The popular MMO Aion has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons since day one. It all started with some lengthy queues for players who pre-ordered the game, before moving into the humorless phase that most MMO gamers are more than familiar with.

Now, NCSoft have gone one step further by banning 16,000 accounts across American and European servers. Read on to find out what Community Manager Andrew Beegle had to say on the issue.

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As October starts coming to a close, one thing tends to be on every one’s mind, Halloween. This spooky holiday also seems to have NCsoft captivated . The developer/producer is planning Halloween themed events across all six of its active Western titles.

The world of Guild Wars will see the return of the Mad King Thorn. Lineage II players are going to have to deal with Scarecrow Jack. Gamers who are still playing the first Lineage will be treated to a costume party. The City of Heroes is going to have to unite against a Halloween Apocalypse. The Mechnaughts of Exteel are getting a spooky orange and purple paint scheme. In NCsoft’s newest title Aion, the Asmodians will host a Wild hunt, where as the Elyos have to stave off a zombie invasion.

To get a more detaiedl description of each event, hit the jump.

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Reviewing an MMO is like taking a ride in a supercar. It’s fun at first. Everything is all shiny and new. Promotional material is glossy, promising to provide you with everything you need for an amazing experience. You step in, boot things up and take a ride. It is fun. It does seem to meet its promises. You walk away feeling a little bit giddy and hopeful.

But then reality sinks in. After a few experiences you start to realise that it’s not everything you thought it would be. It performs, but not in the ways that you want it to. Little issues creep up, you pretend to ignore them because, god, it just looks so gorgeous and it handles so well. But there is something missing, an element, a factor that was apparent in the others you tried and ended up enjoying. It’s not bad by any means of the word, but it’s different.

It’s lucky them, if World of Warcraft is the Bugatti Veyron, Aion is the Ferrari Enzo of MMOs.

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Every so often, an addictive game comes along and swallows us whole. For some, it’s Call of Duty: World at War’s zombie mode. For others, it’s Wii Sports Resort, and for the few, the proud, and the nerdy, its a little ol’ genre known as MMOs.

These games come and go by the droves. They range from sci-fi to fantasy; from free to play to $15 a month; from casual to hardcore; and from a full $50 entry cost to browser based affairs. But all of them have one thing in common: they’re timesinks. For the socially sane, MMOs are squeezed in after work, and before dinner with the kids, or after the wife goes to sleep (cough, cough). Should you choose to take the road less traveled and let an MMO dominate your life, say goodbye to your significant other, your social life, and your job.

So who is the new kid in town? What devilish fiend is attempting to lure you into his van with candy, and take you on a vacation that never ends? This month, its NCSoft’s Aion. Read more… »

It seems like NCSoft was quick to act in regards to their launch day jitters, as a new patch is set to go live today that will address the main queue blockage problem: private vendors refusing to log off, and simply setting up a player-made shop to avoid being booted from the game indefinitely.

The new patch sees to it that if you leave a private shop up for more than 30 minutes, you’ll automatically be logged out of the game.

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Aion already appears to be getting off to questionable start, not only with our previously reported epic queues, but now players are being banned for merely joking about gold sales.

Below is a copy/paste of the email banned Aion player Redmoons sent us.

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Well, Aion is technically here, and it’s not looking good so far. The official forums are flooded with complaints over insanely large queues for an event that was supposed to allow people that pre-ordered the game to play two days early with a pre-claimed character.

While this is fairly typical of MMOs (and this isn’t even technically a true launch), it seems like NCSoft wasn’t able to meet the initial demand despite pre-order and pre-registration statistics they had far in advance. Whether this problem will carry over to launch day come this Tuesday is yet to be seen. Read more… »

As most of the MMO players amongst you know, the recently Westernized Aion opens its servers for pre-purchased customers on September 20 (tomorrow!) for North American, Australian and New Zealand players.

It was announced a few days ago that NCSoft had decided to listen to the large Oceanic community and create a server with a GMT+10 timezone, so AU/NZ/SP players could participate in events and endgame raid schedules! The server, Nezekan, is currently available for character selection and will be active on launch.

A couple of members from the local Aion Oceanic community have asked us to spread the word – If you’re an Aussie, choose Nezekan!

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Every six months or so, hardcore World of Warcraft players anxiously await their new lord and savior: an up-and-coming MMO to deliver them from their addiction. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of these games, despite their unbelievable hype as the “great hope” fail miserably. As a former WoW raider, I remember Age of Conan and Warhammer’s promises of a better virtual world that were never fulfilled.

Aion, the newest MMO on the block, promises exciting gameplay and a beautiful visual style. Oh yea, and you can fly. Is it everything its cracked up to be? Read my impressions of the beta, and find out. Read more… »

Haven’t heard that much about Obama lately, eh? Well that’s about to change. Read more… »