| I cancelled in Dec.
The largest problem I had (probably not easily understood unless you've spent some time in the game): You start playing the game in June, your buddies don't start playing until the following January. When you jump into the wacky world of FFXI, you start questing immediately - it eventually feels as though everything you do requires a quest of some sort. By the time your buddies start playing the game, you're already hopelessly ahead of them in terms of questing and character development. It's great that you could switch jobs, no need to make 39 alts, but if you're going to actually play these jobs, you find yourself caught between your cash flow and your inventory space.
Eventually your newbie friends hit 20 and needed 6 hours to feed a fucking chocobo for a quest, then they need to work on gobbie bags but low and behold, they don't have enough fame in the smaller cities to do them, so back they go for a week or two to at least one of the 3 starter cities to work quests. Then they'll need to work subjobs - so you're back into the grind with another 2-3 jobs (that you personally know you will never use but are only leveling to hang with your friends) so they have the "appropriate" shit leveled to use with their main jobs.
And there's a lot more to the game than killing, leveling and questing, oh yes! Your newbie friends will want to craft, also! Everyone wants to experience a game to its fullest, right? So not only are they farming to buy gear, they're farming for crafting! Oh yes! And you're farming too! You're farming to buy gear for jobs you're never going to use other than leveling with your newbie friends (God forbid putting some gear drops for low levels in the game)! And by farming, I mean killing mobs 30 levels under you for stacks of fucking hornet wings to sell at the auction house because just about every decent spot on my particular server was eaten and conquered by hoardes of IGN farmers. (I won't even touch that subject.)
I started FFXI with a group of friends who eventually quit and went back to EQ. A second round of friends came over after round 1 quit, that's where my problems started. You put so much time and energy into developing this stupid, gay-looking character that you find yourself not wanting to do the Star Onion Brigade quest a 4th and 5th time with your newbie friends. You don't want to go back through the Dunes a 5th or 6th time, the shit is too painful and too frustrating. It's hard enough getting a single group to learn HOW to group, having to level up low level characters with that sea of stupidity turns into torture after about your 3rd time. And I don't know what it is about the game but new folks will not go anywhere without an escort, so guess how many stone monument tours I led. When all was said and done, my main only hit 50 but I had an entire fucking stable full of 20-40's that were leveled only to pass time with my friends who were attempting to reach my main's level so I could incorporate my main (whm) into the group. Waiting....waiting....waiting.... The game is too painful to be a game. I had fun (until all the waiting, which is no one's fault, just the game we chose) but I don't regret quitting - in fact, I miss EQ1 more than I miss FFXI. |