Take a look at Lineage 2. It was released four years ago and it still looks amazing. NCsoft has never had a problem ponying up the art. The issues come from them being asleep at the wheel for after the game is released. In L2 class balance is a joke, bots run rampant in almost every hunting ground. Ebay and powerleveling services are the so out in the open that NCsoft doesn't even try to keep up the pretences that they are still actively combating those issues.

My entire time in WoW(just over a year) I saw three bots out in the open. L2? Bot groups run almost every room in Catacombs/Necropolises(sought after hunting areas). It's a fun game and I am sure that Aion will be, but NCsoft has shown itself to be capable of producing a modern AAA MMO...but wholly unable to manage one.