Review Deep Dives

AION 2 Steam Reviews: A Beautiful World, a Pay-to-Progress Problem

BC2S · 2026-10-14

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Short version: AION 2's launch week reviews describe two different games. One is a beautiful world: looks are its best category (+3.3), and the most common praise, a world that is beautiful with combat that feels good, comes up in 108 of the 406 reviews we read. The other is a free-to-play MMO where paying decides how far you get: 145 reviews say a subscription and character-locked items gate progress, and Pricing & Fairness ranks 599th of 652 analyzed games. Overall: 60.8 / 100, 589th of 652.

What we read

We collected these reviews on October 6, 2026, the day after AION 2's October 5 Steam release. At that point Steam listed 9,155 reviews (6,634 positive, 2,521 negative, Mostly Positive). We took 500 of them in all languages, filtered out the ones with too little to analyze, and analyzed the remaining 406. 221 of the 406 were written before release, during Advanced Access (September 30 to October 4), which was open to buyers of the paid Founder's Pack. Those reviews are friendlier than the ones written after release: 37% of them recommend the game, against 22%. Each review is scored on 25 indicators in 8 categories, from −5 to +5. How we score games.

As of October 13, Steam lists about 27,000 reviews, and the rating has moved with them: it is now Mixed, with 59% recommending the game.

The breakdown

Overall: 60.8 / 100, 589th of 652 analyzed games.

What players praise: the world

Summarized from what reviewers wrote (the number is how many reviews made the point):

• "World is beautiful, characters okay, combat feels good" (108 reviews)
• "The game is fun and enjoyable to play" (37 reviews)
• "Combat feels fast and responsive, dungeons reward attention" (14 reviews)
• "Iconic music and nostalgic atmosphere from the original Aion" (8 reviews)

Within that category, the visuals indicator alone scores +3.4, the most praised thing about the game by a wide margin. Eight reviews single out the music and nostalgic atmosphere carried over from the first Aion.

Where it falls short: paying to progress

• "Subscription and character-locked items create pay-to-progress restrictions" (145 reviews)
• "Combat is boring and floaty, feels like a cheap phone game" (33 reviews)
• "Forced PvP without explanation, 10-minute cooldown trap, hostile to new players" (15 reviews)
• "Almost no co-op content despite paying 100 dollars for an edition" (15 reviews)
• "Poor optimization, crashes, stutters and a mobile UI not adapted for PC" (14 reviews)

The pricing complaint is the single most common point in the reviews, ahead of the top praise. Pricing & Fairness scores −1.2, and its pricing indicator is also −1.2. For comparison, the category is −0.9 for The Elder Scrolls Online and −0.1 for Star Wars: The Old Republic, two other MMOs we analyzed.

Combat splits players

Combat appears on both lists. 14 reviews call it fast and responsive, and 33 call it boring and floaty. Controls and feel lands at +0.2, close to neutral. The bigger gameplay drag is elsewhere: strategy (−1.9), onboarding for new players (−1.5) and variety (−2.1).

What critics say

Few outlets have published full reviews yet. Metacritic shows no score so far (it needs four critic reviews), and we found no OpenCritic page for AION 2.

• Game8 (70/100): "Atreia remains an impressive world to explore," but "it starts feeling like you're paying to make the game less restrictive."
• MMORPG.com (review in progress, no score): combat "feels floaty and disconnected," and the monetization feels "designed to part you with your money."

Both point the same way as the Steam reviews we read: a world people like, and paying as the main complaint.

By language

English reviews (222) give it 54.0, Japanese reviews (33) 51.1 and Portuguese reviews (31) 70.2. English reviews are more than half of the ones we read.

Is there room to improve?

Pricing & Fairness counts complaints across all reviews, so changes to the subscription and locked items would show up there first, as fewer people write about them. Crashes were rarely mentioned at launch (stability 4%), though 14 reviews mention poor optimization or stutters. Tech & Support still ranks 102nd of 652.

Limits

1) These reviews come from launch week, analyzed the day after release. Steam's rating has dropped from Mostly Positive to Mixed since then, and a later look could differ.

2) This measures what reviewers wrote, not the game itself.

3) Scores and ranks are as of October 13, 2026.

BC2S. Better Creative, Better Society. We read hundreds of thousands of reviews so you can see what people really think.

Game pages: AION 2 · How we score games