Page 124 - PC Gamer - UK (February 2020)
P. 124
REINSTALL
OLD GAMES, NEW PERSPECTIVES
My trusty NPC bodyguard
always keeps me safe.
Yes, you can breed
your own chocobo.
Vana’diel is big, and getting
anywhere takes time.
console that wasn’t really designed graphics engine can’t count pixels resolutions and graphics options as
with internet multiplayer in mind. higher than 800 and the client will well as a host of addons and mods to
That’s why Final Fantasy XI came crash if you so much as even glance make in-game tasks easier. It’s an
bundled with a 40GB hard drive and at another program. incredible godsend.
a network adapter. Fortunately, modders have come
PlayOnline was an ambitious push to the rescue with a tool called TAKIN’ IT SLOW
to normalise online console gaming. Windower that allows for modern I spent more than two hours that first
Square Enix designed it to be a kind night just getting everything set up,
of platform for all of their multiplayer reading guides, and installing addons
games and it included ambitious before I actually started playing. But
social features for the time, like GET A JOB even when I was ready for some
personal email accounts. It was adventuring, Final Fantasy XI likes to
Steam for the PlayStation 2. Takealookatsomeof start slow. A beginner’s guide I found
Today, though, PlayOnline is an FFXI’smostuniqueclasses first had me tour around the major
enormous burden. Even the simple districts of Windhurst clicking on
act of registering an account feels like teleportation points and joining
an arcane ritual. PlayOnline ID, various crafting guilds for an initial
PlayOnline member name, boost of experience points and
PlayOnline password, Square Enix currency that I could use to buy some
ID, Square Enix password – you decent armour.
probably need them all at one point Everything in Final Fantasy XI
or another just to get access to Final takes an enormous amount of time,
Fantasy XI. Menus and prompts are but that’s actually something I like
so confusingly arranged that more about it. Modern MMOs are too
than once I found myself in some BE ASTMASTER BLUE MAGE DANCER eager to please, too afraid you might
weird dead-end corner of PlayOnline This job is for The Blue Mages are If you’ve ever play something else so they try to
with absolutely no real clue how to players that don’t unique in that they punch-danced your make everything as frictionless as
get where I was going. mind going it alone. don’t learn spells feelings, the possible. But Final Fantasy XI doesn’t
And that’s just the tip of the Beastmasters can automatically but Dancer is the job give a damn. It’ll make you spend two
iceberg. Like many older MMOs, charm monsters earn them by for you. They can minutes walking back and forth
and use them in defeating heal allies and
Final Fantasy XI is virtually combat. monsters. weaken enemies. between a pair of quest givers half a
unplayable in its original state. Its dozen times. It’ll make every
124 FEBRUARY 2020
