I reached level 10 in Final Fantasy XI yesterday, which felt like a pretty major feat on my part. I was quite sure that I was going to quit before I reached that magical mark, that I once again would leave the game hanging somewhere around Windurst. Taking my advice from Sera, I decided to leave the area I had been in from the start – East Sarutabaruta, just outside Windurst – and trek to Mhaura, where I grabbed the boat to Selbina and the Valkurm Dunes.
During the time I’ve played MMOs I’ve managed to identify certain key moments when my character grows from just being a character I play to a character I can identify with. One of those moments is when I leave the starting areas. If you play a new MMO it is easy to judge it from the first area you are in, if you’re not entertained it is easy to think the rest of the game is similar (the opposite is also true, which is something that most designers these days have realised to the point that we even have a term for it, the “Tortage effect“). So stepping out of that first, probably rather safe, zone is incredibly important. It always feels like a pretty major event.
Windurst and East Sarutabaruta (silliest area name ever?) were starting to feel incredibly boring. I was killing more or less the same mobs over and over. The environment felt dull. None of the crystals I was gathering sold at the Auction House. I had nothing to put in my mog house. I was unable to find a fishing pole, which felt increasingly frustrating. In short, I was bored and had no idea what to do. And then I dinged level 10.
First of all, I got a couple of new spells, both from the shop and as drops. Finally I wasn’t just throwing Stone, Water and Poison on my enemies – now I had Blind, Aero and Dia to play around with as well. I realised that I could solo most of the mobs in the area, making me feel at least a bit powerful. And, as mentioned above, I could leave and see other parts of the world. So I left for Mhaura, dodging nasty goblins along the way.
I’ve heard people use the word “immersive” a lot when it comes to describing Final Fantasy XI, but up until I reached Mhaura and got on the boat I hadn’t felt it. It might sound silly, but the boat ride changed everything. First of all, there’s the process of actually getting on the correct boat – you’re not allowed to go near it without first paying the 100 gil fee, which lets you pass the guard. Then you have to wait for the proper boat to arrive and when it finally sets sail it zones you into a boat area. The boat ride between Mhaura and Selbina takes about 15 minutes, which you can spend fishing (if you have a fishing rod), shopping or killing monsters that get on the deck. I spent my first boat ride talking to a guy named after a Nick Cave-song, idling away next to the captain of the ship. When the 15 minutes were over, I was zoned into Selbina and had to go through immigration before being able to explore the town.
I had to stop myself from tweeting “You can’t stop me because I’m on a motherf*cking boat!” during the whole boat ride…
Anyway, I do realise that the whole travel thing can get pretty old if you want to get from one place to another quickly. I’m pretty used to slow traveling from Ryzom (I tend to forget to buy new teleportation pacts), but I’m sure the boat ride isn’t as cool the umpteenth you have to take it. On the other hand, it’s a good time to take a break or level your fishing. As I continue to play, I will do my best to view it as that instead of as an annoying evil.
I feel a certain love for Final Fantasy XI grow as I play more. I still have no idea what I am doing or where I’m going. I currently plan to head back to Windurst instead of looking for a group in the Dunes, since I haven’t found one yet and I’d rather try to level a bit on my own than standing around waiting for things to happen. I’ll keep playing until my 30 days are up, then I shall review how I feel about it and see if I’ll stick around longer. I’ll probably keep blogging about it. There is still a lot to see and do, which will make or break my future stay in Vana’Diel.
Until then, I will just enjoy that giddy feeling I get from travelling on a motherf*cking boat.
This pretty much describes my feelings about FFXI when I started playing it over a year ago. It was very confusing initially and it just felt… old. I kept asking myself “wth was I doing” during the grind to level 10 and since I was tired from my other favorite MMOs, I decided to press forward and play for at least my 30 days.
It turned out that I got really hooked to the game past level 10. My first trip to Valkurn Dunes was an epic story. Traveling in the game was full of dangers and when I got to the Dunes for the first time, I felt a big relief and accomplishment. My next objective was to get to level 18 and get a sub job. After that I was able to finish the Chocobo license quest. And just like that, every little progress you make with your characters, gives you this huge sense of accomplishment.
It is a very social game too I think, since pretty much everything you do past level 10 will require a group (at least it did when I was playing), you end up meeting new people all the time and you’ll learn a great deal about the game that way. Past a certain point, Pug’ing in FFXI is not so bad as in other MMOs you’ve played, just because leveling forces you to group so everybody out there pretty much knows all the mechanics of their classes after they got a few levels past 20 I’d say. I have a lot more fun leveling that way than Quest Soloing on nowadays MMOs.
It is an amazing game with very deep gameplay elements. I always think about returning to it at some point. I played it for 4 months and I got to a point where I didn’t have the time I wanted to dedicate to the game, due to work and other family activities. Now that features like Level Syncing and Fields of Valor are available, I should maybe give it a try one of these days. Or maybe I should just wait for FFXIV…
Wow, your comment really made me want to push even further into FFXI…I can’t wait to get my Chocobo license. Did you ever try out breeding your own Chocobo? I’m not really sure at what level you can start doing that. It’s a bit about the gil too, I suppose.
What you are saying about grouping is probably true, but to be honest I returned to Windurst pretty much directly after I finished writing this post (with a bit of a help from a goblin butcher, who killed me and sent me to my home point…). I guess I should just return to the Dunes and just wait until I find a good group, then.
And yes, there’s always that magical FFXIV…I shall get back to that in a future post, but it’s hard to stop thinking about it when you pick up a game as old as FFXI. Especially if what they said at E3 is actually true and we can look forward to it already next year.
Getting your Chocobo License will open up the world a lot more to you. It is a huge thing in my opinion, just like getting your subjob quest complete. I have never tried to breed my own though. I don’t remember really well, but I think it was a bit expensive and that’s why I didn’t do it since I was just so fresh to the game… and poor.
As far as grouping goes, I knew the game had “forced grouping” when I jumped onboard. I heard about the terrible first 10 levels before I started playing so I was anticipating my adventures in the Dunes. Having a full group of people, each one performing their roles accordingly and you get pulls after pulls of mobs, giving you those nice XP bonuses, it’s a thing of beauty! I really miss that aspect of the game in other games. Now, if you get a bad party, it will probably be one of the worst MMO stories you will remember for a long time haha. But like I said, this is really minimized after a certain point, since everybody sort of expects to group and somehow they gotta learn their class, if not, they won’t be able to find teams in the future and progress.
But, the game has changed a lot from what I’ve seen. There is this new feature I don’t know much about called Fields of Valor, that will allow you to solo some quests (?) and that may be a viable way of leveling up without groups… Maybe. I don’t know really. It’s worth checking out if parties in the Dunes are not happening for you, which I think it should, since they added Level Sync making that a lot easier.