Aion: closed beta journey (part 2)

Be sure to read the first part of this saga on Aion: closed beta journey (The Beginning).

  Finally I've finished the starting zone, don't get me wrong it is beautiful and i am sure that for a new player it might be awesome to explore it all and read the lore, but since I've already done it before I did what most players tend to do now-a-days like skipping cinematics, accepting the quests without reading, etc...

  Once you hit level 9 you should already have a couple of titles which you gain from completing specific missions, these titles go beyond bragging rights as they give stats as well. In my opinion this feature is unwelcomed simply because as a player feel compelled to use the title that provides best stats instead of the one i like the most or none at all which is what i usually do in MMOs.

  After recovering part of your memory you will be asked to "remember" your class, this is the point where you will choose your specialization and go for the first time to Sanctum, the main city of the Elyos. Here you will find several quests which will help you navigate in this great city however, this part even though useful for newcomers is extremely boring. You have finally become the class you wanted and then you have a ton of "talk to X" quests that take you in a tour of the city when you are dieing to try out the new skills.

  At this point you will be introduced to the pet system, which is a new addition from last time i played and something i have learned  to hate with a passion. I have noting against people who like to have cute pets following but Aion goes a bit beyond that.

   Pets not only follow you around which for me is annoying enough but they also have a looping animation and sound when you attack something, this depending on the pet can be nerve racking. I could avoid this by simply not having a pet but here is the twist, if you give him some attention(every 10 min) you will gain some coins according to your level which you can trade for some decent gear, not only that some more expensive pets can do stuff like carrying items for you, applying item buff automatically or just giving you random items when fed, so yeah now just like the titles i feel forced to have this annoying pet around.

  Next you go to Verteron city where you will remain at least to lvl 19 which depending how fast you level can be from one to four days, here you will learn to use your wings and will most likely feel disappointed when you see that you can't use it all the time nor can you use it everywhere, the time limit will increase when you buy new wings(which is weird) but you are only allowed to fly in certain areas, most of the time you can only use them to glide as you bonce across small inclinations on the floor which is ridiculous.

  Verteron has three themes(a desert, a forest and a contaminated area) which is good to counter the visual dullness however the change of scenario is too abrupt, you can have this green beautiful forest behind you and a orange desolated area in front of you.

  As you are questing you will see a lot of gathering quests which requires you to keep up the gathering level but this is nothing but a waste of time if you are trying to level-up fast as the time spent to continuously level  the gathering isn't worth the little XP the quests give.

 Beta is not over and we just have to wait until 28th of February which is when Aion becomes officially free-to-play.