I play AoC with a four year old laptop, and logically have very bad fps... but I've never crashed when alt-tabbing :). (Does go very slow tho, but that's because of the laptop, not the game :D)

There's been quite some grouping in the lower level dungeons since the merges in Europe. And before you could always find lvl 80's willing to run you through them. It's not the same as experiencing it in full group of players of the intended level, but still :). Sanctum is a gorgeous instance, that you should really visit ;). 

And yes, AoC has a lot of "kill x" quests, but in this game you're usually fighting multiple enemies at once. I don't think you would spend more time in AoC killing 20 mobs than you would in another MMO killing 10.

*drool*

The younger generations don't associate Conan with Arnold, and thank heavens for that. Horrible actor who made a horrible Conan.

And I hope Funcom never announces F2P for Age of Conan ;)

Do you see them asking those questions to any other developer? Do you think interviews with any developer should always focus on class balance and not finding a group at low level? Because, again, you could ask those same questions to Blizzard devs but I see noone calling for that :).

Originally posted by Eladi

Originally posted by Adhesive33

Originally posted by hieloux

To all of those people saying "there is no pvp" I beg to differ. I play on Wiccana and I PvP everyday. True there are still some problems, but tbh it is getting alot better. FC has a chance to make a big impact with the movie coming out. Lets hope they don't drop the ball this time, second chances don't come along often.

Well, I played on Doomsayer during Early Access until just before patch 1.05 went live, and I would PvP constantly. I've logged back in recently, rolling a lvl50 on Wicanna, and I've tried, unsuccesfully, three times to queue up for a PvP minigame. Am I doing something wrong? How can you PvP everyday when I haven't been able to get a match in the last three?

Course he is a lvl 80 that has bin blinded by it. there alot of folks who say theres pvp, and grouping,and fun..well theres not.

Im playing atm, and not the free days but a sub , same issue all over the place on every server (tho the main pve server seems a little better )  below 80 there is -no- grouping, no pvp, AoC = a Solo game were you grind to 80 in order to find other players doings mini's and khitai content.  the gap between a new 80 and a "vet" 80 is also HUGE, perks, time based  give them better stats and powers, PvP gear gives them a HUGE adv, as a new 80 you can expect to die, die die, and just lay down on your back untill someone kills you.  and thats between two egual classes, theres still some mayor issue's whit class ballance going on.

the game is fun, but for new players it got alot of fustrations and i be amazed if 1/10 stays and subs afther the first month free play. it be more likely 1/1000

 

I play at Aquilonia, one of the least populated servers in Europe. When you join a guild, you'll be able to group even there below level 80. Minigames below level 80 are non-existing on that server, but are definitely going on at the more populated ones.

It's no different from other MMO's that have been out for some years: people are max level. Go to the most populated servers on WoW, and you can bet that in a lot of zones you'll be playing alone or have a hard time finding a group for some low-level dungeon. And as a new player in WoW, you'll also have a hard time taking on people who've played for 7 years.. And class balance? Have fun finding an MMO which has real class balance, you won't find one.

Age of Conan has the same "problem" every single MMO has that has been out for some time.

The game's great, and I'm having fun levelling even on the less populated servers. Grind? There's so much content now that there's hardly any grind needed to reach max lvl. Definitely not more than in any other AAA title.

Originally posted by eoweth

I'm assuming you guys haven't played since the first week of release or something?  There are new players and a ton of returning players showing up every single day.  A lot of new content has already been added to the game and more is coming.  Even presumedly an expansion pack.

Conan is definitely a AAA title and keeps getting better with each new patch.  It's a wonderful change of pace from the WoW clones like Rift and everything else out there.

 

This.

Best MMO on the market for me these days. Dreamworld update made the game decently playable even on 3-4 year old laptops, Khitai is awesome after the progression patch, there's tons of (good) content, graphics and music/sound are best on the market and not to mention that the combat system puts every other MMO to shame.

Only minus is the PvP. God damned bunnyhoppers.

I've recently resubbed as well, after having the hugest burn-down ever seen in the world of burn-downs. A two year "break" and the burn-down is reduced to a faint memory. The game has improved incredibly. Sure, many of the things Funcom did to improve the game should have been in from the start, but, it's there now and it's great. Especially the engine-update did wonders. I also play on a 3-year old laptop, I bought especially for Age of Conan's launch at the time. I actually had minus FPS at times. Now I can run the game perfectly, except for larger PvP or PvE where I have to turn off particle effects etc. (it still is a three year old laptop badly taken care for).

Levelling gaps have been filled almost completely, though there's still a small gap in lvl 70-80 if you don't do group-dungeons. Most of the game there's more quests than you can ever need to level. There's also more quests post-Tortage with voice-overs. Most are still text-only, however I've never really found that so terrible. Disappointing a bit, yes, but not a deal-breaker. I mean, most MMO's don't have voice-overs at all!

Also want to say: Age of Conan has a lot of very nicely designed dungeons, both solo and group. Black Castle is pure Indiana Jones. The game's definitely at the top when it comes to PvE.

PvP is still somewhat disappointing though, as I'm simply no fan of minigames/battlegrounds/whateveryouwanttocallthem. The game's combat system does lead to some very interesting PvP-fights, but I absolutely hate the none-stop bunnyhopping and running circles that you need to do if you want to stand a chance in PvP. Breaks the immersion, it looks ridiculous, and well, I suck in it. Haven't done Sieges yet so far.

Most bugs are fixed, though there's still some there that still aren't fixed (Herald of Xotli floating sword to mention one). The game's become very good, but it ain't perfect yet.

Of course, the combat system is simply brilliant and it's really hard to get back to the boring, traditional systems of other MMO's when you're used to AoC's system again. Fatalities keep bringing a smile on my face every time I or a team-mate pull one off.

Not to mention that the game still has the best graphics and music/sound of any MMO currently on the market and will most likely remain at the top in those regards for some time to come.

In short: Age of Conan is currently at the top of the genre, without a doubt. If you set aside your prejudices and forget about the things that were promised once and instead take a neutral look on what's in the game now, you can only be amazed. Only thing that still could use quite some improvement is the PvP, but to be quite fair, that's something that can be said about pretty much every MMO out there.

PS: Funcom should consider a Tortage revamp though, reducing the amount of running there. Reduce the running, and it'll be a lot more enjoyable to having to go there for the 100th time.

It IS real. 

I doubt Funcom would go as far as spreading VIRUSES to people visiting Ragnar's blog. Yes, viruses. 

His blog got hacked; hackers put viruses on them (some members got infected); Ragnar tried to remove those; hackers used his account to send spam mails; Wordpress removed the account due to the spam mails. 

If you want confirmation on this, read this topic:

http://www.darkdemonscrygaia.com/showthread.php?t=8227

These posts:

Confirmed by community manager Famine

http://www.darkdemonscrygaia.com/showpost.php?p=272468&postcount=31

http://www.darkdemonscrygaia.com/showpost.php?p=272867&postcount=75

Ragnar's Twitter:

"@CaelinUK Thanks for the heads up. Should be up and running again now, but I don't know what to do to prevent this in the future."

"@rainforest1155 Sniper kitten = my redirect. Until the bullies leave my site alone - or I get some help with security - the kitten stays."

"Adding insult to injury, my domain is now being used to send mass spam emails. Lovely. The blog won't be back for quite a while, I'm afraid."

"@KurtisC_Nyte Apparently it's Wordpress; they've been using an exploit to do lots of nasty stuff."

"So that's the end of that: RagnarTornquist.com has been shut down, my account suspended due to a massive amount of spam mails. Bye-bye blog."

So, no, this ain't part of the marketing I'm afraid.

Originally posted by Mystik86

Either way it still begs the question: Why would a bunch of Indonesian hackers want to fuck with Ragnar and/or TSW? Makes no sense other than some stupid asian script-kiddie trying his luck at screwing a random person over...

Multiple wordpress blogs got hacked, he wasn't the only one.

Originally posted by hidden1

Those grainy, pixelated pictures worry me.  Sure I'd like to say it's "stylistic license" but I like other posters have mentioned would like to see picture perfect jpgs, and not what looks like snapshops of old PS1 FMV.  Although I have to admit, the town reminded me of what I used to picture the mood and feeling of HP Lovecraft's various towns I'd read in various stories from time to time.

But, please show us some clear, high resolution pics next time.  Would be nice.

The pictures on the Kingsmouth site are meant to be grainy, as to make it harder to see that they are in fact screenshots from a game and not real pictures. That's why they also included some real photographs in the gallery on the site. 

Funcom's taking a good approach on 'hyping' this game, doing it entirely different than the way they did with Age of Conan. It's actually not really possible to get hyped about the game itself at the moment, since have hardly seen anything of it. 

The story however... I don't think I've ever been so hyped about a game ever. I wouldn't actually even care if the game sucks, the story till now was totally worth my time and drool. 

By the way, they've been working for a long, long time on this game already, so I actually think they're further than we think. I guess they don't want to make the same mistake they made with AoC again: lots of promises they can't deliver on. I'm guessing that the moment we'll start seeing more in-game material (screens and vids), the release will be quite close. 

Still, it's a 2011 release at minimum. I just hope they're not actually going to wait till 2012 so they can release on the Maya doomday :P

Had Templar as result, but I joined the Dragon. 

I like both groups, but the Dragons look a bit more my style.

The trailer is pure bliss. TSW is all about the story, the ARG, and these trailers really set the mood perfectly for the game. Even if the game would ultimately suck, the ARG so far has been so good already.. That alone makes it worth your while to follow this game. 

Looking forward to what comes out of PAX. Would be nice to start seeing some in-game footage (normally we're going to see some in-game screenshots at PAX at least). 

Played the expansion at GamesCom, saw the Age of Conan booth and the hundreds of people crowding it, talked with the devs, ... definitely didn't look like a dieing game ;)

Originally posted by elmomiento

Good review. Just one mistake: There is a way to change your characters with out complete log out the game. Just click in the log out bottom and wait till the time finishe with out click the "log out ". These will make you go back to the select characters screen very fast, and you will not need to re-enter  in the game as you said in the review.

You can also just type /camp

Yes, classless mmo's are almost non-existing. And EVE isn't exactly a mainstream game either. 

Though it would seem there are some mainstream mmo's in the make with classless systems, Champions Online for example, The Secret World also. But yeah, even with games in the making I can only come up with 2 names :/

Yeah, the cover icons look a bit stupid, but we already knew that you were only going to be able to cover behind certain objects, not everywhere. It's not necesarrily a dumbed down feature, not more than the features of all other theme park mmo's are 'dumbed down'.

The reason WAR never got the same negative comments and ratings was because everyone was still nagging about Age of Conan. It was and still is like people wanted Age of Conan to fail and took every opportunity to break it down, while everyone turned a blind eye on the WAR problems.

Age of Conan had a far better launch than Warhammer Online. Much less server issues, while WAR had quite some lag, crashes and stupid queue's. Both AoC and WAR suffered from performance issues, and yes, AoC had more of them, but AoC has top-notch graphics, while WAR has completely out-dated graphics. I think having performance issues with a game like WAR is a lot worse than with a game like AoC, at least you get nice graphics in return for the latter... 

And, in AoC most people managed to get to lvl 40 before they quit the game because of lack of content, in WAR most people got bored before reaching lvl 20... 

Honestly, the only reason why WAR didn't get the same negative critics as AoC was because when WAR launched people were bashing the lack of lvl 50 and 80 content in AoC. The real negative critics and drops in subs came at that time, while WAR got hit by the subs dropping a lot faster. 

I quit AoC myself and I'm so burned-out of it that I'm probably never going back to it, but WAR was so utterly flawed and boring once you got past the first 15 lvl's, I'm certain I'm never going back there. Both games deserve a lower rating, but WAR definitely deserves a lower rating than Conan. 

The things AoC did bad, WAR often did even worse, so it's not really fair that it's AoC that's gotten in the fail dictionnary and not WAR. Definitely now that AoC seems to be improving each day and regaining popularity and respect, while WAR is still the same..

Look at the 1.5 patch for AoC, everyone was "this is the patch that will be a matter of life and death for the game, it has to be good". It's got huge attention from players and press, with often people almost hoping it's going to fail. But at the same time WAR launched their Land of the Death patch, a patch that's just as crucial for that game's future as Gangs of Tarantia for AoC. But again, everyone turns a blind eye on it.

I doubt that Mythic will actively help with the design of SW:TOR. As a group I'm guessing they'll mostly play an advising role, definitely on the part of the MMO-aspect, an area that is completely new for BioWare. BioWare also stated long before this that they were very intrigued by the RvR systems of DaoC and WAR, so it wouldn't be a far fetched assumption to believe that Mythic will be providing insight on that aspect either. 

I believe the most active "help" Mythic will provide is not as the "group" Mythic, but BioWare pulling some of the best developers away from WAR to work on SW:TOR instead. 

On the aspect of "experience". I think in the MMO-world it has shown that experience of making MMO's means absolutely nothing:

- Turbine: Creators of the extremely good Asheron's Call, but lost much of their reputation with AC 2 and Dungeons & Dragons Online. It's only with LOTRO that they managed to become once again a highly acclaimed company.

- Mythic: Some call DaoC a "lucky shot" now, but even if that would be true, it's still a highly acclaimed game and succesful in it's day. They failed to live up to that reputation with Warhammer Online, where they didn't manage to deliver what was promised and the game is not nearly the succes they had hoped for.

- Funcom: With Anarchy Online they started out.. terrible, but in time that game grew to become a succes and an inspiration for other MMO's. Much as Mythic's Warhammer, they failed to live up to the expectations for Age of Conan and didn't deliver what was promised. Both WAR and AOC seem to be recovering and on the right track again now, however.

- SOE: This company has a long list of developed/published MMO's. With EverQuest I and II they have two extremely succesful MMO's, with definitely EQ I as one of the most important games in the history of the genre. Although the game has lost much of its former glory, they've got probably the best MMOFPS out there with PlanetSide. With Star Wars Galaxies they've appeared to have shattered their reputation for eternity for many people however. And Vanguard was so unsuccesful many people don't even know it exists.

- NCSoft: Giant MMO developer and publisher. As Sony they've got a huge list of both very succesful and very unsuccesful games. Lineage I and II, Guild Wars, City of Heroes, etc belong to the first group, Tabula Rasa and Auto Assault to the second. 

- Blizzard: No experience with MMO's whatsoever, but managed to create not only the best-selling MMO in history, but having more subscribers than almost all other MMO's on the market together.

I could go on. But I think that if you look at the history of the MMO-genre, you'll all come to the same conclusion that experience of developing in this genre means near to nothing. If anything you'd rather say that the companies with no experience produce the best games. All companies listed above have almost all gained their reputation and acclaim with the first MMO they developed, not the MMO's after that, even though they had more experience then.

If it's good, I might come back to the game :)