u/Zack_Gainsboough

I've been playing Black Desert since 2017, and after all these years I think I'm finally ready to move on to another MMO. For me, that game is Aion 2.

And honestly, one of the biggest reasons is something that probably sounds superficial to some people:

I love beautiful character customization and outfits.

That's genuinely a huge part of why I play MMOs.

I enjoy PvP and PvE, but I spend a ridiculous amount of time customizing my character, collecting outfits, taking screenshots, making videos, decorating housing, using different poses, dances and emotes, and basically trying to make my character look as good as possible.

I'm a fashion/customization player.

That's also one of the reasons I'm interested in the Founder’s Pack.

But if Aion 2 wants players like me to continue supporting the game through cosmetics, I really hope NCSoft puts serious effort into the quality of those cosmetics.

I'm not asking for every outfit to be extravagant or revealing. I just want them to be beautiful, detailed, luxurious and well-made.

Aion 2 is using Unreal Engine 5, so I really hope the outfits take advantage of that.

I want to see:

• High-resolution textures
• Detailed materials and fabrics
• Beautiful accessories
• Good hair and cloth interaction
• Interesting designs and silhouettes
• High-quality animations
• Minimal clipping
• No obvious missing geometry
• No transparent/invisible areas caused by broken meshes
• Consistent quality across the entire outfit

I've encountered some of these problems in BDO over the years. Sometimes parts of an outfit can have clipping, missing geometry, transparent areas, or noticeably lower-resolution textures. And when you're paying a premium price for a cosmetic, those details really matter.

I'd rather have fewer outfits with incredible quality than dozens of outfits that feel rushed or repetitive.

I also really hope Aion 2 doesn't fall into the trap of launching beautiful cosmetics and then gradually changing or censoring them after release.

I'm not against a game having an artistic direction or content standards from the beginning. That's completely understandable.

What bothers me is when a game launches with one artistic vision and then later changes outfits, character designs, animations or other cosmetic elements — especially when the original version remains available in another region.

Consistency matters.

If I'm buying an outfit because I love its design, I want to know that the design I'm buying today won't be significantly changed later.

And I'm not someone who expects cosmetics to be free.

I've spent years collecting cosmetics in MMOs, and I've spent significant amounts of money on individual skins when I thought they were genuinely worth it. One of the most expensive cosmetics I've personally bought in a game was around 450 USD, simply because I loved the character and the design that much.

So I'm exactly the type of player who is willing to financially support a game through cosmetics.

But give me something worth supporting.

I love the kind of fashion design you see in games like Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts — outfits that look almost like fantasy haute couture, with layers, materials, accessories and details that make the character feel special.

That's the level of ambition I'd love to see from Aion 2.

And this isn't just about making characters "sexy."

For me it's about fashion, fantasy, identity and visual quality.

A great outfit can make me want to log into an MMO just to take screenshots of my character.

A great housing system can make me spend hours decorating a room.

A great character creator can make me care about a character for years.

That's the kind of MMO I want to play.

I'm moving from BDO because I want something fresh, and Aion 2 seems to have many of the things I enjoy most:

Character customization.
Beautiful outfits.
Housing.
Poses and emotes.
Beautiful environments.
Screenshots and photography.
And a character I can actually feel attached to.

So, NCSoft, if you're going to build a game around this level of visual quality:

Please go all the way.

Don't just make the outfits beautiful in promotional screenshots.

Make them beautiful in-game, up close, five years later, in every region, from every angle.

And if cosmetics are one of the ways players are going to support Aion 2 for years to come, give us cosmetics that make us want to support it.

That's the kind of player I want to be in Aion 2.