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Aerial combat isn’t just for jet fighters anymore.
In the new online role-playing game "Aion," characters sprout wings and soar into the sky to meet their opponents. The T-rated PC game from NCsoft is set on the lushly rendered world of Atreia, which has been literally torn apart by an epic cataclysm. Two societies — the fair Elyos and the darker Asmodians — continue to thrive on two chunks of earth that are separated by an enormous gap. Both sides continue to struggle for supremacy in the Abyss, which separates the upper and lower halves of the shattered world. They also battle the more sinister Balaur, who roam the Abyss.
You start off by creating your character. You select your side, choose your class — fighter, scout, priest and magic user — and set your appearance.
After creating your character, it’s time to join the grind. Developers say the game contains more than 1,500 story-driven quests. However, it still boils down to a grind, with many of the mission consisting of the typical fetch-this and kill-that quests familiar from other RPGs.
Things start getting better once you earn your wings at Level 10. However, it still takes quite a while before you’re high enough level to join the player vs. player struggle over fortresses in the Abyss, which is the focus of the game’s main story.
The game play will be familiar to most RPG fans … journals, inventories, chat, hot keys, loot-gathering, all of which function admirably. Combat seems to be pretty well balanced as long as you don’t try to tackle an enemy who’s a much higher level that you are. The biggest additions to the standard formula are flight and the Balaur, whose arrival can turn sworn enemies into close allies — at least for a short while.
Platform: PC
On the Web:na.aiononline.com
