First off, let’s start with the trailer itself, shall we? In my view, it seems rather blown out of proportion, being a nice idea but far too vague to truly satisfy. Then there’s the ‘upgraded graphics’ idea. Perhaps a fun notion, and has potential for those aesthetic-bound. In total, the preview for this Aion “Vision” has a great level of potential, but has been overdone, like a great preview for a movie that could be movie of the century, or could sink without a trace.

Second, the ‘lore’ that I’ve heard incidents of people complaining about. It’s a brand new game, new universe with a SHIT-ton of room to grow. Kinda like Starcraft before the books, or the beginning of the Warcraft Saga with Orcs and Humans to put a couple out there. Give that some slack and let it grow.

Third, the low amount of players in the game. Yes, it has been in Asian countries for a year, but unless they get a decent percentage of the population of say… China or India, you can’t really count. On top of that, how many games do you hear about that are exclusively in Asian countries? Little to none, word does not spread from there about gaming easily for some reason. Yes, the brand has games like City of Heroes/Villians or Lineage, but on the flipside, they’re trying for something rather new in the MMO industry, which is good looks and decent mechanics, which they haven’t done completely abysmal on the mechanics but need serious help if this is to take off good and even dream of competing against big established WoW with 11mil+ people. In the end on that part, I would say wait and see how they handle problems players have, and bugs they experience.

*takes a breather*

Fourth! The infamous grind. Dear christ people, it’s an MMO. Expect there to be a grind. Given, the grind is far too much growing at an exponential rate per level. However, you don’t see people bitching about their fifth or sixth top-level on WoW, now do you? That being said, reducing the XP requirement for levels will help the game’s stance that much more.

Fifth, the bugs. Dear christ on a motherfucking crutch. The main thing I seem to hear about is bugs in this game when I hear complaints. “This is too weak; I’m unable to finish so-and-so quest objective.” We get it. It has been out for a year in Asia, but you have to keep in mind, due to the huge revamp in code they did, things are going to be a lot more buggy for a game that’s supposed to be a year old. Dumb move for them to rewrite everything, but it’s their cross. Keeping that in mind, allow them some slack because of such.

Alright! I’ve gotten all I can think of. Anything you guys think I should mention, or would you prefer me to shut up now?

The rest is just fluff. I give it a C- because you beat out the bell curve of readers by using complete sentences, proper grammar, and good paragraph structure.

This bit cracks me up
“Sometimes I give news and unbiased reports. Sometimes I give insight and advice. Sometimes I give opinionated editorials. Sometimes I post pretty pictures of attractive women in compromising poses.”

One thing I will say is you would beat Obama in an election with that statement any day, but what it wont do prove that your review wasn’t very good and hay, you couldn’t do any better than NCsoft making an MMO.

If me, well, for one I’d bet Spooner cares (perhaps not much, but enough to at least reply — and bonus, he actually typed a coherent post with full on words) since we were having a discussion about things we had in common – IE having gotten started on MMOs in FFXI. =)

Spoon, you’re right, the Aion fanbois ARE funny! I withdraw my request to have you nuke the Aion stuff.

I /did/ learn some good habits there though, like about being prepared with consumables, and those lessons serve me well to this day in WoW.

Tried LotRO — it might surprise you but I’m a big Tolkien buff, shocking I know. =) The gameplay was so lacklustre it just didn’t make up for the fanboi moments in between when I got to squee at Wethertop, or the Prancing Pony, or the Party Tree. =)

I’ll never put investment at all into any Asian MMORPG again with the exception of Final Fantasy XIV because it’s a spiritual successor to FFXI which was my very first MMORPG ever; so it has a soft spot in my heart.

Aion is not fun after level 20.

Aion does have some brilliant graphics and man did they do a great job of spin-doctoring their ads so the game looked fresh and inviting. Personally I really wanted to love it, I was all set to cancel my WoW Subscription.

Then I played it.

For months.

Never again. =) I did a quick check of the NCSoft Aion forums — it really (did not) surprise me to see that the posts there were the same drivel I read there months ago. The same issues are unresolved. The herd of asshats treating each other like shit.

Hey Spoon, maybe you should just nuke all the links to AIon stuff here, not like it is or ever will be relevant to anything again. =)

in my short lifetime so far i have seen games go from the old DOOM and NES to games like Aion and L4D and any other game with awesome grahics. the next years coming up i’m sure we can only imagine what changes are coming.

welcome to the future of gaming. it’s changing and getting better whether you are aware of it or not

It didn’t win this game for “poor mechanics” or for being a “lackluster company”.

Again, your opinion is respected.