Why not borrow the good parts from FFXI?

[Ibi]

That's a good point, I'll edit my post. Though it's worth noting this is 6+ years after Zilart was released.

The 7th Census, taken two years earlier, already had 77.9% of the player base with Sky access, so the portion of players taking that long is minimal.

Unfortunately that's the earliest survey that has the expansion data, so it's not clear how long it was really taking people. Or, possibly more meaningfully, how long it was taking them after they reached 75 and started working towards end game.