Filed under: Aion

Aion to offer free server transfers soon

by Rubi Bayer Oct 6th 2009 at 1:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Game mechanics, News items

Sunday we told you about the open letter to the Aion community from NCsoft West executive producer Lance Stites. Stites addressed the ongoing problem of seemingly endless queues for players trying to access the more popular servers. This has been a frustrating issue for everyone involved, with the crew at NCSoft West "engaged in multiple discussions each day" on the topic and players queueing for hours a day, attempting to play.

Unfortunately, rolling out new servers hasn't done the trick so far, as the problem does not stem from too few servers. Players continue to flock to the popular servers, leaving other servers nearly empty. "Sure, you rarely had to queue, but once you got into the game large areas of the world were devoid of fellow players. It's a hard balance to strike, and we need our servers full to ensure players experience Aion at its best," says Ryan James, PR director for NCsoft West.

Aion gets its first State of the Game address

by Brooke Pilley Oct 4th 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, News items

It's been a little over two weeks since Aion launched and NC West Executive Producer Lance Stites just released its first State of the Game address. These kinds of announcements have become more and more frequent as new MMOs launch and they usually cover the main successes and issues within a given period. This address is no different.

Lance proudly declares Aion's "fun and polished" launch and goes on to talk about the incredible demand they've experienced. Perhaps the demand was too high because the main issue he covers in this letter revolves around the server queues players have been sitting in since launch. NC West ran the usual prelaunch calculations and even added a 25% buffer to determine the game's initial server caps but that just wasn't enough.

It doesn't help that players have been playing long and hard either. "For example, we're seeing timeframes where 60 percent or more of our players are playing at any given time. This is a significant event by any MMO standard," Stites says. To address this problem, the studio is working on offering one-time free server transfers in the near future. Check out his full letter on the official site.

One Shots: Awaiting ascension

by Krystalle Voecks Oct 3rd 2009 at 2:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Screenshots, Aion, One Shots

According to the Xfire charts and the sales numbers, Aion is doing very well for NCsoft. With visuals like this one, sent in to us by regular contributor Johanis, we're absolutely not surprised at all. Aion players seem to really love the detail (wings) and solid writing, coupled with the familiar game-play of favorites such as World of Warcraft. Here's what Johanis had to say about this particular image he sent in. Here is Metros, my newly created Templar in Aion who is about to ascend and get his wings. His mother would be so proud.

One Shots lives on your screenshots, so we'd love it if you'd take a moment this weekend to snap a screenshot from your favorite game for us. It can be of just about anything. Please try to remove as many UI elements as are possible and make sure your image is at least 1024px wide. Add your name, the name of the game, and a quick description and email it to us at oneshots AT massively DOT com. Yours could be one of the next ones featured here!

Gallery: One Shots

Exclusive Aion designer interview at AionSource

by Eliot Lefebvre Oct 3rd 2009 at 10:00AM

Filed under: Aion, Interviews, MMO industry

Aion has certainly made quite an impact at launch, with impressive subscriber numbers, a broad spectrum of starting content, and - of course - a groundswell of fan support for the game. AionSource, the Curse network site devoted to Aion, has recently obtained an exclusive interview with the game's lead designer, Yongchan Lee, in which community-submitted questsions are put forth to Mr. Lee to get a sense of where the game is going to be heading over the next few months.

For fans of the game, there are certainly some interesting questions here, ranging from strict interface concerns (such as the addition of a dual-targeting system) to specific mentions of class balance (Spiritmaster pet issues are brought up more than once) and individual character customization. The answers are brief, as designer interviews tend to be, but Mr. Lee took the time to insert a fair bit of information in each response, and even a bit of humor regarding the issue of allowing swimming.

Enjoy the peek inside the near future of one of the more popular new MMO launches around. And if you're one of the many fans who can't get enough information about the game, keep your eyes open for our own NCSoft interview, coming in the not-very-distant future.

Aion and Fallen Earth dominate Steam/D2D charts

by Brooke Pilley Oct 2nd 2009 at 7:00PM

Filed under: Aion, Fallen Earth, News items, Champions Online

Aion. Champions Online. Fallen Earth. Three MMOs intended for three different audiences and yet they all have one thing in common: September gaming sales chart domination! The latest numbers on Steam and Direct2Drive show a bit of a re-shuffling compared to the last time we checked in.

Steam (9/20 - 9/26)

1st - Aion Collector's Edition
2nd - Aion Standard Edition
3rd - Fallen Earth

Direct2Drive (9/20 - 9/26)

1st - Aion Collector's Edition
2nd - Aion Standard Edition
3rd - Fallen Earth
8th - Champions Online

Champions Online was launched a few weeks before both FE and Aion, so we believe that might have something to do with their now lagging sales (according to these charts). Be sure to check out our one-month checkup on CO. Both Aion and FE appear to be doing quite well for themselves since release. Considering the lack of marketing behind FE and its more design, we're happy to see it up ranking so high. Actually, it makes us warm and fuzzy to see any MMO selling well, so kudos to all!

Aion patches, denies whispers

by Seraphina Brennan Oct 1st 2009 at 6:00PM

Filed under: At a glance, Fantasy, Aion, Culture, MMO industry, Patches, News items

In an attempt to shut up some of those annoying gold spammers, Aion has placed a temporary restriction on whispering in today's patch. Anyone below level 5 will find themselves unable to whisper their friends until they reach the magical level, when they can once again make use of the function. In practice, this makes whispering very much like the general channel, which is also restricted to only those characters above level 5.

This is only a temporary restriction while the Aion team works out a solution to keeping the gold spammers off of their channels once and for all. However, in the meantime, looks like we're going to have to suffer a bit.

Today's patch also fixed a few things for the French and German language version of the game -- mostly localization issues, along with spelling, punctuation, and grammar. Pretty basic things, and nothing to write home about. If you're interested in the breakdown, check out the patch notes on Aion's PowerWiki.

Aion's first fortress falls to the Origine legion

by Seraphina Brennan Sep 29th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Culture, Events, in-game, Interviews, PvP, Endgame, News items

So for those of you who have been counting the days, Aion has been out for about a week in the North American / Europe regions. And, in this short, short, week, we've already got a legion who has gotten into the Abyss and accomplished one of the main objectives -- capturing a fortress.

Origine, a legion making its home on the [FRA] Suthran server in Europe, has taken a level 25 raid to a level 35 objective and has laid claim to the fortress. The entire siege took over 1 hour and 15 minutes from the door of the fortress to the downing of the boss inside. Control of the fortress gives Origine access to a special dungeon, which the legion has already cleared as well.

Sebastian "Ayase" Streiffert, the community manager of Aion, managed to catch up with Gwarf, Origine's leader, for a short interview regarding the event. You can check out Ayase's full interview over at Aion's main site. If you're interested in seeing the siege for yourself, you can see Origine's stream of the event at their website.

Five more quick tips for Aion

by Brooke Pilley Sep 28th 2009 at 5:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, New titles, Tips and tricks

We spent a lot of time playing Aion last weekend and have another round of quick tips to share with you. Check out last week's list in case you missed it. Enjoy!

1. Cheaply level your craft

This tip assumes you know the basics of crafting. The fastest and cheapest way to raise your crafting skill is to complete work orders given out by your crafting trainer in the Artisan district in your capital city. Crafting costs kinah (money), but there are three important things you should bear in mind to maximize your savings.

First, only grind up your skill on work orders 10-15 levels below your current crafting level. For instance, if your Tailoring is at 40, only do work orders that require a 30 Tailoring until you reach 50 skill points. Each work order will give you around 1-1.5 skill points, will complete more quickly with a higher level of success, and your extra ingredient(s) cost will be lower from the crafting vendor.

Second, only make as many items as needed to complete your work order. Each work order only requires that you create 6 items but the trainer gives you enough basic ingredients for 8. Too many people click "Craft All," which ends up wasting additional resources (i.e., money). Manually type in "6" and then press your craft button.

Five more quick tips for Aion (p2)

by Brooke Pilley Sep 28th 2009 at 5:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, New titles, Tips and tricks

Aion announces new North American server to be available soon [Updated]

by Seraphina Brennan Sep 25th 2009 at 5:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Business models, Culture, MMO industry, News items

Lani Blazier, associate producer on NCsoft's Aion, has announced today via Twitter that the game will be opening its arms to a new North American server very shortly.

This announcement most likely comes to many cheers from the community, as server queues have continued all this week on many of the NA servers. While we announced earlier that private shop changes will be coming to the game in order to reduce AFK spot holders, the new server will be one of the best ways to help spread out the population.

The new server is currently unnamed and the time frame is still not set in stone, but Lani has assured everyone that the server will be available sometime this weekend. This post will be updated as more information becomes available.

A new European server will follow as well, but as of this posting, the time frame for that server is still up in the air.

Update: Fregion [West] has been added to the server list and is now taking players. An East Coast American server and the new European server are also on their way.

Aion gets reviewed: Let the drama begin?

by Brooke Pilley Sep 25th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Reviews

If there's anything that gets MMO fanboys and trolls engaged in a cacophony of epic proportions, it's an official review followed by a score. Oh, and +1 drama if it comes from Eurogamer after that whole Darkfall / Ed Zitron hullabaloo. Oli Welsh of Eurogamer recently reviewed Aion based on his open beta experiences, giving it a 7/10 or 'Good' score. It's not as controversial as a 2/10 or "it has no soul," that's for sure!

Oli basically sums up his Aion experience with a string of key-presses: "2, 2, 3, 3, 5, 2, 3, 4, 5." We guess he didn't figure out how to make a one-button macro to simplify things even more! Actually, many players are saying this same criticism can be applied to almost all MMOs.

In terms of pros, he found the world beautiful and polished but in terms of cons it was quite grindy and the focus on PvPvE might not appeal to everyone. It seems we're experiencing a bit of an MMO conundrum since World of Warcraft gained such international popularity: Make an MMO too similar and you're dismissed as derivative; Make it too different and you're not mainstream enough to be accepted. One wonders when the paradigm will shift and MMOs will be judged by their own merits; or at least compared to a new benchmark.

NCsoft scrambles to reduce server queues: Private store tweaks incoming

by Brooke Pilley Sep 25th 2009 at 12:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Patches, News items

If one thing has marred the otherwise polished launch of Aion it is the extremely long server queues players face when trying to log in and play what they paid for. NCsoft responded a couple days ago saying that they are aware of the problem and working on solutions such as increased server caps and even opening a new server in both North America and Europe. Today they just announced a maintenance patch that addresses a major cause of their queue problem: Private stores will now have 30-minute timer to prevent them from being abused.

Private stores are a great concept. Players can set up shop anywhere in the world to sell their spare goods and make a pretty penny. Unfortunately, a feature of these stores is that they prevent you from idling out of the game. This feature really compounds the current server queue problem.

To avoid going through the queue process again, many players simply set up a private store and go AFK for hours at a time. One store we came across had this description set: "AFK at work, making you queue." This is even more evidence that MMO players will often take the path of least resistance for personal gain. Devs really need this hammered into their heads.

What do a treadmill, bike tire, and Wiimote have in common?

by Brooke Pilley Sep 24th 2009 at 4:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Video, Aion, Humor

ManaEnergyPotions.com has combined three seemingly unrelated inanimate objects into a dangerous contraption rivaling that of a medieval torture device: the Aion fitness machine! Okay, we'll admit that it's actually kind of cool even though we don't think there's a huge market for MMO-related exercise equipment just yet. (/munches on Cheetos and /sips Coke guilt-free, while /relaxing in comfy chair.)

In an experiment worthy of the pages of Popular Mechanics, these fellows interfaced a basic treadmill, road bicycle tire, and two modded Nintendo Wiimotes with a PC running NCsoft's newest MMO, Aion. It's really only one stick of gum and a few matchsticks short of Richard Dean Anderson material folks.

Anyway, running on the treadmill propels your character forward and flapping your arms while holding two Wii-motes makes your character fly. They also mapped various controller buttons to directional commands and use a mounted keyboard for combat. Take that Billy Blanks! Check out a video after the cut and head on over to Mana Energy Potion for the "system specs."

NCsoft responds to Aion's server queues

by Seraphina Brennan Sep 23rd 2009 at 3:00PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Culture, Launches, MMO industry, New titles, News items

The long Aion server queues are a sticking point for many players who have been looking forward to playing these past few days. We even made a guide to help the Aion folks survive the long waits.

However, the calls against the server queues have not gone unheard. NCsoft has taken note of everyone's feelings, and they've sent us the following response to the issue of the server queues.

At NCsoft our commitment is to making the MMO player experience the best it can be. And while Aion has seen a very successful launch that has exceeded our expectations in many ways, we are aware of the longer than usual queue times that players have experienced on some of the servers. This is due to the initial rush of players that we've seen in the early days of the game's launch in Europe and North America.

Five quick tips for Aion

by Brooke Pilley Sep 23rd 2009 at 11:00AM

Filed under: Fantasy, Aion, Game mechanics, Tips and tricks

For those lucky enough to get past Aion's login queue, we're happy to announce five quick tips that will enhance your gaming experience. You can expect more of these kinds of posts in the weeks and months ahead. Let's get right into it, shall we?

1. Change the channel

The initial rush of new players coming in to Aion can really bung up certain areas of the game. While we're all for being social (see #5), this can lead to some long and frustrating waits for shared PvE content. Or maybe you're on a lower end rig and the massive amounts of players on screen is causing you performance issues. There is a remedy and it's called channel surfing.

Click the menu tab near your skill bar > Click 'Support' > Click 'Change Channel' > Pick a channel from the drop down and press 'Okay' -- You will be teleported to the exact same spot in another channel

You may also need to change your channel to meet up with group mates or rendezvous with another player to make a trade (item, gold, etc.).

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