Yeh I played this game for a while too. It was all good until they stopped PK trips in their tracks...but I found I could still live with that. After they brought in the trade equalizer update thing I just gave away all my stuff and have never played since.
What's the fun in the game if you can't even give away free stuff of any value? Far too many restrictions and not enough give in the gameplay for any enjoyment.
The whole problem is that they are trying to protect the little kids who play the game. If they had a better age minimum on it, they probably wouldn't have gone through with all those silly game updates.
It matters not to me though, FFXI has filled the MMORPG gap fairly well

.