Return to Vana’diel

Several years ago, I played Final Fantasy XI. I stopped playing because I didn’t really have the time for it. Well when I found out there was a 2-week free trial, I thought “what the hey, I’ll give it a go”.

And I have to say, I’m loving every minute of it! I’ve started life as a Mithra Thief by the name of Nuraiel in Windurst (Phoenix world) – Mithra have the best agility and dexterity, making them the ideal race for a Thief, my favourite job. Their intelligence also makes them good Black Mages, another of my favourite jobs. However, I’m sticking with Thief for now.
There have been a lot of improvements since I last played, including some good quests to get beginners learning quicker and more effectively, while boosting experience gained. Field manuals (floating books) outside of cities also offer mini-quests in the form of “kill X amount of Y”, with the rewards being a large chunk of experience. Experience from enemies is also higher than it used to be, and one of the first items you can obtain is a ring that boosts experience by 75% (although it does have very limited usage).
I’m just about to hit sunny Valkurm Dunes to level up with people I don’t know. So far I’ve been soloing, and it’s been good, but an MMORPG is really all about playing with or against other people. Now that I’ve got my Thief and Warrior (for subbing) at level 13, I’ll be making the treacherous trek over to Mhaura soon, and then get the boat to Valkurm from there. Good times.
When my trial ended, I was pretty disgruntled to find that to continue playing, I’d have to purchase the game again. Now, I could just reactivate my old account, but I’m quite enjoying the fresh start. In the end, I decided to purchase the game again – it was a tenner on Play. It includes 30 days game time, and I get two new expansions to go with it.
Returning to the game inspired me to make a plugin for WordPress. You’ll see it on the left, there. The plugin page is here, and should be released soon. It’s a widget that shows your character’s information. Unfortunately, all the information has to be edited manually, but an options page is provided in the administration section that makes it very straight-forward to update. I may add features to this over time, depending on feedback and what improvements I think it could do with.
Now I just need the box to arrive so I can start playing again!