Others say...

"Final Fantasy Rocks"
This add-on to the original is needed to complete several quests, and adds new adventures. You already know how much fun the original is, this adds new jobs, as well as new items, and it is needed to get your ticket to Khazam.

"A solid expansion, although a bit disappointing..."
Chains of Promathia is a fairly solid expansion released by Square Enix for their Final Fantasy XI MMORPG. With this second major expansion (Rise of Zilart being the first expansion) for the series, SE (Square Enix) attempted to introduce several new missions and quests that may be attempted by low/mid-level players, increasing content and play for the more "casual" players. Note: There are no new job classes nor did the level cap change with this expansion (Currently at 75)

In addition, several additional enhancements were added to the game, some of which are still being uncovered through scheduled patches that SE has implemented these past few months. The Adventuring Fellow quests and NPC were added to aid a player in their journeys across Vana'Diel and made possible for exploration in areas where soloing might not be a good idea. This feature and many others are currently under full support by SE with new quests and events being added almost on a monthly basis.

Of course, with all the new content and additions, there's also the downside. Several job class balancing problems were not addressed in this expansion and subsequent patches still have not fixed them (Only the job classes of Rangers, Summoners and Dragoons saw major changes over the past 6 months from the date of this review) Furthermore, the missions have proven to be more difficult than first expected and many players did not believe the reward justified the horrendous amount of time (In terms of equipment procurement, gil and hunting of several key rare/ex items) This sentiment is still being echoed today even by veteran players who are just now getting into the higher level (Uncapped) areas of CoP and are encountering impossible to beat NMs (Notorious Monsters) and incredibly difficult missions.

The expansion does warrant purchase that can greatly enhance a player's time spent in the game, however. Most notably is the inclusion of several new areas which can be accessed without the special missions (Bibiki Bay and Ulegrande Range to name a couple) Bibiki Bay in particular is an experience hunting ground that has become widely popular with many players and most players I know will suffer greatly if they do not have these areas installed to go to with other players.

In short, the expansion is good fun with a group of trusty adventuring friends, but casual players might get turned off with the prospects of spending hours upon frustrating hours to put together a pick up group of strangers to accomplish many of the quests and missions in this expansion.

If you're new to this game and looking for the PC version, I highly recommend the DVD edition of the game, in which is contained both the core game as well as both of the expansions in an affordably priced package. For continuing or returning players, the price is not prohibitive and while much of the content might go to waste on casual players, it is still recommended for the more routine experience outings.

In my own experience, I did not find this expansion as entertaining and fun as Rise of Zilart. However, I rated this release at 4/5 out of consideration that while I may not have found it as enjoyable, that my situation is not entirely due to the fault of SE and that while this expansion certainly has its design flaws, for some players out there, especially for those "hard core" players, this expansion will no doubt provide them with many more hours of play and content to keep them busy until the next epansion (Due to be released sometime in April 2006)

"Final Fantasy XI ROCKS!"
This just has to be one of the best online games ever created and the best game in the Final Fantasy series. If you like RPG game then ckeck this game out with great graphic and game play is awsome. I'm a big fan of this series and I can see elven has gone a long way.

"Great Game"
Game was everything I thought it would be. However, they should let people know that only one person can use this game because of the coding. (It can't be shared). Also - why did Amazon raise the price $5.00 over what it was a week earlier?

"So much has not been discovered..."
CoP marks the first major expansion of the FFXI world since its release to the US. This expansion does not add any new jobs or raise the maximum level you can attain in the game (still 75), but it does add many new areas, monsters, missions, quests, NPCs, recipes and equipment. The new areas are divided into those you can enter as soon as you install the expansion, and those which you need to complete missions to get to. The ones you can freely enter include new monsters, treasure and fishing areas, but are not hugely different than the areas adjacent to them. However, one thing I've learned is that there is more than meets the eye since many changes are below the surface and take many weeks for them to be discovered.

The areas that are locked out require quite a bit of work to get to. You will need to have a character of lvl 30, with appropriate equipment in order to complete 3 missions to gain access. Since there are a few job combinations that work well, you may need to start a new job, or gain a high enough level in that job to use it. This can be a big time commitment, however many people already have a job or two that they can use around level 30 so it's not terribly difficult to participate. Each of the missions may take between 1 and 4 hours to complete, and you will need between 6 and 18 players to help you. This makes it quite a hassle just to enter the new zones, so don't expect to be able to see everything advertised as soon as you install the game.

The areas that I have been in are absolutely breathtaking and the music fits the atmosphere of that area. There is a new beastman race that you can fight called Moblin, who have their own cities, culture and history. There are new super powerful dragons that give those that are already 75 something to do. One of these dragons took 30+ level 75 characters over 5 hours to kill. There are new recipes for crafters, new spells for mages, new avatars for summoners and new weapons and armor for melee jobs.

That being said, I still give this 5 stars based more on my experiences with the current game than on what is in the new expansion. It will take many months for people to complete all the missions and gain access to all the zones included in this expansion, which is really required to write a comprehensive review. This is probably the reason why very few review are posted.