kubes

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Aion is about to have another closed Beta (July 31st - aug 3rd). I'm curious to know if anyone else has opipions on the game(gameplay/ graphics/ sound/ population/ ect..)

I personally think its the next gen of MMO's in terms of graphics. Abosultely stunning graphics. Gameplay seems much more challenging than WoW, but not as rough as Lineage 2, Eve is. I wonder however, if it will be able to sustain a large enough populatoin to not fizzle out. This game at least to me seems worth dropping the few dollars to see if it pans out.

The game is exploding over in Asia, and i'm curious to know if the trend will follow here in NA/Europe. Thoughts?
 

kubes

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They just finished Closed Beta #5. They still do have a few things they need to work on:
few examples:
*Turn on General Chat
*Few audio glitches still -> this beta was heavily testing this to work out the bugs
*The chat filter -> so many things are flagged which shouldn't be
*Like to see an auto run button

I'm sure however all this will be worked out by the time it goes live.

I will say that after playing however This game seems to be more than just some eye candy. It's actually quite fun and refreshing from some of the other MMO's out there. There seems to be a huge spike in leveling time after level 10, but I also hear they plan on increasing experince in one of the up coming patches for quest rewards. It does seem encouraging that they are listening to their fan base to produce the best product available.

The flying part of the game does take a bit to learn but is unquie in its own way which adds a lot of value to this game. It also seems that the pvp and pve is fairly well balanced between the classes (for group play). The one down side is that there are only 8 total classes you can play on each side. I wouldn't be surprised to see this increase over time. The character custimazation process is outstanding. I found myself taking over an hour just to make my character. Their entire face structure is pretty much custimable and most of their body attrbutes.
 

kubes

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Is there a way to set what you want it to be? The only reason why i asked, was because I looked multiple times at the keybinding interface for it and there was nothing for it. (Numlock by default is autorun in WoW...but not sure for Aion?)

No i probally did not try numlock though...so you could be right which would be great!!

Unfortinally can't try it till the next beta event...
 

kubes

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I do agree with you that MMO's deffiantly use beta testing as a way to mass market their product but I think its also important to note that they need it. They have a lot more issues that need addressing than a game like modern warfare will face. For example scaling. Setting up the infastructure for an MMO is much more complex than a FPS (IMO).

This comment is a bit subjectical but I also think Aion has more content than Modern Warfare do to the sheer size of the game.

Bottom line though your probally right...Modern Warfare 2 will probally make more money that Aion...At least in the short term. Maybe not in the long term as subscription fees add up over time.
 

grog189

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also remember while i personally don't find it a bad thing but this mmo is based off an asian style and their mmo's usually require grinding and take a long time to level unlike the way most american's are spoiled with the easy leveling system of WoW.
 

kubes

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Yeah, your totaly right grog189.

Even though when WoW first came out there was a bit of a grind to get to the top level (60) it seems to no longer be the case. To me WoW has become more casual gamer friendly with each patch/expasion. People have reported getting to level 80 is under 2 weeks time now. Where as it would take at least a good months worth of playing to hit 60 back in the day.

I was not able to dedicate as much time as i wanted to for the last beta ( beta #5) and did not hit the level cap. I will say though that it seems to slow down quite a bit for leveling as you go up. Rumor has it though with the release of patch 1.5 the amount of xp you get from doing quests is greatly increased easing the grind of the game. It's been stated that Aion will release in NA with patch 1.5. I don't know how much this will affect the grind.

I personally don't mind a bit of a grind because it seperates the men from the boys. Unfortinally NA players have grown accustom to the easiness wow has presented to them and its a bit of a slap in the face when they have to start dealing with the diffculty of the grind in aion. IMO the grind isn't that bad but players just arn't use to it anymore. They want things easy as can be. IMO Aion is more difficult of a game than WoW. It'll be interesting to see if NA players are willing to overcome this because really the game seems to be developing quite nicely. It also seems like end game content should be pretty rich as well.