Home › Game Forums › Aion
Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Aion: Can this game be the last stand for new MMORPG's in the near future?
It seems that Aion has a chance to sneak up on people especially with the recent news about Warhammer. For those that do not know Aion is being developed with a Western taste in mind. The character generator rivals CoX along with less grindy feel than the traditional Korean games, and realm versus realm play.
Only obstacles I see is NCSOFT needs to work on advertising the game and enforcing their EULA for the game.
I am currently playing WoW and AoC( and enjoying both games) but I think Aion has a chance to shine and only NCSOFT could be holding this game back from its potential.
What do you all have to say? 
Comments
NCSoft will hold this game back from it potential. Every single one of their games are copies of COH with different skins and a different theme. I wish a more original approach would be taken with this game.
I don't know about Aion, it all sounds good on paper, but I question the game sometimes.
The game looks polished, but so did AoC. The graphics are very anime like, some like it, some don't.
Development has been pushed back many times, beta dates pushed back 2 years in a row, still no official beta.
It's another heal/tank design and raids are just tank and spank atm.
The raids atm and the design is my biggest worry, it seems to want to adopt a hierarchy design where raiding and top PVP gets you far superior items. That's all well an good but it kinda limits the potential market too, and it usually results in time-sinks to keep players playing.
For the rest, the game looks ok, it just seems like they have a problem bringing it out on time, which sort of makes me wonder, hm you know.
CoX is nothing like L2 and CoX originally was from Cryptic.
Betas always occur in Korea first then NA. So that isn't a concern to me becuase we know what is heading down the pike in the near future.
Of course the distribution of the content to markets outside of Korea in a timely manner is a problem with NCSOFT.
You know, it is another Korean game by NCSoft. They thrive on grind games. I just cannot believe that this is just another one in a long line of them.
Pinning your hopes on this game is rather risky, unless of course you are one of the small minority here that actually like grind away games.
Hey, if NCSoft can pull off a good game without major grind, I will look at it, but they have to prove me wrong first. I don't have high hopes that they will.
NCsoft has only developed 2 MMORPG's, and both were early asian games and of the same franchise, so ofcourse they offer similar gameplay.
Aion is a completely new game, hence it's not called "lineage 3".
If people actually do some research on Aion they will soon learn that Aion pretty much the opposite of Lineage 2.
By the way, why aren't you posting on your other account?
I am skeptical as well that it isn't another Korean grinder but I have seen no indications that is has a legendary grind like L2 has up to this point from the evidence we can gather.
I am not really pinning my hopes on this game becuase I am having fun (unlike many others) at the moment but I am just pointing to something that may lie on the horizon for those that are disgruntled.
I do like old school grinding games like L2 but I am currently playing AoC/WoW as a change of pace and enjoying them.
Aion will more than likely not retain old school grinding elements. But the million dollar question is will it be an open world with very little instancing? NCSOFT did pull it off with L2 so I think they can do it.
I've said it before, but it doesn't seem Aion is bringing anything fresh to the table. That doesn't mean it won't be good, or not popular, but for example: look at the classes. Fighter, Thief, Mage, and Cleric theme is getting so old. Of course classes are flawed anyway. I don't want to play any of those, no matter how good the combat is. Yes, I multi-class in D&D. Always.
But hey, for money-profits and general popularity? Aion might do both of those well!
It may be successful, popular, and/or fun (if bland). But I won't be playing. I don't think Meatwad will either.
To those who will be: Enjoy!
Well, the game actually offers a way bigger sandboxish enviroment than any of the current mainstream games in terms of classes.
Right now in CBT3, the first reaching level 40 (limit during this beta) was an assassin with polearm thanks to stigma system, thanks to that, the assassin had better parry than the other assassins so he could solo stronger mobs, there are stigmas for almost every skill ingame, it's up to you how you customize your class (healers might get profit from getting a plate user stigma, you can get a "charge" stigma for your sorcerer, etc).
Having more classes only means they would have a certain style of gameplay, Aion doesn't force you to have 50 alts in order to experience the melee combat and all of its variants.
The game does have a great potential, under 25 days of limited game time (7 hors per day, 10 hours on weekends cause the rest of the time NCsoft is adding new stuff or fixing bug reports) people already reached the level 40 (limit in CBT3), out of the 50 the game will release with, so it's not a L3, plus there are hundreds of rewarding quests with cutscenes and a deep storyline.
The game right now is not under an enforced NDA, there are lots of infos about the game and hundreds of player made videos in youtube from the korean closed beta. The engine is quite powerful for some epic massive sieges, right now there are fights going on in CBT3 with hundreds of people in each faction. The graphics and animations are amazing, but the game runs perfectly on a P4 and a Geforce 6600 on medium settings, the patch notes show the devs don't really have to fix many bugs (there aren't almost bugs in this beta test) they are focusing entirely on content.
I'd keep my mind open about Aion if I were you, this is the second franchise from the second best seller P2P MMORPGs company, 5 years after their previous creation
And hoplites, I have the answer for that million dollars question :P
There will be little instancing, only on certain non important dungeons so small clans can feel accomplished after completing them and also during quest cutscenes so you don't get griefed while watching the movie.
If you searched online you will also find beta players complaining about how long it took to kill a mob and about their disgust that it is so much gringing.
You don't know what it's like unless you played it.
They have let no player play it yet but people in korea, there is no way to guess if it's going to be grind or not.
Excuse me if I have put little faith in what developers say pre-release when I saw how AoC / Vanguard and TR worked out after releasse.
All I'm gonna say is don't knock it till you try it.
We have many reports from CB testers that state that Aion is not "Another Korean Grinder"
Go here www.aionsource.com and get educated.
People are able to hit max level pretty darn fast in AoC and it still doesn't make them happy because it's too fast. I mean gimme a break!
Aion's leveling curve (according to beta testers interviews) seems to be somewhere between WoW and FFXI (or whichever one it was).
Can't make everyone happy, frigging whiners.
If you searched online you will also find beta players complaining about how long it took to kill a mob and about their disgust that it is so much gringing.
You don't know what it's like unless you played it.
They have let no player play it yet but people in korea, there is no way to guess if it's going to be grind or not.
Excuse me if I have put little faith in what developers say pre-release when I saw how AoC / Vanguard and TR worked out after releasse.
If you searched online you will also find beta players complaining about how long it took to kill a mob and about their disgust that it is so much gringing.
"Aion is pretty similar to WoW, not a grind fest game like Lineage 2. I am not sure about FF11 since I've never played it. Well, I personally think it's pretty fun, quest and lore oriented instead of endless grinding. There are things to be balanced and fixed here and there but I am sure it will get better as they test the game."
Notice, this was posted before the endgame was released, the endgame is what tears Aion appart from classical western type games, being really PvP oriented in open world enviroment with sieges and so on.
From a wow player who is in closed beta. that was during CBT2 some months ago www.aionsource.com/forum/101158-post10.html
"They have let no player play it yet but people in korea, there is no way to guess if it's going to be grind or not."
Zyuu from curse.com is swedish. Source: videos.curse.com/details/1443/
Since I'm actively playing in the Aion beta right now, I can tell you that Aion is already at least as polished as WoW was in Closed Beta. Aion also have many new features that WoW does not have. It is incredibly fun, detailed (not just graphic-wise, but oh so many other things) and it seem to have a lot of content polished and ready already. Yet... it's still in a closed beta phase with an NDA that is not enforced. Basically, the Aion development team also realise what a good game Aion already is, so that is why they don't bother enforcing the NDA is my guess.
I'm so impressed by how well designed Aion is. Everything meshes up nicely. There will always be concerns and issues, however, Aion is the only MMO I've seen come close to the polish and creativity + not to mention FUN that World of Warcraft seem to give so many players. While games such as Lineage 2 had fun aspects, it also had many flaws. Aion is a "next-gen" MMO in my eyes due to how they really have improved, learned and adapted from previous mistakes and successes and polished it even further + added new groundbreaking features.
World of Warcraft took from many other games and polished and improved upon it. Aion takes it a step further.
If Aion was to be released right now - it would do damn good. But since it won't be out for awhile, they have even more time to further enhance the game. So when it's ready to be released, it won't be damn good. It'll be superb. Excellent, better then sliced bread. You name it.
I've played many MMO's and I am picky. It's very easy for me to notice if the developers of a MMO title have that 'little extra' and Aion's development team does have just that. Comparing development teams is like comparing mushrooms with oranges. I hate mushrooms but oranges are great.
. Or how about comparing a new car with an old one. Or aliens with Swedish girls? Exactly.
My point is (and it's backed up with facts and personal experience and experience from others too, no rumors or assumptions) is that Aion is incredibly well polished, well designed and it only keep on improving.
Excuse me if I have put little faith in what developers say pre-release when I saw how AoC / Vanguard and TR worked out after releasse.
There's no enforced NDA, you don't have to listen what devs say if you don't want to.
I can see Aion doing very well IF NCsoft markets, and promotes the game properly. Sure, they promote it overseas. But in America they need to do alot more dev. chats, interviews, sneak peaks, and let EVERYONE know the game is coming along. NCsoft doesn't do anyhting like that, which is why their games take a back seat to others.
That is my only worry with Aion...marketing..NCsoft really needs to get on the ball with that.
Wait until 3-6 months until release and see what they cut out. That seems to be the trend lately...either that or release with unfinished, bugged content and try to make it better with band-aids after launch. I only say this because what you described was what WAR was about a year ago - I still think it's gonna be great but maybe not as great as everyone thought. Until cities and classes are back in the game. But what game is perfect?
If Aion is good, though it's not my style of art really, I'll give it a shot. If it's really this awesome, polished, no-NDA, no grind, easily run on low-end and graphically intense game then great.
--------------------------------------
A human and an Elf get captured by Skaven. The rat-men are getting ready to shoot the first hostage with Dwarf-made guns when he yells, "Earthquake!" The naturally nervous Skaven run and hide from the imaginary threat. He escapes. The Skaven regroup and bring out the Elf. Being very smart, the Elf has figured out what to do. When the Skaven get ready to shoot, the Elf, in order to scare them, yells, "Fire!"
Order of the White Border.
I really wanna see what throwing $200 million at a game will do to its quality. I don't actually imagine I would feel much grind in this game because of strives made in the Korean Industry rescently. One thing many Korean Designers learned in 2005 is that Korean's don't like the grind just as much as anyone else. However, there is the need to make achieving a goal feel like an accomplishment. So a difficult or long progression to that ultimate goal is something they prefer.
What we are really gonna see in AION is a combination of the ideas of making reaching the end a long journey, but having it fun along the way. The problem with this is that its a time consuming and expensive process. Thus the reason for the huge budget and delays. Koreans use something interesting when it comes to quests really steaming from Guild Wars. Its chain quests. You don't just do 1 quest get a reward but a series of them and get a greater reward. In AION they use this in combination with normal 1 of quests. Even more interesting is that these chains aren't some dull go kill 10 boars cause I said so, but they tell the story of the world with cutscenes making the experience more memorable. It may take a month to reach your next level, but atleast your not doing it by killing 100k creature X monotonously.
AION also does another unique thing and they use a smarter monster AI. Monsters who party and move instead of being stationary things that are just waiting to die. I think this should bring some more interesting aspects to the PVE side of the game.
My criticism of the game is really the curse of putting so many more people to work on it. You have to dub down the graphics to accomodate your worst artist. The character outfits look pretty good, but the actual skin looks highly undetailed, and the hair doesn't connect to the body well. Its not really the kind of character graphics you expect out of a Korean Game. Also the environment art isn't really that great, although not many companies are capable of doing good environment art in my opinion.
Aion's beta is going progresively, meaning we get to see what they test at every single level zone. Aion beta started with CBT1, where they opened the first 20 levels, they tested crafting, combat system, and basicaly every feature a game can have from level 1-20.
Some stuff were pointed by the testers: Mobs were hard to kill cause the only zone to level up to 20 was a party zone, customization wasn't as good as expected, crafting was hard and people wanted PvP.
During CBT2, they upgraded the crafting system, they improved the customization system, they opened more areas from level 15-20 and they created content up to level 28, they also implemented the promised rifts system, which ended up in massive combats between Elyos and Asmodians.
After CBT2, some stuff was pointed also: Leveling from 24-28 was grindish, Asmodians were less attractive than Elyos and there was some lack of balance between classes. NCsoft had a system going on which allowed them to see how people died during PvP, which skills were the most overpowered ones and which classes had troubles against certain classes.
During CBT3, they opened the abyss (level 25+ area) with a lot of new quests solving the 24-28 problem, they showed sieges and an Asmodian legion currently owns one of them, with taxes sytem in already. People area already level 40, there are a lot of raid bosses, Asmodian wings were changed to attract more people to that faction, and the classes are now balanced. Flaws during CBT3? ATM people has pointed out that the idea to make asmodians level up faster from 1-30 and then change things around give an advantage to asmodians, considering how NC has dealed with reports, I can foresee this is going to be fixed soon enough.
Well, huge teams have never made the top games it seems.
Raven software and IDSoftware and even Epic were small teams and had killer games.
EASoftware uses huge teams and seems to fail a lot.
I don't know if that's the same with MMO. Blizzard had a lot of money but I don't think their core team was all that big.
Yet Guild Wars has sold 5 million copies
Wait until 3-6 months until release and see what they cut out. That seems to be the trend lately...either that or release with unfinished, bugged content and try to make it better with band-aids after launch. I only say this because what you described was what WAR was about a year ago - I still think it's gonna be great but maybe not as great as everyone thought. Until cities and classes are back in the game. But what game is perfect?
If Aion is good, though it's not my style of art really, I'll give it a shot. If it's really this awesome, polished, no-NDA, no grind, easily run on low-end and graphically intense game then great.
It's about 3 maiby 4 months until Aion releases in Korea and where ins't any content cut out and it won't be because Aion have very good developer team (over 10 years developing mmos) and they know how to make mmo. So i have big hopes for this game. Expecially because people who tested in beta said it's great game .
At the peak of development on WoW, its team rose to around 600 developers. This compared to the around 20~30 typically on an mmo development team before WoW.
Yet Guild Wars has sold 5 million copies
Guild Wars has nothing to do with Lineage.
Guild wars development team consisted out of North American and European people for the most part. The main developer used to work for Blizzard and was the main designer of WoW.
Lineage are Asian designers.
Aion is far closer to Lineage 2 and uses people who worked on Lineage for Aion.
If you searched online you will also find beta players complaining about how long it took to kill a mob and about their disgust that it is so much gringing.
You don't know what it's like unless you played it.
They have let no player play it yet but people in korea, there is no way to guess if it's going to be grind or not.
Excuse me if I have put little faith in what developers say pre-release when I saw how AoC / Vanguard and TR worked out after releasse.
Actually beta players are reporting there is little grind.
This goes to me, and everyone else who will flame to other games, at least read the facts and information, before flaming, and then, do not put a game down on meaningless things that do not really matter, well, thats all I got
