After resisting the urge for months to return to FFXI, the holiday season got the better of me and I made the trek back to the world of Vana'diel.

Final Fantasy XI is the one mainline entry that I've feared would allude me. Since it's a 20 year old MMORPG, the playerbase has well and truly moved on with their lives and even so it was never a game that had a huge following in PAL regions to begin with. By the time it reached Australian shores, World of Warcraft was well and truly on it's way and everybody I knew flocked to it instead. I gave it a chance but since all my friends were off playing WoW or one of those free MMOs, I just came to the conclusion that MMOs weren't for me.

However the few hours I spent in FFXI did leave an impression on me and I always wanted to go back to Vana'diel and more specifically Bastok.

Ahhh it's good to be home.

A few years back I put a few weeks worth of play-time into FFXI on a private server called Supernova. It's a 2008 version of the game with custom updates to make the game less grindy. Then real life got in the way and I stopped fairly early into the campaign. I tried to get back into it but logistically I was running into the same issues and they've since made some changes that made the game less suitable for what I wanted to do.

So I decided to check out the Canaria server. It's essentially a copy of the retail version up to the latest update in 2015. I thought I'd chronicle the experience for the laymen out there who get just as bugged eyed as me when they see WHT 99 w/Rjlnoir gear and Mwyoin gloves trekking in Zurrachia Everglades to face mobs of Vynnnoir. ^^

None of that, this is the tale of Thinned Skinned Rex (thanks Squaresoft Name Generator) the hulking cat guy just trying to make his way in a bustling town.

FFXI begins twenty years after a great war. The campaign is divided by three major cities all with their own stories to tell. Again I went with Bastok which is home to humans and galka's these humonoid giant cat dudes.

The game begins with your character walking into town and being shown around by another bright eyed adventurer who gives your character a coupon to get 50c. And that's how FFXI starts, no terrorist plot or high school exam, just 50c and you've got to work it out from there.

I have no idea how players would have functioned in 2002. I'd imagine there was a lot of discovery and word of mouth about what to do and where to go. It actually would have been pretty exciting, instead the game has been optomised to the point that there are guides that will show you the most efficient way to play the game. I've been following this guide on the wikia which has been useful. Unfortunately some features here aren't on the private server, so there have been instances where I've wasted time trying to unlock transport only to be met with a brick wall.

www.bg-wiki.com/bg/Quickstart_1-119_Guide

One of the biggest changes to the game since I started playing was the introduction of trusts. They're AI party members you summon that take the form of popular heroes in the game, so for instance you can summon Cid to join your party.

The other big change is the Record of Eminence. They're essentially KPIs you have to hit that will grant you EXP once you fulfill them. So for every 10 enemies you kill in an area, or the number of common drops you recieve, you can get an easy 500 EXP that keeps rolling over. It turns what was a really slow boring grind to start the game into a breeze as the game essentially gives you 10 levels for swinging your sword, earning 50c, striking a Tim Tebow pose and all this other misc stuff.

So starting off in Bastok, I immediately left the town and went straight into this sparse deserty area called Gustaberg. The area is crawling with bees, lizards, evil ninja turtles called quadavs, vultures and your typical assortment of low level JRPG enemies. This used to take hours to clear circa 2004, especially if the quadavs teamed up but I essentially got through the area giving me the option to unlock trusts.

This was actually somewhat painful. In order to access trusts, I had to talk to this foreign big cat guy down in the docks of Bastok. He then set me all the way to the metalworks where I had to ride an elevator and talk to this pompous knight who gave me the ability to clone him and summon him at my leisure. I thought I was going to be stuck with this doofus, but I learned once I summoned him, the game kept giving me more spirits to summon to the extent where I had a paladin, white mage, black mage, samurai and bard.

I guess this was my suicide squad.

So naturally you'd think progress would be pretty simple in FFXI. Clear one zone and move onto the next, right? Wrong. Despite being this massive zone that's about the size of a typical overworld in a FF game, you completely skip the highlands and go straight to the dunes. The Vulkurm Dunes is where the training wheels come off and you learn all about playing roles in your team. It's basically like overwatch where you have tanks, damage dealers and supporters.

In the base game, you'd have to hang around like you're at a school dance hoping that Patty Mayonaise would ask you for a dance. Like any school dance, some roles were far more popular than others, so you could spend an entire day waiting around only to be rejected. This is where having NPCs is handy because you can get started at your own leisure.

I couldn't wait to show the dunes what I was made of! I wasn't some pencil neck booger breath loser, I was Thinned Skin Rex baby!

I died after a few monsters. :lol:

You really have to take your time early on. The trusts are scaled to the level you originally summoned them, so if you gain 3-4 levels, you have to release them and summon them again. It's a simple process but if you're not aware you'll become lizard chow like yours truly.

So on top of the Record of Emincence EXP boost, I also came across a book that gave me additional EXP if I killed a certain amount of lizards and rabbits per cycle. I did that and moved onto crabs and dragonflys until I was about Lvl 20 or so.

I was doing well, but I could have been doing better.

Since the player base was dwindling, Square introduced a new storyline that makes progressing through the game even easier. In fact, it was so easy, I completed the first two missions without even realising it. All you have to do is walk out and walk into your opening town where a cutscene will play about a mysterious girl who wakes up during some mysterious crystal ceremony. You then go to Selbina, the town that's at the Dunes where you speak to a mayor who needs you to collect bee pollen for a pirate.

Bee pollen is a rare drop for a wasp from the highlands. So I guess Square found some usage for that area after all. This is MMORPG 101 here, where you have to get three rare drops from killer bees. They're incredibly harmless, you just have to find enough of them and try to avoid goblins or quadavs who will fight you even when they're out-matched. It's the type of MMORPG mission I hate where it's tedious for the sake of being tedious.

Once you complete that, you unlock your first major progression in the game, the ability to equip a sub-job ala Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. The catch is, you have to level the jobs seperately and you only gain the first half of your subs abilities. It's still worthwhile, since a lot of them will compliment your build or make you more versatile. Right now Thinned Skinned Rex is a big hulking warrior designed to take damage while the rest of the team does their thing. I swing a giant axe that usually misses while provoking enemies to attack me. I'll either pick Thief which will allow me to stealth attack enemies or monk which will buff my character up more.

I'm not sure if this was around when I originally played, but one of the early goals of the game is to unlock crystals to allow you to warp to other areas of the town. Running through Gustaberg to the Highlands to the Dunes can take you 30 minutes easy and since you constantly get stronger and become capable of equipping better weapons and armour, it just isn't efficient to do it manually. The game actually has a better transport system now with more terminals and such but again apparantly the server I'm on doesn't support it.

So starting the game, this storyline about this vision I had of the girl is taking precedence over the main quest line. I did play through one quest line, where a guard got me to go deep into the Bastok Mines, collect a field report and give it to that pompous knight I spoke of earlier. It was a pretty boring mission really where I ran past all these high level sand worms and bats who left me be, got this report which basically pointed out the divide between humans the giant humanoid cats.

The reason why the other mission takes precedence is that the game gives you all these rewards that makes everything cheaper and gives you more EXP bonus. I don't want to waste too much time playing through the game, so being able to experience the story ASAP is key.

So right now Thinned Skinned Rex is Level 25. I have to meet Gilgamesh over in another town to discuss the girl since he seems to know more about the situation. After that, I have to do some more missions with the guards involving Cid and this old mine that's now being over-run by Quadav (the evil Ninja Turtles).

Oh one thing I didn't mention.

The Huge Wasp grind was actually a new mission designed to be more convinient. You basically do it as a favour for Gilgamesh who rewards you with a certificate and you use that to impress the veteran warrior who teaches you how to have a support job. Originally, the veteran warrior tasks you with getting a rare drop off a dragonfly, crab and a ghoul. The former two were easy enough since I was using them as axe swinging practice. The ghoul on the other hand only spawns from 8pm - 4am and they're scattered all around the Dunes. One in game day is an hour, so if you miss your window tough titties. It took me three cycles to get the magical skull, but I did it just to experience how painful it is.

Since last time...

I completed the first chapter of the Rhapsodies of Vana'diel. After the huge wasp grind, I was warped to this pirate hide out and all I had to do was sit through a cut-scene. My reward was a permanent EXP bonus, 80% off all warps and access to a special shop with hard to get items. The quest is extremely easy and it's Square's attempt to make the opening portion of the game far less bothersome.

Sub-Job
Since you have to level up your sub-job individually it's recommended you level right away. Sub-jobs are extremely useful since not only do they expand your abilities but they also provide you with those stat increases. So for me it was back to basics, working my way through Gustaberg back to the Dunes until I had levelled my sub-job to 18. When I first started this could have taken a week to achieve, now it's only a couple of hours easily.

With my Warrior, I decided to give him Monk just so to compliment my damage dealing great axe.

Chocobos
At level 20, you're qualified to get your Chocobo license in Jeuno. Jeuno is a big secondary city that signifies the half-way point of the adventure. Ordinarily you wouldn't go there until you were Level 35-40 but since it's easier to get around you can run away from all the OP monsters. So going from the Highlands, I ran through a Marsh and then through these fields where they had all these big berry trees. The mission itself is very easy and just requires you to go from one town to another, talk to an NPC, feed a chocobo three times in three minutes and you've got yourself a chocobo.

Not only do they make it easy to get around in the open area, but you can avoid aggro with the enemies.

Qufim
Jeuno also grants you access to the next grind area, Qufim which is home to a bunch of ogres and spirits. They're of no real interest and the guide recommends killing more worms and crabs to get from Level 25-35.

Welcome to the Jungle
Of course you don't have to stick to one area and there's other areas with monsters around that level. The other common area around Level 30 is Yhoater Jungle, the first expansion area in the game that's home to deadly monkeys. The guide recommends sticking to the entrance where you can fight these mandrake type creatures, but I got bored and ended up getting deep into the jungle and coming across enemies that were clearly above my pay grade.

Delkfutt's Tower
Despite my character beefing up in levels, I decided I just wanted to explore some areas and just ran around Qufim for a moment. FFXI is a game where you're constantly tied to game guides to get ahead that it's easy to forget to smell the roses. So I went in, faced off against a bunch of enemies and just looked at other areas that were connected. One of them was Delkfutt's Tower, which was a trigger point for the second DLC Chains of Promithia. I thought like Yhoater it may have been a new area, but Delkfutt was a part of the original experience and it's a just filled with ogres, arcs and these fairly passive magic pots. Going through a few floors of the tower was one of my favourite experiences since I was able to just unwind, kill some mobs and discover parts of the world without banging my head against a wall.

Bastok Mission
After completing the first chapter of the Rhapsodies, I was informed I had to complete three chapters worth of base missions. Basically you go to one of the guards at the exit of your home nation, ask him for work and he'll make you an errand boy. Typically this meant talking to one of the guards who would send me to one of the special areas around Gustaberg to fetch somebody his lunch or Cid wanted me to help research some crystals. Really it was just an excuse to see the world and waste time killing creatures for rare drops. The first proper mission was the sixth one, where they sent me to the other two starter villages where I had to complete two seperate missions.

You can choose the order, I went with Sand'Oria to begin with which is the Elvan kingdom and the most advanced civilization in the game. It's a fair hike from the Dunes, you have to go through two giant areas to reach it so it's easily 20 minutes of just walking around to get there. They sent me out to deal with this one orc who was causing trouble. So after walking 30-45 minutes to find this orc in this one far-off corner, I literally bopped it on the head once and left as all his comrades watched on and let it happen.

Then I had to go to Windhurst, which is like an Ewok village on a remote island but it's the size of the other towns. I had to catch a boat from Selbina, the town where I got my sub-job travel through a bunch of areas and then set up a mission in a similar area with the orcs. Except instead of orcs, Windhurst has their own band of crooks known as Yagudo who are bird like warriors. In a far off corner, I had to find a warp pad which took me to a fight against a dragon which is meant to be your first real test but I just bopped it once. It took at least 10 times longer just to get to the area. Anyways this was the first real development where I was informed the Shadow Lord was being resurrected and all the evil forces like the Yagudos, Orcs, Ninja Turtles etc. were growing in numbers and looking to take over all the capitols.

More Jobs
At level 30 you gain access to jobs that were added through DLC. Every job is useful in FFXI, these jobs merely just provide you with more options or provide better synergy in different parties. On my last playthrough I was just working my way to becoming a Paladin, a tank oriented character. It required exploring three different areas around Sand'Oria, killing an enemy or looking at a specific point of interest and reporting back in.

I'm about 20 hours in and the game has really just finished it's tutorial type stuff. I'm looking forward to exploring more and seeing how the story unfolds from here.

So over the Christmas Break, Square hosted one of their Return to Vana'diel Campaigns. This gives former account holders a chance to log-in free of charge and despite coming off Guild Wars, I was curious to see how FFXI compared.

When I started this thread three years ago, it was through a private server that tried to emulate the modern FFXI experience. It came fairly close, but was missing a few key features like additional NPC party members and the ability to warp around Vana'diel without activating warp crystals. So I was looking forward to those features and how much it would streamline my adventure.

Before I dive in, I should point out what happened to my last adventure. I fulfilled all the qualifications to become a Paladin, I then grinded for hours, going through the exact same mobs as before until I finally hit Level 50. At that point, the game wanted me to Jeuno and see this old man who was just hanging out in the courtyard of their parliament house. The old man tasked me to go on this fetch quest in all these dangerous dungeons where I had to the option to farm a powerful enemy for a rare drop, or collect three fragments from around the dungeon.

This took hours and the game wanted me to do 10 more missions just like this before I hit the max level. To make matters worse, I completely misinterpreted what they meant, and thought you had to farm three rare drops, not knowing one rare drop, or three fragments that form one drop - so I wasted a couple hours farming one enemy.

Fortunately it only took a few hours to reach the same point as before. There was an EXP bonus in effect, so it virtually took 50 battles to reach Level 50. I didn't bother unlocking the Paladin class and just stuck with Warrior. I met up with the old man in Jeuno, accepted his quest and proceeded to make the exact same mistake as last time. Fortunately combat was easier, thanks in large part to better trusts. I had access to event exclusive trusts like the best Black Mage Shanatto II and the Unity I signed up with had one of the best healers as well, so combat didn't drag on.

Once I realised the error of my ways, I moved onto the Level 55 challenge. Fortunately this was less time consuming, as the three items I had to collect were all in the same area. I just had to find the three caves, battle the notorious monsters, or even just bait them, take the item and warp out.

Unfortunately the Level 60 challenge was the most difficult yet. Once again, I had to visit one really tough dungeon in all three kingdoms and retrieve an item that's hidden deep in the dungeon and it's protected by an army of enemies that are far more powerful than you. The object is to turn yourself invisible and silent so you can sneak past, wait until the coast is clear, pick up the item and warp out. This would be easy enough, but the game has challenges like unlocking warp points, traps or time limits you have to negotiate with. These items are really deep in the dungeon and it took me a good hour on each to get them all. That's not including a few failed runs where I thought I could brute force my way through, only to aggro the entire map and watch my units slowly lose the battle of attrition.

The toughest challenge of all was in the Windhurst region, where the enemy stronghold is this ancient temple that requires you to collect passwords that are hidden through out the temple. Then you have to make your way through this maze like structure, go up all these floor of stares, insert all the passwords manually before you have to quickly retrieve the item before the boss detects you and wipes you out. It's the closest the game made me feel like Indiana Jones, trying to get away with the treasure without setting off the alarm.

The Level 65 and Level 70 missions were a piece of cake by comparison. The Level 65 just required going to all three major cities and speaking with the right NPC member based on the clues given. The Level 70 requires you to beat the old man, a task I was looking forward to after all those fetch quests. Back in the day this was really difficult but since you can use NPC party members now, it's a total breeze. Within a week, I was well and truly ahead of where I was before.

In the base game of FFXI, originally there were 36 missions - 12 from each major city to complete. A lot of these you can cheese by simply buying the required items from the Auction House, so since I had already played through them and was on a limited schedule, that's exactly what I did.

Of the missions I played, they were really underwhelming. For the most part, you just turn yourself invisible and silent, sneak your way through all these large rooms and maze like structures until you get to the target, boop them for the OHKO and then you watch the cut-scene.

It begs the question of whether they're even necessary since so much of FFXI is just experiencing Vana'diel with the community. However so much content is gated by these missions, that to unlock other campaigns or perks you have to do it.

That Level 60 Level Cap quest I detailed earlier was actually an extension of the 10th mission, so it was highly suggested to kill two birds with one stone. That's where you learn who the Shadow Lord really is and it's the typical tragic villain story where he was a victim of racial prejudice and was granted all this unwielding power beyond his dreams. He was taken down before, but to avoid all this drama you have to take him down again.

The final mission takes place inside his castle. It has some really nice scenary but since you're so OP and it's recommended you just sneak through the castle, it just feels like an extended hike before you boop him on the head and get him to come to his senses.

I'd imagine this would have been so much more climatic back in 2002 when everyone was playing on their PS2s and there's a gold rush to see which party will be the first to take him down. A part of what made this playthrough enjoyable was just reading up about the history and how it wasn't even possible to beat the game on release. At level 50, you were just too weak, so it wasn't really possible until Level 60 and even then it required so much strategy and knowledge of the game.

It's something that's difficult to appreciate all these years later because the game is designed to rush you along the story content so you can get to the post-game stuff. That's where the real multiplayer action is as players want to farm the best equipment, take on the newest challenges and get to really test themselves. I didn't come close to any of that and it requires at least 100 or so hours before you can really dive into the minutia of the game.

As my trial was winding down, I was working on the Level 80 quest which was essentially just grinding a new form of experience and hunting for some quest related armor. I also started on one of the expansion quests, Chains of Promithia which takes place in this alternative almost Silent Hill like dimension that threatens to take over Vana'diel and you have to hunt down this Children of the Corn like kid. Apparantly the story is mant to be pretty good, but the first mission suffered from one of the main issues of the game. That being a lot of missions are 'do this exact 20 minute mission, but in all three kingdoms and they all mirror one another'. Those missions just get really tedious and it's clearly done just to waste time.

Still, there's a lot I like about Vana'diel. The music is as good as ever, the character/enemy designs are fantastic, the cities feel alive and there's an overwhelming amount of side content there. Playing through the game, it got me thinking what it would feel like if it was a single player Xenoblade like experience. I think they could translate it over and tweak it where it could actually hold itself nicely with X and XII. THe story would be a little flat, but if you just leaned into the adventure aspect and fleshed out the NPC party members it would be a sweet experience.

I think the only other issue I had was looting. Loot is such an important part of the experience, but a lot of items are hidden behind this chest mini-game where you have to guess the combination and you only have a set amount of clues/guesses before it disappears. It's just cumbersome and just another way to pad out the game.