Revisiting Aion (F2P) – Rant

A few days ago, I friggin downloaded 'Aion' once again, I was looking to have a little fun, not to mention that I had some sort of interest in the player housing and the so call new features… lol!

I played the first few hours with no problems but after a while I notice that the same old issues and shortcomings are there and it looks like they are not going to go away at all…

The first thing that really got over my head was the grind… That’s right!!! The grind is there!!! I know that is not as bad as it used to be but grind is grind!!! Any amount of grinding is bad… I don’t want to be smashed in my head! Not even once!!!!!!

When I first left the game, my character was level 49, it took me around 3 days of self-punishment to get it all the way up to 50 and finally get into Balaurea… The problem is that the amount of desperation and frustration is way too high compared to the satisfaction I get when I finally level up. Not to mention that I still have 10 more levels to go…

I know the game have some quests around the place and some repeatable quests but repeatable ones are just grinding with a little extra bonus… But in the end, you are grinding! Aion 3.0 is nothing different, it’s a grind and for the most part I don’t really think it is fun at all.

The second issue I had in Oriel is the same old Graphical issue I had in Heiron, Eltnen, Abyss, etc!!! The graphics are disjointed!!!! I don’t understand why in the hell the game have a good looking model then a crappy mesh at its side… or a good looking texture then a crappy one at its side… I don’t friggin get it… The problem is that it looks like such disjointment is part of the Aion franchise because those issues are also present in Oriel, the new housing area…

I know the artstyle looks pretty but these technical issues are way too bad to be ignored, I am wondering if NCSoft have a QA team at all!!!!

(This kind of issue is all over Oriel...)

The third thing I notice is that the new crafting profession is a bit dumb because getting those new construction fluxes is a big pain in the butt… How do I get those things without the constant daily farm for fluxes using my house plants???? Oh wait is not possible… Because in AION!!! Everything is an eternal grind!!!!

The same goes with the Oriel quests, I took me hours to find a single item for quest, guess what I had to collect 10 of those things… So I guess it will take me 100 hours to finish a quest that is supposed to be done every day??? C'mon!!! make sure this quests work in a more logical way...

In the end the new Aion 3.0 is like a luxurious straw… Outside is pretty and cute and it really looks cool sometimes (Shugo Butler is my favorite one, I really like that npc)… But when you look inside, you notice that is a bit hollow or full of shortcomings…Not to mention that some key features that every mmo needs are missing...

I know that some people actually enjoy Aion and they really love the grinding, but I am not in that small minority, I only hope that the people in Aion right now have a good time because everyone really deservers to have a good time when they play, unfortunately I need to play another game for me to have a good time…