try. It's different, but not terrible.
It's really sad to hear the old leveling parties are done. That was, literally, one of the crowning moments of that game. Yes it was a terrible handicap but there was a lot of fun moments to be had. Endless party killing of bats and beetles in Garlaige Citadel was a chore and a blessing all at once. All the parties, everything... it was insane and fun. I just can't believe the parties are gone now...
This book burn sounds interesting, but do people actively help people like that? What about missions and story arcs for CoP and RoZ? Do people even go to Sky and Sea anymore? Boyhada? >_< So many things about that game were awesome and gave the world a robust feeling...to think that's done away with...is sad. =\
Parties aren't completely gone, they're just a lot different. Instead of teaming up with 6 people you take 18 and go wreak stuff in Abyssea zones. The mobs there don't xp chain, but with every consecutive kill of the same type the experience goes up and up, until almost 600xp a kill. So before when doing 20k an hour at Colibri camps back in the ToAU days, now you're doing 200-300k an hour in an alliance.
Story Arcs like CoP and RoZ have been made easier, especially CoP with the removal of the level caps, so anyone can pretty easily breeze right through the missions. Though I do miss the days when doing Promyvion's and sneaking around to get to the bosses as a group of lv30's.
Sky still has it's uses, with the new Voidwatch system in place they've put new NM's up there to battle against, but Sea hasn't been as lucky, though just a few days ago a group of us did take down Absolute Virtue, I just wish that was still an accomplishment.
A lot of the older zones just had Voidwatch NM's tossed into them in an attempt to still make them worth while visiting, but other than that, there's not a whole lot of reason to.
What server were you on? I was on Fenrir.
*fetal position*