Customer Reviews

Aion: The Tower of Eternity Collector Edition

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

First off - the graphics are amazing. The graphics engine supports visually stunning landscapes and both the player and non-player characters are crafted with loving care and attention to detail (if you buy this definitely look closely at the monsters you are fighting, the level of detail on each is impressive). Along with this you have such things as fluid cloth animation, physics for hair that moves and depending on wind and movement. What is nice is that this is a very efficient graphics engine as well, and though many people will eventually be bogged down in a large pvp battle, a recent moderate system will run this game with all settings on maximum easily. Don't look too closely though. Circles are actually octagons, the landscape looks like EverQuest from 1990. There's no such thing as "rounded" straight angles and lines on the landscape, everywhere. Oh, and though the armor is amazing, both in design and graphical quality, it is of a sort of anime nature, so the women aren't wearing much and the guys look like mechs. Since the Armor is actually separate models than your character and not just skins it both looks far more impressive than most games (and the pieces match, unlike the clown gear of WoW) and it also suffers from the straight line effect. Triangular breasts and square pants are in store if you don't zoom out after making your initial observations.

But graphics aren't everything, no matter how much the graphics and the customization of character and even equipment might appeal, there needs to be something else. Aion got a couple of things spot on - the skill chains are an interesting way to add some complexity to the normal one-two-three of many games. Note that depending on your class and situation this just means a one-two-two-two-three button press i.e. because of the way the skill chain works, it many times simply activates, the player clicks through, and you move on to your next skill or skill chain.

Crafting is another big point in this game - if you can gather one type of material, you can gather all similar types (i.e. metals, foods, fibers, ect. form one skill) which makes it much more interesting and easy to skill up gathering skills and to support multiple professions. Each character has the ability to master two trade skills and another to a lesser degree. The items made from this process are very useful and often times better than the items that (very rarely) drop in the game. Anyone who enjoys this aspect of games might find Aion a nice home. Also, you do gain experience from tradeskills and gathering, so while it is not a viable way to level, you don't completely give up gaining levels when you tradeskill.

So why the low rating? Because, after having played it for several weeks I can see why people in many reviews talk about a "lack of content". The fact of the matter is that the game space and world is fairly small. You won't notice this until you're at least level 30, but it becomes quite apparent after that. There are limited areas to quest at any level, limited places to get loot or drops, ect. The first instance you have access to is at level 25 with a 18 hour lockout time. Did I mention you'll probably leave with one to two green drops that you can sell for relatively little money? No loot unless you're really, really lucky. You can't come back here after level 28 either. While instances getter better past this point, it's nothing many players of MMOs will be used to.

Quests also practically stop after level 26, at least as a means of gaining gear or experience. By the time you complete most quests you will have better gear than the rewards and usually killing one to two mobs will equal the quest experience reward. Of course, the quests usually are simply "kill 25 of ___" ... and many of these quests are repeatable, over a hundred times. So you can make what people call "grinding" a little more rewarding, even though running back to the quest giver to turn in and reacquire the quest is probably a waste of killing/experience time. If you buy this game with the WoW game mechanic and theory in mind - you're going to be severely disappointed within your first couple of days playing.

There is no escape from pvp. And pvp in this game means being killed while doing the above mentioned grinding. If you don't mind this, it's the game for you. If you want to level up and do it to other people, buy it! But for many this will become a massive source of frustration and annoyance. When it takes you 8 hours of killing individual mobs to level up, and you have two places to do this in, when a higher level player decides you're not going to use that area, it's game over for the day. Seriously, you *will* be killed, over and over again while trying to level up. You will not even have a chance to fight back either since even if the person is you're level (which they won't be) they have come prepared to pvp, so better gear, potions, scrolls ect are at their disposal to ensure that you die and they escape.

***Parents*** If you are considering this game for a child be aware that after level 10 the player enters the one and only channel that connects the entire server together - LFG. This channel is used for chat, selling of goods, and people actually looking for groups. This chat is most times, if not always, littered with racism, sexism (extreme), graphic sexual content, vulgarity, and plenty of complaining, whining and arguing. Since this is the only channel to effectively look for a group in, you're pretty much subject to this no matter what. You will have to read it, you will be exposed to it.

The player base is really an issue, since this is an MMO it's all about the collective experience and a game that is based (aside from all that grinding) on social activity and interaction. I've found most people to be reasonable and many times interesting once you get a legion or a group, but a very large portion of the people that still actually play this game are generally speaking very self involved, unhelpful, aggressive and rude. If you've played World of Warcraft in an Alliance battleground...this is the same thing, all the time, and much, much worse.


I don't really want to say don't buy this game, because I really like a lot of the aspects of it, and I'd like to see the community grow ( and mature) so that the game can continue to develop and expand into a more finished title. At the same time, if you have a tight budget, and realize that this game means continuing to pay each month that you play it, I don't want anyone else to buy it like me, to at first think -"what are all these reviews on various websites and especially the game website about? This is great" It's not. Period. The game is Korean made, and there will not be two versions for a North American audience with different tastes. The game has been out for a year prior to it's North America release, so anyone that says it is a new game is confused. The game has been in a released format for over a year.
Unless you really love "ganking" (getting killed while minding your own business by a player) "grinding" (standing around killing the same things over and over and over again for hours if not days) and a less than supportive or involved community of teens at each other's throats I'd highly recommend that you find a different means of occupying your time.

If your immediate response to this review, that states as clearly as I can some of the most important aspects of the game that a prospective buyer/player might have, is "stop whinging" "QQ" and whatever else you use to describe someone who is dissatisfied or unimpressed with a product, then this is the game for you. You will fit into the community immediately, and probably enjoy the game.

I had preordered the game so I was able to play in the closed beta events as well as the open beta and headstart event. I have played EQ and City of Heros, and I was really looking forward to Aion as I ultimately love a fantasy type setting.

What I like:

The graphics are amazing, the first glimpse of the floating city of Sanctum is breathtaking. I also love the character models. They are very customizable, and everyone should be able to make a toon to please them. Game play also seems to be a lot of fun. I tend to be more of a solo, casual player, and so far I haven't had trouble with that game play style. Now, not every class is going to have it as easy and be as quick. Also, I haven't played a character past level 17 so I cannot comment on the higher end game or the PVP aspect.

What I am not so keen on:

The game, at least in the beginning, is extremely linear. While the story and quests are very interesting, the fact that everyone is doing the exact same thing can cause some trouble. Also, I'm not sure how people will like going through the same storyline every time they create a new character. I will be curious to see how this is tweaked as the game matures. I also have concerns about the PVP aspect; I'm not a fan of PvP, and have not yet experienced that aspect of the game, but I'm hoping that there will be enough content with PvE that I can avoid the PvP if I want. Kill stealing can also be a problem, but not one I have encounted significantly so far.

All in all I have thoroughly enjoyed the game and will be playing for a while to come.

First some background - I've been involved in a moderate number of MMO games in the past (City of Heroes / Villains for a couple of years, World of Warcraft (WoW) for 4+ years, dabbled in Warhammer Online, Lord of the Rings Online, Champions Online (CO), and a few other lesser known games). So this is not a review for the hardcore, but more for a casual, semi-serious player. I've played Aion since open beta and have moderate level (30+) characters for both factions.

Character Creation - Somewhere between WoW and CO. A reasonable number of controls including overall size (you'll see some characters that are very short - usually for PvP reasons), a couple of dozen face and body part combinations with reasonable adjustments that can be made. Not nearly as customizable as CO, but for me that works well since character creation is a smaller part of the game to me.

Introduction into the Game - As an experienced player, this may turn you off a bit, but as a new player, the help system is very nice including screen shots and animations as appropriate. If you take the time to look over the help as it is offered, you will get a very good understanding of the controls and the environment you are in. The starter zones (only one for each faction) have a reasonable variety of missions including collecting items, killing, looting, and traveling. The storyline is a bit light for the first zone that will carry you to level 10 (a couple of hours), but picks up fairly well afterwards.

Capital Cities - There is only one capital city for each faction. I personally like the Asmodian capital better (Pandora), but they are well organized with crafting all centered in one area (so if you decide to have multiple professions, you don't need to travel all over capital cities or across a continent to continue), all trainers are in one area, and storage and auction house system together. The cities are well rendered.

Classes - There are only 4 classes that each branch into 2 specialties. I think this actually works very well since the roles of each class are well defined. If you need a serious healer, you need a cleric...simple as that. No need to argue about whether healing variant A, B, C or D is sufficient or not. You have the Plate wearing Warrior classes (Templar - tank, Gladiator - melee dps), the Chain wearing Priest classes (Cleric - healer, Chanter - dps/buff), the Leather wearing Scout classes (Assassin - melee dps, Hunter - ranged dps), and the Cloth wearing Mage classes (Sorcerer - magic dps/cc, Spiritmaster - magic dps/pets). Each class is fairly well balanced; and I'm very pleased that my cleric (healer) is able to do things solo with no real issue unlike some other games.

Flying - Once you reach level 10, you get your wings. You are limited in what areas you can use them (very restrictive in the PvE areas), but are available in the most important area (Abyss). Flying is actually pretty easy to pick up (game defaults to 'R' and 'F' keys to control climbing and falling)...especially if you use your mouse to steer (right-click to turn in any direction). You are limited to 60 seconds initially, but will find additional items and potions that can extend that time significantly.

Continuing Zones - The zones after you hit level 10 are limited in number, but are pretty large zones with a lot of variety throughout. Unlike some other games, you won't find yourself running for long periods of time to get somewhere...most quests involve activities that you can walk to within a minute of where you got the quest. You don't have a mount, but you aren't going overly far most of the time anyways, so the lack of mount currently (NCSoft is apparently looking at adding mounts soon) is not that big of a problem. There are some areas with elites that will require you to team up with other people in the game.

Campaigns - In addition to moderately generic quests, there are campaigns that have a reasonably strong story line. About 1/2 the time, each step of a campaign contains a nice cutscene. Completely a campaign usually results in a nice reward. Regardless of class, the reward is something useful due to the nature of the reward (e.g. potion that extends flight time) or due to choices (e.g. choice of gear type that fits your character).

Instances - You won't run into your first instance until level 25. The instances I've been in so far are relatively short, with several interesting bosses. You will want to have a balanced team (up to 6 people) including dps, cc, tank and healer. This gives everyone a roll, and if you develop other characters, a chance to do something different even though you've been in that instance before. The instance can be challenging if you don't understand the things that your character can, and probably should, be doing.

Abyss - This is the central focus of the game. NCSoft has labeled the game as PvPvE. While questing in the Abyss, you can be attacked by the other faction (this can occur in some other zones as well) which adds an interesting dynamic. The classes are balanced enough that you will not be one-shotted (unless the other faction includes a very high level character which is not to their benefit) or stun-locked to death (potions to avoid some of this are relatively cheap).

Crafting - Rather than making an explicit limit like some games, you can pick up as many crafting professions as you can afford. The problem is, you probably can't afford more than 2 professions initially. So if you decide to farm enough Kinah at level 50, you could have all professions. As you level, keeping your profession relative to your level (10 points for every level 10 and above) actually allows you to craft level appropriate gear. Rather than have you gather tons of materials and use those materials to level your skill, Aion has a work order system that lets you spend some money to level your skill and gain some rewards in the process (additional materials or designs). This saves your gathered material for actually making useful items for yourself (or to sell at the trade broker - Aion's auction house). I've had no issues keeping my skill level up appropriate to my character's level.

Interface - The interface comes packed with plenty of options. Not quite to the level that you can get with WoW add-ons, but pretty close overall. There are some add-ons from WoW I kind of miss, but I think NCSoft did a very good job putting in the majority of options that casual to serious (but probably not full hard-core) players are looking for.

Customization - The primary method of customization in the game begins in the 20s with the use of Stigmas. You will get a quest to understand the use of stigmas as well as a standard (for your class) stigma. Additional stigmas drop throughout the game and eventually you'll be able to equip 8 of them. The stigmas act as additional powers, so every stigma is another spell that you can cast. You can exchange stigmas fairly easily, but do have to have stigma shards (obtained by questing in the Abyss mostly). Additional customization comes in the form of manastones, enhancements, and godstones. Manastones are basic buffs to your stats (defensive and offensive), enhancement stones can be applied to weapons (for damage boost) or armor (for defensive boosts). Godstones have more unique properties. By the time you get to 50, you can have a very different character from the person next to you.


Overall - This is an enjoyable game that hearkens back to the better days of WoW (the easiest to compare to). It's not particularly innovative (neither was or is WoW who continues to steal ideas from other MMOs), but what it does do, it does very nicely. The graphics are a nice step up from WoW(but doesn't stress the video card as hard as you'd expect), the environment has some nice backgrounds, the mobs are some interesting and different designs, and the PvP is pretty well balanced. I've found the game to be a reasonable challenge so far (which is a very, very nice change from how WoW is currently set for easy mode). The options available on the interface are actually very good without any add-ons (could always use a few more options). The biggest struggle the game seems to have today are the bots. NCSoft is taking steps, and we'll see if they go far enough (of course, anything short of instantaneous action results in complaints from the masses).

If you are looking for a decent MMORPG with a bit of challenge and some PvP action, this is a good game to try out. If you are annoyed by challenge or PvP, I wouldn't recommend this game for you. The penalties are not steep (pretty much non-existent if you die in PvP), but I know some people take dying pretty harsh.

This is a solid game and a lot of fun. Most press on this game tends to be focused around its graphics which are really great but to be honest that is just the surface of it. This game is just really fun, plain and simple. If you've played any other the other big games out there like wow, warhammer, lineage, lord of the rings etc you will feel right at home.

The first week or two the servers went on-line the game had some major hick-ups as they got the servers and loads balanced but the game has since evened out.

I've played most of the major MMORPGs out there (Wow, lotro, lineage, warhammer, conan etc) and have now played Aion up to max level so will give you a quick run-down on Aion here:

Character creation is extremely extensive. You really can pretty much make your character look like anything. Even your characters voice can be changed around. There are 3 races in Aion, 2 of which you can choose to roll (3rd race is server controlled). Any piece of armor can be used as a template for another so you can make your plate mail armor look like cloth etc. Every piece of gear can be modified in color as well for full customization. But the real character customization is not with the character looks but with how your character is. Titles, manastone, godstones, stigmastones etc. allow you to pretty much make your character into anything you like. None of the other MMORPGs released allow this much customization in player looks or abilities.

You have your typical mage, cleric, rogue and warrior types in Aion. You further define a subclass at level 10 for a total of 8 classes:

Sorcerer (Crowd control and nuker. They hit hard with spells but fold as easily as paper if hit.)
Spirit Master (Pets, DOTs and lots of Fears.)
Cleric (Healer. Sorry I personally think healing is boring so kind of hard for me to get pumped up here but those who like to heal seem to love this class.)
Chanter (DPS and buffing healer. Substitute main healer.)
Assassin (Melee DPS. Stealther. Posions. Assassins are great at pi$$ing other players off in PVP.)
Ranger (Ranged DPS. Kiting and crowd controls.)
Templar (Tank. They can do damage but they can't be killed easily either.)
Gladiator (A DPS tank. Melee mostly. Subsitute main tank.)

The classes are well balanced and of the 6 out of the 8 classes I've played so far all are a lot of fun.

The first few levels have a lot of things to help out new players of MMORPGs from in game help videos to lots of pop-ups with tips. Well done entry to the game.

At level 10 you choose your subclass and get your wings as you ascend and become a Daeva. You were a lowly human until then. You don't really use your wings though until much later.

Levels 10-25 are pretty much learning the abilities of your class. Tons of quests and gathering to do. Lots of which are only done in groups although you can solo all the way to 50 if you'd like but not recommended. At level 20 you may start to encounter the opposing faction and start doing some limited PVP. Up to this point the game is pretty linear and scripted.

Level 25 you do your abyss entry quests and enter a completely 3d world. The Abyss is huge. Larger than the rest of the world combined and you really do go all over the place in it. You will encounter both the opposing faction and the 3 race, the Balaur. The Balaur are a computer controlled faction and are used to balance out the two player controlled races. If one race starts to dominate too much, the Balaur come in and wipe the slate clean. You are often thrown in against both factions at the same time in combat.

Level 25 to 50 consists of quests, PVP, instances and crafting mostly. Tons of stuff and you never run out of things to do. Unlike most games you do all the quests all over the world map. You even have to go back into the starting zones a few times. So while the start of the game consists of doing quests in one area then move to the next, this ends later as they send you all over the place. In other words, the game is very linear at first and becomes completely non-linear later on.

End game consists of well the same things as above except you can actually work on getting your gear set. Tons of end game instances and PVP to do. Fortress sieges really start at level 35+ but are mostly done by the upper levels. There is a lot to do at end game already with more content on the way. When the servers first came on-line there were very few upper level characters but now the shift has changed and more level 50s then lower. This has made it much easier to do the upper level group quests and instances and PVP.

Instances:

First instance is level 25 and is designed to train you how to do an instance. The instance is even called Training Grounds. It's actually designed both to teach you how to do instances as well as teach you how to do the later fortress battles. It's simple and easy and a good way to learn. Most instancing starts at level 30 and up. There are several dozen instances so far and they have plans of adding quite a few more. You really don't run out of instances to do. Some instances have both mobs and the opposing player faction at the same time. Many instances are timed (Speed instances) and all of the instances are quick to complete 20-60 minutes). If you come from a heavily instanced game like wow you will have no issues here.

Loot:

Yes there is loot in the game but Aion is not a loot based game. You won't find any DKP systems or people checking your gear to see if they will group with you and such. Most bosses don't even always drop loot. Aion is about the game play, not the loot. It is very easy to make Kinah (Gold) and very easy to spend it. Money is tight until after level 40 but gets easier after that. Once again loot is secondary in the game to the game play.

Crafting:

Crafting is very extensive and takes a long time to complete. You can learn all professions but only master two. The professions are Weaponsmithing, Armorsmithing, Tailoring, Alchemy, Cooking and Handicrafting. Crafting takes a lot of money and a lot of time. You cannot level crafting in hours like in some games. It will most likely take you months to level your first profession to max. Crafting is multi leveled and is more similar to the crafting system in Lord of the rings than any other MMORPG. Crafting in Aion puts some games (Warhammer, wow Conan) crafting systems to shame.
Gathering:
Gathering is not a profession per say. There are two types. Air and ground gathering. Took a while to get used to the gathering system but now love it. It is very slow at first but speeds up a lot later. Gathering is used quite a bit in Aion but some people do not like to gather and just buy mats in the broker. Air gathering is very slow but does teach you to fly better so I highly recommend it. I would not start learning any profession until you have your gathering up some.

PVP:

PVP starts at level 20 but to be honest you don't really do much until later. PVP is a complete free for all in that you can easily encounter people much higher or lower than you at any time. I suggest you make friends and stick together when soloing or are lower level as single players are often easy prey by passing players from the opposing faction. PVP is very fast and not easy at all. You are not gimped in what abilities you can use and there are safe places to go to avoid PVP but sometimes even the major towns are raided so you can't even be totally safe except for in one zone and your capital city. All the classes are fairly evenly balanced with none standing out as better or worse than the others. As you get higher in level more pvp is introduced and you are sent into the opposing factions areas for specific quests to do. There are several instances in end game where you have to fight both the instance mobs and players from the opposing faction. If you want to avoid PVP you mostly can but sometimes you will run into it a bit. You just can't avoid it totally. If you absolutely hate PVP, buy another game. If you love some or a lot of PVP you will love Aion.

Graphics:

Yep top of the line. Very difficult to find a game with better graphics than Aion. Lord of the rings online has great still graphics but sucky animations. Wow has very poor graphics compared to aion in almost every category. It's not just the looks of things in Aion but the animations and how fluent everything is. Sort of a cross between Conan (Looks great but horrible lag) and wow (Great gameplay but graphics are terrible).
They are talking about a graphics upgrade later in 2010. I doubt there will be much improvement though as its top of the line already. I'm not sure where they can improve. When you go into the graphics options, you can click the auto-detect settings and it will scan your computer and set the graphic levels to the best level for your hardware. Except for just downright piss-poor computers, almost everyone will be able to run Aion at max settings. Oddly enough even though the game's graphics are better than most games, the system requirements to play it at those levels is fairly low. Moving from any other MMORPG you will see an instant improvement in both looks and or animations.

UI:

The user interface is very easy to navigate around in. It looks good, it's simple but has enough to get the job done. There are no addons in Aion and to be honest I first thought this was a major set back. But after playing I realized addons are not needed. There really isn't anything missing from the UI and it's laid out about as perfect as you can think. It is highly customizable but most people I have talked to seem leave it at the default. Gone are the days of updating addons after every patch. When you talk to NPCs and accept quests, you have a hypertext type system in place which is really nice. Click on an item name in the quest text and it will give you the description of it in more detail including what types of mobs drop it. Click the mob name and it will give you a description of where to find that type of mob. Also included are place names and locations which activate maps and such. It's really well done. The world map is nice and even nicer is the map overlay which brings up a transparent world map. It's easy to navigate. UI in Aion gets a A+. Looks great, simple yet customizable enough for any need. Night and day difference in the UI between games like Lord of the rings and Aion.

Broker, mail, vendors, etc:

Yes there is an auction house but being this is not a loot oriented game, it is used but it's not a centralized part of the game. You won't be spending hours scanning the broker with addons and you can't even put many items in the broker at once. The game is just more oriented to playing rather than doing maintenance to get ready to play. All items stack to 1000 or 10000 and your cube (Bags) do get full but inventory control is not too much of a problem. You can expand your cube, warehouse (Bank) and legion warehouse (Guild or fellowship bank) via quests and from leveling certain crafting or by just out right paying for it. You do not have to repair your gear ever (Gear does not get damaged in Aion). Mail is simple and easy to use. Not used often actually but it is there. There are trainers for all kind of things and you can buy training manuals from a trainer before you level and learn your new abilities as soon as you gain XP and level. You can set up your own personal shop at any location. Some people love this. I personally don't use it often. All NPCs will talk to you and have animations and even move around from location to location. Some are hard to find. Some are only found during certain times of day or night.

Death, dying and time:

When you die you appear back at your obolisk. You lose a small amount of xp when you die but you can gain 2/3rds of it back by paying a soul healer. You cannot lose a level by dying. Buying back lost xp is optional, it does not have to be done. Any character can resurrect another in the game either vie spell (If there are a healer) or by using resurrection stones. There are even self resurrection stones available. If needed you can buy portable obelisks called kisks and bind to them temporarily so if you die you resurrect at your kisk instead of your permanent obolisk. This becomes vital when in enemy lands or during fortress sieges. Raiders often bring portable kisks with them so they can resurrect nearby. Time is accelerated in Aion and is a centralized part of the game. Many mobs and NPCs move around or are found at different times and locations. Some abilities can only be used during certain times as well.

Flight:

In Aion you can glide and fly. There is a difference which you will learn eventually. The first 30 levels or so very little flying is done. It's mostly used later in the game (Where you spend most of your time in). The game really is 3D. They do limit where you can fly in the first part of the game but open it up later on. 3D combat adds a lot to the game. I love closing my wings and dropping like a rock to escape an enemy. Flight time management is extremely important and adds to the difficulty of PVP and questing in the abyss.
You are constantly trying to customize your gear to improve your flight speed and time you can spend in the air. #$%^&! Spirit Masters can force you out of the air :( Ariel combat is often more about gaining an aerial advantage sometimes than fighting. Your characters stats change depending on if you are in the air or ground or even what direction you are moving.

Lore:

Those that get into the lore (I'm not one of them) like the lore in Aion. Aion does have a lot of lore behind the game but there are better games in this area (Lord of the rings). The Aion developers did a good job of adding long descriptive texts NPCs give you and there are tons of in game movies and cut scenes to keep you interested. Campaign quests really add to it. They have added lots of little things throughout the game to add to the lore. NCsoft says they hired well known top dollar fantasy writers to write the lore and quests in the game.
Music and sound:

Top notch. Really. You can turn on and off various aspects if you'd like but not normally needed. Really the game music and sound effects get an A+. There is no built in voice chat system. Most players use the normal vent, teamspeak, skype or yahoo.

Legions (Guilds or fellowships):

All standard stuff here. Guild sizes are limited (to 30 characters) but you can buy the right to expand the size of your legion up to 90 characters. When a guild gets to rank three you can design your own guild emblem which is shown on your characters cloak and on any fortress or artifacts you take. Legion commanders have all the standard controls over the legion like in any MMORPG.

Combat:

Combat is very fast paced compared to most on-line games. It's not like you just spam the same buttons over and over like in some games. One really nice aspect is the chain skills. Basically some skills activate to open up others. Chain skills can have multiple branches and go very deep on some classes. You are constantly making choices in combat due to the chain skills. Chain skills become very nice after level 35 or so. Server lag tends to be very low. The hardware and ISP NCsoft uses is very good. They have been making on-line games for years so have it down right. The first few weeks the game was released the game was very poor in this category but it is extremely efficient and works well now. Characters statistics change as you move in various directions and if you are in the air or not. Combat is just plain and simply a lot of fun.

Chat system:

The chat system could use some work but is functional. You can turn on and off or create additional channels and chat windows and choose exactly what you want in each. They need to add the ability to adjust the transparency of the chat window (Promised to be added later). Hardest part of the chat system is remembering what buttons you press for each function when you are used to playing in a different game. You can right click a character name to get a drop down menu with options but they need to expand this out a lot more. You can link items and locations and there is a notepad in game that you can save links, texts and locations in. One thing of note, you cannot use any chat channels other than /s until you reach level 10. This is to prevent gold spammers from creating characters and sending annoying whispers to everyone with advertisements. Luckily level 10 can be reached in one game session easily.

Quest types:

There are three types of quests in Aion. Campaign quests, normal quests and crafting workorders. Campaign quests are given to you automatically as you go up in level and are more based around the game storyline. They almost always have in game cut scenes and have greater rewards. Normal quests are well normal. There are tons of different types of quests; repeat quests, escort quests, quests with multiple paths to choose from with different endings depending on what you do, time quests etc. Pretty much any type of quests you can think of from all the various MMORPGs out there you will find here. Workorders are crafting quests given out by the crafting trainers. You can have up to 30 regular quests in your queue at once and unlimited number of campaign and workorder quests. Quests can be shared and done in a group, solo or sometimes in raids (If a raid quest).

Game content, world size, tech support:

Game world is fairly large and completely filled with content. Doubtful you will run out of things to do all the way up to max level (50) and beyond. Game is fairly well balanced between quests, crafting, gathering and pvp. Not too much of any one thing and if you get tired of one you can easily do something else. The game is not very grindy or repetitive. NCsoft has already added lots of new quests and content in just the first several months and has several large expansion packs to be added this year. The first couple months Aion had a huge bot and gold spammer problem but they have since gotten it under control. The bots and gold spammers are almost never seen any more. NCsoft is currently in the process of replacing their website and forums as they are pretty lousy. The forums outright suck actually. They do have a wiki right on their website and there are other utility websites with game databases and such out there as well. They promise the new website should be up and running March/April 2010. Tech support is very helpful and quick but their hours are limited. Luckily you don't need them too much but this is one area they could improve upon. What tech support they have is A+, it's just not open very often.

Misc:
Aion has servers in various languages and is world wide. Group size is 6. Raid size is 24. Aion is a channel based game. If any one area gets too many players playing in it, the game automatically creates a duplicate channel of the area so it is not over crowded. If you group with others, you must be in the same channel.

The Aion world is extensive and well done. The client and server software are not buggy at all and NCsoft seems to be adding stuff to the game already constantly. Patching the game is done automatically in the background and does not take long even with large patches. Servers seem to be populated and balanced well (They control this). Over all the game looks really good and plays even better. It truly is one of the next generation of MMORPGs. If you have played one of the older games like wow, warhammer, starcraft, lotro or guildwars, you will feel pretty comfortable upgrading to Aion. It really is an upgrade. If you have never played this type of game before, it is a good game to start with as they really made it easy to get into. Aion is subscription based and very well worth the money.


Pros:
Great gameplay. It's just plain fun.
Tons of content and well balanced between the various things to do.
PVP, combat system crafting and questing system is very well done.
Graphics rock. Game looks new and is easy to get around in.

Cons:
You have to be real picky to find much. They need longer tech support hours. They need a new website and forums. Chat system could use a bit of work but overall not much bad.

Great game overall. I've pretty much played all the MMORPGs out there and this one is easily the best of the bunch.

Well I am posting my review on this game. I know many will not agree, but as it is my review, it is my opinion. I have played online games since the text-based MUD days and have played pretty much every MMO release since UO. I have played UO, Everquest I & II, Shadowbane, EVE, City of Heroes/Villians, Age of Conan, Warhammer, Tabula Rasa, Matrix Online, Lord of the Rings Online, Asheron's Call I & II, Horizons, Star Wars Galaxies, Lineage II, and World of Warcraft. As well as many of those Korean free-to-play mmos.

I felt that Aion is nothing new at best and just a Korean grindfest repackaged for the U.S. which it technically is at worst. There were two main selling points of the game: Flight and PvPvE. Both I found to be sub-par in their implementation. Flight is limited in both location and duration so I did not find much enjoyment there. PvPvE has been done countless times in other online games and has been done better in games like Dark Age of Camelot. Nothing like going out to grind exp and then get ganked over and over again. The answer to this seems to be, just find a group, but due to the way the class system is designed as well as grouping mechanics, people want groups with one of each class, and from my experiences, rarely double up. So if you play a popular class your are screwed, same situation happened in World of Warcraft if you played a rogue or hunter. Not to mention the minute you group you can pretty much kiss your exp gain goodbye due to the penalty involved in grouping.

Crafting was poorly designed as well. Crafting is extremely expensive to raise your skill in. I know, I got 200 skill in every crafting skill in the game. To do things you must constantly grind out work orders (repeatable crafting quest) over and over and over again for hours spending loads of money at the same time. Work orders do not grand you an exp or monetary reward. They do give you a random crafting component or recipie. People will say that at least you get exp from crafting things...you get like 500exp a craft, killing one mob that takes about 1/4 the time yields 4-5 times the exp and does not cost you money. Crafting brings back the days of clicking craft, then finding something else to do for 10 minutes to an hour depending on how many items you are crafting. Also, to craft an actual piece of armor, weapon, or jewelry, you have to get rare mob drops in the form of fluxes and you need anywhere between 2-6 of them to craft a single item on top of any other rare mob drop you may need for example "Azmodean souls". Add onto that, the making of "well crafted" items is entirely random, your crafting level does not effect the chance of producing one and it just plain is not my cup of tea.

Also the leveling curve is insane in the sense that 1-10 fast and fun, 11-20 still fun, but slows down, 20-30 still some quest and slows down considerably, 30+ kill yourself. At 30 the game seriously increased the amount of experience needed to level by a factor similar to the old EQ1 days as far as leveling speed is concerned. At this point it became a constant search for groups due to the pvp element and doing highly uninteresting instances with elite enemies. I grew tired of instance grinding in EQ1 and have never become interested in it since.

Zones are designed to provide an extremely linear experience. The problem with this is that put about 10 people in an area and they can literally clean the area of mobs creating a competition for doing quests and gathering crafting materials that can at times be incredibly frustrating. Add to that frustration the increasing amount of enemies you have to kill to level and it gets even more frustrating. Also note, the ability to switch to a different channel, instance of a given area, is extremely limited or non-existent in higher level areas and you end up spending a lot of time running around trying to find something to kill. People would address this critique by saying just group up. This would be nice, but most quest items that drop are exclusive to one person in a group so if you were grouped up with just one other person, that means you now have to kill at least twice as many enemies than if you were to go solo. Note that mobs do not drop quest items every time. Also note that exp gain is cut dramatically when groups so there are many negatives associated with grouping.

In conclusion Aion is a pretty game that has been out for over a year over seas in China and Korea. At its core it is still an Asian MMO with a Western MMO white wash. Some people will like it some will not, I did not. In closing, at least they did not nerf the game the day of release like Champions Online did.

The Aion Collector's Edition has been a pleasant, if not completely original experience. Opening the box revealed some nice trinkets (e.g. a figurine and some maps), but it contained nothing I simply couldn't live without. Because I preordered I was able to partake in the closed and open betas. Having done so, I got a good feel for the character customization and PvE elements. Since launch, I've found the action to be pretty typical for an MMORPG.

If you've played World of Warcraft, chances are you're already pretty familiar with what goes on in Aion. I've also played Tabula Rasa and Guild Wars. Aion just doesn't have much on any other MMO. The only things that distinguish it from the others is the fantastic graphics and limited flight ability. That's about it. I must say that the time I've spent on Aion has been fun. I've enjoyed the cut scenes, quests, and story line. The character customization has also been one of the best I've seen.

Unfortunately, Aion has experienced all kinds of lag and gold spammers and bots. It's more annoying than crippling, so I tolerate it. That's not really a deal breaker for me. I've had success with logging on and staying logged on, so the game is pretty stable. Only some mild glitches here and there will cause the image to stutter. Again, not a deal breaker.

I really like the back story. The Elyos and Asmodians are both rich in heritage and culture. Personally, I prefer the Asmodians. They're a tortured, dark race filled with resentment and anger. Their eyes glow red during combat. Creepy.

My advice is if you're getting sick of WoW, you might try Aion. It's nothing earth-shattering. I wouldn't bother with the Collector's Edition unless you really like figurines. That's probably the most interesting part of this edition.

Been playing Aion Online NA/EU since closed beta events and great MMO.

8/10 Graphics CryENGINE does a great job with graphics and landscape is lush and not of the 10 and less trees. Aion must have 100s of tree that make the game look that much better. The armor is great looking and polished look. Only reason gave 8 is capital city is a bit laggy on graphics. But I only have a 8600 GT XXX 256mb. Those that have newest cards with lots of memory may have no issues.

9/10 Sound NCSoft again hits it out of the ballpark with games music and sound. Only sound not impressed with was the battle sounds and you can turn them off. They are same battle sounds you hear would hear in Final Fantasy series and not original.

8/10 Interface NCSoft provides a lot of options in the interface and they add more each major patch.

9/10 Gameplay Game has 8 well rounded class and each one it a lot of fun to play.

Well, maybe not eons ahead, but it certainly has caught my attention and that of many of my friends both online and off. Aion: The Tower of Eternity was first seen at a sneak-peak during E3 2006. Produced by the company NCSoft, Aion will not go unnoticed in their already large line games including; City of Heroes and Lineage 1 and 2. Korea and China were the first to check out the game, which allowed for a lot of time to beta-test and tweak things for the North American release on September 22nd.

Personally, I think this game is the embodiment of all of the things previous MMORPGs should have been doing all along, it's still not perfect, but it's currently as close as you are going to get with any game on the market. When you begin the game you start out as a "Daeva" which is a magical human enhanced by the use of "Aether", the back story to the game is original and certainly won't deter you from playing it in any way, but so far lacks the depth as many dedicated single player RPGS. However, to compensate NCSoft has created a pretty cool system of questing with a built-in quest tracking system which is nice since they have not yet announced that they will allow UI mods. There is a story-driven series of quests called Campaign quests, completing these will usually display a cut-scene featuring yours truly right in the middle of the screen, which puts you right in the middle of the action. It's a very nice feature since most MMORPGs leave you in the dust feeling like some story is happening but you are just there grinding through quests while the world passes you by in a flurry of instant quest text. Visually speaking the game is very pretty, based on a dumbed down version of FarCry's CryEngine the graphics certainly won't leave you asking more. One of the largest advantages to using CryEngine is that it's so scalable which means that if you are using grandmothers laptop or a custom built gaming rig with frames to spare, everyone gets to enjoy the beautiful scenery. People have told me that Aion has a subtle Anime look and feel to it, personally I can't really tell. The characters do look quite human though so don't worry, you won't be running around as a wide-eyed bobble head, unless of course you want to. Aion boasts one of the easiest to use character generators and one of the most detailed that I have seen since The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion, what it does lack is the 2 hour process of designing a character to a perfect T only to still have it look like complete garbage which Oblivion decided to leave in. Your character can either be the most gorgeous elfin looking babe in the world of Atreia or the gnarly looking pirate inspired assassin of your nightmares. That is, if the assassin of your nightmares is a beautiful GQ looking model, the fact here is that most of the characters, no matter what faction you choose, are going to look pretty good if you stay within the realm of normal body proportions (you can go far beyond them if you like though). The factions in Aion are the Elyos and the Asmodeans, with the Elyos being the faux-hawk sporting good guys, while the Asmodeans are the clawed foot and hand bad guys and girls of the land. For lack of a good segway here I'm just going to jump in and say that the sound-track to the game is pretty good, Ryo Kunihiko did the composing, who you might have heard of from the famous anime "Emma" (I haven't, but you might have). Music is laid back and classical sounding, with nice bursts of upbeat fighting music as you progress though battles and kobold brains. Actually, bashing kobold brains and any other creature that stands in your way isn't a bad idea, since they have went ahead and made both grinding out mobs and questing (or both!) viable options for success in getting to level 50. Especially since NCSoft has incorporated a channel system which is reminiscent of Guild Wars where there are 10 playable instanced "sub-servers" which are shared on a single server, the difference here being that you can swap between then once every 3 minutes. In a game like World of Warcraft killing raid bosses is easy since it's all in a single instance, however grinding out those 10 elk hides might be a huge challenge since everyone and their mother wants a set. Problem no more! In Aion you can just do a little channel surfing and appear exactly where you were except now there is no more competition for the mobs. Don't worry though, it's not going to stop you from grouping, since you can chat, group, and interact with players cross-channel. Since so far NCSoft has only improved upon the creations of other MMOs they wanted to add a little flare to the game. Other MMOs have tried to make flying a legitimate option, which they have done and successfully at that. However, the flying system in Aion makes those games look like a little league team at the World Series. Flying in the world of Atreia is easy, smooth, and really fun especially since many of your player attacks and skills are modified or usable only in the air like the sorcerers Comet Fall. Well, you might be asking like I did "So I can just fly over or around mobs I don't want to fight, or zones I want to skip?" NO, but the developers did think about people like me and added a nice feature called "Gliding" which is initiated by pressing the spacebar to jump, then again while in the air. Which is especially useful in zones where flying has been disabled (but don't worry there are plenty of flying zones to spread your wings through).

If you pick up Aion you aren't going to be disappointed, you aren't going to be surprised either. The game is very playable, and if you've played any other MMO (or if Aion if your first) you should be able to start right up and have a really good time playing it. NCSoft has really done a great job with this one (which is saying a lot since I was not a fan at all of City of Heroes or Lineage) Really the game shines with all of the improvements that it has made on many other MMOs without going too far out into the realm of experimental. If there is any selling point I can make for it, it's the smooth details of the game that make it worthwhile. Take it easy and have fun, and watch out for my next review, and say hello to Grundy in game!

I will keep this short as I have for the most part lost my patience with the Aion staff at this point.

I love the game, and I think the game mechanics are good for what it is. People who love it or hate it have their reasons, but as a subscription based game, it can still get better or worse depending on the staff who are in charge of the game and its contents.

My gripe with the game is with just that though...the game has been out in asia a long time before it was released for north america...and it seems that the staff just hasn't prepared for any of the problems that hey should have anticipated. I am not talking so much about the lag or even the early snafus with login queues.

What I am talking about is any sense of much needed live tech support, problem reporting, and the plague of spam and farming bots.

First of all, their tech support and problem reporting are done using the same mechanic...which is an online petition. The problem is, it did not even work even weeks after the game went live. The system even sent a reply that it wasn't working, then had a survey that asks how helpful it was. Also, their petition/live tech support is not active 24/7. Rather, it only works during their business hours...and for a 24/7 game, this is unacceptable. You can get stuck or hit a major bug in the game, but if its not during business hours, you are out of luck.

The other major "live" problem is the spam and farming bots. They seem to have done some things against the spam bots, but they have since practically allowed farming bots to advance, level and loot unrestricted even though people have been reporting them for weeks. They tell everyone to use a /autoreporthunting command, but all it does is hinder xp and loot gain based on the number of people who report them. Herein lies another problem...this system is completely broken...first of all I am convinced that this command does nothing in any form of reporting, and if it did, Aion staff doesn't investigate anyways. As a competitive game, it is unacceptable to be getting ganked by reported bots and it is also unacceptable to compete with bots for quest kills and material gathering.

I may still change my review to reflect more the things that I do like about this game, but the lack of dedication by the Aion staff to take care of the issues that will break the game for their customers in a timely manner when they should have anticipated these issues upon release says a lot to the customer base.

Update:

After 6 months of playing I have a few things to add to this review. First of all there has been a lot of removal of spam bots and farming/hunting bots, although some of the most notorious offenders still slipped through. At least they finally reacted to it in some degree, but the same game mechanics that encourage gold buying and cheating in the game still exist for the most part.

The classes are definitely not balanced at all, so if your interest in this game is to do solo pvp and you pick the wrong class you are out of luck unless NC soft fixes their issue with skill and character balance. Group pvp gets more balanced, but depending on the racial balance of the server that is joined, it may not even matter as one side will either have more high levels or more "geared" players. Choosing a badly losing side for the most part kills about 50% of the game experience as you will almost always get ganked before you even get anything done...this is even worse if the sttrong side knows a lot of the "exploits" in the game and know how to abuse them.
This game also has terrible pacing, especially if you are into crafting. The drop rate is so slow, most people will typically outlevel their ability to get enough drops to make anything before they get enough to even try. This is particularly true with materials needed for completing expert level quests for crafting as well as the items you can make after achieving expert level.

I do still enjoy the game but it still has too many pacing and balance issues for me to outright recommend it to anyone unless they have nothing to do but play Aion all day, every day. I know people have complained about the grind, but after all the levels I have gained on various characters, I have come to realize something about the "grind". The pacing for gaining experience and levels is actually not bad, and I think that it is paced right for the game. It is the loot drop rate which is so dismally balanced as to make it so that it takes lots of luck (or in the case of some, lots of botting) to be able to at least feel comfortable...for the most part the bad drop rate combined with the completely out of balance costs for everything will keep most people feeling poor, even when they have reached max level. It really is like they tried to hide their lack of real content by trying to artificially slow the pace down in the game.

I've played Aion for a little over a year now..and I must say that truly enjoy it. I may even be addicted to it, but I tend to take a month or so break from it. Recently NCsoft banned my account and now I'm forced with the decision of buy the game all over again and get back my years worth of veteran rewards the long way, or just quit playing completely. Lovely. Customer support sucks badly.