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Chinese OB Review - Lv. 22 Elyos Sorcerer
From the start I'll say that this review is based upon the gameplay until Lv. 25. Maybe the game becomes super fantastic past this level (which I doubt it) and I just wrote an useless review, but I think that I will cover mostly gameplay parts that will be in effect the whole game.
Anyway....
You really know you're about to play something awesome right from the login screen. The Aero look makes it seem modern but the fantasy landscape in the back really submerges you in the virtual world.
The character selection screen will be your first orgasm (orgasm? wtf am I thinking at, lol). The characters are displayed with a nice background, some sitting on rocks, some standing in the back... very natural. Another thing that NCSoft threw in was that every toon from the character selection screen is dressed in high level armors that add to the drooling.
Sooo.. you pick your character, you pick your class, gender, hair style, height, big, small, fat, thin, long neck small legs.. whatever you want.. and you hit START.
I strongly believe that "the journey" 'till max level is just a tutorial (mostly boring if you solo through the levels) for the hardcore gameplay you'll have to put out in the Abyss. That's where all the drama begins and where the bada*s items drop.
For the people that recently discovered the joy of MMOs, this will be a great game to play. For the older wolves out there that have some history with MMOs, well, you all know what you have to do guys:
Happy raiding!
Anyway....
You really know you're about to play something awesome right from the login screen. The Aero look makes it seem modern but the fantasy landscape in the back really submerges you in the virtual world.
The character selection screen will be your first orgasm (orgasm? wtf am I thinking at, lol). The characters are displayed with a nice background, some sitting on rocks, some standing in the back... very natural. Another thing that NCSoft threw in was that every toon from the character selection screen is dressed in high level armors that add to the drooling.
Sooo.. you pick your character, you pick your class, gender, hair style, height, big, small, fat, thin, long neck small legs.. whatever you want.. and you hit START.
- The UI is very nice, sophisticated but simple and classic: gauges, skill slots, flight button and some other buttons that open all sort of menus. The skills are ordered by level and you can see what you learned so far and what still remains to learn. The keys can be remapped any way you like so you aren't stuck with the classic 1,2,3,4; Alt+1, Alt+2...
Quests can be easily pinned on the screen by just checking a box in front of them. You also have available a tracking system in the quest text: lots of names and locations are shown as a link. You just have to click them and click Locate and the map will show up with the location. Of course, not anything is traceable, so for some quests you have a little searching to do before you can finish them.
In any way.. for a casual MMO player, it won't be any kind of problem handling the UI.
------------------ - The classes are very well balanced. While the melee types can handle 3-4 mobs at the same time with no problem, the ranged classes rely on disabling skills that will help them annihilate the mobs 1 by 1. Of course, the damage output is inversely proportional with the number of mobs you can handle.
------------------ - Quests are divided into 2 parts: EXP quests and Story quests (that also give EXP)
Right from the start you get some that send you to a village (in my case Poeta) that has more quests. Great! No more mindless grinding!
The starting quests a fairly easy and are meant to familiarize you with the game and story. You shoot up to level 12-13 with no problem and with no need of help.
This until the Krall quests come up and you'll cry that you don't have any friends to play with because you didn't leave your bedroom since last Christmas when you bought WoW. Most of those quests are nearly impossible to make alone or even in a small party. You need a full party to get through them with no sweat. They are all like mini-bosses and their drops like Lv. 1 bunnies.
The quests tend to become more party reliant with every level up, especially the Story ones, or Missions.
Aion is not a game for soloing, despite what Ken Choi told us a long time ago. Get some friends or get into a clan if you don't want to end up quitting in frustration.
There are tons of quests everywhere. Arm with some patience.
------------------ - The skill system is very well thought. How many times did you see you party members teleport to town in the middle of the battle saying "brb skills"? Many, I bet. Well, Aion comes to solve the skill balance and learn rate of the skills. You learn some new skills like every 3 levels or so. BUT with every level gained, the skills level up themselves too becoming slightly powerful from level to level.
Example: You learn Firebolt I - Level 1 from the master at level 3. At level 4, your skill will automatically upgrade to Firebolt I - Level 2 and so on until you go at level 6 back at the master and you learn Firebolt II - Level 1. And the process restarts.
Nice idea that really makes you feel you've progressed with leveling up.
--------------------- - Money in Aion is very relative. The mobs that actually drop money are very few and drop a very small amount. The big bucks you get is by selling the misc items that they drop and get paid very well. Another way to get easy Kina is by using the Auction house. Everything that you think it might be of some use to someone should go there. You'll make easy bucks in no time.
---------------------- - And speaking of money: In Aion, Obelisks are the resurrection points. In order to resurrect to a designated Obelisk you have to pay a fee to bind you to it. Well that fee is pretty big, especially for low levels and especially when you are moving from a place to another very quick. Try not to die too much.
You lose EXP too, but not permanently. The lost EXP grays out in your bar and can be bought back through a Soul Healer that sits next to every Obelisk. A thing that I noticed when buying back EXP is that you shouldn't buy back small amounts of EXP, like right after your first death, because it costs you lots of money. Just wait a couple more deaths ( I usually waited until I could level up with the EXP I regained) and the outcome will be more cheaper. It's like with the amount of money you wasted to regain 10k XP after the first death and another 16k XP after the second, you could regain 50k XP later on in one package.
--------------------- - Professions:
They are basically the same as in any MMO but with a slight twist to help you out with leveling it: the NPC gives you some chores that you have to do. Some of the parts needed to craft the items will be provided by it, some you'll have to buy/gather yourself. The reward is random, from materials to rare recipes.
--------------------------- - Gathering:
You will encounter in the world lots of plants and rocks (both ground and up in the sky) that can be gathered, much like herbalism and mining merged together.
My advice: level the crap out of those skills. There are numerous quests that require gathering and if you don't have the skill properly leveled up, you will have to return to some lower level zones with some herbs and minerals that require a lower gathering level in order to rise up your skill. You will go through some of the most boring moments of your life - tested by: yours truly.
-------------------------
I strongly believe that "the journey" 'till max level is just a tutorial (mostly boring if you solo through the levels) for the hardcore gameplay you'll have to put out in the Abyss. That's where all the drama begins and where the bada*s items drop.
For the people that recently discovered the joy of MMOs, this will be a great game to play. For the older wolves out there that have some history with MMOs, well, you all know what you have to do guys:
Happy raiding!
Total Comments 3
Comments
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- True, money is definitely not a problem for me.
- Grinding and difficulty is what bothers me.
- Lore and quests were unappealing in terms of story and content. Reading them seemed like a chore after my first few levels.
- I agree, the skill mechanics were well-designed. Having skills that are only available in certain circumstances are absolutely clever.
- And yes, I thought classes were fairly well-balanced in terms of PvE.
As a PvP oriented game they should have sped up the amount of time (not to mention grinding and difficulty) PvEing so that players can enjoy the core aspect of the game.
In the current state, I would rate Aion Chinese OBT a 6.5 .Posted 04-13-2009 at 10:54 PM by aznkenshin
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I totally agree, Azn!Posted 04-14-2009 at 07:27 AM by Hellriser
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A decent review, I feel that you missed some things though.
In regards to your comment about the Flight button, it's page up. It's that by default. The whole needing friends thing is just a silly complaint in a Massive MULTIPLAYER Online RPG, don't you think? Those are really my online gripes about the review. T
he obelisk issue isn't too bad in the first areas, the first obelisk is what? 99 Kinah to bind and that zone is small enough where you can just fly to the second camp. But I could see where constantly binding it could be cost prohibitive.
But as I said, all in all a good review. If I had to rate it right now i'd give it a 10/10. Not because i'm a fanboy, just because i've had that much fun playing it. And the only thing that's annoyed or held me back is the fact it's only a beta.Posted 04-14-2009 at 10:02 AM by Dannan
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