Evan Sims

Thoughts on Returning to Final Fantasy XI

So as many of you know, either because of my Twitter stream or because you know me personally, I’ve made a return to Final Fantasy XI along with my friends Ryan, Will and Jim. I began playing FFXI when early 2002, when I was accepted into the beta for the PlayStation 2. At the time I really didn’t have much faith in the game, or interest to be honest. I was more excited about getting a free hard drive unit for my PS2 than the game itself. That’s probably why I never made it past level 8. That and the fact that I was trying to play it on my tiny, shitty television at the time.

Fast forward to November 2002, and I’m over in Arizona visiting Jim. He wasn’t very interested in the game either, but my consumer whorism got the better of me, and I talked him into trying it by buying him a copy. We headed to EB and picked up FFXI, and the rest, as they say, is history. Jim’s girlfriend Stephanie joined us, and together we started a guild. In time, the guild grew and grew, thanks almost single handedly to great efforts of Stephanie and Jim. The guild eventually grew to become one of the better known linkshells on our server, and we made a lot of friends during the time we played. But all good things must come to an end, and ultimately the guild was disbanded.

Recently the idea of returning to FFXI was brought up. I had tried to load up FFXI several times since the guild, but as I expected I couldn’t get into it. With the exception of Ultima Online - which was to thank for my meeting Ryan, Will and Jim in the first place - I’ve never played an MMO by myself. Or, I should say, I’ve never seriously played one. I load them up and then get bored. So I was very pleased to hear that the guys wanted to go back to FFXI and jumped at the opportunity.

Continue Reading ‘Thoughts on Returning to Final Fantasy XI’ …