Note on all expansions: Every part of FFXI takes an enormous hit in my ratings for existing within the god awful, unconscionable interface, code base, and general design philosophies of FFXI. These things are the foundations of the whole game, and thus no expansion can fully escape these sins. Despite this I have chosen to log them all separately because they are each different beasts.

ToAU, like much of FFXI, feels like it has a few really cool ideas for its plot but not enough to build out into a roughly 40 hour expansion storyline. Its climax is good, its premise is good, and most of the memories players will take from it will be good too, but in the moment to moment playing, it feels even more like drudgery than that which preceded it. The base game, RoZ, and to a slightly lesser extent CoP all frequently presented players with strange new dungeons at regular intervals that carried just a hint of Castle Ravenloft. This, of course, made them very stupid and mean, but also memorable, funny, and in some sense, "epic." Just as World of Warcraft was about to do, FFXI seemingly casts this aside with ToAU. The actual gameplay of the expansion mostly consists of running back and forth a great many times between three or four key locations and watching the cutscenes that ensue, with semi-frequent breaks that demand the farming of various items.

As a result, in a perhaps shocking twist, I consider ToAU a step backward for gameplay... though it is a small step forward for story. Unlike CoP, ToAU is comprehensible and has sensible structure, though it leans excruciatingly hard on comic relief from a character who's more likely to give abuse victims PTSD than to elicit any laughs.

Is it worth playing FFXI for? No. It is considerably more tame than CoP in just about all ways, and thus its relative refinement has rendered it the less interesting. It has its moments and its concepts, but I can't say its worth the effort.

Alright, let's do this one more time.
Treasures of Aht Urhgan is pretty neat!

I held no real expectations that it would rival Promathia, and I was right, but I don't think it really needed to anyway? It was a nice little story with interesting concepts, dang cool lore, very neat locales and a net boost in production value and presentation.

The cutscenes feel more vibrant, with genuine good comedy finally being conveyed by the presentation, as well as the writing (NEED TANK? SEND TELL), and I also really liked the ost being used specifically for comedic purposes.

Character-wise, I don't think the cast is as stacked as Promathia's but Aphmau and Luzaf were genuinely very well written, especially as dual foils to one another. On top of that, the overall larger stake divine battle between Alexander and Odin englobing the expansion's plot was like SUPER cool, even if the resolution was (by design) open-ended (one day i'll deal with those epilogues bweh).

Something else of note is that I've finished the Windurst questline (the non-S.O.B portion at any rate) in preparation for the next expansion, and it was pretty cool honestly! I'll definitely do the other two before WoG, which will also wait a while cause i'm thinking of taking a break from the game.

But overall, good expansion, I liked it!

This is everything I wanted FFXI to be. This expansion is actually fun! The characters are endearing, the plot isn't needlessly complicated, and the sense of adventure is pretty good too. The storyline does have two admittedly atrocious quests (the one where you have to spend four hours trekking in and out of the arrapago reef if you want to get a home point, and the one battlefield where Naja accompanies you and dies at the drop of a hat).

I really liked the story of this expansion too. It wasn't anything particularly groundbreaking, but the twist on setting it around the conflict between two fan-favorite summons was really cool.

Aht Urghan was also the only town int he game where I wanted to explore and talk to people. I actually did a few sidequests because I liked the vibe of the place. It may have something to do with the fact that Aht Urghan isn't as large as the other colossal towns in the game.

However, having to pay coins to travel through the undersea ruins got old fast, and since the only way to get more is to do assault mission with other players (and no-one plays this game in 2022), I would have preferred if they just dropped it.