Making FFXI An Offline Game.

I just started to get what I want, ***.

If you enjoy the look of it you can always keep it around for that, or stats for any level synced content

I keep a Royal Cloak for the lulz (and it was signed :D )

For FFXI, I agree with Kali on the connection to one's gear. Even at 99 some of the classic gear was kept relevant to some extent. Back around 2005, those were the best days of FFXI, we all wanted to be that DRK with a Balmung and an Adaberk or that PLD in full Koenig, or if you dared to dream you wanted to build a relic and be an over night celebrity. All the gear we knew and loved and had memories with because we either worked so hard to get it or because our friends helped us was pretty much rendered obsolete with Seekers and it's ilv system which was a bad idea for so late in the game's life. We all knew the game, we all loved the game but they changed it. I was fine with Abyssea, yes the game lost a lot of what it was with Abyssea but you still had the feeling you were playing FFXI, Seekers took that feeling and trashed it, leaving me with the thought that "this new game looks a lot like FFXI, but it isn't."

I'm a real hoarder, I kept a lot of rare/ex gear in 11 and I do the same in 14 (two retainers just full of gear which is 350 slots)

I agree fully with Kojo, and just wanted to add this to his ilvl system observation.

We have stayed too long under the 75 cap, along with some of the best gear being rare due to time limitations (Nidhogg's 3-7 day pop with a very very VERY small chance of an E body Abj. drop, then saving up millions to buy the -1 cursed body), some that require competent people to kill (aka Kirin 75 era), or just some out of the way requirements (farming 5 eyes, having an alchemist make a cluster, finding 17 competent people doing the same, going down to the vast recesses of hell Den, and hope that they don't disband before your turn to pop).

That's the main reason why these items were good. It wasn't because of the stats on them, it was the effort, the tears, the bloodshed, and the linkshells breaking after their leader got the ***they wanted and were punks who decided that nobody else should get the ***they got.

The ilvl system pretty much destroyed that, where you can get moderate gear with less than no effort. Which killed the game for most of us.

One day in the future, it would be nice if Square-Enix would permit / encourage fan-based private servers and an expansion of Windower to replace PlayOnline Viewer to play the current [or improved / streamlined] version FFXI game with all of its content.

-Skjalf :3

:33333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333

（ΦωΦ）

-Skjalf :3

We know who's posting, why do you sign your posts each time? What's the point? lol

Skjalf loves everyone. Be happy!

-Skjalf :3

I don't wanna imply anything since I don't know if the program(s) in question is a bannable offense if posted here, but there already ways to play FFXI offline if you look hard enough.

It is for Square-Enix to decide the fate of FFXI, they own it. Hopefully, they will not let FFXI die. One would hope that they would want it to live on. If it becomes unprofitable / not optimum to keep game servers running -- it would be nice if they could make it free-play (ad-supported?) / cheap / open-source / public / etc.

-Skjalf :3

From what I remember, Matsui wanted to make it ftp, higher ups said no.

I keep them in hopes of being able to turn them in for seals/desynth.

and retainer gear.

; ;

Nooooooo ~ don't die FFXI! :(
Don't let FFXI die, SE! ;;;;;
Must must gather together and make a stand!
If we cannot convince them -- then we must take action without their consent! ^o^ Like that attractive young girl who said meow at first, but changed her mind and then said no.... err.. umm... nevermind! Just kidding! ^0^

-Skjalf ^_~

Leave Skjalf alone, bear.

While nice, the biggest reason it isn't going to happen is due to direct competition with SE. Matsui already teased that the mobile version will have the team working around the clock to put the old expansions in, as well as mused the possibility of original expansions exclusive to it, like the Mithra homeland. To keep that venture profitable, SE is going to have to control the flow for XI addicts. Why release a one time fee version, when SE can instead direct people to the mobile app and nickel and dime players for the future?

The real truth is that they have to code in all those server checks and other "secrets", which will promptly be dissected most likely by the more technical members of the community, and used in proper XI server emulation, ala SWG & UO, as opposed to the current system most private servers utilize being based on guesswork. Basically, people with the knowledge of how things work could look into an offline version of the game, assuming it was merely patched to be that way, and go to town cobbling their own content up, and altering existing stuff. Wacky antics like maybe having Chloris suddenly be a random pop with a PH in East Sarutabaruta from the exp mandies could be a thing, with unique drops for that encounter, as an example.

Another big reason it isn't going to happen "officially" most likely is due to pride. If SE were to release a completed XI officially, just imagine how much that will shame some of their other games. Massive investments like FFXV would suddenly be compared to what would be the Elder Scrolls version of FF, due to the massive amount of content it could offer. Just think about that for a bit, and then apply it to stubborn JP logic: Do you really think they are of the nature of self shaming by having a product that was from the Square era be released to the masses, and having it compared to stuff like XIII and other main games? That would be mighty embarrassing to have a product of yesteryear potentially outshine some of their more recent... "accomplishments", don't you think?

The last major issue is that after working on ARR, Matsui royally screwed the game balance, which will need a major overhaul, or exclude post-SoA content from a single player game. You're gonna grind sparks and get handed ilvl 117 gear at 99, then suddenly destroy and negate most of the content within the game, after maybe a week or two of soloing for the average person. XI never had really strong storytelling, as it really is just more of a bad design acting as a skinner box to keep people wasting time with many of the storyline missions, so I'd hardly classify that as a selling point for an offline version. Imagine the frustration for someone having to go click on a ??? halfway across the globe, then go through an entire area to another ???, and then demolish a NM or BCNM with their trusts in under 10 seconds, just to watch something like the Zilart twins act like big shots, before the player ultimately spends about 4-10 hours getting to them and smashing them hard in under 30 seconds due to gear imbalance. What will motivate people new to the game to suffer through all of this per expansion? The old system worked due to requiring statics and community to experience a story together, while the true XI endgame just makes it glaring how unfun and uninteresting many of the mechanics really were.

tl;dr - No easy money, no point - SE

You know, I really didn't want to point this out but... Is it just me or does it seem like Matsui took ideas from XIV and applied them to XI? One good example is the vanity system, XI got one not long after XIV did.

Now, I don't have a problem with it and don't see it as a bad thing but I see a lot of XI players that seem to absolutely hate XIV while thoroughly enjoying features that were inspired by Matsui's involvement with XIV.

It is difficult to tell what is copy-paste content from XIV and what is just "MMO modernization," because XIV is itself a hodgepodge of copy-paste content from other games.

Matsui works on XIV so I'd have to assume he saw XIV with these features and decided to add them to XI. Also, XI was always "different" than other MMOs but now it seems to be adding stuff to try to be like other MMOs. A vanity system would've been nice when I played. It should've been added years ago. >.>

I actually think that for an offline version of XI the paradigm system from XIII-2 would work better for trusts.

They're already categorized by party role as it is. And being able to swap your party around at a moment's notice could enable solo players to clear more difficult content.

Just different mentality at SE. Depending on how far back you last played, it was likely still during the "Why would anyone want to jump in a MMO?" Tanaka era. Once they seen how well received it was in XIV, it quickly became something in XI. The irony is that as a player, I feel XI does it better by letting the player Shikaree it up with gear, while XIV is oddly the stickler of "Your current class must be able to wear it" for Glamour to work.

As an older MMO player, I liken SoA era and the XIV style integration as to what happened to Star Wars Galaxy's "New Game Experience", which is a bad thing. Both games originally have a very slow approach with some interesting mechanics, and things ingame that can take ages to grind up (Relic in XI, Jedi in SWG), but both games get sent to slaughter by forcing a "modernization" upon them in a vain attempt to do many different things. Suddenly, people in SWG NGE can start the game as Jedi, XI players can grind sparks and Yorcia for weapons that surpass 50-100+ hour grinded weapons, and the devs for both games can't figure out why they're bleeding subs and how come nobody wants to join their "newer and better than ever experience", ultimately ending the runs of the respective games. Both games ultimately try to turn WoW, ending their uniqueness in the market, and alienating their loyal subscribers, and alienating potential subscribers since "WoW already does x better than y" argument is in full effect.

Matsui and the rest of the XI team were all pooled over to help work on ARR to get it out so fast, so guessing they either seen, or actually worked on some of the features of that game and brought them back. Some stuff was great, like HP warps everywhere of importance. Other stuff like ilvl to work around a level cap? Not so great.

On the brighter side, he's lied to us before already, so there can still be some hope for a single player XI. He said before that to update the game like people wanted, they would have to rebuild the game from scratch ala ARR due to legendary SE spaghetti coding, and now we're having Nexon rebuild the entire game in a year's time to a completely different infrastructure. There always exists some code monkeys somewhere that can do the job, if SE considers the investment return worthwhile.

I quit March of 2013. My LS was dead and most of my friends had quit.

It would be so much nicer if were able to enter username / password(s) in one window and start playing FFXI without the additional five to ten steps that we have presently.

-Skjalf :3

By this point, I honestly feel POL is a better option than the lifeless launcher of most games. I liked to jump on it during periods I was unsubbed and able to chat with pals playing the game or bumming around on POL. Nowadays, you gotta pay money to even post on the official forums or have any chance to communicate with other players, which really kills the whole friendship aspect if something goes wrong with someone. Had an old LS mate keep in touch with me and a few others after his life imploded, and he kept us up to date over POL for free with his PS2 client.

While I'm on the subject of "XIV did it" still, wouldn't mind if an offline version of XI borrows the eventual jukebox personal housing is due to get. Mog House music is soothing, but sometimes you just want Christmas in Jeuno in July, you know?

The idea of FFXI Mobile makes me want to puke because I'd bet four mythics' worth of Alexandrite that it's going to follow an odious Pay to Win setup like, oh, 99% of mobile games that exist.