Why was FFXI so great?

[Andrien]

Played FFXI since 2004 to 2011.

No its not that great, but it is fun when you have something to do, especially if you have friends to play with. Otherwise you're good as dead meat due to force grouping. Once I was able to solo Avatars I was farming that just for kicks. Making my empyrean weapons, Ballista, Campaign, and Abyssea is what kept me going until late 2011.

[jwang]

The storyline (especially CoP for me), the massive selection of events to do (until Abbyssea made it pointless), the community, the really pretty skill effects.

NM hunting can go to hell though, hated camping out a 6 hour respawn NM only to lose claim or get nothing to pop.

[Zantetsuken]

For me, it was the following:

1. It got the Final Fantasy feel right from the very beginning. The fact that your starting jobs were exactly the same as in FFI was sheer brilliance.
2. The challenge of the game and requirements of party play created a tighter player community.
3. The history, lore and culture of the game was fascinating, deep, and provided lots of intrigue.
4. The world was vast, varied, was crafted with lots of history in mind and was very fun to explore.
5. Fantastic Music.

That said, FFXIV is more than capable of surpassing FFXI on each of these points IMO.

1. The Final Fantasy Feel: It seems the devs are reviving many beloved elements from past FF games -The Crystal Tower from FFIII, Two Moons from FFIV, Magitek from FFVI, Materia from FFVII, Gunblades from FFVII, the races from FFXI... If they continue down this road, FFXIV may evolve into an homage to the whole FF series.
2. Challenge and Community: Things are easy at the moment, but 2.0 may very well change that. Still, it will never be quite as difficult as pre-abyssea FFXI. But those insane challenges and time-sinks had plenty of downside, and are part of a different era of gaming. - With more solo options and PvP, the community of FFXIV will definitely be different from FFXI - for better or worse.
3. History, Lore: While this game doesn't have iconic NPCs like Shantotto or Kam'lanaut, it does have some gems in characters like Papalymo, Yda, and Merlwyb. The (limited) voice acting and real-time 7th Umbral events give the game some life as well. But the lore surrounding the 2.0 shift will be the big test.
4. World: Vast and Seamless, yet rather dull.. at the moment. However, if the concept art is any indicator, the post-2.0 Eorzea will make Vana'diel look tame in comparison.
5. Music: While the launch tracks are good, they are a bit lacking in character. But we have new talent moving forward, and if the Matsuda-inspired Goobbue music is any indication of future direction, the soundtrack for this game will be superb.

[bobbygunz]

I must admit, I thought about it differently in the beginning. But now, every time I see a slope that I've seen like 5 times before in the last few minutes, it just makes me [insert emotion here]. Changing weather effects (that only look pretty at the moment) don't cut it anymore.

It was much easier to get bored of the scenery in FFXI than in FFXIV.

[Kiote]

Abyssea ruined FFXI because when they Raised the Level Cap, they turned the XP system into something like we have in FFXIV now. Players could go from level 1-99 in a month. You would think this was a good idea, the biggest complaint about XI was that it took way took long to progress. Unfortunately, what actually happened is everything that is not Abyssea became Invalid. All 8 years of content prior to it's release was instantly useless and no longer worth doing. Yes, the rewards were gone, but it was the loss of content that was the killer. It's the same thing that happened to Toto-Rak. It's still kinda cool, but there is no reason to do it and no one wants to do it with you.

This is the very reason why there is a Strong Opposition to the rate of XP gains in XIV.

[Kiote]

FFXI was great because there was a sense of Achievement when you accomplished anything. Hitting level 75 took real effort, maybe to much, but when you got there you knew how to play.

Items were not just rare like they are in FFXIV, but you needed to work for them. They required large teams working with a lot of precision and if you weren't on top of your game, you lost. Losing meant watching someone else walk away with the win.

Individuality was a guarantee. In the mid levels a lot of people had all the same stuff. There was good gear and you wore it to maximize your power. At End Game, there was so much stuff, it was rare to see two people in the same gear. New gear from new events never made previous gear useless either. You always had a choice and the gear you chose made you better at something, but you had to sacrifice other things for it. i.e Optical Hat was premo ACC, but Wahlra Turban made you hit faster. With enough effort you could build your character into anything.

Level Caps. Level Caps ensured that all content was always challenging no matter how strong you got. If you wanted to help your level 30 friend with your level 75 complete Promyvlion, you had to be level 30. No walking through Toto-Rak one shotting everything that got in the way. Yes, it made content harder, but Victory was a celebration. A win meant something.

Grind Parties. People bitch about grinding all the time. But the fact of the matter is, some of the best times ever had in FFXI were in the grind parties. You knew you were in it for the long hall so you had two choices. Get bored or Make friends. Most people chose to make friends. Those friends became LS, those LS brought more friends and in the End You had a Friends List you could count on. People who would willing fight through a level 30 dungeon for you even though they had long since defeated it.

The community in FFXI was unlike any other in the MMO world. It brought out the strongest feels its players had. Deep seeded hatred for a rival LS pushed people to do whatever it took to be strong enough and skilled enough to get the win, if for no other reason than to rub it in. But on the other side of the spectrum the strongest comradery. People willing to risk not just their time, but there XP and even their levels to help a friend with nearly anything.

FFXI had its problems, no one will dispute that. But it had so much that was lost to the MMO world the day WoW and the Solo-MMO was born.

[Neekzz]

XI is still a great game, the amount of stuff to do is insane. That being said, The game was shaped over the years into its greatness. Abyssea didn't ruin anything. All MMOs evolve as time passes, if they don't they get slow and boring.
I enjoy all the new content and its great to feel like I'm doing something other then stand in line for gear. Give it a try the game is cheap now.

Example of battle events in XI

[Geesus]

Otherwise you're good as dead meat due to force grouping. Once I was able to solo....

1) Why were you playing a MMO if you didn't want to party?
2) Why do I constantly see this from other players in this MMO?

It's not a solo game and neither was XI. If your biggest complaint is that it wasn't solo friendly than all I can say is ...

[Dianic]

IMO - the reason FFXI was great is its style. People love nostalgia, and the old ways of MMO gaming have taken a back seat to the casual audience. FFXI greatly resembled an upgraded version of an "Everquest-Style" game... long, unforgiving, hard... but you really got a feeling of "WOW -- I just did that!" accomplishment.

FFXI was not for casuals. Sure, casuals could play it, but it would take them an eternity. The game forced you to embrace the true nature of MMOs by playing with other people; almost demanding it.

They never bent a knee to the casual solo'ist that has ruined modern MMO gaming.

[Peucritond]

here's what i liked about ffxi
1) storylines --- not just the main ones either. Quest storylines were almost as good as the main ones. For instance, getting the sleepaga II spell, the npc fellow quests, the af quests ( which were connected later on by the WoTG city quests). Alot of quests have overlaps that gave you a bigger piece of what Vana'diel was.
2) the npc -- they have very distinct personalities. from gloomy emo Zeid to the witch Shantotto.
3) the music - we got what 6 different sound tracks
4) in the beginning the grind to your first 75 job. but lets be truthful after that getting your next 75 was far far easier.
5) the collaboration needed in normal partying. Like skillchains and magic bursts. But lets not kid ourselves after year 3 those things were stopped as everyone with a parser would say do the high powered ws would do more damage then sc and burst.

what i hated about ffxi
1) you couldn't tell aldo that his sister was in selbina--- really
2) the botting --- the best thing abyssea did was make the botting less relevent
3) the gil farmers -- the fact it took years before SE even thought of addressing these problems.
4) the massive bannings due to salvage -- pure stupidity on SE part. They should have just took away the exploit and took away the equipment.
5) the arrogance of AV and PW. Mobs that were designed to take more 8 hours is horrible, designing them to be more then 30 hours was ridiculous.
6)early death of crafting -- if all your best drops come from quests and mobs why craft other then to throw gil away.
7) gilbuyers - almost as bad as the gil sellers.
8) the lack of some sort of solo content -- yes its a mmo and that means working with people. but people have lives outside the mmo and working on exping for an hour or two. When the game first came out you couldnt solo a Even Match mob after 20. Heck in some cases you couldnt do too weak mobs either.
9) Too many Melee jobs and not enough Healer jobs. This made for way to many people waiting on pts. If your on an unpopular job you could spends hours and not get an invite.