Aion has been fairly quiet lately and while players have been enjoying the new in-game event activity, many are still wondering what is on the horizon. The new and elusive producer Chris “Kinslon” Hager shares a bit in February's Community Address about Aion's immediate future and touches upon a couple of hot topics such as community communication and potential updates.
Greetings Daevas,
First off, I want to share that I am very excited to serve you—all of the Aion players—as Aion producer for NCsoft West. Having worked on Aion for the better part of two years, I’ve seen it grow from PAX 2007 and the first demo area in Poeta to prelaunch mayhem and now post-launch live operations. As a fellow Aion player myself, I have a vested interest in making it the best game possible, and helping you feel as excited about it as I am. Aion has huge potential, and we have only tapped the surface. We are working on a lot of exciting things set to release in both the near-term and long-term timeframe.
As the producer, one of my focus areas is to communicate frequently and honestly with you. Global coordination of a game as large as Aion takes a lot of planning. We know that at times you may feel like you’re wringing water out of a rock in regard to getting information from us, but we want to be cautious with telling you the correct information to not mislead the community. We are in constant communication with our development and production staff, and we really want to share with you more information on a regular basis, but due to scheduled release timing, localization efforts and Western development schedules, we aren’t always able to share what we’d really like to.
I know you have all been waiting with bated breath for information on the next game update. While I can’t give you a lot of details, I can tell you a couple of things that we are addressing in upcoming game updates. We’ve listened to your feedback and have been working diligently with the Korean development team, and we are proud to say that over the next few updates (the first of which will be coming in Q2 this year) we will address some of your major concerns: a desire for more content at lower levels, increased rewards for quests, and improved drop rates. Even though we aren’t always talking publicly about the next update, we are always listening and integrating feedback into the next update. As part of that, we’re trying to coordinate and deliver on what we say even before we say something. Our goal with update communications is to not only be transparent with you, but also give you a reason to trust us when we talk about updates so that you know we will deliver on what we share with you.
If you’ve been reading the news lately, you know that MMOs are under attack by RMTers (“gold sellers”) and hackers—not just Aion, but several other MMOs as well. Even Google has been the target of recent attacks. To combat this, NCsoft has been communicating with several other MMO companies about ways we can fight back as an industry. At NCsoft, you already know that we regularly review our account security processes and implement changes on an ongoing basis to ensure your Aion accounts, in addition to your other NCsoft game accounts are secure. These complex systems take time, require rigorous procedures, and need a very steady hand to balance additions and not disrupt the security measures currently in place. We sincerely appreciate the patience you have shown as we take time to make sure we are setting up and implementing the appropriate systems to best protect you.
This year in Aion, you will notice that we are implementing a lot of the suggestions you’ve sent us about the game services we offer. We’re also planning on providing you more services and increased interaction with our team. We recently introduced exciting paid services (name change, Legion name change, character customization, and gender change), and we will be adding more services throughout the year aimed at improving your experience. (Yes, server transfers are coming!)
While not a lot of new information is shared, it is good to know that the team is still keeping their ear to the grounds when it comes to community relations. Check back here at Ten Ton Hammer soon to keep aprised of future Aion developments on the news front!
The relative business:
