Aion 2 Hit 73,761 Players at Once on Steam. That was a two-day stress test on Steam alone, and NC closed it by handing paying members their own priority queue for launch.

The Story

NC opened Aion 2 to anyone on Steam or its own launcher for two six-hour days, with the shop switched off and a full wipe at the end.

How many people turn up when a new MMO opens its doors for six hours with no key, no invite and no sign-up? For Aion 2, the sequel NC set 200 years after the original Aion, the answer was 73,761 at once on Steam alone. NC is the Korean studio that made both, and the rules it set that week are rules Riot has never spoken for its own MMO.

• No gate at all. The Launch Scale Test, NC's name for the open stress test, needed no key, no invite and no registration list.
• Two six-hour days. It ran September 17 and 18 on Steam and on PURPLE, NC's own launcher, for 12 hours of play in total.
• Level cap 37. Characters stopped at level 37, and progress carried from day one into day two.
• The shop was off. NC switched off the shop, passes, memberships, the marketplace and player-to-player trading for the duration.
• Everything got wiped. Every character was deleted at the end of day two, and nothing transferred to launch.
• Announced August 26. NC posted the dates three weeks before the servers opened.

Aion 2 runs on Unreal Engine 5. This was its dress rehearsal, in public, two weeks before launch.

The Numbers

The peak is a Steam-only figure, the reviews turned around after a rough first day, and NC's own launcher counted for none of it.

• 73,761 at once. SteamDB, the tracker that logs Steam's concurrent player counts, recorded the peak in the test's own Steam listing on September 17.
• 73,739 on day two. MMOHuts, an MMO news site, reports that count for September 18.
• PURPLE is not in it. Neither figure counts anyone who played through PURPLE.
• Mostly Positive, 134 to 56. Steam reviews of the test build stood there when we checked on September 20.
• The opening score. MMOHuts says it opened below 50 percent on day one.
• The complaints. Testers hit a mobile-style interface, an easy opening stretch, and two features that play the game for you.
• Playing itself. Auto-navigation walks your character to the objective, and auto-potions heal it without a keypress.

A free six-hour window costs a curious player nothing, so the peak measures curiosity as much as commitment. What it does prove is that NC can put a five-figure crowd on one build and keep it standing.

The Rules

The wrap-up post carried two test rules into launch: direct trading stays off, and paying members get their own queue.

NC posted the wrap-up on the evening of September 18 Pacific time, September 19 UTC. It closed the test and set the launch rules in the same post.

Trading

• No direct trades. NC keeps player-to-player trading disabled at launch and calls it an anti-bot measure.
• One place to trade. The Market, the in-game exchange NC points players to, 'remains our central hub for trading between players.'

Queues

• Members go first. 'When a server is at capacity, members in good standing join the priority queue instead of the general queue.'
• Membership costs money. Every Founder's Pack, the paid pre-order bundle, includes a 30-day membership, and NC sells membership on its own too.
• It can be revoked. NC says accounts with disciplinary action, or suspected of breaking its terms of service, may lose the privilege.

Launch week

• Paid access first. Advanced Access, the five days reserved for Founder's Pack holders, runs September 30 to October 4.
• Free on October 5. Aion 2 goes free-to-play on PC that day, through Steam and PURPLE.
• Reinstall required. Steam testers have to uninstall the test build and download the retail client.
• Sixty streamers. War for Atreia, NC's two-week creator event, starts September 30 with 60 streamers split between the game's two factions, the Elyos and the Asmodians.

Every cell on the right is empty because Riot has said nothing about any of it.

What This Means for the Riot MMO

Our read: demand for a new MMO is not the question, the paid queue is the decision Riot faces the first time a server fills, and NC's day-one complaints name the traps.

• The crowd showed up. A new MMO can still pull a five-figure crowd with nothing but a date and a free download.
• The reset. Riot co-founder Marc Merrill scrapped the first version in March 2024 because 'the initial vision just wasn't different enough from what you can play today.'
• No build since. Riot has not shown a playable build in the two and a half years since.
• One signal this month. The closest thing to a status update was a producer's five-word post that it is time to lock in.
• The queue is monetization. A priority queue for paying members is a monetization decision made on launch day.
• Not an outlier. A free MMO already put a $25 door on its first five days and gave the people who paid their own servers.
• Riot's track record. Riot ships a catalog that is entirely free-to-play and monetized through cosmetics, and it has never put a business model on the record for the MMO.
• Bots get the blunt fix. Switching off direct trades charges every player for what a minority automates.
• A sharper tool exists. Vanguard, the kernel-level anti-cheat under Riot's PC games, is a bot answer that costs no player a trade window.
• The other approach. Blizzard banned gold-for-loot raids in WoW Forever, its rebuilt World of Warcraft, and promised to punish gold buyers.
• A design brief, free. Riot's one design opening in Sydney is a senior UX designer who knows Unreal Engine, posted September 14.

We ran a take-or-leave sort on Blizzard's nine WoW Forever decisions. NC's launch rules get the same treatment.

Our read. The first time a Riot server fills, the studio answers three questions in public at once: who waits, how bots get handled, and how much of the game plays itself. NC answered all three on launch day by selling the queue, closing the trade window and leaving the automation in. Riot has not said whether its MMO inherits Vanguard, what the game costs, or how big it is.

Your Take

What to Watch

Three dated beats on NC's calendar, then three more RuneGrove reads.

September 30

Advanced Access opens for Founder's Pack holders, and War for Atreia starts

Five days of paid early play; 60 streamers across three regions for two weeks.

October 4

Advanced Access ends

The last day before the servers open to everyone.

October 5

Aion 2 launches free-to-play on Steam and PURPLE

Steam testers must uninstall the test build and install the retail client first.

A Free MMO Just Put a $25 Door on Its First Five Days, and the People Who Pay Get Their Own Servers

Riot MMO

Riot Should Take Six Things From WoW Forever. Nine decisions Blizzard put on stage at BlizzCon, sorted into the six the Runeterra game should copy and the three it should leave in Azeroth.

Riot MMO

Riot's MMO Is Hiring a Senior UX Designer. The Sydney listing posted September 14 wants Unreal Engine familiarity and is the only design role among the studio's seven Sydney openings.

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Reported from NC's Steam posts, SteamDB and MMOHuts, with the three X posts embedded above. The MMO read is ours and clearly speculative. Analysis by RuneGrove.