Is it too late?

[Kunet]

Finding parties at low levels is much harder than it used to be, but far from impossible. You'll do best leveling jobs if you find 1-2 friends who are leveling jobs that fill different rolls and stick together then finish the party from there whenever you want to XP.

[Flamehammer]

It is not too late to get into this game. Leveling speed is going to go by which job you decide to play. Melee are a dime a dozen, some are more popular than others.

IMO starting a new char from scratch is probably your best bet so you can get to learn the game the right way.

[kujatu]

There is always the Solo guide which pretty much all jobs that do decent dmg can do. Especially at low levels, you can get almost any jobs to about lv 40-45 using the solo guide. So you could do that if you got bored seeking and you can still seek while soloing, it's just theres limited places (1-4).

[Blaze1211]

Its never to late to start FFXI, just know to expect its a long grind and you come accross alot of elitest players when it comes endgame.

[BrandNew]

My best memories are my noob days, so it's never too late.

[byebyeffxi05]

I wouldn't say that starting fresh in FFXI would be absolutely impossible. However, I would say that it would be much slower than it would have been a few years ago, but that's to be expected I guess. As long as you're smart about making money I'm sure you'd be able to do fine. The last time I played the economy of my server was in a slump and making money was fairly difficult. Keep up with ENM's and BCNM's!

[Godchain]

The thing about this game is it that is is heavily community based, unlike WoW. You won't be able to solo much further than 15 or 20 and then you'll have to start the extremely ordealing level grind. I've started from scratch once and I nearly gave up it was so difficult.

[woodman0691]

I don't think there'd be any issues with creating a new character. I don't think the lower level community is as small as everyone seems to think it is. I would highly recommend playing on PC though, so you can use windower and the like and have access to FFXIwiki and other resources.

[poisonedego]

It is never to late to start playing this game and never to late to come back, Ive been playing since March of 2003 and Ive taken 2+ years off during that run at different times and intervals. I love this game from running around with a lvl 1 character to partying or duoing or soling or end game events. I never get bored. Also, theres alot of friendly players like myself willing to lend a helping hand to a newcomer.

[RADD]

It is definitely not too late to start in FFXI. People are always looking to level another job and if you begin as a WHM or RDM you will have no trouble finding a party, as I have spent hours looking for a group just because there were no healers available. Also, as Poisonedego said, there are tons of players that would love to help one get acclimated to the game.