Final Fantasy XI Online

Rating:
Summary: Solid and Fun
Review: Prior to purchasing this game I spent several months playing Star Wars Galaxies, which is supposed to be the most cutting edge MMORPG on the market. Unfortunately SWG is still extremely buggy and many of the available professions in the game are broken. Needless to say, I started looking for another game and came across FFXI Online. With the exception of a few nitpicky things this is a great game.

Pros:

It's Solid - This game has been up and running in Japan for over 18 months and any bugs that may have existed have been worked out.

Fun story elements - If you take the time to explore town and talk to all the NPC's when you begin you'll quickly fill your mission queue with things to accomplish during your early levels. These are not all typical "go kill/fetch" tasks and some are multistage. Key missions also have in-game movies to introduce them.

The FF atmosphere - Elements of the earlier games permeate the online version. Chocobos, Mogs and Guardian Forces are all here in one form or another and add to the overall charm.

Great graphics - If you have a good video card you're going to love the look of this game. Some of the reviewers have complained about pixelation. I've had little-to-no problem with it. Make sure you use the configuration tool to bump up the graphic performance as high as your card will handle. There's also a benchmark utility on Square's website that will give you a good idea whether or not your system is up to scratch.

Cons:

Poor documentation - The book that ships with the game is horrible. They would have been better off shipping Brady Games' strategy guide with it. There are pros and cons to certain character race and job combinations that you would not know about otherwise.

Long install - Yes, it's a doozie. Don't expect to play much your first night. First you have to install the Play Online client, then you have to install the game itself. After that you have to install the expansion pack. Finally there is a lengthy update to install the latest files. The account creation process is also pretty involved. My guess is that all the extra gyrations you have to go through are due to this being a cross-platform game. Still, they could have made this easier.

Character variation - There is very little you can do to make your character look unique. There are 8 race/gender combinations, 8 faces per combination and two hair colors for each face. On the plus side, this probably reduces the amount of lag associated with rendering characters and keeps this a speedy game for console players.

Interface - Slightly customizable, but it's definately geared towards console players. Still, most MMORPGS have variations in the way their command keys are organized, so experienced gamers will overcome this quite quickly.

Overall Rating: I'd give this a qualified "Buy" rating. Complaints about the cost are unwarranted. The monthly rate and initial cost are comparable to similar new MMORPG's on the market. Still, it is a lot to plunk down if you're not used to it. Also, this game has learning/advancement curves that may not suit the average MMORPG player. North American gamers tend to gravitate towards first person shooters while the Japanese market is high on RPG's. If you are a Killer or Achiever type of gamer you may be frustrated. If you are predominately an Explorer or Socializer there is much here to love.

Rating:
Summary: Lets be honest
Review: Ok lets be honest. I like many others who have reviewed this game have what I would like to call extensive experience with MMORPG'S (I've played Everquest,DAOC,Rubies of Eventide,and quite a few others in my time),and thus I think I can make a good judgment of the quality of this game. This game is the same old stuff yet again,we have casters who can not solo,we have the old leveling treadmill that makes it nearly impossible to gain a level (and oh this is my favorite thing---am I the only one that is tired of paying for these games only to not have them be any fun till I reach X level? I mean I'm tired of fighting bunny rabbits and rats,I'm tired of playing a mage that can only cast 1 or 2 spells before his tanked out and is then useless),we have the same character types (you know what I mean,the black mage is the wizard from Everquest,the white mage is the priest,the warrior is the warrior,need I go on here?),and we even have the same types of races. It's all wrapped up in a new looking package for us USA players,but the fact is that a fruit cake,no matter how you wrap it up,is still a fruit cake. But even that would not normally get a 2 star rating from me,no better than a 3 yes,but not a 2---you see this game "adds" some wonderful little delights to the mix of the old. First off let me state one thing that I've found positive from this game and that is the nice graphic look too it,but to be honest that's the only thing I can like about this game. There is first the wonderful registration procedures you have to go through and they have been quite thoroughly covered by other reviews here,but to re-hash that part slightly I will use some of the words of another on here---they have taken what is normally at most a 3 step process with others games and doubled it. The interface of the game can be described using the words "convoluted" and "unnecessarily difficult" not only in the game itself as well,but the secondary client called Playonline too (which seems to be some form of e-mail service within the game itself---why this is need I really don't know). Everyone is assigned random servers,this means that playing with your friends is going to be near impossible (one needs quite a bit of luck),and with the quickest means of getting everyone together within the same server is the near impossible to gain World Pass (it costs you Gil,money,in the game and in fact costs quite a bit in the upwards of 2000+. This means that no beginning character and few advanced one's afford one and with economy of the servers already wrecked (more on this in a minute) all a characters Gil tends to go toward getting better equipment instead). Oh yes did I mention the wrecked economy of the servers,well there is a good reason for that,you see this game has been out in Japan for some time now,and because they did not open near servers over here in the USA those players play on those same servers---which means that not only do you have to deal with people who don't understand you or you them in all likely hood you have to deal with players who are FAR more advanced than you. And then there are the spawn and drop rates of this game,newbie zones are full of newbie's but nothing to fight,and when you do fight them they rarely if ever drop anything---making it yet again nearly impossible to get Gil. Oh and this review would be lax without mention of the utterly useless manual that oddly enough is quite large too but seems to have so little to say,there is ALOT missing from it,not the least of which would be rules on crafting or even some hints and guide-lines. To all those who give this game a 5 star review,I'd like to ask you just one question,if you took away the Final Fantasy name and archetypes (the name of the black mage,red mage,chocobos,etc.) would you still like this game? Would you still rate it as high as you have? I know what your thinking---"Gosh this review sounds like all the others" and you know something it does and if you really think about it---it's quite sad really. I mean have game designers not learned anything by now? This game could have been so much more,and I really do hope that some of the other game designers on MMORPG's of the future do read these reviews and learn a few things. I also hope that some Final Fantasy fans read this review as well and try to listen to the words I've said---give it a try you do get 30 days for free after all,but let me tell once my free period is up well lets just say I won't be going back to it.

Rating:
Summary: MMORPG'ers READ THIS REVIEW
Review: 2.5 stars to be honest.

Repetitive music. Combat is mostly boring. Graphics are fair, fair, fair! I have a Radeon 9800 PRO and I have the few quality settings they offer on full. There are noticably better graphics out there on other MMORPGS. The zones are large and few. Getting around to other places is expensive or complicated. You can lose a level with XP losses due to death - old, dated EQ stuff there.

The game is OK. Nearly all your "INCREDIBLE" 5 star reviews all over the net are the F.F. fanatics that haved waited for this to come out and tried their first MMORPG game or may have looked at a few others briefly.
This is an average game this will make a lot of F.F. people happy.

Rating:
Summary: Good MMORPG for those with spare hours
Review: Final Fantasy XI Online is finally out, and millions of Final Fantasy fans are enjoying the fun world of chocobos and airships in an online MMORPG.

The graphics and sounds are lush, and the cut scenes and quests make you really feel like this is an adventure game in addition to a MMORPG. There are all the familiar elements - from chocobos, airships, and familiar faces - plus enough new things to keep it interesting.

Like all other MMORPGs, this is about creating a character, developing him or her by gaining levels and experience, killing monsters, going on quests, and developing group friendships.

It has to be said that every MMORPG appeals to a different type of gamer. FFXI will appeal to gamers who are patient and who are in it for the long haul with their friends. Levelling up is slow. The learning curve is difficult, and it can take you a LONG time before you do things that are considered "fun" like riding chocobos or airships. You'll have to put in long hours before you can get your character a sub-job or an advanced class. And you'll need friends to help you achieve those goals.

Also on the annoying side, you can't choose what world you start on. Only after you put in time and effort can you "buy" the ability for a friend to start on the same world as you did. So while we bought 2 copies of the game at the same time so we could play together, the game prevented us from doing so.

So really the game is about one person going on first, and creating a character to get those "World Passes". Then he starts inviting on friends and slowly the entire group of friends can join a server. Then together they can start the long quest to develop their characters. This might be fine for people who don't work and have hours and hours to do nothing but sit in front of a computer screen, but for most of us, this is a detriment. If you have 2 hours to play in a given evening and want to go questing, that's fun. But if the quest involves finding an item and the game only has that item spawn once every 3 hours, now you've wasted 2 hours trekking around an empty desert and have achieved nothing. That is NOT fun.

Hopefully the FFXI designers will get a better balance of the game so that those with 8+ hours a day to blow on game-playing will enjoy the slow pace, but so that those who want something enjoyable to play that doesn't invade their entire life can have fun as well. A game doens't have to be easy to be enjoyable - it just has to give results when you put in the effort.

Rating:
Summary: How can this possibly be worse than Everquest or others?
Review: How can this game be possibly worse than everquest or everquest online adventures for PS2. I see some reviews by people who are "not new to the mmorpg community" giving this bad reviews. It may have it's flaws, but compared to the other mmorpg games it still at least matches up, if not better. I have a feeling that alot of people do not like this game and other new mmorpg's such as SWG, because it is not as easy, if not impossibe to benefit from 24/7 gameplay (i.e. living at home with mom or unemployed), cheat and "twink" your character with items and other higher level characters you own, or use multiple computers and accounts in your home, dorm, LAN party, etc... I have been playing EQ for years and, although it is a good game, it is out-dated and has it's many, many flaws as a result of that. It has been my experience that the majority of people that enjoy EQ and have high level characters are people that have cheated in one way or another (using the above methods), some have even used credit cards to buy in-game items, in-game money, or bought items to trade for experience (orc belts) online. These new games put an end to that nonsense. These new mmorpg's such as FFXI, Horizons, and Star Wars Galaxies are putting an end to this and I think it's great. This is the new age of MMORPG's. Don't be fooled because these people give it bad reviews because they can't find an unfair advantage like with their high level everquest characters. Also, this game along with others use new job systems and break away from the old philosophy of hacking and slashing millions of creatures for weeks in order to benefit from any of the games features. In older mmorpg's such as everquest, everything, including finding resources for all job skills and professions, comes down to hacking and slashing millions of creatures. These new innovations are trying to put an end to that. You should not have to kill giant frogs to get the copper and ore you need to build a sword! since when do frogs carry copper and ore? Everything in the old games comes down to killing things. These new games put an end to that I I like it. I give it a thumbs up.

Rating:
Summary: I'm not buying the P.C. version , I'm getting the P.S.2 one!
Review: The P.S.2 Version will be better in everyway to the P.C. version except for one thing......
GRAPHICS!!!!!
You know you do not have to buy this version.
In order to go online with your P.S.2 get the network adapter.(from,where else,Game-Stop!)
Get a Really long phone cord.
A Screw Driver.(actually,no,a quarter.)
open the exspansion pack on the back of the p.s.2 then put the adapter in,screw it with the Quarter,then plug in the phone cord and your done!!
Anyway I'm Hoping that Final FantasyXI will be an auesome game.
Sincerly,
kenny

Rating:
Summary: Not bad. . . but has it's flaws
Review: I've waited to post a review for this game to get a feel for it. I will be completely honest in the fact that I thoroughly enjoy it, but for the less tolerable game players, I would not suggest it. This game requires immense amounts of patience.

It takes a long time to level up your character, and after a short period of time you will find out that in most cases you NEED to start finding groups of people to game with.

The game does have quite a few things to keep you busy. Missions, quests, crafting, etc. But I can see how someone can become bored with it, all of these things tie in to having a strong character, and as I mentioned before it takes time.

As for the gameplay. . . it's smooth, granted the servers aren't in the U.S., but I haven't experienced much lag and I am on the east coast, so I'm not complaining. The graphics aren't too shabby, when you start the game up, you will think you wasted your money if you are big graphics nut, but after tweaking with the display options, it looks pretty nice. Sound quality is great, it holds very true to the final fantasy experience (i.e. music and sound effects).

If you are looking for a story line, this isn't the best place, the story line is loose and not really there, but there's not a WHOLE lot you can do for a MMORPG in ways of a story.

System requirements seem to have been an issue for people, it states on the packaging what it requires to run the game, honestly you don't need a "super-high end-spend the next years worth of paychecks" video card. I am using one of the lower end GeForce cards, I think I paid some 60 bucks for it.

The only real beef I have is the cost, you have to pay a monthly fee for your "content i.d." and then a dollar for each character made under it, so if you like to have a lot of characters, you're going to be forking out some serious dough.

All in all, it's a pretty good game, you need time to play it, a little patience, a decent computer set up, and a little bit of cash. If you want something that is, more involved, I'd suggest Star Wars Galaxies, SWG has more stuff to do than you have time to spare.

Rating:
Summary: This game is the most annoying and tedious mmorpg ever!!!
Review: I have played quite a few mmorpgs and i gotta say, this one is the most annoying and tedious one out in the market. Just to give u a few examples. To ride a chocobo, you gotta be lv 20, and u have to complete a quest to do it. To use the airships, you have to complete 6 missions, the last one is a ridiculously long ass quest. To be able to be an advance class (ninja, samurai, summoner, ranger, etc) you need to reach lv 30 first, and complete a quests. The worst thing of all, you gotta get to lv 18 and complete a quest just to get a subjob! And you wanna know how hard this quests is?? My group and i have just spent the last 3 hours trying to find 1 item, for this quest, and we have only found 1. Square decided to make this 1 item, a rare drop, and on a mob that hardly ever spawns! So let me say this again! Do not buy this game. cause you will definitly start to hate it. I surely know that i am canceling.

Rating:
Summary: All Other Online RPGs are Now IRRELEVANT
Review: FF XI is so vastly superior to every other MMORPG I've tried (inluding Everquest, Asheron's Call 1 and 2, Anarchy Online, Dark Age of Camelot, Ultima Online, and that Korean one whose name escapes me), that I don't see how they will long survive if they don't do a great deal very quickly to compete with this PERFECT online RPG.

FF XI is simple and complex; you can just fight critters for no reason if you like, or mine, or chop wood, or ride chocobos, or become a craftsman; or you can get quests and missions to give battles purpose beyond merely leveling up; some missions even involve gaining more territory for your particular city-state and therefore making your city state (and thus you) richer; and you can get quests and missions that don't even involve combat as well; You MUST speak with EVERY NPC to find that ones that will give your gameplay experience depth. Do this and you will find yourself involved in plots galore.

Having said this I have only mentioned a few things the gameplay offers. It would take pages and pages, and it would take me dozens more gamplay hours, to be able to explain it all.

The graphics in FFXI are amazing; there is no online rpg and no rpg frankly with graphics like this; Morrowind comes closest but FFXI outstrips Morrowind because the CHARACTER MODELS in FF XI are so crisp and finely modeled you won't believe it; no blocky arms or legs here; each npc and pc is sculpted with all the sublety and fine modulation of a Greek sculpture. They are simply beautiful. The landscapes, while not brightly colored as in FF X, are varied and interesting with lots of realistically subdued earth tones, except of course in green forests and fields, which are also sprinkled with colorful fruites and vegetables here and there.

The modeling of the creatures is also breathtaking; from the giant crabs to the gigantic sheep, these critters are a pleasure just to observe as they move about, which brings me to the animation;

the framerate on my 1.6 gig pc with a G-force 2 card and 128 megs of ram, is fabulous; and the movements are so realistic they all seem to be motion captured, though how you can motion capture a troll is beyond my understanding. But they've done it.

And as others have said, there are no bugs; zero, nothing is amiss here.

If there is any downside you will find the installation process long; and the patch that automatically installed before I could begin took about an hour with my cable modem, so consider that.

Also, the interface will take some getting use to. As I said, you get out of it what you put into it, so if you want to experience all the depth and beauty and satisfaction this game has to offer, all the challenge and story, you MUST take time to get acquainted with all the controls and menus; SURE you can just run off and start killing little animals, but to enjoy ALL this game has to offer, to do more than skim the surface, you should read the manual AND buy the strategy guide.

If you want ONE online RPG, one you know won't frustrate or disappoint or let you down as some have been known to do, then BUY FFXI

Rating:
Summary: High expectation yet was disappointed
Review: First off, I would like to say that I am a big fan of FF series. I've played the NES, SNES, GAMEBOY, PSX, etc version of this serie. I've loved everyone of it.

Secondly, I have played quite a few Massive Multiplayer Online games in the past 6 years or so. I really do enjoy the MMO atmosphere of interacting with other.

Now for the review of this supposedly great title. I really anticipated this title to come on this side of the Pacific for a very long time. How can I go wrong with a title like Final Fantasy and Square.

When it came out, I was a little dissapointed that there won't be any server on this side of the Pacific. I live on the east coast, that mean lag might be an issue because its basically on the other side of world that I am trying to connect to. At first I was goign to say screw it and forget about this title, however, something inside me told me that its Final Fantasy and I have to buy it...foolishly I gave in to my inner demon desire.

Oh cool, I got the game, stratergy guide and a nice mouse pad with poster also as a bonus. Opening the box reveal 5 CDs. So pop in the CD #1 to run the setup, error...you need playonline. Ok, no problem, look through the CDs found 1 that is by itself so pop that in. Install it. Register. Download the update, which download some 7000+ files... That took around 45 minutes. Ok, its cool, I am almost done.

So after around an hour total, I get to start installing the actula final fantasy game. Put in CD1 and install it. It stop and CD3. CD4 is the expansion and have to be install separately. No problem. Took around another 35 minutes to install the 4 CDs. I have a P4-2.5GHz, 52x CD-rom, and 1g of ram. I am pretty sure if it will take you much longer if you have slower system.

So after an 1hr 45minutes, I guess I am done and ready to play. WRONG!!. When I connect to FF XI, it start downloading patches again. This time around 1300 big files. Estimated time on the timer was 2 HOURS 10 minutes. The 1300+ files is rougly 2CD worth of data.... so I let it run and hope I don't loose connection or anything. After around 2 hours it was done. It took another 15 minutes or so for the 1300 files to install, will probably take longer on slower computer again.

So after 4 hours of installation, I get to start the game. Error, can't play yet. Have to setup playonline handler and buy and id to create a character. WTF!?!!! is this? Ok, I already wasted 4 hours, might as well do what it said. So bought an ID, it was free (didn't know that at first). So another 1/2 hour of creating handler and setup id. I got my first character and on my way to adventure.

Got pass the intro and start moving, accidentally hit the WINDOWs key, ERROR! Program not in full window mode, terminated....kick me back to playonline. Oops, np, I will just log back on. ERROR... character in use, please try again later. WTF!!!!! Had to wait like 10 minutes, and was able to log back on again. Had to watch the whole freaking intro again for the character. The controll was inferior to any other PC games I have played. Basically this game is completely design to use the num-pad. A lot of the short key are on the num-pad. From open menu to movement, to enaging enemy...The graphics are inferior to game such as Earth and Beyond.

Anyway, I managed to find my way to the hunting ground. Killed a few mob and got a headache from the death of the 1/4 of my brain cells. I have no idea how Square managed to sell 400k copies of this title. I wonder how many of those 400k account is actually still subscribing after the first 30 days.

Cons:
-Pixelated graphic
-Installation took around 5 hours on cable modem
-Monthly cost is very high
-Game control poorly design
-Lack of MMORPG admostphere for some reason. Missing that spark that keep you playing.

Pros:
-It carry the Final Fantasy name in the title