I agree with the article, though not so grandious about it <_< some things like hillside graphics don't look good...at all, which odd among other things looking fantastic.  The wings and various gameplay elements, including skill animations are great - best I've seen in a long while.

The largest worry I have, and I'm hoping its the beta limitations, but it seems that the item supply is sorely lacking on the low end (I hope not the high end).  Seeing one white and one green of a given armor type every 5 levels...is very light to say the least.  And contrary to posts, there were some latency issues last test...so I'm looking forward to see the next test, get some more time in - I advice all those with interest to do the same :)

When i played the chinese beta there were items that dropped from monsters that had a lower req then the standard so I think there is more items throughout most of the lvls, though your probably gonna want crafted armor.

Get it through your heads already, the term "WoW killer" is not gonna happen.  No game can do this, only WoW itself and time can kill it off.  Aion may have gone from 1.0-1.5 but WoW has been out for a long time, so its got many updates and plenty of time to grow.

I'm thinking on playing Aion just cause the graphics are awesome and the PVP is lineage 2 ish, but don't expect different gameplay from the game, its a fantasy MMO, just like all the others.  Unless you know a different way to play a Fantasy MMO like FPS style, click to walk, or WASD movement there isn't no change.  There's plenty of quests and the grind will be there.  You just gotta be enjoying yourself in order to get rid of the grind.  If your having fun you don't care about anything else.

I consider Blizzard to be third in quality, behind NCSoft then Sony.  This is not the reason for this reply though.

Keep in mind that, as far as item selection goes, they are still putting on the finishing touches and getting ready to ship.  If you are beta testing you may, in fact, suggest to the development team to make this addition.  Typically though, in most MMORPGs you are limited in Armor and Weapon choices anyway, due to the fact you really do not need alot early on.  I am still using much of the armor I gained in the starting areas beyond level 10.  The amount of armor you need to select from is dependent on how skillful of a player you are from.  Once you get into the two capitals you can always have item colors changed, though it is quite expensive.  I currently play an Elyos Gladiator and Asmodean Ranger, aside from my base class characters.  The main places they need item shops is in the cities and not the starting areas.  Everything centers around Sanctum and Pandemonium. 

I did encounter one issue in the game I did not like.  Flying(not just gliding but full flight) was a bit difficult and I hated that you had to manually land when you were at the ground.  The manual landing felt unnatural to me.  Granted this is one thing I would love to be able to do in real life........fly under my own power, nothing between me and the open sky.  I just have to be sure not to use wax to hold it together or I would end up like poor Icarus who flew to close to the sun, despite the warnings of his father Daedelus........lol.  But seriously, this game allows us to role play something we can only dream of, the ability to fly with our own wings.  How cool would that be in real life.

Anyone who thinks that World of Warcraft cannot be overcome is just deluding themselves.  Yes, it may be a difficult task, but it is not impossible.  Nothing is ever impossible.  Remember, at one time they said nothing would ever be better the Everquest, and that has been proven time and again that it has been.  The same will happen with World of Warcraft eventually.

I have to admit most people including myself are bored of WoW now and are looking for something fresh or a decent update from blizzard.

Bots are always a problem is asian mmo's especialy the free to play ones. However you should never let someone elses actions degrade your image of a game. Aion is still a great game in all areas, but it is true community makes or breaks a mmo.

We will just have to see but i get a feeling if WoW was being released again in its current state and had a bot problem like Aion people who are disliking aion would still like WoW.

Strange but you get people who just plain hate new mmo's on the market and will pick at the slightest thing.

All  I say is why let bots ruin your fun.

Originally posted by khameleon

The best part about it is we get Ptach all the way up to 1.5 for NA release and that adds even  more polish, content and fixes. Character creation even gets way more faces, hair, arm, leg and shoulder length options and more!!

Are you sure about this? For all I know theyre just adding some more hairstyles and faces, but I havent heard anything about the other things you mentioned.

(my source: www.aionsource.com/forum/general-discussion/20946-patch-notes-v1-5-update-shadow-balaur.html )

Originally posted by Bureyku

Originally posted by Cryomatrix

You forget to include some missing graphics. The bot graphics overrunning the game and hampering game play left, right, and center. Guys get real, this is NCsoft here. What evidence do you have that they won't screw this up like they screwed up Lineage 2. Not to mention their recent epic failure of Tabula Rasa.

Note: I'm extremely biased :), but seriously, it's NCbots . . .

 

They published Tabula Rasa, but they didn't develop it.  NCSoft is a very capable MMORPG developer.  WTH are bot graphics? 

You are definitely biased, but I don't like bots or RMT either.  They plague every MMO and this one won't be any different.  Until developers create a system where they can't thrive they will be there.  Maybe you just have rose colored glasses for whatever game you are playing that you don't realize how many are there as well? 

Aion really is a AAA polished and solid game.  Something we haven't seen in many years.  All of the trolling, stereotyping, and doombringing these forums can muster won't stop it from being extremely successful. 

This game has RMT in Korea.  I am not sure what they will have in the western version, but if it is similar it will be a major negative to this game.  You can have all the beautiful graphics you want, but gameplay determines whether a game is good and RMT is a definite detractor when it comes to this.

I will take a wait and see attitude on how they handle bots in the western version, but past practices by NCSoft have not been very good in this area.  So don't be so quick to criticize someone who brings up this point. 

The rule of thumb is no matter how well designed the security measures are, it is only a matter of time before someone defeats them(Just look at what happened to the Secret Service computers on July 4th after all.........I know it isn't a game but it makes the point that someone smart enough will eventually beat any security you throw at them).

I have never run into any major bot problems, except perhaps on World of Warcraft(I am pretty sure there are more than a few bots running around there because I see characters doing the same quests over and over and never moving on).  From my experiences beta testing Aion, I have seen no clear indication any characters were bots, but then it isn't fully active yet either.  I expect some bots to pop up, as with any MMORPG, but I doubt it will be the rampant problem people are saying.  Truth is I have played almost every NCSoft game and never really had any major problems with bots, unless you count the robot characters in City of Heroes, but those were built by the company to be enemies, and are not player character bots.