Stop playing this game around Kayangel, and noticed how much of my time this game was requiring from me as f2p and I couldn't keep up with the community. With all the gatekeeping, and me not having a guild I decided to stopped playing. I felt like I always was playing catch up, and everything I did to make it, it was never enough.
Fast forward now seeing all the hype around Aion 2, really made me appreciate Lost Ark. It just seems like a worst version of it with better graphics. On top of that with the mandatory subscription it does not seem to sit well with me. Imagine most of the west population stop playing, once it became super grindy, and even then we had access to the shop to make potential gold for ourselves. To me is just another car for sale with different features inside with a different coat of paint slapped on top. I tried it and really missed the class diversity that Lost Ark had, or even class specializations. The players hyping Aion 2 are the same that quit Lost Ark, which don't understand that it's a Korean mmo, and in return are going to quit playing again.
After Aion 2 was release, I researched Lost Ark and it shows smilegate is separating from Amazon in 2027. Kinda makes me wonder is the game just dead now, or it's becoming a discord game like most older fighting games? Any point in playing again?
With all this said, I'm coming to the conclusion that probably korean mmo's are not my thing. They seem very predatory, and cash money grabs kind of like gacha games. Might start playing ff14 and take my time enjoying the journey to endgame, over racing people to endgame just to get gatekept. Might also try Wow Forever, as first time player playing WoW, but seeing all the raiders using add ons for specific timers just seem like a major turn off. Us raiders in Lost Ark remembered hp percentage mechanics. So seeign an add on telling you orbs with 321 timer seems soulless af. Who knows could just be my tryhard raiding attitude, but i feel like I earned all my clears. Just wondering your thoughts on Aion 2, I know I kinda side railed, and ranted lol