Recent reviews by Kaelvas

I first started FFXIV about 4 years ago and had a non-steam version where I leveled up to 30 with a Bard. I took a long break and started again with the free trial version. The free trial version of FFXIV contains the base game and the expansion with some social restrictions to prevent too much market manipulation. That said, I put a satisfying 300+ hours into the base game and first expansion before moving to the subscription. I have now been subbed a few months and would highly recommend trying this out if you like the following:

A strong story and 1 player content
Mini-games
Card games/collecting
Raiding where it doesn't take your entire day to complete a run (raids have hard timers for completion)
Dungeons aplenty
Having the true endgame be aesthetics

Common complaints:

Housing system - hard to get into because of scarcity
Transmog system requires having the item on hand instead of saving a history
Base game story is reaaaalllly long - they've made updates on this to shorten some things

Pretty much exactly what I was looking for in a FPS MMO.