Final Fantasy 11/XI - Final Fantasy
Final Fantasy XI (11), also known as Final Fantasy XI Online, is an MMORPG and the eleventh installment in the flagship Final Fantasy series published by Square (later Square Enix ) was released in Japan on May 16, 2002, for the Sony PlayStation 2. It was released for Microsoft Windows-based personal computers in November of that year and was later released for the Xbox 360. Developed by Square, it was the first MMORPG to feature cross-platform play. A spin-off game called Final Fantasy Grandmasters was released for mobile in 2015. Generally, the game received positive reviews from critics, and at its peak, approximately five hundred thousand active users were playing Final Fantasy XI online. In April 2015, the Final Fantasy XI development team announced the end of updates, expansions, and other major additions.
Prologue
The world of Vana'diel is on the brink of war. Three powerful nations, united in their fight against the forces of the Beastmen, turn to their last hope: brave adventurers like you! Will the Beastmen gain the upper hand and push the once-peaceful land of Vana'diel into another war?
-Game intro on the official Final Fantasy XI website
The plot of Final Fantasy XI
The story takes place during the Age of Adventurers, in the year 884 of the Crystal Era, twenty years after the end of the Crystal War. The three nations of San d'Oria, Bastok, and Windurst employ adventurers to defeat the beastmen, whose troops consist of Orcs, Yagudo, Quadov, Goblins, Antica, Sahagin, Tonberries, Gigas, and Demons. Players must create alliances between the nations to defeat the resurrected Shadow Lord, and throughout the game, they face numerous bosses and powerful enemies such as Shantotto, Raubahn, Omega, and others.
Gameplay
Each player customizes a character by selecting a job, gender, race, face, and body size. The races to choose from are Hume, Elvaan, Tarutaru, Mithra, and Galka, and there are six initial jobs: warrior, thief, monk, white mage, black mage, and red mage. Other jobs become available later in the game (ranger, bard, beastmaster, dancer, scholar, geomancer, etc.), and the player can switch jobs at any time. The player can also unlock the ability to choose a support job, where they can use two jobs at once, such as being a monk who can cast white magic. Battles take place in the game world, where the player may be attacked by monsters as they travel the land. Some monsters initiate combat themselves. Levels increase when the player gains enough experience, which is gained by defeating monsters, completing quests or missions, and various other means such as joining an EXP party.
Players can complete quests given by shops, organizations, or NPCs and carry out missions to resolve issues troubling their nation in order to receive rewards and compensation. The main plot of the game unfolds by completing missions given by the gate guards of the three main nations. Initially, these missions differ depending on the nation, but converge later in the game. In Conquests, the player fights for their nation, gaining influence and territory by defeating beastmen and monsters. Players can communicate using chat and emotes, and join groups and alliances to defeat powerful monsters. One of the main criticisms of the game is that it did not allow for significant PvP action. However, two PvP game modes called Conflict (where players fight by throwing petras into a castle) and Brenner (a capture-the-flag-style game) pitted players against each other.
Characters
In the game Final Fantasy XI Online, players could choose from five different races for their main character.
- Elvaan - The Elvaan race is composed of proud warriors from the Kingdom of San d'Oria. They have deep faith in their beliefs and possess high levels of strength and wit as skilled swordsmen. However, they lack MP and Intelligence stats.
- Hume - The Hume are the game's equivalent of the human race. They originate from the city of Bastok and are the most common race in Vana'diel. They are known for their balanced abilities and high intelligence.
- Galka - A race of powerful warriors with no origins, as their capital city was destroyed by war 600 years ago. They are known for their strength and possess the highest HP and Vitality levels in the game. However, they lack MP stats.
- Mithra - A hunter race that coexists harmoniously with the Tarutaru race. They are known for their energy and possess high dexterity and agility. However, they lack HP stats. Male Mithra are rare, and females are the only playable gender in the game.
- Tarutaru - A race of skilled magic users who are smaller and child-like. They have the highest MP and Intelligence of all the available races. However, they lack HP and Strength stats.
Development
Hiromachi Tanaka, lead developer of Final Fantasy XI, expressed interest in creating the game as an MMORPG after being exposed to Western-style MMORPGs such as EverQuest. Hiromachi stated that the game was influenced by an earlier game, Final Fantasy III , and its development was tied to Square's new "all platforms and media" development approach. The game ran on the Nvidia GeForce 4 Ti GPU, one of the most powerful graphics processing chips at the time, and operated using the PlayOnline system, Square's online gaming service used on many platforms. Numerous patches and updates were developed for the game after its initial release, adding new content, features, bug fixes, and languages such as French and German. Five major expansion packs were released before Square announced the cessation of major development. Naoshi Mizuta, Kumi Tanioka, and series veteran Nobuo Uematsu composed the game's music.
