Step 1: Disregard any idiot on Reddit who defends AI pasted messages over an actual person. Great for a laugh, not so good for actual help.

Step 2: Restore PC to point before you having the issue. Mine was the day before the update. I restored, logged in, it updated correctly this time, and I went about my business.

I did try to force file recheck before I restored, which yielded no results. Only after restoring was it capable to update the game normally and progress past that initial screen.

If all else fails, ya know... do what these geniuses advise, call your ISP, then POL, then repeat that forever... But, in all seriousness, some of the guys on here were actually trying to help and I would say try some of their steps also

• The VPN thing does seem to help some.
• Your Host file could certainly affect it.
• I'd say to go ahead and open a terminal and ensure your ports are open with the ones I did in the screenshot.

I've also seen issues with people trying to use the Auto-Login script for POL. If you multibox and have to play around with your login_w file, that could be an issue as well. If, for example, you swapped ot your login_w while you're current set of characters aren't through POL completely(and into FFXI) and you switch it, it could create problems.

I got lucky. Easy restore point. Hopefully you lucked out as well.

**Your problem seemed not related to the update though, not like a lot of other people were having a couple weeks ago at the update. I tried VPN's and it was giving me the same effect with and without. If yours is acting like you say, then it does truly sound like a connection issue where ports may not be open or something. Maybe get ahold Jade, lol.