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Aion Servers To Merge, XP Grind Softened
Massively reports that NCSoft's fantasy MMO Aion will soon be getting a round of server mergers to balance player populations and shore up in-game economies. A newsletter from Aion producer Chris Hager also brought word that character transfers will be an option starting in June, and NCSoft will be "offering them to all of our players for free for a limited time." This is happening in the lead-up to the game's 1.9 patch, due on June 2, which contains a number of measures to make the XP grind a bit less harsh (among other things; patch notes). They're creating more quests, increasing XP rewards from existing quests, and implementing a system that "grants you experience bonuses as you continue to play."
>>It's why I've avoided aion entirely and will most likely continue to do so.
I beta tested it, and that was more than enough to get me to avoid the game.
They'd have to cut grinding by about 75% to make the game playable in my book.
Exp. boosting weekends? Making the game easier? These things sound good on the surface but they're ultimately MMO suicide. This is because MMOs live and die by the perceived value of in-game achievements and items, and that perceived value is dictated by two major factors: how difficult they are to achieve in game, and how valuable you perceive in-game achievement to be to other people. This is fundamental to why people play MMOs at all: Players play MMOs to feel powerful and special.
Firstly, nerfing 'the grind'. Players bitch and moan about it but in the end, if there's no grind and no other challenge, then levelling up becomes meaningless. If the best items are trivial to obtain, then why would players care about getting them? Players only value what took time and effort to acquire.
Secondly, server mergers are THE death knell of any MMO. Why? Because no matter how it's presented, a server merger is always interpreted by the players as "lots of people are leaving the game". The main reason you play an MMO is that everyone else is playing it. If everyone leaves, who is going to admire your shiny epic gear? Players only value things that set them apart from others. If there're no others to admire their achievements, why bother?
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
I played WoW for about a year and a half after release, then put it aside for personal reasons, the foremost one being that I'm a flawed person with an addiction-prone personality!
Played and liked Guild Wars for two years, played and liked Age of Conan for two months, but I'm beginning to see a sameness in nearly all MMOs. Of course each will have their slight variations, but in the end ever subscription MMO is trying to beat Blizzard at what they do best (except Guild Wars...that game marches to the beat of its own drum).
Until a MMOG offers something revolutionary and enjoyable, they might as well name every single one "Not WoW", because that's how their potential customers see it.
Nah. This is one of those MMO based announcements. It was supposed to be the MMO that killed WoW, lots of people switched for all of about 2mo, before they realized that the grind was so heavy you needed to dedicate your life to it. Not as bad as FF or anything, but plenty bad enough. The reality is everyone has been spoiled, for lack of a better word because of WoW. They know playing it, that if you stop for 3mo and you're way under the gear cap you can run heroics and get the gear. If you only want to play for 2hrs a week, you can, and still get somewhere at the end of the game without grouping with anyone.
Om, nomnomnom...
You have got to be kidding. Aion would have to be one of the least grindy MMOs out there. Remember WoW is not the norm, it is the exception, the outlier, when it comes to quick and easy progression. On the other hand we have the TRUE grindy MMOs like Lineage 1 and 2, FFXI, and various other (mostly Asian) MMOs.
Aion is a compromise. It is an eastern style MMO (in terms of lore, graphical style etc) with a dash of western-style questing and story thrown in. The grind factor is somewhere between 'grindy' and 'WoW-like easiness, although to be honest it's closer to the less grindy side of the spectrum. An average player (i.e. just plays for a couple of hours every couple of days) should be able to hit the max level in Aion in approximately 6 months (less after the 1.9 patch goes in). Compare that to WoW where max level is achievable in mere days or weeks. And compare again to, say, Lineage 2 where max level even for a regular player is at least 4-5 years, and a casual player will never reach it. So yeah, I think cutting the grind by '75%' in Aion would be ridiculous. It's already fairly quick to level, and the 1.9 patch reduces that further.
The other thing is - what is with the mad rush to level up anyway? I enjoy the content at the low and mid levels just as much as at high levels. It's only a 'grind' if you want it to be and you are dead set on getting to max level ASAP at any cost. I never understood that mentality though. Enjoy the path, not just the destination. Personally I like MMOs that are a bit tougher (or require more time to achieve things, whether that be level or gear or whatever). Otherwise you end up with everyone walking around at the max level, with the best gear. All virtually identical. What's the point of that?
Oh and one final thing regarding the article generally (this is not directed specifically at the parent post) - the server mergers are basically necessary because, at launch, there were such serious server login queues that NCSoft rushed a couple of extra servers in to meet demand. So it's not like the game is dying. Even if they merge 4 or 5 or 6 servers, it will just be back to the number of servers they planned at launch anyway. A game does not have to be as popular as WoW with its hundreds of servers to be successful - it just has to turn a tidy profit. And Aion will continue to do so. It's not a game for everyone (due to the fact that, as mentioned, it IS a compromise between eastern and western elements). But I think it's the best new MMO out there right now, and it will tide me over until Diablo 3 comes out at least (yes, I know D3 isn't an MMO ... but it's the next major game I'm hanging for).
Actually the stereotypical "Players" you describe with their wants & needs and what they value are only the Achiever kind of player in the Bartle Player Type classification (here).
The Explorers, Socializers or Killers do not necessarilly derive any enjoyment from endlessly repetitive tasks.
Even the Achievers don't derive any enjoyment from endlessly repetitive tasks - what they enjoy is achieving something hard or getting something rare or unique: the "hard work" needed to get those hard to get achievements needs not be endless grinding: in fact, complex, difficult encounters with hard to get pre-requisites can be just as satisfying.
The truth is that, in MMORPGs, grinding based game-playing is a cheap way for publishers to create time-sinks in the game instead of spending money in creating real content like areas, dungeons, boss encounters, story quests and others.
While most people that played MMORPGs in the time of UO and the like were willing to live with it (since there was nothing beter), nowadays, there's plenty of MMORPGs out there with massive amounts of content for players to enjoy (in my personal experience, both current WoW - it was worse in the past - and LOTRO are very good in that aspect).