I played Lineage II a while back and I gotta say it had the makings of a great MMO of its day.
Unfortunately, although it was released 5 years ago, the design ideas a far older. It was made in a time when devs felt the way to keep people engaged was to make the grind more punishing with little regard for the actual quality of the game experience.
It released on the heels of WoW which showed us you can have a light grind and still hold our attention and interest for very long periods of time AND have fun doing it.
I also think NCSoft North America did a horrible job at administating/policing the game which even today has persistent bot problems.

Had L2 launched with the current leveling curve and had they been more vigilant in their bot policing, L2 may have made a great impact on the west as well as east.
In the year I played I experienced some of the most intense ingame politics and communities ever bar none.

To bad, so sad for L2, coulda, shoulda, woulda. Now its just another old timer typing to keep up with the new market but they missed their day like so many other NCSoft games.