The pet system is also fantastic and custimisable. You can even 'tweak' pets by rebirthing one species into another so that the new pet has spells it couldn't get before. Good times.

I also think the Cash Shop is one of the best value and reasonably priced ones out there.

"It was easier ten years ago... when you'd just ship a great product and the users pay you up front," [Pacific Crest analyst Evan] Wilson says. "Those days are over."

From there, he raises a controversial question: "How important is game development when you have poor quality free social games generating these kinds of numbers?"

Media companies only care about daily average uniques, Wilson continues. "The industry has been moving in that direction rapidly and it's accelerating and it's scary," he adds. "It is a big, big issue when some of the leading social gaming companies can get over 20 million players on a game in nine days," he adds -- even the best AAA titles can't pull those numbers."

What is more of a threat to 'quality games' is people who start making whatever type of game gets the bigger market share, rather than the type of game they love that appeals to different (smaller) niches of players.

Not every genre of game can attract 20 million people. If that number of players becomes the requirement for a game to be called a 'success' in the future by publishers and investors, then we'll have a real problem on our hands, but it won't be the fault of Farmville.

It's interesting to me how many people (who probably like to brag how hardcore they are) canceled after playing 15-20 levels in Open Beta without even reaching the meat of the PvP experience. I'm sorry, but there are so many people who play MMORPGs while hating the mechanics that define the entire genre (quests,grinds,grouping requirements,crafting,lore,RP,etc). Anything that isn't a glorified FPS mechanic, in other words.

I swear it's like most people who hang out on MMORPG sites are closet-MMORPG haters who just haven't come out and admitted it to themselves. All these cranky old 'MMO-burnouts' should just get on with their lives already. Just because a game didn't appeal to you doesn't mean it sucks. How many people here hate WoW, LotR, EvE, or the other games that are succeeding in appealing to a specific type of gamer? Does that mean those games are terrible? They may be terrible for YOU, but obviously enough people like them that they can make a living.

The secret to success in the post-WoW world is to FIND A NICHE MARKET AND EXPLOIT THE HELL OUT OF IT. If Aion can just do that, it will make a place for itself. it doesn't have to 'kill WoW' or have millions of players, or have revolutionary new concepts, or do any of the other things people seem to demand of new MMORPGs nowadays. It just has to make a profit and satisfy a specific type of player, and THAT'S IT.

If you like RvR and a more 'group-focused' MMORPG experience, Aion has things that might appeal to you. I know there are many 'oldschool' MMORPG players that might enjoy that. Feel free to try it out in a few months, if nothing else.

Though I agree, that bragging about pre-order numbers is pretty stupid. They don't mean anything.

So if you're manning your own shop... how long can you leave it AFK until the game auto-logs you out for inactivity? Or can you be AFK online indefinitely?

Because if you won't get logged out automatically, a personal shop wouldn't be a bad idea to set up while you're asleep or at work or something.

So I just d/led this game... but server maintenance is going on so I have some time to kill before can play. =P

Which server should I pick? Are certain ones more popular/more RPish/etc than the others?

Originally posted by Ozmodan

I was just going by what the article said which was up to 5 minutes flight time.  Basically that is a blink of the eye when it comes to playing a MMO.   Just very disappointed they made this feature so limited.  Of course if you can eventually extend it a lot beyond 5 minutes at later stages then sure, we can make do at lower levels.

As to stepping up, they need to make other features much better than the average MMO to compensate.  Many of us have been looking forward to the flght feature.  We have basically been spoiled by flight in other MMO's and just don't understand why it is so limited in this game.

You read where there's only a 10 second cooldown before you can start flying again, right? That's like, nothing.

So at the max level you'd have to land every 5 mins for 10 seconds before you could take off again. That's not 'ruining' anything.

The giant rats are a nice touch. =)

Looks pretty cool.

Bleh, a third delay. *pout*

Originally posted by Hexxeity

Originally posted by Pietoro

These Dev Journals are nice, but a release date would be even nicer.

Sorry, I'll take evidence of testing over a release date anyday.

Some of us have been following this game for a long time already, and the Dev essays are kinda fun, but after two delays/false release dates already, and no word on anything actually getting finished or even Beta announcements, it's heard to maintain much interest in these articles that aren't actually saying anything substantive. If these articles are still entertaining to you, that great. But I'd prefer something more relevant at this point than just regular 'Hey, we better make sure people keep hearing about Spellborn, even though there's no real news! Let's pop out another fluff piece of a dev lecturing us about his job process." stuff.

These Dev Journals are nice, but a release date would be even nicer.

Originally posted by Itanius

The difference in quality between the DX9 and DX10 stuff certainly doesn't justify the requirement of having to use Vista.

Exactly.

This sort of 'event' is something I'd expect to see in Second Life, instead of in WoW.

After seeing WoW win 'Worst Graphics', I lost the ability to give any credibility to the rest of the list.  It becomes clear just how mindlessly negative bias > actual taste or perspective in the case of this 'article'.

Originally posted by UnSub

As a side point - if Turbine were really trying for maturity or realism, why only boobs? Why not full frontal nudity for both males and females?

That is a good question. Especially since the mythical 'fact' of '95% of gamers are teen hetero males' has already been proven false, especially in this day and age. Yet companies still seem strangely blind to how self-limiting their design choices are. They're overall hurting themselves by being so narrow minded and not even considering that there are more kinds of people playing games.

I find it funny when gaming companies:

1. Make a game with elements strongly favoring the tastes of only one kind of demographic.

2. Then wonder why it seems 'so hard' to get more diverse playerbase (which = more money) into their games. (Hint: It's because your game does ALMOST NOTHING to try to appeal to them!)

It's not rocket science: stop pandering to only one kind of demographic, and more people will be attracted to playing your game. Pander equally. Doing anything else is just stupidly shooting yourself in the foot when it comes to making money in the rapidiy diversifying gaming market.

Originally posted by daarco

Dec would be very nice.

They've said before that there will be no simultaneous U.S./Euro release.

So even if it releases in Dec. that will be in Europe, and it will be a few months past that before we get it in the U.S.

Originally posted by Ciccero: The game, since people seem to be gasping for words, is reminiscent of Vandal Hearts in appearance of characters and zone layouts.

I actually was getting more of Monkey Island vibe, but I'm gonna guess that most of the players of this game will be too young to have ever played that.

Whoops! =P

Originally posted by FomarThain

As others have stated. I don't see the delay as a problem. I have played most all of the major MMOs and they all seem to have one delay or another. Taking their time seems like a good move to me.

However, also what others have said,  what sends a red flag for me is the corporate mumbo-jumbo about letting the "specialzed" people go. *cough* You mean you fired people. That sounds like money crunch talk to me. I mean how about let'em become testers? They would be better than testers as they could not only test but probably fix things as they go.

I don't know. Sounds like money crunch talk to me. And I don't think that is a good sign.

I am not crying doooomm by any means but as I said it does send a red flag up for me.

Also, remember that in 2006, they did the SAME THING -- said they didn't need so many devs, and fired a bunch of them. So this is the second time they've done this during the development of this game. That's horrible for morale in the company, if nothing else.

Originally posted by Pomy

Originally posted by Pietoro

This mmo podcast sums up my opinion of the SOE Hate Cult.

Most people nowadays are just parroting what everyone else says about SOE, with little actual knowledge or personal experience with anything bad that SOE has done. Hating SOE is just 'what you're supposed to do' so people just follow along.

Well that is what happens when you piss of f your customer base.

What, that the fanbase starts donning tinfoil hats whenever the company gets mentioned, even if current history shows no basis for it? EQ2 keeps improving all the time. Vanguard was a tranwreck before MS even dumped it, and SOE saved it from being trashed forever.

PotBS is using SOE just to manage their billing and marketing, and people are screaming for boycotts of FlyingLabs just for associating with them. I mean, that's a frothing-at-the-mouth level of overreating.

People are irrational about SOE, regardless of what the company did in the past. People draw negative connections were there isn't any -- they're making stuff up when current reality doesn't support their hate (like who's to blame with Vanguard). Most people have never even personally experienced anything bad from SOE -- they're just following the herd because they figure that hating SOE is just what all respectable MMOers are supposed to do.

Originally posted by anoma7y

 While I admire and support a delay in order to launch the game polished and high quality,they think laying off 30-40 employees will enable them to "act with more agility on the feedback of the playerbase"? What kind of illogical nonsense is that? The game is in trouble.

Exactly, it's a total PR line. Businesses downsize for ONE REASON ONLY --because of finances.