So there probably isn’t any other MMO out there right now that I’ve been following more closely and waiting with such high hope for than Aion. Since I read the first announcements in 2007, and saw the first videos in 2008, I’ve loved everything I’ve seen about the look, the art style, and the prospects of adding something really new to the genre — flying PvP combat. And yes, before we go any further, I know flying and combat has been around for some time in MMO’s, but in both CoH and WoW, flying is an add-on. It’s not considered a cornerstone of the game. The first videos I saw of Aion promised that this game was about flying combat.
So when the first closed betas rolled around, I stayed by my guns of trying to avoid the hype and to play in the betas. But when the FilePlanet beta opened up, and all you needed was a FilePlanet subscription to get a key, well even I could stand it no longer, and so into the beta I went. But none of that matters to you. All you want to know.. and anyone that’s not actually in the beta really wants to know is — if I liked WoW, am I going to like this? Well you’ll have to read a bit more to get my answer.
Shiny!
There is a lot to like about the game. It’s been said in blog after blog that the game is beautiful, and well, it is. The amount of time and effort that’s gone into the content creation for this game boggles my mind. Only Guild Wars has only come close to presenting a game in which both the environment and the characters were as gorgeous as these are, and I think this one has even Guild Wars beat. Unfortunately, the beauty is marred by what I would consider some poor design choices, but more on that later. We’re still talking about the good stuff.
The combat is quite good. Unlike LOTRO, the reponse time for abilities is sharp and concise. The animations are incredible, and the special effects are all over the top. Sound editing is nice, and overall I feel like combat is as enjoyable as any other MMO I’ve played, and more so than many. I played an assassin for fifteen levels, and while the class is not as strong as I would have liked (so far), good gawd she does look great killing mobs.
And there are a number of game mechanics brought over from other MMO’s, and some new ones as well, that provide plenty to like – the quest system is familiar and workable; a simplified auction houses that dispenses with the bidding notion, and just lets you put up your stuff for sale; and Warhammer’s nice inventory management, where you dispense with bags altogether, and just get a ton of slots to start with, and pay money periodically to add more. There is even account-wide bank storage to facilitate transfer of goods between alts.
Also, for me the game was incredibly stable, for it to be in beta. Gamegard crashed on me a few times and brought the client down with it once or twice, but by far and large things went smoothly. And while there were server performance issues, my gawd if you’d seen the number of people in our zone at one time on opening day, well quite honestly I haven’t played any MMO yet who’s servers wouldn’t have groaned under that load. Aion’s actually held up quite well, and Sunday the performance was even better.
I see you Korean MMO, you can’t hide from me
But after around fifteen hours of play, Aion’s heritage starts to shine through. It is, at its heart, an asian MMO that’s trying really really hard to appeal to western audiences. And I think in many ways it succeeds at this. But the more you play the game, the more you see mechanics that bely its asian heritage. And if you’ve played those games, then you know that that they are designed for an audience that has a much higher tolerance for pain than us westerners. And it shows.
The amount of time you will spend gathering items for crafting, procurring the necessary ingredients, crafting all of the sub-components, and then eventually crafting the actual item will make you realize just how much of a grind the crafting profession will be. And it’s made even more “exciting” when each and every attempt at crafting has a potential for failure, losing the components. And imagine my surprise when I learned that you lost experience when you died. Hello ten-year-old game mechanic! Didn’t we figure out a long time ago that punishing players for dying wasn’t all that fun? At least you can’t level down from dying, but you certainly can go backwards. And they have the old player-driven private stores, which surprised me because I haven’t seen them in a western MMO since EQ1, but they’re all over games like Ragnarok and Lineage II. To make it worse, there is a mechanic called DP points (damage points?) that you build up over time doing combat. You have to build up an insane amount of this in order to launch some high end abilities. If you die all your DP is lost, and if you log out, your DP is lost. So people just park their characters in store mode and leave the game, to keep from losing their DP. The result of this is that by day two of the beta, all of the starter zone quest hubs were already inundated with a slew of billboard spam from afk stores, and upon entering the otherwise beautiful city of Pandemonium, your entire screen was filled with, what is literally, player spam. And mark my words, if the mechanic stays at launch, six months after launch the major cities will be filled with nothing but chinese gold farmers parked in store mode — exactly like they are in Lineage II.
And I could go on. The itemization is pretty poor. For every 2 to 3 levels, there is exactly one white drop and one green drop for each class. While the character art is beautiful, just as in RF Online, at each level range, all of the characters in each class look almost identical. These are all things that I think they could fix or make better by launch, but honestly I don’t think they are viewed as bugs. They are conscious design choices, that point to the difference in attitudes between an asian MMO and a western MMO.
Why are you so racist!
Finally, I want to be clear that I don’t think the differences in design mechanics are necessarily bad – they’re just different. Well I really do hate the player stores, but that’s another post. And it is because of that difference, that I think the answer to the question I posed at the top of this post is — probably not. If WoW was your first MMO, and while you loved the game for five years you want something that’s going to feel a little different, and everyone is talking about how gorgeous this new Aion game is — are you going to feel at home here? I think while you may be drawn in by it’s initial beauty and ease of play — but as you play, you’ll start to recognize the things like failing in crafting, and losing experience when you die, and flooded by private stores in every town, and I think you will ultimately not want to stay. After all, 10 million players didn’t come to WoW and stay because they like losing experience when they die.
Are you going to play it?
So if you’re still here, you may have the impression I’m down on Aion. Actually, that’s not the truth. One — I’m a sucker for asthetics. I am impressed with a game that is artistically beautiful to the point that I can look past a lot of mechanics I don’t necessarily care for, and asthetics is something Aion has in spades. And second, I actually don’t mind so much some of the grindy aspects to asian MMO’s. I played RF Online for much longer than I should have, because the PvP was just so darn much fun. And while failing is not fun, succeeding is a blast. And you can’t have success without failure. So I will try out the crafting, and curse it’s name every time a recipe blows up, but I’ll cheer when I get critical successes, and am rewarded with things I totally did not expect. I’ll invoke the name of a half dozen different dieties when I die and lose experience, but for me, for at least a while, it will make the ding of a new level all that much sweeter.
I may not stay.. but I will definitely be there to try it out when they launch.
Honorable Mention
One mechanic that stood out for me as outstanding in Aion is the quest hypertext. I was so impressed with this that I saved it for it’s own paragraph at the end of ths post. In effect, every place and every name in all of the quest text for Aion has a hyperlink associated with it. Click the link, and a small box pops up with additional information. That box may, itself, contain more hyperlinks for digging down even further. But the best thing is, within that box is a “Locate” button. Click that, and a waypoint indicator appears on your minimap and overhead map showing you the mob/place/NPC’s location. It’s elegant and genius. A million times better than the map cluttering hashmarks from AoC and Warhammer. And more precise, because often it’s not the location of the mobs I want for the quest, but trying to remember where in the hell the NPC was that gave me the quest to return to. Someone said Aion’s quest system was derived from Lineage II. I played Lineage II, but only for a very short time, and I didn’t recall this system there. Regardless of its origins though, I absolutely loved it.
Notable in Absence
But while we’re on the subject of quest mechanics, what the hell is up with not displaying group coordination information in your quest log? The designers at Lord of the Rings Online need to write a book in the minimum set of requirements a quest log should have, and every other MMO designer should be held to at least that minimum. This is 2009 people. I should not have to spend 10 minutes trying to figure out who in my group has which quest and who doesn’t.
Thoughts? Comments? Your own two cents on Aion? Post ‘em up!
Tags: Aion, AoC, Beta, mmo, Warhammer, WoW
July 5th, 2009 on 6:16 pm
Pretty much in full agreement with you, except I won’t be playing at launch. I can wait for a price drop, but definitely have every intention of playing eventually.
Of course, I said the same about Tabula Rasa, so I best not wait *too* long!
twitter.com/pasmith
July 5th, 2009 on 6:22 pm
I feel I’m in the minority on this but …. playing Aion made me miss and, subsequently, re-subscribe to Lineage II. Maybe there’s something wrong with me, but I feel the Western MMOs are going in a direction I don’t care for (at least don’t care for all the time).
I don’t want to be held by the hand. I don’t want to be playing a linear game. I don’t want to be given stuff because I’m special, I pay money and I deserve to have things! While I love WoW for what it is, I am sad that it seems — in the West — games without the Disneyland approach are dying. What saddens me more is when a game doesn’t do the Disneyland approach well. If you’re going to make a linear quest-based MMO, make the quests incredible. See Lich King expansion on how to do a quest-based MMO correctly.
That said, I agree with most of the above but for different reasons. I think Lineage2 is actually better. I find it funny you compare it to Guild Wars because it’s the most eastern looking Western MMO out there. I don’t know what Korea and Japan feed their kids but they grow up to be amazing 3D modelers and animators. And Aion doesn’t have anything on Lineage II’s mobs. Granted, Lineage II is aging so it’s not as shiny. But, to me, it’s way more evocative and haunting. I think that’s due to the fact that Aion wants to be liked. It tries, very hard, to be loved. Lineage II, on the other hand is a game that says “This is what I am. Play me if you want or don’t: I don’t care.” and I admire that.
- I never got the DP bar to be full so have no idea what it’s good for
- Animations and art are up to Korean standards (seriously, why is there no Western MMO that can make cloth look like cloth and make armor look like hard, shiny steel or whatever?)
What will stop me from playing it is a couple things:
1. Aion on Rails
Too many areas have invisible walls! Too many areas have “You can’t fly in this area” …. REALLY?
My favorite thing in Lineage II is the complete lack of zones… it’s an open world. Aion is really a bunch of connected areas. I don’t get the feeling of an open world at all.
2. My biggest complaint and the thing that made me quit Lineage2 (and will again eventually) is the lack of diversity in equipment. While the outfits look great, there’s usually only one or two ways to look for each class at any tier. And there’s rarely much diversity in stats.
3. Quests are boring
See my opening rant. Grinding is grinding, be it mobs or quests. This game chose the grind-by-quest option. If you’re going this route, make the quests interesting and make them tell a story. I actually get turned off of bad quests way before I get turned off of mob-grinding (if combat is interesting). Mob grinding can actually be a lot of fun with friends and interesting places and fun mobs. Quest grinding is just less combat and way more running around, clicking text options, and not actually playing the game. Why this is the new hotness, beats me!
Things that are great:
- I must also say the hyperlinking is awesome!
- Music is great (Almost as good as Lineage II — why L2 doesn’t get more credit for their amazing soundtrack, I don’t know)
- Visuals are pretty!
…. if I have friends that play Aion I may get it. I enjoyed healing and I always like new things to explore. Otherwise, I will skip it and play WoW for my linear-but-fun-gear-grinding and Lineage II a bit more for my Korean love-the-art-amazing-sounds-animations-haunting-world-mob-grinding.
P.S.
Thanks for mentioning the ’sloppy’ feel of LOTRO’s combat. Drives me crazy. In fact, it’s going to be the reason I give when I cancel the game next month. Love the world; don’t like the combat.
July 5th, 2009 on 6:37 pm
@pasmith – LULZ yeah given this is NCSoft, you probably have at least a year before they start eyeing it if it’s underperforming. But honestly? I think it will do fine. It may not be for everyone, but it’s clean and polished enough I think it will be for some.
@richard – great comments! And an interesting take on Lineage II. I completely agree with your assessment – Lineage II is a man’s man MMO, and you are either staunch enough to stomach it, or you’ll move on. It’s ambivalent either way, lol. And yeah, the combat in LOTRO is still mushy. It’s something you get used to or you don’t, but it’s still not as sharp as I would like.
July 5th, 2009 on 7:20 pm
I am still downloading the client. The next Beta weekend will allow access to the Abyss and level 25, and as the PvP there is considered to be the “core” or endgame of Aion, I wonder how it will be. And I will be able to level to 25 and then still have time left to test the Abyss during the test weekend…!
July 5th, 2009 on 7:50 pm
I can’t say one way or another anything about the game, since my download was hosed. However, I’m seeing a lot of the same threads through various posts around teh Intarwebs, which doesn’t make me regret not pursuing the beta.
July 6th, 2009 on 1:24 pm
I went so far as to preorder, to get into the Closed Beta 2 weekend two weeks ago. That also gives me access to the subsequent beta events, so I was back for CB3 this past weekend.
I pretty much agree with everything you’ve said about Aion here. It’s a great-looking game, fairly easy to play, and makes some obvious effort to cater to Western tastes. One thing that struck me, reading some of the specific criticisms, is how well they apply to Final Fantasy XI (a game which I’ve been playing for over five years now, and which many also consider hardcore):
Itemization: Both games have fairly cookie-cutter gear progressions, at least through the midgame. Melee classes or mage classes look much the same at a particular level, at least until artifact gear begins to differentiate things a bit at 50 and up. I think that games like WoW have *too much* itemization. Nothing stays with you for very long, and crafted gear (at lower levels, anyway), is basically useless because you’re constantly showered with quest rewards and mob drops. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that FFXI has a strong economy, and that crafted items form a significant part of it. I haven’t seen enough of Aion to tell whether it will be the same way there. At least Aion has dyes, so there is some possibility of player customization.
XP loss: I think that some sort of death penalty is desirable; I’m just not sure what it should be. I find that FFXI’s XP loss (and potential for delevelling) provide a strong incentive to play carefully, but I think it goes too far. It will be interesting to see how Square-Enix deals with this in FF14.
By the way, while we’re talking about old school throwback features, I would like to point out that training (MPK-ing) and kill-stealing are both alive and well in Aion.
Crafting: FFXI’s is a total grindfest, but Aion’s looks even worse. I like that there is a risk of failure, in the sense that there needs to be *some* sort of gate to prevent people from zooming to maximum level. But sitting in the Sanctum this weekend, converting iron ore to steel ingots, and then to nails… yeesh. At this rate, it will take me a week to make my first mace.
Random observation: Clerics seem hideously overpowered. As a healer, I love it… but I can’t help but wonder when the nerf bat will fall.
Anyway, to wrap this up before it takes too much time, I will definitely be around at launch, but I can’t say whether I’ll be hanging around past the first month. I guess we’ll see.
July 6th, 2009 on 3:59 pm
I had been considering pre-ordering simply because of all the amazing screenshots I’ve seen. But I must confess, I think I might just be one of those western gamers at heart
.
Overall, while I might not agree with the approach only the DP system to me seems like its in need of a serious reworking. Maybe of some form of rapid decay, to prevent people from staying logged on to gain an upperhand and/or to prevent botting. In my mind having an entire population attempting to stay logged in at all times is bad for performance, and more or less a potential detriment to the experience.
If anything, I may try it for the PvP experience. I’m curious to see how it stacks up to the old Daoc (#1 ranked mercenary on Merlin server first year here!).
Do the classes feel relatively balanced individually or in a group for Player combat?
Are there PvP or Faction vs Faction reward systems for players?
July 6th, 2009 on 4:20 pm
@Richard: I never actually found out what “DP” stands for–but as you fill the bar to successive tiers, you become surrounded by glowing mist. When I first saw this, I thought I had some sort of disease effect on me, but I believe it’s actually the DP accumulating. On or after level 10, I trained a skill that will give me 50% of my MP back, at a cost of 2000 DP. At least, that’s what it said–I never actually got around to trying it. Apparently, if you die, you lose all the points. *cough*
Between CB2 and CB3, I had the notion of reactivating my L2 account. I’ve never done that much with it, but I might poke around in there some more now. I don’t expect much in terms of n00b-friendliness, but is there a server which is better for beginners?
July 6th, 2009 on 4:43 pm
@Periastron – Great comments! Spot on with how much it resembles FFXI. Of course, FFXI is draped in 10 year old mechanics, so one would hope Aion would reflect a little more what’s current, but we’ll see.
And yes, I didn’t get to it but I was totally trained on a number of times during play, and the kill-stealing was rampant.
@Brian – I only participated in a tiny bit of PvP, but I hope to get to 25 next CBT, as LongAsc mentioned, and try out a bit more of it. Can’t say about the rewards, and way too early to say about class balance. I did try PvP out in the arena for about an hour, and as an assassin was consistently getting owned by rooting-slowing-snaring-fireballing sorcerors. Bright Mage much anyone?
July 7th, 2009 on 7:01 am
[...] and never enthralled with Asian MMOs as a whole. But I’m willing to listen — and quite a few bloggers are making a case for and against it. Stay [...]
July 7th, 2009 on 8:06 am
“DP” is not “Death Penalty” like in Guild Wars, it stands for Divine Power.
It is used for two things: 1.) Special Combat Skills and 2.) Crafting/”enchanting” items. You get it for killing creatures that give more or less of it. I also heard it gets lost once you log out.
The Sorcerer skill that uses 2000 DP is a nuke that deals roughly 4x the damage of my main nuke at level 10 and has one-shotting potential. You can use it on players, too.
For crafting, DP is used to imbue materials. So you need to kill some stuff if you want to turn your steel into some spiffy raw material for magic weapons.
Class balance in Aion is odd. Not only while levelling, also at max level. In the Abyss where flight is pretty much unlimited ranged classes have an advantage over melee classes.
On the other hand, a Templar using strong magic resist gear makes a Sorcerer totally useless, as they just do zero damage. Around level 10-20 Sorcerers on the other hand can snare and root melee classes that it is not funny anymore.
A Templar won some AION tournament in Korea, Clerics are powerhouses, too, they dish out and heal themselves very well, but Abyss pvp has a lot of Assassins and Sorcerors.
Rangers suck for PvE, but Assassin and Ranger are said to be a deadly pvp team with stuns, snares and damage par excellence.
So yeah… I tried to find out a “safe” class that is fun to me and strong. Clerics and Templars are on the nerf radar according to Korean players. Spiritmasters and Melee cry for help in the Abyss zones.
Then I thought… OK, you like Templars and Sorcerors and they seem to do okay… and then you read something like “there are already too many Sorcerors”. I could not confirm that from personal observation, but well.
There seems to be a lot of Rock-Paper-Scissors going on in class balance, too. The armored Templars make mincemeat of Assassins, but their burst damage is the bane of Sorcerors (low hp, low armor), who despite the magic resist issue I already mentioned have potentially awesome damage and tons of CC abilites.
I am afraid if people can complain a lot about balance in Guild Wars, AION will give them a serious headache.