- The Thrill of Flight: Flying is a strategic and integral part of the game, adding a fresh dynamic to all aspects of the genre, including combat, quests, and exploration.
- Stunning World: Discover a meticulously crafted fantasy world brimming with otherworldly inhabitants, mysterious enemies, and ancient secrets.
- Innovative PvPvE: Aion introduces a new dynamic to MMOs by combining both PvP and PvE gameplay into an exciting new style.
- Intense Visceral Combat: Engage in a spectacular and evolving combat system utilizing combos, skill chains, counterattacks, and spectacular aerial combat.
- Unprecedented Customization: Take individuality to a new level through an incredibly in-depth character creation tool, advanced crafting systems, and extensive item customization.
Product Description
The Thrill of Flight: Flying is a strategic and integral part of the game, adding a fresh dynamic to all aspects of the genre, including combat, quests, and exploration. Stunning World: Discover a meticulously crafted fantasy world brimming with otherworldly inhabitants, mysterious enemies, and ancient secrets. Innovative PvPvE: Aion introduces a new dynamic to MMOs by combining both PvP and PvE gameplay into an exciting new style. Intense Visceral Combat: Engage… More >>
Aion: The Tower of Eternity Steelbook Edition
Aion is a good looking game, this is true. Looking past the pretty façade I however am left underwhelmed by the game. It doesn’t seem to offer anything particularly new or exciting.
Character creation is decent, there are quite a few options to customize both your facial and body features. I can’t really fault it in any way considering that you’ll eventually be decked out in armor and character creation in such a game usually stands as a generic look. There unfortunately isn’t much avoiding looking like everybody else in a broader sense because there are only two races. Upon close inspection you should find that most characters manage to create a pretty unique look. As you progress through the game you can choose to maintain various armor looks despite equipping other pieces though which is a nice way of looking unique in the long run.
There have so far been pretty annoying race lockouts on certain servers in an effort to balance them. For example I haven’t been able to play with many of my guild mates because no more Asmodians are being allowed on their server. I imagine this will be fixed to some extent but I can’t really lie and say that I’m not a bit bitter about being blocked from playing with my friends. Hopefully those who choose to jump in to the game after my writing this don’t have this minor annoyance to deal with.
After some initial hiccups at launch the game actually runs quite well. Again the game looks gorgeous with interesting environments and flashy attack animations. The default UI is alright, pretty standard action bar with health bars, but if you’re coming from another game it may take some getting used to. I for one am hoping for add-on support or UI customization though since I would personally prefer a slightly more minimalized UI.
The introductory zones come paired with help messages which offer limited video and audio help which I found to be a pretty nice newbie feature. Quests also have a keyword location feature which is like a built in quest helper. I find this feature to be pretty neat, I feel that it adds a sense of authentic adventuring to it for some reason and it doesn’t clutter you map with all sorts of quest waypoints. So with these two features getting in to the game and advancing up to level 10 is rather painless.
At level 10ish you become a Daeva which grants you wings and allows you to choose from 2 specialties with your class. There isn’t really anything of particular note here but it does add a bit more depth to game play.
Following level 10 it seems that the game becomes increasingly grindy which I don’t much care for. Following level 15+ leveling is still quite doable but the rate at which I’m being rewarded for my time is a very important factor for an MMORPG for me and I don’t feel that I’m gaining skills or equipment quite fast enough to hold my interest in the game. This has nothing to do with slogging through content too difficult for my character or being oblivious to other questing hubs, I’m simply noting that experience gain tapers off quite quickly. Gaining levels doesn’t appear to get you anything aside from skills another factor contributing to the slow feel of the game. It has thus far been quite common for my character to go 2-3 levels getting very little aside from statistical boosts. This is hardly an issue unique to Aion but again it’s another one of those things that takes away my desire to get from one skill to the next.
Eventually you get access to Stigma Stones which are sort of like a generic talent tree that allows you access to more skills. I was a rather let down to find out this was the feature which NCSoft was heralding as the way to play your character totally different from another player. While it is true that it allows you to diverge away from other players within your class specialty it isn’t so broad in its choices that you’ll find a slew of viable builds. I’m looking at it right now as something that will easily be theorycrafted to a point where everybody competitive will play a given class in maybe one or two ways.
Skills are pretty standard for the most part but one pretty cool thing so far is that you get chain skill where one initial attack triggers the use of further more powerful attacks. Unfortunately you can’t use chain skills out of sequence but I do like the feel of an attack coming off cool down allowing you to unload on an enemy all at once. Having more than one chain attack generally allows you to be in constant active control of combat. The various chains and what you need to complete them are listed in your skills window and there appears to be quite a variety for the various classes.
Another feature I like is having your own personal shop which others will be familiar with from games such as Ragnarok Online or Fiesta Online. Basically you can open a little shop anywhere and sell your stuff. I far prefer this to auction houses typically because it allows you to be more competitive as a salesman than an auction house typically does because location becomes a valid choice and undercutting doesn’t kill all chance at profits. It’s also good for going afk for extended periods of time.
Flying is a big part of the game considering you have wings and all. I haven’t liked flying much at all so far and I’m really kind of dreading parts of the game where it becomes more necessary. The controls seem very clunky and the limitations of cool down between use and the overall flight time lead to a high preponderance of ineffectiveness of death. You can modify your wings and combat abilities while flying so perhaps by the time I really need to worry about flying it’s more tolerable but up to where I’m at now it seems little more than a poorly implemented gimmick. After quite a bit more practice with my wings I’m still only finding the flight mechanics to be marginally more tolerable, perhaps I suck but be fairly warned.
PvP has so far been respectable, especially for a rather new game. I haven’t personally encountered any particular class which I feel is broken beyond belief despite some community complaints of balance issues. There does seem to be an attitude of this game and its PvP being “hardcore” and I have to comment that I feel this is a rather glorified designation. The flying adds a bit of depth and skill to PvP but I feel that’s where the unique aspects of PvP in this game end. I don’t think anybody playing WAR or WoW, particularly PvP servers, are going to switch over to this game and be refreshed by the PvP. It’s fun and well implemented but at its core this has been done before.
Pros:
Good looking
Overall solid game
Seemingly popular
Cons:
High grind possibility
Awkward flying
Race lockouts
In summary, I don’t think I’ll be sticking with this one for long, I’m simply not being moved in any particular way by it currently. It’s different enough from other games to warrant some consideration but it also hold so many cliché similarities that prevent me from getting too excited about it. The game has great potential for many players but I recommend taking a long look at it before biting the hype bullet. If I had to recommend it I feel that fans of Guild Wars, Lineage 2, FFXI, or even first time MMOers would like the game quite a bit.
Rating: 4 / 5
Just putting a post, to give out some information for those folks “sitting on the fence” wondering if Aion is worth ordering or not . I’m trying not to be negative about the game per se, rather saying it maybe not for everyone. It tends to lean heavy on the “PvP-aholic”; “Grouping is where its at” ,”I luv to grind XP ” style of game play. Which don’t get me wrong is a perfectly valid style of play, but tastes do differ. I much prefer the exploration aspects of a Morpg verses bragging rights.
Graphically it’s very nice. Similar to Guild wars in appearance,but perhaps a little more advanced and shimmering. The zones are similarly laid out; with the usual “single road” and long corridors to fight over/through. If your expecting the freedom of flying and therefore tons of massively open 3D areas; be prepared at least for levels 1-30 to be largely ground based (there’s lots of no fly zones) and be hemmed in by mountains. Leveling is and can be a bit of a Lineage 2 grind fest, with the usual kill 10 of these, deliver this experience. When you start reach lvl 18 + quests , then your kinda forced to group. It’s hard to solo, not impossible, just be prepared for lots of repetitive “farming”. Most folks find it a drag until you reach lvl 25 then you begin the main part of the storyline.
Overall the aim of the Aion is to get you to this massive open ended Zone “the Abyss”. As this is where the game is suppose to shine, with the focus tending to lean heavily on PvP and again grouping to survive. Bear that in mind if you buy the game, yes there are other things to do, crafting,big boss instances etc. But it’s in the open 3D “battleground” of the Abyss, where the NCSoft are putting the heart of the Aion Experience.
Overall it’s a fine MORPG, nice visuals, follows the standard pattern of leveling by gaining XP thing. And that’s where it’s strengths and weaknesses are. Is it a good game? Yes. But the next “big” new thing? In my experience sadly no. Hopefully one day a developer will have the courage to break free from the Everquest style of design and produce a different gaming online experience.
Rating: 3 / 5
This game is so shallow it’s like a kiddie pool. From the exploration, to the questing, crafting, instances, character customization, items/loot, flying, abyss, guild management tools, UI, etc, EVERYTHING is paper thin and screams of a f2p game. The world is perhaps the most linear I have ever seen in an mmo and you can only fly unrestricted in the abyss. If you haven’t gotten to level 25 people will tell you that’s where the game opens up and becomes fun. Um, no. Take all 3 layers of the abyss and put them together and you have the size of one zone approximately since most of it is islands and open space. The fortress and artifact battles seem intriguing at first until you realize that there really is no big benefit to having control of one of these things. Questing in the abyss is beyond boring as it is in any other part of the game and the dungeons/instances are the most uninspired I have ever seen. Oh yeah, and expect to run instances multiple times and not have any boss drop loot. LITERALLY, even end bosses of a dungeon will often times drop LITERALLY nothing. NOTHING.
I got to level 30 in this game and realized that everything that was supposed to be fun wasn’t, and why keep going in this disaster. Perhaps this game will be to your liking, but it definitely wasn’t to mine.
Rating: 1 / 5
Aion is a solid MMORPG. I’m not going to go on here and say it is a World of Warcraft killer or anything, but it has some aspects that I like better over WoW. The fantasy world of Aion itself is beautiful. I was really impressed with the way the world looks. The character creation system for the game is very well done. The characters look really good and there are a lot of options. In World of Warcraft, you get one type of human body, but in Aion you can be skinny, muscular, stocky, short, tall, and lots of other combinations, which is great.
I like the crafting system a lot. It reminds me of crafting in Lord of the Rings Online. The crafting system has a level of complexity I enjoy, but it is not so complex that it gets on my nerves. World of Warcraft’s crafting system is so easy it is boring to me. Also, WoW’s crafting system doesn’t have much variety, so WoW kind of fails on crafting when compared to Aion. Also, I like the crafting halls in Aion. I enjoy seeing other people craft while I am crafting. One thing I never really liked about WoW is that there isn’t really any crafting halls. The cities where the crafting halls are have teleporters that make it easy for you to go to the bank and back to the crafting hall for a small money drop, which is really great as well.
The Player versus Everything (PVE) play is very well done and challenging. Some people have complained that there is a lot of grinding. I’m not sure what MMORPG does not have a fair share of grinding really so I think this criticism is amusing. Anyway, NCSoft has started doing bonus XP weekends to help out the casual players, and so far I feel this has helped with any slowness in level gains.
The character classes are very good. I’ve played almost all of the classes and each one has something to offer. I feel that some of the classes are harder to play at early levels than others. Warriors seem to be the easiest class to play. However, I think the gameplay gets somewhat easier the higher in levels you get, due to added abilities. I would say the toughest classes to play are Assassin and Ranger, but I have not played them up to level 20 and they might get easier at a certain point. I do not know for sure.
In short, I would recommend this game to anyone looking for something new and different in the MMORPG genre.
Rating: 4 / 5
Pro’s
Its a beautiful game, the quests are somewhat interesting and I find the combat mechanism for melee anyways is way more interesting than WoW.
Con’s
The UI is clunky, I didn’t like it at all. I felt like I was constantly having to adjust the camera and jack with things to keep up with my surroundings, and little things like looting and targeting are just way different.
Chat. I hated the chat. It was so full of retards trying to troll each other and gold spam that you just want to turn off all chat, except you can’t! You can’t report spam, you basically have trade/Barren’s chat ALL THE TIME! Sure you can create your own chat window but it still defaults to the LFG channel every time you log in
It pulled up their website every time I logged out. This had to be the most retarded thing ever, even after I selected that I don’t want to pull up the Aion site when I log out it still did. Don’t ninja my computer when I log out you bastards.
Overall I was very disappointed and will stick to Wow,
I didn’t get to play with my WoW guild in Aion, but reading the forums most of the people that leveled higher than me got tired of the grind and the boredom and are selling their accounts or quitting.
Rating: 1 / 5