I've never played XI either. Till now. The game was on discount on the SE store (9 bucks the base game+all expansions+30 free days), now it's currently at 30 bucks. It's definitely not a game for everyone, as it might feel slow and clunky (specially if you play with KB+M, highly recommended to play it with controller), the graphics are not the greatests but the feeling is there. They buffed the experience you receive by a lot with rings, pieces of gear, the Rhapsodies of Vana'diel questline+other stuff. It's not the grind it used to be (based on what my friends told me).
I believe the game is worth it, just to have a glance of what the game was, even if they dumbed it down (Which I don't care). The game is almost soleable with your Trusts (some sort of squadron that follows you everywhere. You get a huge variety of those through quests, events, etc), so even the partying up got taken away. It's also very crowded in Asura. You see players everywhere.
I'm personally amazed by XI. I wish XIV could use some ideas from there. I also see they already stole a lot from XI. In any case, see it as a vacation if you ever want to take a break from XIV.
