Returning ancient player. Just sayin' hi :)

[Alhanelem]

Actually, no, I don't speak for myself, I think 75 era... was a thing that existed, and had its charms, but it was an age where you were supposed to get excited about seven magic attack bonus on a piece of gear. Summoner gear barely even existed, like two pieces of blood pact delay stuff and a little bit of perpetuation down? No wonder it was usually treated like worse white mage with more MP.

But if you hang around any place Final Fantasy XI players congregate, eventually you'll start hearing all the comments romanticisizing the "you can lot on one piece you might want, in six months, if it drops, maybe" stage of the game's history.

Personally, the only thing that I can remember really liking about FFXI at 75 cap was the people I played with, who started disappearing because of Final Fantasy XIV, not the level cap increase.

This really confuses me, because it seems to be in direct contrast to your previous post.

Anyway, while I'm certainly nostalgic about the 75 era, MMOs must progress and change to survive, and the 75 era dragged on too long. If the game had moved on it years earlier, there would probably be more players today.


The virtual world aspect of FFXI, where things happen slowly (i.e. reail time waits for airships and travel) and make you think very carefully about every decision you make, was appealing when I was in college and had a lot more free time. Now that most of us work long hours in jobs, waiting for the sake of waiting is just not fun anymore and at this point, most of us have seen everything and thus those waits and slow grinding became less enjoyable. Early FFXI was fun because of the community- the stoires you swapped as you killed the 1000th crab for 150xp after a few hours in Qufim, the excitement of meeting someone new who started in a different city, and so on. Today, the gameplay itself is what matters a lot more.

[Zenion]

This really confuses me, because it seems to be in direct contrast to your previous post.

Anyway, while I'm certainly nostalgic about the 75 era, MMOs must progress and change to survive, and the 75 era dragged on too long. If the game had moved on it years earlier, there would probably be more players today.


The virtual world aspect of FFXI, where things happen slowly (i.e. reail time waits for airships and travel) and make you think very carefully about every decision you make, was appealing when I was in college and had a lot more free time. Now that most of us work long hours in jobs, waiting for the sake of waiting is just not fun anymore and at this point, most of us have seen everything and thus those waits and slow grinding became less enjoyable. Early FFXI was fun because of the community- the stoires you swapped as you killed the 1000th crab for 150xp after a few hours in Qufim, the excitement of meeting someone new who started in a different city, and so on. Today, the gameplay itself is what matters a lot more.

It's in direct contrast to the opening paragraph of my post, though the rest, you may note, largely addresses "what to do when you return", and highlights things which make the modern FFXI experience more convenient than it was in the early Abyssea era (and points out a really really good song from the soundtrack because seriously Wail of the Void is right up there with Ragnarok.)

It's a rhetorical device in which one claims a position or makes a statement with unusual emphasis or contradictory circumstances to convey an opposite sentiment; in English, I believe it's called sarcasm?

[Alhanelem]

It's in direct contrast to the opening paragraph of my post, though the rest, you may note, largely addresses "what to do when you return", and highlights things which make the modern FFXI experience more convenient than it was in the early Abyssea era (and points out a really really good song from the soundtrack because seriously Wail of the Void is right up there with Ragnarok.)

It's a rhetorical device in which one claims a position or makes a statement with unusual emphasis or contradictory circumstances to convey an opposite sentiment; in English, I believe it's called sarcasm?

I don't think you realize how poorly sarcasm can come across in text without the audio emphasis.