Fiesta Online was what introduced me to MMO's. It was Grindy as hell, and the level up progression was horrendous at certain stretches. Level 69 - 70 for example--had only ONE quest, that gave like what. . . 10-20% of the EXP you needed to level?
"How do you get the 80-90% rest of the EXP you needed?"
Grinding, baby! I have vivid memories of getting home from highschool just to immediately rush to my room, boot up my laptop, and grind for a few hours every day for a week or two. Worst part? The best place to grind was an "Abyss"--A PVP enabled area. Yeah, you lost a decent chunk of EXP if you died, so. . . It was rough. That sweet sweet level 60 was worth it though. Each base class got an upgrade at 20, 60, and then 100. The one at 60 added in some pretty sweet stuff, a gigantic glacier AOE for mages, an AOE heal and regen for Clerics, etc etc.
Met some people I obviously would have never interacted with otherwise on there too, still am in contact with some of them 10-11 years later to boot. IDK what changed over the last decade, but MMO's now adays have the same charm those earlier ones did. I could sit and relax in the beginner town, Roumen--for the rest of my god damn life if my friends that played the game back then were still around. We would explore the maps in search of cool places to sit and hang out. We'd see how far we could go at our current levels--we even made it to the level 60-80 town, Uruga, as level 30's back then! Was a perilous journey where any enemy we ran into would OHKO us, but we made it lmao.
It just isn't the same anymore. Which sucks. Most MMO's now adays cater to solo play--giving classes built in self heals and in some cases, completely remove the Healer role--I'm so vexed!
