---

Originally posted by x_rast_x
To be honest, I think it's a good thing that this game knows who its target audience is and is sticking to them.
To me, it seems, the biggest reason games are failing left and right lately is because they try to be all things to all people and end up failing everyone in the attempt.

---

Yeah I agree 100%. Aion is definitely not for me, but I can at least know that for sure, and save myself the money.

They're building a game that they think has appeal, and does have appeal to a certain segment of players and are sticking to it. More developers should go this route, instead of trying to please all of the people all of the time.

I'm just glad they know what they're doing.

Originally posted by levsix

There are far more interesting and fun ways to promote that feeling of achievement beyond GRINDING. To me, it is the lowest common denominator in gaming and utterly boring.

It is possible to create an immersive and interesting experience that takes dedication and time without going into mindless robot grind mode.

 Personally, I enjoy some grinding as long as it has a purpose other than just leveling.  I like to be able to choose what mobs to kill, based on what they drop, or if by killing 400 of them I will get a skill increase.  This was one thing I think lotro got right.  If you were tired of questing and just wanted to do some mindless grinding you could work on your deeds. You get loot, money, possibly crafting items, and you can improve your character at the same time.  On the other hand, you could do L2 grind and kill, kill, kill, and hope you get one of those one in a million good drops, and little driblets of Xp. (unless you had your buff-bot running)

The grind, if anything is a MASSIVE deterrant for games to me, especially MMORPGs. Please, don't make a game that I may as well write a macro to play. The idea that grinding is a sign of worthy acheivement is the idea that because you've flipped burgers for 10 years, you deserve to be a regional manager of your burger chain. NOT everyone who can flip burgers should be promoted, in fact, most of them are incompitant.

This makes just as much sense when applied to MMORPGs; not everyone who can spam "attack 1, attack 6, attack 2" should reach maximum level. This does not create a dignified, skill based system. MMORPGs should reward creativity, inginuity, and adaptability well before long hours in front of the monitor.

Having a grind to get to max level deters me because it means that no matter how well I understand gameplay and strategy, someone with 5 more hours a week to devote to playing will be my superior. We see it in WoW with the grind for gear, which is the primary determining factor in the arena and in raids (why else would all the LFMs be looking for "geared *insert class here*s" and all people seeking arena partners to have a resilience minimum?).

Games should not be about how long you play for, they should be about how well you understand how to play them, potentially as a result of playing them for some time. Some people learn faster than others, and they should be rewarded for it. Being good at chess doesn't require that you play a million games. Similarly, people who play a million games of chess can still be terrible chess players.

Well it's like with all games .. what can the designers invent to make you play on?

Grinding for either levelling or (gold for) getting better equipment, it's always something to keep you busy for days, weeks, months ..

I agree that a true challenge would be a skill-based thing, not a time-invest thing. A game where true skill, mastery of a class and its build would be the ultimate accomplishment, now THAT would be something!

On the other hand, it would discourage a lot of people while the players who would accomplish everything would have nothing to do anymore. Not something a dev would want for his game.

So actually I'm somewhere in between. To have like 3 max level characters (like I had in WoW) to be able to fulfill more than 1 role would be nice to start with.

But I would make a reachable level cap and try to invent multiple targets for a max level character.
1. The best gear for gold
2. The best gear from bosses
3. The best PvP rating
4. Good looking stuff with no extra stats (like in Guildwars)
5. All kind of titles just for who would like it
6. Challenges like described above - only skill is important
7. Housing and stuff
8. All kinds of funny collectables

And on and on.

 Personaly id go with grinding if It was hack n slash style like say God of War,NG or DMC and also was presented with lots of weak minions and later a boss after awhile.

 But continous grind is a no go for me.

There are a lot of different opinions and preferences in this thread, but I'd just like to re-state the following:

Aion is being developed to appeal to a global audience. We are moving away as far as we can from the traditionally perceived 'grinder' type of games.

Of course, in any MMO it's virtually impossible to remove the need for repeating certain tasks at times, but we are really putting emphasis on richness of content and depth. The levelling curve will be very reasonable, and we want to make sure that you as a player have enough things to do (and a good time, of course) as you play through the game.

That's the path we've taken for Aion all along, and that's a definite. :)

Originally posted by Ovum

NCsoft’s Brian Knox talks about Aion

 

Q: The Asian market does not seem to mind the grind as much as the North American market does. So when you talk about the globalization of the game, you are talking about a diverse set of gameplay elements. How big of an undertaking was that?

Brian: While grind games were more prevalent in the past, I don’t think they had a lot to choose from. Now they are seeing all games everywhere, they don’t want to sit there and do the same thing over and over again. That’s a misconception. I think that Aion is one of those games that people are starting to realize – especially in Korea – that this is a new breed of game.

 

And ofc here is the entire interview - www.gamezone.com/news/08_19_08_01_38PM.htm

I don't believe it until I see it, and I have my doubts.

What is his way to deal with this issue? It's a lvl and skill based game, I cannot imagine that it does not have grind in one way or another.

I think the quote was quite clear. Specially if we consider the context.

NCsoft is fighting against a stereotype they helped to set 10 years ago with Lineage I, and 5 years later with Lineage II, which ended up being a huge niché that became incredibly successfull in the Korean market (obviously not cause of the grind, but cause of the game's qualities, which were a lot back then).

The low budget Korean companies witnessed that success and started trying the same formula in order to get a piece of the cake, when many companies copy one, you end up putting them all in the same boat, and creating a stereotype out of them if they come from the same racial group or social organization.

As time passes, we can notice how companies now copy Blizzard, and we are starting to hear more and more the WoW clone concept, which would lead to another stereotype if all of those clones came from the same country, or if we were a bit more open minded to see the flaws on ourselves as we see them on the others.

What Brian Knox tried to say here is that Aion doesn't fall in the same boat as the rest of Korean games, and that means Aion will have its share of grind, if we understand grind as repetitive tasks, just like every MMORPG wether its korean or not, but it will be hella well hidden.

NCsoft set the model to copy 10 years ago with Lineag, and 5 years later with Lineage II, they can do that again, even if the market has changed, and be sure that if so, low budget korean companies will copy NCsoft once again, but this time with a different formula which will lead to another prejudice from Korean games, cause low budget companies never copy the good things.

isn't is quite stupid to say that you hate grind, and say give us quest. when a quest is just the same as grinding, just the difference may be a useless item from the quest or that you have to run and do useless stuff for the quest dude that you will never see again.

And more often then not the quest says kill 20 boars, and you get a reward. instead you could just get a little bit more xp from the boars and drop the quest reward instead. 

 quests are useless in general unless they are class based oriented, like lineage2s class change.

As long as there are levels and equipment... there will be a grind of sorts.  Questing is a form of grinding, just givin a fancy name and rewards but with certain goals in mind that may actually end up taking longer.  Gathering gear via raids is also a tremendous grind... karazhan anyone? 

The question is not whether there will be a lot of grind or a little, but how fun can it be made?  For some people, just killing monsters endlessly is relaxing and can be done while watching the tv.  Others like quests which basically separate grinding into segments with micro-stories. 
 

Now here's a thought....  for a long time, grind has been.... kill 1,000 monsters for 200 exp each. This is not  hard, it's just repetitive and time consuming.  What if it was... kill 10 monsters for 20,000 exp each...  but the monsters hav e a complex AI which will force players to work hard for that tremendous amount of exp... as if it were a real "duel".  Weaker monsters wouldn't necessarily have less HP, but they would be dumber as far as AI and consequently give out less exp.  This would make for challenging gameplay and make for a very interesting "grind". 

Damn, how I hate when people makes a big generalization with the word "Asian MMORPG". As far as I know, the only country that poops out the copy-cat shit over and over again is SOUTH KOREA. Why don't people start saying "Korean MMORPG" instead of "Asian MMORPG" like all countries in Asia makes the exactly same MMORPGs.

Japan for an example does not release many MMORPG's at all, and it's a part of Asia, no? I know that MMORPG's and PC games aren't big within the game genre over there, so generalizing with "Asia" just sounds so wrong to me.

Little off-topic, but major of the western character graphics are ugly, and look so god damn bold. Why?

Originally posted by Hawkaron

Damn, how I hate when people makes a big generalization with the word "Asian MMORPG". As far as I know, the only country that poops out the copy-cat shit over and over again is SOUTH KOREA. Why don't people start saying "Korean MMORPG" instead of "Asian MMORPG" like all countries in Asia makes the exactly same MMORPGs.

Japan for an example does not release many MMORPG's at all, and it's a part of Asia, no? I know that MMORPG's and PC games aren't big within the game genre over there, so generalizing with "Asia" just sounds so wrong to me.

Little off-topic, but major of the western character graphics are ugly, and look so god damn bold. Why?

if im not mistaken didnt japan release Final Fantasy XI? and FFXI has a major grind in it from what i hear. im not sayin that all asian games are big grinders, im just sayin  japan does release mmorpgs... and the majority of games that come from asia do have a bit of a grind. Aion though isnt suppose to have a grind.

Originally posted by blackhand231

if im not mistaken didnt japan release Final Fantasy XI? and FFXI has a major grind in it from what i hear. im not sayin that all asian games are big grinders, im just sayin  japan does release mmorpgs... and the majority of games that come from asia do have a bit of a grind. Aion though isnt suppose to have a grind.

Let's get a few things straightened out.

FFXI and Aion are not F2P gaming experiments by small and sometimes little known companies (though that may be changing). They are subscription based games by renowned companies.

Think about when FFXI was released. That's right, a few years after Everquest and years before WoW. Everquest is a western game is not? And it's one heck of a grind. FFXI emulated EQ's model, and today games will emulate WoW. That's how it goes.

People like to talk like grind is an eastern invention when in fact it's roots are western... Before we had content we had grind. F2P have little budget and therefore tend to use the grind as a crutch, it's not just because they are eastern, it's because they are lots and lots of people willing to make games in Asia..

Originally posted by blackhand231

Originally posted by Hawkaron

Damn, how I hate when people makes a big generalization with the word "Asian MMORPG". As far as I know, the only country that poops out the copy-cat shit over and over again is SOUTH KOREA. Why don't people start saying "Korean MMORPG" instead of "Asian MMORPG" like all countries in Asia makes the exactly same MMORPGs.

Japan for an example does not release many MMORPG's at all, and it's a part of Asia, no? I know that MMORPG's and PC games aren't big within the game genre over there, so generalizing with "Asia" just sounds so wrong to me.

Little off-topic, but major of the western character graphics are ugly, and look so god damn bold. Why?

 

if im not mistaken didnt japan release Final Fantasy XI? and FFXI has a major grind in it from what i hear. im not sayin that all asian games are big grinders, im just sayin  japan does release mmorpgs... and the majority of games that come from asia do have a bit of a grind. Aion though isnt suppose to have a grind.

Which MMORPG wasn't a grind at that time? in 2003, MMORPG's were still farily new, and grind was a standard. Besides, FFXI and a local game called something that I can't recall, are the only two japanese MMORPG's that I can think of. I am sure there are more, but I haven't heard of anything else.

If you're imagining an averege Japanese guy sitting and playing FFXI, then you are greatly misstaken. FFXI is called a haijin-game from the nerds in 2chan, which basically means "a game for disabled persons". I think you can get the meaning from it. Korean games in Japan are being called chon-game, chon being a slang for Korean people, and are mostly categorized as low-quality copy-cat hunting(mob grinding) MMORPGs. Chon-game can go for any game developed in Korea, but the term MOSTLY refers to MMORPGs.

Japan is a developed country, and they have their own game culture. MMORPG's are absolutly not a part of it. I do not want you westerns to mix the little island with mainland Asia. It's an insult for me.

I've put 2 years into both FFXI and WoW. Honestly, I prefer WoW's leveling system a lot more. The problem I had with FFXI is that you seemed to be standing around Jeuno more often than not LFG. At least with WoW (even though at times I wasn't getting anywhere), I at least feel busy. It is kind of like when you try to avoid traffic on the highway and go down some side streets; You end up taking longer to get home, but at least you weren't bumper to bumper.

The only thing I'm hoping from Aion is that you can choose to solo while waiting for a party/instance/whatever.

Originally posted by Astonish

I've put 2 years into both FFXI and WoW. Honestly, I prefer WoW's leveling system a lot more. The problem I had with FFXI is that you seemed to be standing around Jeuno more often than not LFG. At least with WoW (even though at times I wasn't getting anywhere), I at least feel busy. It is kind of like when you try to avoid traffic on the highway and go down some side streets; You end up taking longer to get home, but at least you weren't bumper to bumper.

 

The only thing I'm hoping from Aion is that you can choose to solo while waiting for a party/instance/whatever.

You could've been doing something else while LFG? crafting, farming, cybering, dancing, poking someone, something. You just chose to stand around in Jeuno picking your nose, who can you blame?