NCsoft CFO Jaeho Lee said, in an earnings call, that he expects Aion to be extremely successful in the US and European markets, after the impressive numbers gathered in the west: 40.6 billion won (USD 32.7 million) in Q2 2008, as reported in Gamasutra.

Jaeho Lee words were as follows: "I believe the performance of Aion in the US and European markets will be very successful. ... We are guessing that Aion will be -- could be -- the second [most] successful MMO in the US market next to World of Warcraft."

But when an analyst asked how many boxes of Aion were shipping to retail as compared to NCsoft's MMORPG Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa, that cost tens of millions and many years to make - and Garriott sued NCsoft -, the answer was this: "Ok, um, it's very unfortunate to hear the name of Tabula Rasa at this conference call. And we all want to forget and erase that memory from our performance."

So, has the time come to World of Warcraft to have a worthy opponent, or just another contender to be defeated?