Update from Ayase (Sebastian Streiffert, European Aion Community Coordinator).
What is happening with Aion’s beta?
We are planning for a closed beta later this year, and other phases will inevitably follow. Besides that, however, many details remain undecided. These include: Format of invitations, amount of invitations, time of invitations, times of tests and the role of a Non-Disclosure Agreement. There’s simply a lot of work yet to be done there, which is why we can’t quite go into more detail. We will need to test our infrastructure, arranging events and ultimately server-performance and make sure that the end-user experience is as smooth as it can be. These features need to work as good as they possibly can during the beta and especially during launch, which is why a lot of hard work and inevitably time lay ahead of us. Just hang in there and we’ll make sure to get you as specific information as we can, when we can.
When is Aion going to be released in the EU/NA?
2009 was mentioned. Just like previous estimations we have given out, we still can’t promise much, or more importantly, give you more detail. It’s the nature of things written in sand, or gravel (as I mentioned before). The gardener may very well come and rake that path when you least expect him to.
Furthermore, we want Aion to be of excellent quality at launch, and we have very high standards. For these reasons, we’re not willing to compromise quality for an earlier release. With that said, of course we would really want to give you a final date right away – to say “This, guys. This is it.” - but we can’t do this before we know for certain ourselves. But it’s looking like 2009. That’s the plan. Outlook: Good. When we can, we will try to be a bit more specific.
Will European and North American servers be separated?
Traditionally, our game servers have been separate for Europe and North America. The reason behind this is simply that we want to give you the best customer experience possible. This can be achieved best if each territory is taking care of their own servers and customers. In practice this means that if you want to play on a European server – you will need a European version of the game, and vice versa for North American servers. A final decision has not been taken yet, but this might very well be what you can expect at launch.
ORZ's 2 cents:
Hey, at least beta testing will take place this year...
Tags:
AION,
Aion Tower of Eternity,
Aion The Tower of Eternity.
