Game Review FFXI

Description of the game:
You start off as a "New Adventure" in the world of Vana'dil as one of five unique races all with they're own advantages. You can choose from
Galka: A big burly all male "dog" like kind of race with great physical strength; these Guys aren't the prettiest things in the world but they sure do pack a punch.
Mithra: A "sexy" all female race of "cat" people who are fast and strong and deliver they're hits with great accuracy.
Hume: These characters take after humans and are about average in every way possible making them good in every situation.
Elvaan's: These Tall elf like characters are superior in doing magical based damage and even brute physical damages, they are a force to be
Taru-Taru's: These are adorable mini people that can deliver a massive magical based offensive and are pretty good with ranged based weapons.
After you have selected from the races you get to choose one of six basic "Jobs" each having they're own purpose.
Basic Jobs Include:
Black Mage: An offensive spell caster
White Mage: A healing/protection type spell caster
Red Mage: A job who can mele and/or cast white AND Black magic but less effectively than a black or white mage.
Warrior: A mele based class that either is taking the hits or dishing em out with heavy weapons (Like a big axe).
Monk: A fast attacking martial arts based class who utilizes fist weapons
Thief: A fast mele based job who utilizes light weapons and realies on stealth to dish out massive amounts of damage.

As you progress through the game your skills and ability's evolve and so does you ability's to participate in missions(which is the general story of the game) Player vrs Player arena's and different events. Progression throughout the game also allows you certain other privileges some of these privileges would include.
At level 18 you get the ability (after completing a quest) to take a "sub-job" which adds to your main jobs general strength.
At level 20 you get the ability to ride a Chocobo (Which is a large, flightless bird) which basically is a mount that allows you to move faster and more safely through out zones than you would be able to on foot.
And at level 30 you get to unlock advanced jobs which I personally think is the most killer part of this game. Read the advanced jobs overview for more information.
Overview: Missions
Missions are a unique concept that only FFXI has a mission is basically a new chapter in the story line of the game that you get to praticapate in Some mission involve you running around to get some items or even joining several other people to slay a monstrous beast from the FF world.
Overview:Bestiary and Lore
Another nice thing about FFXI is that it is based on a pre-developed series that has a lot of back story and a lot of pre-existing creatures and such. All most all of the creatures in FFXI are based on creatures in previous games. So you don't have to wonder why certain creatures don't like you very much - but there is enough content that is unique only to this game to keep things interesting.
Overview: Advanced Jobs
There are 13 different advanced jobs each having they're advantages and disadvantages that are even more specialized than the starter jobs if you want more info about these check the FFXI website
Overview: Events
FFXI provides a lot of unique events to the game play of the game these events can include anything from giving away sweets for trick or treating or getting stuff form player aprication event.
Final Review

Final Fantasy XI is one of the best MMO's out there, believe me I know I have played almost every MMO in existence (Yes, I do think its better than WoW).
Whats so good about it? It has a point to playing other than months of grinding to get to the maximum level so you can raid the same instance again and again for gear or PVP till you die of lack of sleep. There are are missions and quests endgame which other MMO's lack or at least ones that have a general meaning to the game. This game also has a general story line which other games in the genre left out. This game also has unique events and the ability to level many classes on one character which is great because I hate starting new characters. It's also cross platform

What I didn't like about it:
The PVP system is kind of weak in my opinion but I rather be playing to a purpose than killing players for no reason all day.
Completing a quest provides no experience for my character - it really runs down the reason for completing a quest.
You Loose EXP for dying,
The billing system (read rant below)
Its not uncommon to run into a jerk in game.
Play Online is annoying to deal with.
The economy is screwed up
Grinding levels can take days
So is the game worth playing with all of those things to aggravate you? No not really I thought it was just the other day then I posted on killingifrit to ask for advice on my review and thats when I realized how stressful this game really was. The only way this game would be worth it to me is If play online gave me my account back and free play for every time they double or triple charged me. And the only way I'd suggest buying this game is if they worked on some of the problems with the game.

Alot of people including myself will cover for Playonline and say that they will never change and you might as well deal; they're is another choice just don't play the game.
Rant Alert:Side Note Billing System
Beware: Rants can cause bad grammar, incomplete sentences and they typically have a general lack of purpose.
The main issue I had with this game wasn't really the game it was the billing system the cost. 12.95 a month just to play this game with one character and an additional 1$ for each additional character so if you want to run multi characters the game is going to cost a small fortune a month to play. Whats even worse about the cost is the billing schedule; your billed at the beginning of every month whether your account has been up for the whole last month or the very last day of the last month, I learned that the hard way. And whats even worse than that is that sometimes the automated billing system has small "errors" and you get double or even triple charged so a game could easily could end up costing you over 50.00$ for a single day of play (This happened to me the last time I have evered played.) A couple of times of being over charged and not checking my credit card statement regularly and I thought I had been paying my complete bill when I really hadn't been. I went over the balance about a year into the game and ended up in some pretty decent credit card debt. This also happened to a friend and I couldn't afford to pay it off for at least 3 months so when I got back to the game my character I had spent so much time on (max level Taru Taru Beast master with a ninja sub job and several of the first level of relic weapons) was deleted over a year of work and the whole reason I ended up in debt in the first place was totally gone. I restarted when I heard a rumor that they had fixed the billing system - so I blindly started playing again but several month later after getting another character to the max level (This time a Galka Paladin)I ended up getting my credit card declined again and lost that character too. When me and my friend reported this bug to them they told us that we were just wrong and we should re review are credit card statements. We reported it several times but we only heard the same response again and again.

Even throughout all of that foolishness I would still love to play again if I had the money and/or they fixed the billing system. I mean I don't think any game was worth the amount of money I was putting into that game. But it really was a good game - I'd definitely Suggest buying it so as long as you keep a watchful eye on your cc bill and mabey one day they will fix the system. That would be great caus I miss my Taru and my Galka :(
Rant Ends Here


Side Note:
Thank you to all the users at the KillingIfrit Community for reading and helping me refine my review so it is the most accurate and absolute best it can be.