The purpose of this post is to create a discussion about Funcom's next move:

Background:

Something is a miss with Age of Conan today, it seems like many players were not playing Age of Conan because it was good but rather because it was a time killer in anticipation of something else.  Yesterday it was Warhammer, today it is Aion and tomorrow it will be Final fantasy and KOTOR 3 MMOs.  Sadely, AoC just can't compete in today's market place because recent users and players have found AoC's lack of content, game mechanics, and bugs/broken issues like sieges to be unacceptable...especially when AoC is not engrossing to most players.

During free trials and win backs many players gave Funcom a second chance and since then the population has plumeted...within the last three months only 1 in 3 or 1 in 4 players still play according to X fire, now that includes free trials and win backs...but  the purpose of those initiatives to get NEW players and INCREASE the population, when the opisite occured.

So AOC today is unacceptable to the average MMO player.

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Looking Forward:

AA posted some up comming stuff that will neither attract new players or keep the one this game has www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/256448/Whats-Coming-Up-For-Age-Of-Conan.html  7 Raid bosses or whatever is all that is comming to tide over raiding guilds until the expansion, then the new RR system while cool is a rip off from Warhammer and Aion. My  point is when nothing is currently working well in AOC why are they trying to add new mechanics? So far a good number of subscribers to AoC, just keep their subscription in support of the next patch as what the game has today is not enough and more often then not those patches are more grief than good.

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Funcom's Next Move?

Do to recent population issues with AoC, it seems after losing 34 million dollars on Age of Conan already that AoC is in for more trouble ahead. Funcom can't afford to lose money forever and they only have two shots at survival, AoC which is already a collosal failure by any measure other than a few personal oppinions, 34 m loss + low population trump any personal opinions.

Norway, the country who throws around Nobel Peace Prizes like goddy trinkets, is in jeapordy of being one video game company less very soon. So this thread is to discuss how Funcom can turn it around.

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My Prediction:

I think financial pressure will cause TSW to be released early after being burned by AOC, Funcom will have fewer people willing to buy it so unless it is the best game ever created AND it attracts the people with enough pull to bring in more players by word of mouth, this game won't do well. Most of the movers and shakers in the MMO world are not going to pay to beta test anymore Funcom games.  So Funcom will have major issues here IMO. To remedy it - they will burn through their cash reserve to advertise like mad, which will just expediate the company's fate, good or bad.

AoC expansion?  Heck yeah, it also will be released early do to the population decline, as people leave it snowballs do to the social nature of the MMO, TBH I have always quit MMOs do to social reasons rther than gameplay issues (guild or dedicated group disbanded, most of my friends quit, etc)....anything after 6 months from today and AOC will have trouble bringing people back because this MMO will be forgotten.  Whatever happens, AoC will bleed subs until the expansion, which will snowball. The main issue is if it is released early or it is content lite or crappy or buggy....AOC is done and will either be shut down or it will tank the company.....the only other possibility is Funcom stopping 99.99999 % of development and bug fixes and firing all of those positions and just hosting whatever the game is like on some server and doing nothing to it, which will shrink the population even more.  Also the US/EU, PvP/PvE server splits will make this complex.

SUMMARY:

Funcom is in trouble, AoC is in trouble and if Funcom makes one wrong choice, unlike how Norway wrongly choose who to award the Nobel prize too, Funcom will reap what they sew. Will Funcom panic and rush out more unfinished and buggy content in an attempt to bring in and keep new players? How will Funcom turn this around?

1)  wall of text. Just skimmed through. Where is your comments regarding, korea launch and also the 2 casual mmos Funcom aare woriking on? Thats money coming in. 

2) Here is "proof" that sub numbers is the same as in may this year.  Look at the 6 months graph. Doesnt look that bad now that Aion has crashed. 

http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/ageofconan.com

3) And before you start throwing xfire figures at me, please go into WOW; LOTRO, WAR, and AION (yes Aion). They have all crashed according to xfire. 

4) Why dont you head over to the WAR forums and troll there? That game sold more than AoC and is now doing worse? Move along!
 

EDIT the link you linked proves my point...website trafic to that site is DOWN 66% over 3 months www.alexa.com/siteinfo/ageofconan.com  it went from .1 to .03, you said you don't read much, which explains those facts but how is your math?

Your wrong again Funcom wont make another penny off the Korea launch, they sold the rights outright.

AoC loses money and the game lost 33 million...so with much much much fewer people willing to buy the expansion and the new MMO TSW it seems like Funcom is likely to lose much more money. 

Think! AoC duped 800,000 people to try AoC and 50% stayed after 3 months and the game still lost 34 million....imagine how bad it will be when they can only dupe 100k to try those expansions do to the poor reputation of AoC and Funcom?

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Sorry, I can't argue with you because your just making stuff up and your facts are all wrong.

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Warhammer was a pretty good game and it is not doing worse....a little better actually than AoC....they both have the same issue, no end game and bad game mechanics/class balance.

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Where in the world are you getting your numbers from? If the game was failing, why are they doing an expansion? They haven't sold off their Korean rights, because that is IP and no company would do that unless they were going under. You are the same doom and gloom type of people they we see with every game coming out. Your predictions are wrong, your facts are wrong and your assumptions are wrong. That website you link doesn't tell the entire story either.  Nice try on the world is ending bit though.

finaticd, since January you have posted close to 500 messages about a game that you obviously hate.  What motivates you?  By now you must have spent much more time writing about the game than actually playing it.  It is fascinating.

AoC's next move?  Should be more character slots.  This is probably the single reason I didn't resub recently.  The game is great, but the re-playablity is low with limited slots.  Opposing factions would be a plus too.

Originally posted by tjcombo

Where in the world are you getting your numbers from? If the game was failing, why are they doing an expansion? They haven't sold off their Korean rights, because that is IP and no company would do that unless they were going under. You are the same doom and gloom type of people they we see with every game coming out. Your predictions are wrong, your facts are wrong and your assumptions are wrong. That website you link doesn't tell the entire story either.  Nice try on the world is ending bit though.

They are doing an expansion in hopes of breaking even. As of now they are losing money.

My numbers are from X fire...and the last two financial reports stated that they sold the rights to AoC in asia.

AoC was just launched in Russia and Poland and it didn't do that well, so they sold the right for either 3 or 6 million in two lump sums.

PAGE 2:

In November 2008 Funcom signed an agreement
with Neowiz, a leading Korean publisher which has
obtained the right to sell and operate Age of Conan
for a five year period in Korea. The Company
received one portion of a minimum guaranteed
royalty in Q109 and expects to receive the
remaining in Q209.

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X fire had th epopulation around 2k users per day 3 months ago today it is 500. Aion has been stable but since it is so hard it will drop a lot.

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EDIT: Funcom started doing the expansion BEFORE AoC was released...so they stuck with it in hopes of turning around the game. IMO they should have used that manpower to polish but it is Funcom.

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I don't like how Funcom conducts business one bit plus I had an issue on the official forums I post a gamebreaking issue and get banned, it wassn't an exploit.

They are not doing an expansion because they are losing money. If they were trying to, then you would see a slew of new things, like new classes. If you have been following AOC as well as you said you have, you would have known that this was coming since the launch of AOC. They have revamped AOC to be more RPG related than just action. Every game goes through this. Look at LOTRO, Vanguard (which people have been trying to nail coffins in), SWG (which is still going after the NGE), UO (10 plus years and running), EQ2, DOAC, City of Heroes...and the list goes on. Even Wow is throwing out expansions every year...are they losing money too?  Also, I can't find these so called finance reports where they sold their rights off and there is nothing on the internet stating such things. I would think that would be big news.... can you link them?

P.S. As far as your gamebreaking issue that got you banned....you probably did something foolish on the forums, they just don't banned you for flagging an issue. I know this, because I posted several bugs and such things were discussed within the community. And not once, did I get a warning or was banned for it. So long as you follow the rules of posting, you are fine.

Originally posted by tjcombo

They are not doing an expansion because they are losing money. If they were trying to, then you would see a slew of new things, like new classes. If you have been following AOC as well as you said you have, you would have known that this was coming since the launch of AOC. They have revamped AOC to be more RPG related than just action. Every game goes through this. Look at LOTRO, Vanguard (which people have been trying to nail coffins in), SWG (which is still going after the NGE), UO (10 plus years and running), EQ2, DOAC, City of Heroes...and the list goes on. Even Wow is throwing out expansions every year...are they losing money too?

Your logic is wrong, they are throwing out an expansion because they started it before the game came out back when they thought AOC would be a sucess and they just havn't changed directions........MMOs need new content to survive so this may kill them but do to AOC's high graphics, development is more costly so don't expect much in terms of anything after this expansion.

Plus, yes the game is doing poorly...this Expansion is the last hope for AoC.  Free trials and win backs failed. MMO companies use expansions to keep and bring back players....so it is important.

On that topic....is it time for more server mergers?

No I posted a big write up about the female attack issue before it was common and got banned. I didn't know much about Funcom then but there is no freedom of speach over on the official forums they mod that site to be 100% positive.

Great, we are all in agreement that MMOs needs expansions to survive, so every game that has a expansion is losing money? That is what I would assume by your logic. AOC should have an expansion, just like every MMO. Free trials??? I laugh at your reasoning for that. Shall we take a count of how many MMOs have free trials out now? Does that mean that are stinking? I doubt it. Free trials are meant to bring in people.....Wow has it, are they failing? LOTRO has it, are they failing, Champions Online will eventually have theirs out, are they failing too? I know you hate AOC and I beginning to believe it is because you were banned. But if Vanguard can survive this long considering how they were dropped by Microsoft and picked up by SOE after everything that has happened, I am sure AOC will do just fine.

Tabla rusa had an expansion planed so IMO expansion have NO RELATION to sucess of the game.

In this instance only, the expansion has 100% percent influence on whether or not AOC will survive.

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My point of the right up was not to argue about points that are obviouse...huge drop in population, financial issues, etc....but what will happen to turn the game around and will it work?  Will Funcom cut its losses? Server mergers? Will the expansions be released to early as a hail marry to bring in revenue?

I don't think Funcom is putting the entire future of AOC into one expansion. If that was the case, why aren't we seeing new Classes? A ton new abilities? Spells? They are not doing that, they have said so. They are making this into a RPG as it should have been. Server Merges---Already done and they dropped the weakest servers. And again, most MMOs after launch has huge drop populations. It is not really the developers fault as people nowadays are just spoiled. They expect the WOW experience because they came from WOW. Then they all want to be uber powerful and when that doesn't work and they can't exploit, they complain about other classes they can't beat in PVP, when that is done, they leave. What's left are the more dedicated, committed types. The same thing is going to happen to Kotor MMO, STO and every other new mmo that comes out.

Originally posted by finaticd   "My numbers are from X fire"

Fail. Another Xfire thread.

Originally posted by AmazingAvery

Originally posted by finaticd   "My numbers are from X fire"

 

Fail. Another Xfire thread.

Agreed.  People here know how I feel about AoC.  But, anyone that uses XFire numbers to try and prove their point has already lost the argument before they even wrote it down.  You need to learn that XFire depends on people actually installing it and using it to mean anything.  There is no statistical point to X-Fire because there is no way to prove how many gamers are on in AoC and how many of those gamers have X Fire installed and working!  Don't use X Fire numbers to make an argument because all it does is make a person look like a moron.

Originally posted by Shannia

Originally posted by AmazingAvery

Originally posted by finaticd   "My numbers are from X fire"

 

Fail. Another Xfire thread.

 

Agreed.  People here know how I feel about AoC.  But, anyone that uses XFire numbers to try and prove their point has already lost the argument before they even wrote it down.  You need to learn that XFire depends on people actually installing it and using it to mean anything.  There is no statistical point to X-Fire because there is no way to prove how many gamers are on in AoC and how many of those gamers have X Fire installed and working!  Don't use X Fire numbers to make an argument because all it does is make a person look like a moron.

 

Doesn't track DX10 AoC users either. I know a lot in my guild that run DX10 with no problems. I however can't say that. Openedge went back to using xfire I think and he only uses DX10 client. (If I read his blog correctly)

I don't get why no players of AoC understand statistics....when free trials pop up the number goes to 2000 users per day, now three months later it is down to 500.  That is pretty epic and both figures are from after DX 10 was added.

The players are discussing X fire and they don't understand statistics but if you log in you will notice many fewer players...forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php

So what is the issue? Because 2/3 or 3/4 of the players just up and stopped playing in the last 3 months.

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Yes all games make expansions.....no in this case if this expansion fails AoC will either stop getting anything new or the plug on the servers will but pulled.   I was just talking about shrinkage in Aion, so yeah...but 90% ish of player loss is excessive. As I stated it is a social game, when your friends quit you will too, if you have friends.

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X fire = 100% accurate on trends so we know 2/3 or 3/4 players stopped playing...there is zero argument  there....guess what???? website trafic to AoC's official site is down 66% over the last 3 months so 2 of 3 Viewers stopped viewing. AoC's recent population plument is documented by those metrix and players saying the populations are way down.

Oh Boy!

Its another "I hope that FC is doing bad and since I have no proof I'll throw up X Fire to prove it".

X Fire? You have got to be joking. X Fire stats aren't worth the page their printed on and everyone ... but you I guess ... seems to know that.

Another X Fire FAIL thread ROFLMAO!!

Try with something substantial you sad little X Fire man ....lololololol

Originally posted by finaticd

I don't get why no players of AoC understand statistics....when free trials pop up the number goes to 2000 users per day, now three months later it is down to 500.  That is pretty epic and both figures are from after DX 10 was added.

The players are discussing X fire and they don't understand statistics but if you log in you will notice many fewer players...forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php

 

So what is the issue? Because 2/3 or 3/4 of the players just up and stopped playing in the last 3 months.

 

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Yes all games make expansions.....no in this case if this expansion fails AoC will either stop getting anything new or the plug on the servers will but pulled.   I was just talking about shrinkage in Aion, so yeah...but 90% ish of player loss is excessive. As I stated it is a social game, when your friends quit you will too, if you have friends.

 

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X fire = 100% accurate on trends so we know 2/3 or 3/4 players stopped playing...there is zero argument  there....guess what???? website trafic to AoC's official site is down 66% over the last 3 months so 2 of 3 Viewers stopped viewing. AoC's recent population plument is documented by those metrix and players saying the populations are way down.

I think it is time to move on and stop stalking AoC.  She obviously doesn't like you anymore and your obsession with her is unhealthy.  

You preoccupation with trying to rally forum hatred against AoC is tired and has been done many times before by people better at it then you.

Your statistics are questionable at best and your ability to predict gaming trends remains unproven and unsolicited.

instead of wasting time on threads explaining why you don't like AoC, how about posting a thread about how good your MMO of choice is and why others should play it with you.