To those who loved FF11...

[Penthea]

I don't think there is a definitive answer in this case. They both have their pros and cons, and different things appeal to different players.

[Skivvy]

I really despise when people try to discredit someone's opinion by just claiming it's nostalgia speaking.


As others have said, there is no way to determine a 'correct' answer here as you're just asking opinions. Some people will prefer XI, some will opt for XIV - and that's all fine and dandy.

If 11 was a better game, we'd all be playing it right now. It seems obvious to me which game is better.

Anyone that may claim otherwise doesn't really practice what they preach, or else they'd be playing it rather than this one.

To be fair, XIV is far more accessible to players, so it makes sense that more people would be playing it. However, that is not a slam-dunk win in proving that XIV is a superior game. Again, if you feel it is, that's fine! We all have our preferences.

[MicahZerrshia]

If 11 was a better game, we'd all be playing it right now. It seems obvious to me which game is better.

Anyone that may claim otherwise doesn't really practice what they preach, or else they'd be playing it rather than this one.

Some of us play both. On my server alone there are over 1k ppl logged in at any given time in XI and are much more interactive than xiv. Frankly XIV has so much down time I keep XI up on my laptop or second PC so while I'm waiting 20 minutes on a queue I can quest, farm or lvl in XI. The game runs on a toaster at this point lol so its easy to dual box. Even on a not so good PC you can have xiv and xi running at the same time since xi takes very little resources.

[ElHeggunte]

I love both to death, but I still prefer XIV if I had to choose. XI just had too many anti-player, anti-real-life mechanics and designs, at least during my tenure (which was from NA PC launch till halfway through WotG) and I'm not so nice as to willingly let nostalgia blind me to that fact even though it was one of the most fun periods of my life. I've heard tell that updates and mini expansions have alleviated a lot of the issues I had, but I can only judge based on the 7 years I've experienced.

Atleast FFXI had content that wasn't dead on arrival.

Mostly because XI's content was padded to hell and back with ridiculous drop rates and spawn times, coupled with them keeping level caps the same for years.

[Awha]

In FFXI I cannot say I was ever bored, or did not look forward to when I could play. In FFXIV I can go weeks without logging in, sometimes I only log in simply to reset the demolition timer on my houses, or to raid. Might be due to age, but FFXI never felt like a chore to me, at times FFXIV does. Main reason I do not play FFXI currently is because personally the games did not age well. So from a core game play aspect FFXIV has FFXI beat for me personally, however in terms of enjoyment FFXIV comes no where close to matching my time with FFXI. I am looking forward to FFXI mobile, I do hope the adjust some of the dated mechanics.

[Maeka]

As a long, LONG time player of XI, these are some of the things people will say about XI that I just find entirely bonkers:

1). "Better combat!" ..... uh, really, now? Most jobs had nothing but Auto-Attack and Weaponskill with a few LONG cooldown abilities. Our cooldowns in FFXIV are 2-5 minutes. In FFXI, your NORMAL CD for abilities was 2-5 minutes and they were usually for 30 second buffs, or something basic like Shield Bash. Now they did eventually shorten some of these cooldowns, but it took YEARS. There was a point in time when Paladins had nothing but Sentinel and Shield Bash... and one of these abilities was on a TEN minute recast. Berserk for Warriors used to be FIFTEEN minute recast. What were Warriors doing in-between casts of Berserk? Standing there doing absolutely nothing waiting on 1000 TP. Then they'd do a weaponskill. Then they'd wait. Oh yes, such awesome combat indeed.

2). Better community! This one makes me laugh even more. Unless you had awesome connections and played the right job, you were a nobody and you were treated like dirt. The only way to get ANYTHING done in that game was to sit in Jueno and /shout for stuff, and you'd be waiting a very long time. Or you could get a linkshell, but most "social" linkshells didn't really do much with each other either! And then you got the endgame LS's, if you got into one of THOSE, they expected to have control over your very life, dictating when you must show up to events regardless of anything in your RL, like your IRL job. Now, I bet Savage Raid linkshells in XIV are somewhat like this too, but hey. Unlike XI, there's actual content that doesn't involve hardcore endgame.

3). "Dangerous world!" ..... sigh. Yeah, a world full of mobs that nobody fights, that everybody circumvents with Sneak and Invisible. Awesome. Let's put a bunch of mobs in a game that nobody wants to fight for any reason, that everybody will just S/I through everywhere. Such awesome design, right? I'm glad we don't have that crap over here in XIV. Sure, the mobs can be solo'd now but you know, there's plenty of danger in dungeons and boss fights to be honest.

4). "The world is better!" Sprawling landscapes of mobs you never fight, with a few decorations here and there, and.... grass..... and rock..... and grass.......and rock as far as the eye can see. Right. Sure the world might feel bigger (the game is in a later stage in life than XIV is), but what's IN the world? Endless terrain that you have to navigate in the slowest ways possible. Walking was your only method of movement for a huge part of that game's life, and only recently they added mounts. And even WITH mounts, it takes forever to get from one area to another. And a lot of time, it's featureless terrain that you're traversing.

Now a few things of mine I'll say:

5). UI. The UI for FFXI was terrible because it was designed for console first and then a PC port came later. It sure showed too. Wanna move 5 items from your inventory into your mogsafe? It takes forever. And there's this annoying pause between each item too.

6). Time Wasting. Heck there's pauses with EVERYTHING in that game. The phrase "you must wait longer" is very common and it happens with EVERYTHING. Moving items around, even opening certain windows, or the fact you can't have two windows open at once, or the fact you can't even enter a text command while you have a window open which is just ridiculous. And that's not to say anything about terrain features that FORCE you to take the long way around, JUST for the sole purpose of wasting as much of your time as they can possibly waste. If you have a 10 foot distance between you and your goal, you can expect to walk three miles to get around some stupid tiny obstacle preventing you from just going straight there. And every. single. zone. had these types of things in it, things forcing you to sometimes go through MULTIPLE ZONES to get to your destination because it was just that ridiculously convoluted just to do something simple.

FFXI is not a better game than XIV. I'm sorry, it just isn't. XIV has made so many improvements, leaps and bounds over XI that it's crazy.

EDIT: And you know what's hilarious? The one thing in FFXIV that they implemented to specifically be like FFXI, Eureka, is one of THE most complained about things in XIV currently. They thought that they would add a slice of FFXI into FFXIV and guess what? Most people I've talked to, can rattle off several things about it that they hate. They want to like it, but the FFXI-like stuff (death penalties, insta-kill mobs, etc) are usually the things they complain about.

EDIT2: I started playing a bit before Promathia, and continued to play clear up until Abyssea. Took a one year hiatus, came back, played a little while longer, got bored of it again and quit for another couple years, and then came back not too long after Rhapsodies came out and played for.... awhile, but quit early this year because it was just the same boring stuff over and over and over and over again and swapping mobs in Ambuscade is not what I'd call adding content to the game.

EDIT3: I'll also add something else where, in that I don't really *hate* FFXI, or anything nor am I saying it's a bad game, I'm more addressing the ludicrous notion that it is somehow better than XIV.

[PatronasCharm]

I enjoyed, lived through, and had such a wonderful time playing FFXI, in its time: I had so much time to play it, as it was my game to play during my late teens / College days so it was a perfect time sink for my poor college self.

Now that I am so constraint on time due to so many responsibilities I have, FFXIV is perfect, for this season in my life; as I can log in, play a job, do a dng, not have to grind as much: even though playing with DRK right now feels like a grind. But its nice not to be too behind b/c I have to play FFXIV less.

So I say, they're both great games for their respected time.

But which one is better? Hmmm.. My 18 year old me would be biased and full of nostalgia, so I say FFXI.

Now my more mature self, that can log in play, and be productive just enough to feel like I've accomplished something? FFXIV.

Either way, I play both off and on; like I resubbed to FFXI last month to play with RUN and GEO / and finish Wings of a Goddess Missions.

Now I'm back on FFXIV this month to play with DRK =D

[Whocareswhatmynameis]

FF11 was a superior online RPG. You had to actually acknowledge other people on your server existed, and coordinate with them to play it.

[Maeka]

FF11 was a superior online RPG. You had to actually acknowledge other people on your server existed, and coordinate with them to play it.

That sounds great on paper, but in reality, you're a speck of dirt and anybody that was worth anything looked down at you like you were a filthy peasant. FFXI was like medieval RL, where there were severe gaps in society between those that lived like peasants, and the nobility.

FFXIV is more like modern-day, where the gaps between the social classes are smaller.

I don't hear anybody droning on about how the 1500s were better than today, though.

[Skivvy]

That sounds great on paper, but in reality, you're a speck of dirt and anybody that was worth anything looked down at you like you were a filthy peasant. FFXI was like medieval RL, where there were severe gaps in society between those that lived like peasants, and the nobility.

FFXIV is more like modern-day, where the gaps between the social classes are smaller.

I don't hear anybody droning on about how the 1500s were better than today, though.

I think it's obvious to say that everyone's online experience will vary in an MMO. I have always been a more casual player, and I started XI when I was in my 20's and with a full time job. I managed to do what I wanted to do in game, and don't recall ever being looked down as a speck of dirt. I personally had several LSs, none that were controlling about your schedule , although these did exist.

It sounds like you weren't able to find a group of people that meshed with your desired game play - can't exactly blame the game for that.

The social aspect of an MMO is huge for a lot of people, so I can understand if it left you unhappy. I haven't had a FC in XIV for ages as I just can't find 'my people', but That doesn't mean the community is crap.

XIV has a 'elite' subset of players who look down on people just as they have incredibly friendly people. The same could be said for XI.