Reviews of Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures - PC

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I am writing this review because I see all the old 2008 reviews which really don't do justice to the bonecrunching, blood and gore awesomeness of this game. I didn't play Age of Conan (AoC) when it came out in 2008 because I was in the middle of my 2 year World of Warcraft (WoW) stint. I have to assume that however messed up AoC was at launch, most of those problems have been fixed because I haven't encountered any of the problems mentioned in the old 2008 reviews. I really enjoyed playing WoW, but after two years I felt that I'd "accomplished" all I wanted to in that game (in terms of PvP, endgame raiding, flying mounts, armor sets, rep grinds, etc.) and I wanted to try something new. I was scared off of AoC last year because of all the bad reviews. But out of sheer curiosity and because it was free, I played AoC's free trial this past summer and found it an amazing game with great content for mature players. I really like this game and I'm looking forward to the expansion Rise of the Godslayer. To keep it short and to the point:

Pros

* Awesome graphics they are realistic and can be violent, sexy, or gritty.

* Great storyline and PvE content the kids won't be patient enough to read through it, but I think that's a plus because it keeps the less mature element out of the AoC community

* No excessive grinding: Whenever you kill mobs or collect stuff, it leads somewhere and you progress through areas to reach a goal while you are killing them. It is not mindless killing and boredom. It feels like quests have a point.

* Fun combat: you can't just mash buttons. You have to pay attention to combos but it is not too complex. It's just very engaging and requires some skill.

* No bots or gold farmers! To me, this is huge. While in the starting area of Tortage, I got about 3-4 pieces of in-game mail suggesting I go to a website to buy AoC gold. They were easily deleted. There's no gold spam in the global chat on my server. I haven't received any spam like that since I left the starting area. Funcom has done a great job with making resource gathering difficult or impossible for bots. Gold farmers ruining WoW's economy is another of the reasons I left that game.

Cons

* Low server population except for Wiccana and Cimmeria servers: People are probably scared off because of the bad reviews from launch. Funcom needs to come out with another free trial period to make up for their poorly executed launch, apparently. I hope that with free trials and the launch of the expansion, this game will grow into a viable franchise that can survive for a while because it really is good now.

* Somewhat limited PvP opportunities before reaching level cap at 80 because of low server population, I have not seen a lot of chances to engage in meaningful PvP while leveling up since the mini-games are not running 24-7 like in WoW. I mean they are "running" but not enough people to sign up for them at off peak hours. I really like WoW's battlegrounds and areas like Wintergrasp and Isle of Conquest. Warhammer also has engaging PvP scenarios (though I think the lack of PvE is why Warhammer is not doing as well as they would like). I had over 14K lifetime PvP kills on my main WoW character, so you can guess that I like PvP a lot. I wish AoC would implement some sort of cross-server PvP system like WoW, but they have a resource problem (apparently) and have indicated that it is not a priority at this time. I hope that with more players each server there will be increased action in the PvP minigames and more siege opportunities, which sound like they would be amazing fun. Maybe some faction based PvP would help. I heard AoC will introduce this in the expansion (but no release date yet).

Bottom line: This game is so cheap! Try it and you will get your money's worth. Admittedly, I want more people to play for my own reasons, but I think most mature gamers will appreciate the AoC community and have a lot of fun with this game as I have been doing for the past 4 months.

Rise of the Godslayer has no release date because Funcom apparently doesn't want to repeat the fiasco of AoC's launch last year. That's a good thing. However, if they want to keep this franchise alive, you would think they will get it out by some time in the first half of next year, the sooner the better. I have not played Aion yet and I may give it a try, but for me, AoC is the best game out there now. I like the blood and grittiness in combat compared to how neat, clean and stylized Aion looks in the preview videos, though. Just depends on what you like.

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I'm glad that a corporation is finially taking note that people over 18 enjoy MMORPG's too. from my experience, most MMORPG's are dumbed down, or are cutesy, like the cartoon feel of WoW or the over simplified Guild Wars. Conan is a bit more complicated. The combat systems feels like an RPG, meaning it makes players pay attention to which physical attacks they use-unlike the typical auto attack you can get by with in many situations in other MMORPGS.

Thus far, i haven't been to impressed story wise due to Age of Conan using a rather trite plot device to begin the game: warrior with lost memory slowly regains skills. But, then again, most MMORPGS have odd convoluted plot, if they didnt the game wouldn't strech for 80 levels.

The Conan world is vast, and it has been worked on by many authors:

I am looking foward to playing more of this game for the following reasons: it seems to be inovative, compaired to most MMORPGS; it is designed for adults; it is designed to give players more single player options; and finially, who wouldnt want to ride a mammoth that can knock your enemies away with it tusks.

As a side note for those who own/buy this game, the JuLY issue of PC Gamer Magazine has a code in it for a free Age of Conan item.

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You may not agree with my review but for those of you who want an honest and objective look into it please stick around.

There are several things wrong with this game that make it generally not quite as great as it could have been.

These issues are: easy of leveling, tedious collection styled quests, massive empty zones, problems with resource skill gathering, lack of voice content, few zones, lack of a decent travel system, ease of travel between starter cities, darkness, generally bland armor, dumb AI, lack of a good faction system, guild creation, instance zones, and weapon selection.

I probably have heated a few of you up so feel free to respond to my comments if you disagree but I'm honestly hoping some of these issues are addressed within the next few months as the game begins to grow stronger.

Ease of Leveling:

One of the most unique aspects of the game, I believe, is the ease of leveling I've found within it. I understand that with 100 possible levels there is room to allow quick leveling but when your character can handle 3 or 4 same level enemies at once he tends to level much faster than he probably should. I don't know but this is my first week (I got it Friday) and I'm already in the high 30s.

Tedious Collection Styled Quests:

I understand I can ignore quests altogether but the game seems to focus in on collection and kill count style quests more so than anything else. Why not kill 50 of a certain type of enemy? How about the same quest in a different zone with similarly level enemies? It's just very very repetitive. Not to mention, for the most part, on non-collection quests, you'll be forced to run through dangerous grounds to light something on fire or break something only to find all the enemies in the area are dead from constant farming. Farming is an issue with newer games but I think when you ask your players to kill 50 of a certain type of enemy you encourage it more than anything.

Massive Empty Zones:

For the most part, when you don't find farmers at every corner, you'll find yourself running alone. The game world is huge! It's just most of the time you'll find yourself running through the huge world. For instance to get to a secondary town in the barbarian area you have to run through a zone that has all of the same level enemies but takes nearly ten minutes to run through. It seems like, yeah, it's much larger than games like WoW but it isn't the size that matters but rather what you do with it?

Problems with Resource Skill Gathering:

Alright so you're allowed to gather resources from level 20 on. The thing is the resources only exist in this barren zone full of no enemies (from what I've seen) so you can spend an hour running around and find nothing at all --no people, no resources. The good thing though is while you may not find one resource you may bump into a different type. With Age of Conan anyone can gather any of the resource types removing the significance of the gather role of resources.

Lack of Voice Content:

When you start the game on the newbie island you'll quickly be amazed to find everyone has voice content. You'll be equally surprised that when you leave the newbie island no one has it anymore. The developers say they're going to add it in over time but I don't really see their incentive given by the 20th level a higher majority of people are likely to stick around regardless of the sound if that's the only thing that bugs them.

Few Zones:

Again, as a mentioned above, there are massive zones but there are also very few of them. This means that as a level 20, let's say, you're stuck going to any of the level 20 zones setup for each of the different starting cities (3 of them). That doesn't leave people who like to explore (or find a variety of monsters) much to do. If you like the idea of running around endlessly looking for an enemy to fight or camping a certain enemy this won't bother you but I think there is something about variety that this game lacks in general. I also found it unlikely I'd be wandering into the higher level zones until I did hit some barrier level that made it easy enough to handle a few enemies. So I'm stuck with 3 choices (which I stick to one because it takes me a half hour to run to any other through the barren zones).

Lack of a Decent Travel System:

Binding yourself to a main city is allowed but besides that there is a general lack of a travel system. There are way points in the game which, when you die, you spawn at whichever you select so people often get themselves killed to save time instead of running. The death penalty is laughable so it's not worth wasting the time running.

Ease of Travel Between Starter Cities:

One of the strangest things about this game is how easy it is to travel between the starter cities. From the minute you leave newbie island you can quickly jump from one city to the next for free making it possible to explore all the cities in the game with little effort (besides a 20 minute walk through the barren cities) almost instantly.

Darkness:

This is more of my own complaint than something that really should be fixed I guess but the game is way too dark and there are no items (torches please) to turn on the lights. I've known scores of people who actually turn off the game during the night-time parts of it just because they can't see anything. The deserts are the worst with this because it just is so dark. I think it's brighter in the dungeons than it is outside.

Generally Bland Armor:

The armor doesn't really stand out. You get a new piece at level 30 let's say and it'll look almost the same way as the level 20 one. The only difference will be a +4 to the armor rating. It just feels like the armor lacks variety and it doesn't have a good way of really standing out. Also 'good' armor pieces fall so frequently from monsters I've come out of a run of an area with 3 or so of the same chest pieces. It's just bleh.

Dumb AI:

I've pulled enemies standing directly next to each other, on several occasion, and watched as the enemies did nothing to alert their friends I was fighting them directly behind them. For the most part there is no real AI and you never really get the feeling it would be all that hard to fix a pull to your liking. Yeah, once or twice a bad pull will happen, but as long as the enemy initially sees you, or walks over to you while you're fighting, they tend to ignore what's going on around them. Doesn't seem realistic.

Lack of a Good Faction System:

I feel like each quest I'm doing is for the few copper they'll give me and not to award myself any form of faction with a group. Just seems like as soon as I kill whatever 50 things they want me to kill next I move on to the next group of 50 things (from the same quest giver) that were sitting next to those 50 things. It's really this tedious and it doesn't make sense why they made it this way. Not to mention most of the different types of enemies look almost identical so there is little variation between monsters besides location and name.

Guild Creation:

There is no real control on the process of creating guilds (which may be alright I guess) so there are tons of one person guilds out there. It just seems like the process isn't as well developed as it should be considering a portion of the game is centered towards it. It just seems like a fancy grouping system as opposed to anything significant --yeah you can rank people but it seems bland at least so far. Perhaps later on it'll get more interesting.

Instance Zones:

The zones are all instanced including the main cities. This makes the load times really fast, yes, but you rarely see people and it makes group in zone much harder. I tend to group at the dungeon location so I find myself trying really hard to find people with no luck when I need them. You'd think this would stop the camping but it's still there. I can hardly imagine what the world would look like without the instances because the camping would be that much worse. It just seems like to deal with issues like this they need a world with more variety, less collection quests, no instances, and more servers.

Guild Cities:

I've seen that the guild cities are also instances. I'm unsure how this will affect gameplay and will have to keep an eye on it as more people join but it honestly sounds somewhat stupid... Why build a city if it's within a closed environment?

Weapon Selection:

The weapons in the game seem to just get a little better each time and you tend to get rewards with weapons of your level or higher so there really isn't a reason to worry about finding a new one. It just seems trivial.

I don't know the whole game seems like a good idea but it's just nothing compared to some of the others on the market. A little more time developing a stronger system of travel, the trade skills, and other aspects would have made it more interesting. Cutting down on the size of zones in favor of quality of zones would work as well. Hopefully at the higher levels things get more interesting... I just hope Conan doesn't ask you to kill 50 dragons or something tedious like that.

I like the game it's just I don't like it enough to keep paying the fee as it stands now.

Also, one last note, funcom has released mounts with some preorders (or Amazon curved bow from amazon). It also releases other items with orders of things like keyboards and mice... It just seems like it's trivializing its own item system to release items that should be gained by normal processes as a reward for buying from them. It's like they're mixing the cost structures of a pay for play with a pay for upgrade which may hurt the internal game economy depending upon how excessively they continue to do so. Who wants to work hard for an item when you can buy a keyboard and get it that way?

Honest reviews on Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures - PC

Bought and tried to install and run AoC on my new high end computer late last year. No success. AoC did not support Vista DX10 and it got nowhere in Windows XP mode. Then a couple of months ago I got the Funcom e-mail inviting my return for another try. Big improvements they said. They were right. Runs great in 2560x1600 rez and only a few intermittant crashes resulting from my pushing the performance envelope.

I'm playing on a PvE server but plan to hunt around for some PvP action (select locations) because once you reach lvl 80, there is not much left to do with your character except PvP or create new characters of different professions and do it all over again with new skills. The AoC map is rather extensive with multiple distant locations and accompanying quests that sometimes make you wish you brought a group with you, if you didn't, because that dungeon with mobs at your level all fight like bosses. Elite mobs are not identified and you can find yourself in a lot of badly mismatched situations when the fighting begins. Funcom needs to fix this.

I reached level 80 in seven weeks going about 80% solo mostly with quests. No need to buy weapons or armor because the drops and quest rewards are better than what you can buy. Money is not a problem if you regularly sell your inventory of drop and quest items you don't need. At level 40 you can buy a horse and do everything from horseback but fight. Having a mount improves on a rather crude travel system that is a far cry from, say, Guild Wars or Oblivion travel. But unlike Lineage II, for example, AoC travel is free.

I find the game to be a blast with friendly and mature players. The guild I joined was new but can still find fellow guild members in the more populated areas. In some of the more distant areas I'm lucky to run across more than a couple of players. There are always plenty of mobs, however.

If you've been spoiled by fancy Lineage II armor or the wide selection of colorful Guild Wars armor you may find the rather dull AoC armor lacking. All the player characters look like real people as well as the NPCs. No pointed elf ears or cartoonish looks. The graphics are outstanding. The music is tops.

This game is definitely worth a try.

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Despite what some people seem to think, AoC or Age of Conan is a well put together, enriched, fun, and diverse game. The great graphics, combat style, character customization, enviroment design, realism are what make this game. The world in AoC is rich and colorful and it looks like a movie almost which is more than I can say about WoW. You can customize your character in many different ways, adding up to literally thousands of possibilites. Everyone can have different combat styles, and combat skills. Now styles are how you fight where as skills are (climbing, hiding, etc) things you invest points into to assist you in combat. For example if someone is chasing you, you can climb up a tree to a cliff and get away from them (provided they can not climb at an equal or higher skill). Your style of combat is also indictive of how you play. Unlike other games (WoW), which is just button mashing and gear. In AoC you can actually use SKILL, and every once in a while you get an automatic or "fatality" kill which temporarily boosts your characters health and stamina. The game is very real, unlike in some games you cannot run through characters, in AoC they can block your path (which is used in some quests) and force you to fight (this is only outside of a city). The world is lush and wonderful, rivers flow and sparkle, winds rip and roar, and snow cools and refreshes (provided your not in a blizzard).

Overall AoC is a great game, however due to its mature content it is not for everyone especially children under the age of 16. It contains what most games dare not to do which is require skill, actual strategy, and be at least somewhat real.