Things are looking pretty good for NCsoft according to their Q3 earnings announcement released today. Combined sales of the company's recently released MMOG, Aion, in North American and European markets total near one million units, with 500,000 units sold in North American territories, and 470,000 units sold in Europe.

Aion is now responsible for 52% of NCsoft's total sales, and overall sales have more than doubled for the company. All in all, a pretty good year for NCsoft!

For more information on Aion, visit the game's official website here.

1 Real player  for every 10 bots dosnt count.

Idiots consume Britney Spears records and watch American Idol in troves as well.  It doesn't make those product any good.  Why should Aion's numbers be any more indicative of quality?

Answer:  It doesn't.  Aion's numbers simply show that unthinking people will always consume crap.

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Originally posted by Stratford
Idiots consume Britney Spears records and watch American Idol in troves as well.  It doesn't make those product any good.  Why should Aion's numbers be any more indicative of quality?
 
Answer:  It doesn't.  Aion's numbers simply show that unthinking people will always consume crap.

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Did you ever think maybe you are the idiot for not watching it? If the shoe can go on the other foot why can't it go back on the same foot? In other words your reasoning is moot because you just contradicted yourself.

I happen to like Britney Spears.

And it's nice that Aion is so successful, infact it's the first game in the last couple of years to sustain large amount of its playerbase after launch.

The huge player base came from Glitz and glamore then Even got me to play 40 cleric and 40 SM. i mean i played like 18 hours a day. but once i hit 40 i realized that the Game was pretty much at an end i hit the WoW Wall. Grind Grind Grind Then PvP(Not really the best pvp) then Grind Get a Grp and Grind-----  atleast 150 Kromede runs and no yellows. Then Craft im also 450 Cookig and 450 Handicrafting. im used to Daoc pvp. So Since alot of people fell for this Game alot of Botters and Gold spammers alot of people Grinding to sell there accounts.

aion was Fun at the begining untill its Novelty wore off then the Nuts and bolts Were shown and it just wasnt pretty. For me anyways other people might think otherwise.lol

Originally posted by Stratford

Idiots consume Britney Spears records and watch American Idol in troves as well.  It doesn't make those product any good.  Why should Aion's numbers be any more indicative of quality?

 

Answer:  It doesn't.  Aion's numbers simply show that unthinking people will always consume crap.

Doesn't mean they are bad either. I'm pretty sure that anything can be looked at with with an eye toward it being crap.

For example, 1 person telling 1000 people that they listen to crap seems to be a bit foolish to me.

I have yet to meet anyone, no matter how high they consider their tastes who doesn't have some form of crap that they adore and who will insist that it is not crap.

Toward the point, most of the people i know and even worked with would say that anyone who spends time playing video games is wasting their time.  I have one highly talented and educated friend who would say it was wasting your life.

I find it hard to hold video games as a pinnacle of cultural achievement when looked at in the light of many greater works, if one were to talk about it with an eye toward highly organized creative thought. I have yet to see a video game that even comes close to the compositional detail and complexity of a milton babbit piece. And yet I'm sure that the majority of video game players would probably not warm up to Babbit and would probably think him crap.

To further that point, the compositional techniques used in Bach or Babbit would probably blow most popular music out of the water. But who wants to listen to Bach or Babbit at a dance or at a club?

 I mean, if we want to talk crap then what standard are we using? In the end it's all personal. One person's mine of gold is another person's "Road House". Or one person's "Road House" is another person's heap of dung.

It's all subjective.

In 6 months it will be another also ran for the NA version.  It just does not have the content to keep people playing and NCSoft is only making a half hearted attempt to control the bots.  This game will start to bleed players by January.

in a few months they will have less then 300k subs, if they dont already have. Avoid NC Soft if u care about your time and money.

Originally posted by Stratford

Idiots consume Britney Spears records and watch American Idol in troves as well.  It doesn't make those product any good.  Why should Aion's numbers be any more indicative of quality?

 

Answer:  It doesn't.  Aion's numbers simply show that unthinking people will always consume crap.

Haha, i rarely see such good posts on this site. My thoughts exactly to those that think if a game sells millions is actually good, the best, etc.

Cheers

Dunno why you ppl want it to fail if more games success the better so we will maybe see some new decent games created not same old type of games everytime dwarfs,orc,elves and the same shit in every game.

If aion is successful maybe(hope) more companies will wait till their game is polished before releasing it.

Originally posted by bloodaxes

Dunno why you ppl want it to fail if more games success the better so we will maybe see some new decent games created not same old type of games everytime dwarfs,orc,elves and the same shit in every game.

If aion is successful maybe(hope) more companies will wait till their game is polished before releasing it.

LMAO AION polished?? Aion was released as a half ass effort,i don't want to get into the many ways it delivered a cheap product,but it was not polished at all. AION  is a streamlined game,made to get out the doors fast,the ONLY reason they delayed this game was because of the TR loss.If they would have rushed AION out the door that is as good as sealing the lawsuit by Lord British proving they rush their games .Instead they have chosen to sell you only half the game,you will buy the rest in expansion packs that they have already made btw,before the game was even released they already have your xpacs ready.

I think NCSOFT should fail for trying to ripoff the player base,everything they do is full of controversy.

Just on the simple fact that they failed in the Game guard area,after what?a full year and a half of testing?They have been running GG for years now,lmao,and people continue to spew bs ,how this game is polished?please save it for the dumb or the naive that walk around blind in games.DID they not know how to implement actors to allow for water physics?or was it sheer laziness or unpolished product?

Why do you think you only got 2 races on release of this game?CHEAP,they have had over a year to make another race and another starting area,nope,easily done but they instead are going to sell you this in xpacs.Omitting half the content and half the game is not polishing,it is a cheap ploy,then disguising it with a late release is a lame attempt at fooling the public.I hope Lord British wins his 20 million dollar lawsuit NCSOFT deserves it.

Polished means you have a lag free game (most of the times at least) that doesn't have much content gaps.

Tell me what mmo these past years came in a state were you could play more then half of it's contents before going dry apart of aion?

And what's wrong with 2 races? the customization is so great you can look different then human, you can be a dwarf if you want. Better then always the shitty races that are placed in all games, yeah human is needed in every game but why dwarfs,orcs,elves needs to be placed everytime can't they create something new?

Kind of weird that they sold more copies in US, yet EU has more servers, aka more population playing the game.

is not wierd , is just Eu ppl like the challenge , US ppl like to buy gold and wine that the game is to easy or is not wow , doesn't matter the game , doesn't matter who did the game , doesn't matter how grate the game is always but always it will be some ppl who will complaing(  even though they do not play the game they are just bitching arround making them self important) , like i would give a ... about iorydragon's opinion , or other allknowing wow player doh.

They main point is first month retention is 1 mill players only in western market + 3 mil in asian market is close to what the designer wanted , 2nd place after wow , if anyone has the impresion that in wow are not bots then my friend u are blind.

Actually it's not, you're not reading the article properly. Almost 1M is the boxes/online keys sold, it's not the amount of players playing the game. The retention rate should be much lower than that. I reckon that NCsoft will be happy with 500k in 3 months, with 250-300k a more realistic number.

If they don't start adding features in the same manner Turbine did with LOTRO, the number could end up being even lower.

Edit: As for botting & kinah transactions, they have confirmed that they ban both sellers and buyers, so beware.

I played Aion through the BETA and throughout the first month.  I did not subscribe.  It was not the right game for me.  In comparison, I found that I spent as much time thinking about how it compared to other games, and I just wanted to play those games instead.  Money does not grow on trees, and there are only so many games I can subscribe to at a time.  I had a couple personal issues with the game, but for others these details were normal and did not bother them.  I had fun every time I played. I thought it was a very good game, and worth an "A" on any scale or 5/5.  Some of the smaller innovations, like the online character and guild screens, were really good ideas and I hope other games can learn from the strengths of Aion. 

I also played Tabula Rasa from NCSoft, and I thought it was also a good title. I feel bad that TR had its plug pulled.  NCSoft's telephone support answered quickly for me, and the folks that I have spoken to were very pleasant.  I have never had an issue with NCSoft, other than unplugging TR which was a business decision for them and that is their call.