For whoever tried Aion: opinions?

Associate
Joined
24 Feb 2004
Posts
1,083
Location
Leeds/Cyprus
Played for all of 3 hours before the servers closed, got to the mighty heights of lvl 7... :p Overall, seemed like a pretty standard MMO, though I thought the combo system was pretty interesting. I only got 2 rudimentary 2-step combos by that point, but I gather they become branching combo sequences later, right? What sort of bonus effects can following a combo line give you?

Did anyone get high enough that they could do the cross-class Stigma thing? What's it like? Is it fairly easy to string together cross-class abilities for sick combined effects? Do yoiu get to use other classes combos, or just individual skills? Are there combos which use skills from different classes?

How about the PvP? Anyone done any? Impressions?

One thing that really puts me off, I have to say, is the slow movement speed. The pace of the combat is ok (in fact _just_ right - I particularly like the fact that it doesn't have a universal cooldown for skills!), but it just feels like it takes ages to walk/run anywhere: I seemed to be wandering through massive forests populated by random critters (most of whom don't attack unless hit first, which was a bit of a refreshing change actually). I guess if I had a few more hours I'd have gotten my wings and cut the travel time a lot (saw the occasional higher-level player zooming past me at a frankly ridiculous speed a few times and was well impressed!) but the slow walk/run movement and massive distances seem designed to stretch out the levelling process.

Another mild complaint is that it's slightly more cartoony in style than I was led to expect from screenshots. I had a particularly gloomy reaction when I saw that no amount of fiddling in the character editor could give my character realistic ears - it was either long and pointy or big and round. At least I found a hairstyle that covered them! I guess part of the "culturalisation" process was to make it look slightly more like WoW, because the screenshots I saw had characters which were much more statuesque and less "cutesy" than anything I was able to create. I did laugh in delight when I saw someone who only came up to my knee though - it's ridiculous that you can make characters that small - bet they'll be hard to spot in pvp! :)

BTW I know there's a special beta thread, but the last few pages of it seemed to have been taken over by people asking for technical advice, and, since the beta's now over, I thought it's best to start a separate impressions thread where people can say what they liked and what they didn't.
 
Played for all of 3 hours before the servers closed, got to the mighty heights of lvl 7... :p Overall, seemed like a pretty standard MMO, though I thought the combo system was pretty interesting. I only got 2 rudimentary 2-step combos by that point, but I gather they become branching combo sequences later, right? What sort of bonus effects can following a combo line give you?

Did anyone get high enough that they could do the cross-class Stigma thing? What's it like? Is it fairly easy to string together cross-class abilities for sick combined effects? Do yoiu get to use other classes combos, or just individual skills? Are there combos which use skills from different classes?

How about the PvP? Anyone done any? Impressions?

One thing that really puts me off, I have to say, is the slow movement speed. The pace of the combat is ok (in fact _just_ right - I particularly like the fact that it doesn't have a universal cooldown for skills!), but it just feels like it takes ages to walk/run anywhere: I seemed to be wandering through massive forests populated by random critters (most of whom don't attack unless hit first, which was a bit of a refreshing change actually). I guess if I had a few more hours I'd have gotten my wings and cut the travel time a lot (saw the occasional higher-level player zooming past me at a frankly ridiculous speed a few times and was well impressed!) but the slow walk/run movement and massive distances seem designed to stretch out the levelling process.

Another mild complaint is that it's slightly more cartoony in style than I was led to expect from screenshots. I had a particularly gloomy reaction when I saw that no amount of fiddling in the character editor could give my character realistic ears - it was either long and pointy or big and round. At least I found a hairstyle that covered them! I guess part of the "culturalisation" process was to make it look slightly more like WoW, because the screenshots I saw had characters which were much more statuesque and less "cutesy" than anything I was able to create. I did laugh in delight when I saw someone who only came up to my knee though - it's ridiculous that you can make characters that small - bet they'll be hard to spot in pvp! :)

BTW I know there's a special beta thread, but the last few pages of it seemed to have been taken over by people asking for technical advice, and, since the beta's now over, I thought it's best to start a separate impressions thread where people can say what they liked and what they didn't.

Cross classing stigmas got taken out a long time ago.

It gets faster in the Abyss, yeah running is slow at first, because you have to run everywhere and it's annoying as hell, but it does get better, don't worry.

AION's a good game, will be fun end-game, but the grind will put a lot of people off.
 
When i originally got into closed beta i didnt even bother downloading it. I was sure that i wouldnt like it. I didnt like the art style i had seen in screenshots and what i had read didnt seem too interesting. Then one bored weekend i decided to download anyway.

I was massively surprised that not only did i find it fun, but it also reminded me a lot of the older mmos like daoc. Sounds silly when you compare aesthetics, but there are game mechanics which feel very daoc like to me. Then i got involved in some rifting pvp and that was it, i was sold
 
It's a standard MMO affair with a twist...

If you're not a fan of the usual mmo junk such as waiting for groups, Quests, GRinding for XP, running across a map only to get ganked and zoned back to the start then even the twists won't be able to keep you.

I've played a few different classes from Ch beta, Ch retail and EU Beta they seem nicely balanced, however I've not seen a lot of PvP due to not wanting to level too far and spoil the game.

This game is heavily PvP oreientated from what I gather, which is exactly whast we're looking for in a game. I don't really agree nor like the games where you have non PvP or "flags" to say PvP or not. If I'm in the wild the risk I take is getting ganked ;) Much similar when we go hunting lol.

The non-aggro mobs on some of the areas were a welcome change :) Sometimes when large distances are involved you just want to get on with it and run thru all the mobs. Also here we have what some people don't like despite being able to fly there are areas where you cannot, these will need to be ran as usual until buffs and spd+ gear is available the movement speed is pretty slow and no mounts that Im aware of.

Char size, yep was amused when I realised they seem to have added yet another level of midget characters, we had people on the Ch servers doing it but they were nowhere near the midget size we have on teh Eu servers. From testing on Ch retail the smaller chars have the same target/hitbox but you might not see them initially. The character creation you can take a long ass time with, remember tho in this time someone might nick your name :p I've seen chars make to look like famous people but I aint into that, mind you nor am I wanting to make a char that looks like some kind of animators nightmare, saw some ridiculous chars made on the Eu open beta

If you enjoy PvP then I'd recommend the game highly, if for example your'e one that prefers End Game PvE there doesn't seem to be a lot of it, altho I've never levelled high enough to find out for myself.
 
Cross classing stigmas got taken out a long time ago.
Aww... I thought that was really interesting, was what caught my attention in the first place. Has it been taken out altogether or is it still in the Chinese and Korean versions? I thought it's been live in Korea for over a year, so they must have stigmas there surely?


AION's a good game, will be fun end-game, but the grind will put a lot of people off.

How high a level did you get to and how long did it take you? Also, can you go to the pvp zone (rift or abyss or whatever it's called) before you're max level? Or is pvp just an endgame carrot to keep you grinding through the pve?
 
Aww... I thought that was really interesting, was what caught my attention in the first place. Has it been taken out altogether or is it still in the Chinese and Korean versions? I thought it's been live in Korea for over a year, so they must have stigmas there surely?




How high a level did you get to and how long did it take you? Also, can you go to the pvp zone (rift or abyss or whatever it's called) before you're max level? Or is pvp just an endgame carrot to keep you grinding through the pve?

PVP is accessable at lv25 I think. Also Stigmas are still in, just not cross class stigmas.
 
Aww... I thought that was really interesting, was what caught my attention in the first place. Has it been taken out altogether or is it still in the Chinese and Korean versions? I thought it's been live in Korea for over a year, so they must have stigmas there surely?

Stigmas are still in, its just that they arent cross class ones now. It proved a nightmare to balance the classes. Can you imagine a tank with healing and stealth?

Now each class has a set of different stigmas that they can get, much easier to balance and much easier to create scope to add in additional stigmas in patches.



How high a level did you get to and how long did it take you? Also, can you go to the pvp zone (rift or abyss or whatever it's called) before you're max level? Or is pvp just an endgame carrot to keep you grinding through the pve?

You can get involved, one way or the other, with Rift PvP from the teens if you wish. You can enter the abyss long long before endgame, to be honest if you want you can be PvPing from pretty much midway right through to max level.
 
You can't fly in a lot of the zones, which killed it for me. The people you've seen zipping past aren't using the taxi service, are they? Because the flight, while fun, wasn't hugely fast, and even in the zones you can fly, they have a silly timer so you can only fly for short periods.
 
I can kind of see the logic for the PvE areas with flight restrictions, otherwise everyone would simply fly over all the mobs. Thankfully the abyss is very flight orientated, and with the pots, buffs and other little enhancements the flight timer is a decent length later on.
 
The flying is ok but I prefer the gliding in the zones where you cant fly lol :D


It reminds of of DAOC too which is one of the reasons Im gonna play it. PVP starts at around lv20 ish when you can start to use the Rifts and youre in zones where the enemy players start showing up :E
 
Is there zero PvE involved then - obviously there is the grind but above that..? I like my PvE as well as PvP :(

How about character uniqueness....is there a big enough catalogue of equipment and rare items to make your character unique? (above making them look different in the character select)

I appreciate these can only really be answered once the end -game as been hit but I think there maybe a few people here involved in playing some of the foriegn releases that have been playing for some time?
 
Is there zero PvE involved then - obviously there is the grind but above that..? I like my PvE as well as PvP :(

How about character uniqueness....is there a big enough catalogue of equipment and rare items to make your character unique? (above making them look different in the character select)

I appreciate these can only really be answered once the end -game as been hit but I think there maybe a few people here involved in playing some of the foriegn releases that have been playing for some time?

Theres PvE, I mean if you really wanted to you could level from 1-50 entirely through PvE.

Theres a fair amount of equipment, plus of course you can alter your equipments looks. So if you find a piece of gear which doesnt have decent stats but looks fantastic, you can make your decent stats item look like the fantastic looking item and have the best of them both.

Also of course there are Dyes (still amazes me that some MMOs dont have something so basic as the ability to dye stuff).
 
Got to keep looking on the brightside !! At least finding out that its not the MMO for you via the open beta has saved you money :)

True.

My friend talked about it so much that it sounded awesome, but when I tried it out I felt a little disapointed.

For example you can't respec to change class roles -I like being able to do different things with my character. It feels like you are the same as everyone else's character, less room to try "new builds" out.

I loved doing stuff like that in WoW, talent builds that seemed off the wall. Half the time they don't work, but on occasion you hit gold - and have a bunch of fun too.

The prospect of forced PVP puts me off too.
 
True.

My friend talked about it so much that it sounded awesome, but when I tried it out I felt a little disapointed.

For example you can't respec to change class roles -I like being able to do different things with my character. It feels like you are the same as everyone else's character, less room to try "new builds" out.

I loved doing stuff like that in WoW, talent builds that seemed off the wall. Half the time they don't work, but on occasion you hit gold - and have a bunch of fun too.

The prospect of forced PVP puts me off too.

You can alter your stigmas , but yeah it doesnt massively change your class (not at least until more stigmas are added). Easier to balance though for a PvP game that way.

You're right though, if forced PvP isnt your cup of tea then Aion wont be to your tastes. Although there are safer zones where you dont get attacked, but even so ultimately the PvP is the focus.

Swings and roundabouts, strokes that arent the same and all that :D
 
i was suprised at how good the game was, i joined the game around beta 3 iirc were levels were capped so i got to try out all the classes, even in OB i only went upto lvl 15 ...

i want to buy it, its really good fun and the PvP looks brilliant however im trying to leave MMo's alone until SWTOR is released. Quite a few mates and pals from lotro are moving to this on release so no doubt ill crack under pressure :eek:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1KSM512chE&feature=related pvp video, shame its on turbo nutter speed but it looks great..
 
True.

My friend talked about it so much that it sounded awesome, but when I tried it out I felt a little disapointed.

For example you can't respec to change class roles -I like being able to do different things with my character. It feels like you are the same as everyone else's character, less room to try "new builds" out.

I loved doing stuff like that in WoW, talent builds that seemed off the wall. Half the time they don't work, but on occasion you hit gold - and have a bunch of fun too.

The prospect of forced PVP puts me off too.



You cant really change class in any game? :P

WoW was a little weird like that towards the end where your talents almost made you a different class :/ bit too noob friendly imo.

I like the fact that the choices you make are worth thinking about in depth instead of just trial and error! I remember DAOC when it was v hard or v expensive to get a respec stone :| you certainly though about your spec then!
 
Back
Top Bottom