FFXI Questions

[VDeity]

Hey, I haven't purchased FFXI (I am still thinking of which game I should join, out of all the MMORPGs out there). I am partial to FFXI because I have always been a Final Fantasy fan. I have, however, given in to the title hype before. I remember all the hype that was generated when the Final Fantasy movie was coming out, but it disappointed a lot of people, the same could happen for this game, as it is the first online Final Fantasy in the series. Here are a few questions I would like answered.

1. Concerning World Passes: I found out that you cannot choose which server you want to join and are randomly thrown into some server where none of your friends are. If you obtain a World Pass, can you take your character over or would you have to create a new character and create it in that server? Also, after you have used a World Pass on that character, is there a time limit to how long you stay on that server before you are pulled back into your original random one?

2. What is the cap on leveling? How high can a person level up to, how high are some of the highest level characters in the game?

3. If there is no PK in the game, what is the point in leveling up? What is there to do in the game after you've reached a certain point in level?

4. How big is the worldmap as a whole? How long does it take to travel from one city to the next by foot? Can it be roughly compared to any real life locations in terms of size?

5. Are there very many role players that actually play their part in the story in this game?

6. What is the ratio of English speakers to everyone else? Which is the best server for an English dominant environment? Eng:All

7. At any given time, what is the average amount of players on the servers?

8. Are there 'famous' people or people well known for being that much better at the game than anyone else? Like on Dothack :) Balmung and Orca.

9. How does this game compare to other MMORPGs that are currently up and running?

10. Playstation 2.... or PC?

11. Benchmark 2: I downloaded the Benchmark thingie and tried running it, but I got an error message like 2001 and a bunch of gibberish. Ummm... does this mean I can't play the game?? I have a 2.4 Ghz Processor, 512 MB Ram, 128 MB 3D Videocard, and I run Windows XP. What's the problem?
There ya go, I'll come up with more later, please answer my questions to the best of your ability.

[Rostum]

1. The world pass is permenant and it can be used up 5 times for the one. You do need get the person on the server you want to be on to get you one, else you will be randomly put on any.

2. At the moment the cap is 75, but let me tell you this, it's hard level to get upto no matter what anyone says. Also it keeps getting raised and apparently it's going to get upto 255.

3. There will be a PvP system implemented soon, but we don't know much about it yet. Trust me, there's ALOT of reasons to level up and there are pleanty of things to do... PLEANTY. (MMORPG's aren't all about PKing ya know)

4. Let me tell you, it's absolutely HUGE. I'm talking miles upon miles. To get from Windurst to San d'Oria on foot, it took me around 45 minutes real time.

5. I don't understand this question too much.

6. Well there's probably alot more English speaking people, as the PS2 version just came out. I'm not sure what is the most dominant though. Ragnarok is alot of importers (english speaking) and Midgardsormr is alot of beta testers (english speaking) and there are pleanty of english speakers there.

7. How am I suppose to know? Trust me, alot of people are always on, sometimes less sometimes more.

8. Yeah I guess there's a few that come to mind.

9. It's one of the best in my opinion. I've played Graal Online, Ragnarok Online, Everquest (briefly). They totaly suck compared to it.

10. Whatever flows your boat. PC would probably get better graphics if you have a good PC and the controls aren't that hard for the keyboard. PS2, well you get to lay in bed or something and play.

11. Yeah you can play the game fine, with settnigs up reasonably high.

Another thing, you're looking too much into this. Seriously. The questions you asked aren't even relevant when playing the game; you will have a great amount of fun with this game if you like MMORPG's. Like for instance, the english speaking question; It doesn't really matter who's the dominant server, you get alot of english players in every server and you can easily communicate with the japanese players because there's a translator.

[VDeity]

Well I guess so, but this is the first MMORPG I'm gonna be paying for, and I want to make sure I choose the right one, rather than blow some cash on a game that I'm gonna quit in a few weeks.

[Lionx]

To add on:

1. You create a new one. Its better to choose a server and then get a friend to give u WP.

2. 75 as omecle said, but its soso easy to lvl til 50, although its 3 months and i am still lvl 37(almost 38). But once u reach lvl 47 and try to beat the Genkai1(the lvl cap quest, beat it to lvl over 50) which can take up to 2 weeks without even getting the items, ur lvling slows down alot. Like you need 7000 to the next lvl(200 exp max per toughest monster kill) and once u reach lvl 50, it jumps to a ultra hard 20,000 exp per kill and it goes only doubly higher and lvling is much harder, especially with another genkai after a few lvls.

3.
3. There will be a PvP system implemented soon, but we don't know much about it yet. Trust me, there's ALOT of reasons to level up and there are pleanty of things to do... PLEANTY. (MMORPG's aren't all about PKing ya know)

Indeed, theres LOTS to do. i can firmly say that PKing doesnt really fit the role of this game.

4. Took me an hour to go from city to city and not die...=/

5. RPers are a bit less, most are focused on doing what they wanna do. But that doesnt mean there isnt RPers, there are some.

6. Trust me alot of the JPN players are much much better players than some ENG. The auto translator function is good enough for partying aspects of the game and its enough to keep the flow going and do advanced partying moves. All i have to say is, welcome the japanese as they have welcomed you(its a japanese server too btw, they are all stationed in japan and they are used my them first) and learn to get along. I love them.

7. Around 2100-6000 or so on Midgard. But every server is different. For instance Gilgamish is a primarily French server. So the odds are a bit different.

8. There are definetly some.

9. Beats every other MMORPG i played and seen. THERES AN ACUTUAL STORY OMFG!! (if you choose to follow it that is, its quite deep after mission 6).

10. Depends on ur financial and playing preferences.

11. I am pretty sure you can do it. It migh tbe that ur vid card isnt an NVidia or Radeon one because those cards are guaranteed to work, but i dunno about others. Might or might not.

^^

EDIT: PvP News for FFXI (http://www.playonline.com/ff11us/conflict/index.html)

[Rostum]

Yeah I saw the link after I posted here Lionx, still doesn't say much, only that some sort of system is comming soon.