And then you find out...
His kit was made by...
The same guy who made bard's kit.
Why Riot, how is this guy still employed. Please.
What the hell? Bard's kit is easily one of the most fun champions in the game. What's your beef with the designer?
Regardless, living up to the hype would have been impossible for Ao Shin or Aurelion Sol regardless. The longer the wait, the higher the bar goes, and the more difficult it is to pass it. This champion is
not Ao Shin. He's not the champ that's been in development forever, he's Aurelion Sol, the star dragon champion we've only recently been teased of.
The same could have been said for a lot of champions, some had immense build ups (Jhin, Bard, Kindred, and Ekko in order of intensity) and none of them lived up to the build up (Except Kindred, even so a lot of people expected something wildly different for their kit), people thought Jhin didn't play the "Psychopathic Artist" too much in his kit, Bard was a support (Underwhelming enough as is), Kindred was thought to be dual champ (But ended up being a handicapped wolf barking around), and Ekko's time mechanic seemed wildly limited.
imo he looks like he's going to be kind of boring to play
his kit looks like a 2012-esque character, and his entire playstyle is based around "be this far from the bad guys"
He's actually not as boring as he seems. "Be this far from the bad guys" also translates into "Be this close to the Aurelion Sol" and "Stun the Aurelion Sol for god's sakes so his orbs don't disintegrate us" and the latter is hard to do because chasing Aurelion sol is as bad a plan as singed. Getting in orb range as Aurelion Sol is also hard, you're either too far for short range orbs (And still in mauling distance for the enemy) or they're too close for long range orbs, and the enemies enter this sweet spot called anywhere else that's still mauling distance, or even worse, just outside for long range orbs.