A Look Back At Aion in 2009

Tags : review of aion, aion review, aion news

If you could picture a board room meeting from say, Robocop or Office Space, imagine a man in a business suit with a line graph of the last six months. Aion has had a turbulent launch, even if it was relatively technically sound compared to other launches. In the last 3 months, we've seen great change and the first steps towards further westernization for our audience. Keep your own personal thoughts in mind as we begin our Ten Ton Hammer review of Aion over the course of 2009.

GET HYPE - The beta times
When everyone heard the idea of ANGELS FLYING THROUGH THE AIR IN OPEN PVP, we responded with great enthusiasm. A closed beta with relatively few participants barely whet our desires and provided little real information for the masses of us looking for a real alternative to the standard that is World of Warcraft.
When the beta actually went live, what did we get? Weekends. Weekends of limited content, limited race selection, and of course limited play time. Of course, when most people think 'beta' what they actually are looking for is a try-before-you-buy trial of sorts. We more or less got that in short bursts. Perhaps those short bursts were strategic, as most players barely touched the 20's and beyond and were in awe of the visceral combat and ever so shiny graphics. Of course, then the real open beta happened and who was it for? Fileplanet subscribers and those of us who preordered the game. Nothing more. If you wanted in on the action, better head to your local video game store and drop that ten bucks for the reservation. Incentive to reserve was definitely there though, since GameGuard, the anti-cheat shell for the game was being removed at launch.

IT'S AION BABY! - Launch
We preloaded our characters, set up the names, and forgot to change our voices. And then we logged in to...... 12,000 people spread across 10 channels, or 1200 people sitting in the newbie zone, most within 100 feet of starting. So many just crashed outright. If you wanted to loot a quest item, you had to stand on top of 20 other people furiously right clicking and hoping to be that lucky #1 who actually got the loot credit on it.
Did you want to log in at prime time? Enjoy your 2 hour wait. Queues are a true sign of a shortsighted launch, and the fact that if you crashed or logged out for any time above 5 minutes, you had to reenter the queue from scratch. Of course, as we all know Aion takes a good chunk of time to launch to begin with so the period for being exempt from the queue is mighty small. Of course, the discovery that running a private store kept you logged into the game led to many 99 million kinah Thin Rawhides being put up as people slept or went to work to preserve their spot on Aion's soil. NCSoft was swift in putting a stop to that loophole however... but just what loopholes did they leave open besides this?

LFG replaces Barrens Chat - 1-2 months in
As we barreled through the initial grouping of the Black Claw and its Elyos equivalent, we reached a lovely lovely point known as the NTC, or training camp. It was a 5 man instance of legendary experience, over 20,000 a kill. It was restricted to levels 25-28 and was your first real taste of grouping. And what a fantastic taste it was. Drops be damned (we all know nothing drops there), it was paradise. With a Lodas Amulet you could get 1 level a day in less than an hour of play time.
30-34 is a barren land of weak skill upgrades, terrible group content, and even the group content you can access (Fire Temple) has level 35 drops and awful drop rates. A lot of subscriptions were lost here. I myself lost my best friend to the fact that there was no incentive to group for another 10 levels until Mistmane. Quests had turned into the same experience as 5-6 kills of the same monsters, so they had become relatively pointless to some and little more than a distraction to others. Repeatables barely existed. Whatever the case may be, our legion of 32 turned into a legion of two after the second month. I'm sure your guild or your friend's legion experienced the same turnover.
Thankfully the botting community has been being smacked around for the last 2 months and we're up to over 100,000 accounts banned for it. Unfortunately between 100,000 accounts being banned, and probably a million quitting, it's not exactly a good time to be rolling new characters. Times you had to compete for single monsters for 10 minutes on end are now complete in 2. You might even have to wait for a black claw or NTC group to form up, and templars/clerics are in high demand and rare cases can lead to parties filling up on 5 and forcing a gladiator or chanter to man up and fill the role.

NCSoft Takes Charge (Kinda) - Current
We're going to make this game a better place! So the following stuff has been put into play or is about to be
- Repeatable quests have received a massive experience and kinah boost for the most part to encourage grinding with rewards.
- Queues are toast!
- Energy of Repose (rest experience) has been boosted for the majority of us.
- Soul Healing no longer causes you to punch things with how much it costs you.
- Flying Spiritmaster Pets!
There's still a few things wrong, but NCSoft is proving they are looking to make this game a winner. Veteran awards are going to be giving us the best non-dropped wings in the game in a few months!