Age of Conan Impressions

I’m a sucker for trying out MMORPG’s. As far as I’m concerned, $50 is a perfectly acceptable investment to try out a game for 30 days. I sign up for every beta I can find and if I don’t get into beta, I buy the game and play it for at least the initial free period. When I really enjoy a game, I usually convince myself to pay the monthly fee. (At one time, I was a regular subscriber to EverQuest, EverQuest II, Final Fantasy XI, City of Villains (& Heroes), Vanguard, and World of Warcraft all at once. Never again!) Right now I currently pay for World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XI. And unless this new game takes a sudden turn away from its current direction, Age of Conan is going to add itself to that short list.

I didn’t get picked for Age of Conan’s beta, so I really had no idea what to expect from the game when it came out. I read about guild cities, watched a video on character creation, and watched another with some combat, but that was about it. Funcom did a good job at keeping pretty tight-lipped about the game. Unlike Blizzard’s Wrath of the Lich King expansion and EA Mythic’s Warhammer Online, which have been publishing a LOT of hype, Age of Conan was pretty quiet. So since I knew almost nothing of the combat or anything else, I figured it would be another WoW clone with blood and naked women. To be totally honest, I figured it would suck.

Still, I am a fan of the Conan universe and I wanted to play an M-Rated game. I really enjoy playing games that take place in fantasy worlds full of blood, violence, barbarians, whores, and hedonism. I look at it as an outlet, since I have to behave like a civilized woman in real life. The perfect opposite of a civilized human being is definitely a wenching barbarian, wouldn’t you say? (And yes, even though I’m playing a female character, whenever I’m given the option to say that I want to have my way with some half-naked female, I click it.)

That being said, I feel that Funcom has done a great job at capturing the essence and atmosphere of Conan’s Hyboria. There is violence, nudity, sex (not explicit, mostly implied), and drunkenness. Conan’s world was full of that kind of thing and so is this game. However, it’s not gratuitous. When I’m playing, I feel like I’ve been sucked into another time and place. The environments are beautiful, with incredible landscapes and an amazing amount of detail. (I’m sure having a pretty powerful computer helps… I have almost everything turned all the way up.)

So let’s talk about playing the game itself…

Character Creation - It was certainly better than World of Warcraft. I hate not having at least SOME control over how my character looks. Having only a few hairstyles to choose from just doesn’t cut it for me. The nice thing about AoC’s character creation was that I had a lot of choices for body markings, hairstyles, and stuff like that. I also had the option to click “Advanced” and alter things like cheekbones, breast size, or various other body ratios. It wasn’t as in-depth as the City of Heroes/Villains character, but nothing is.

Combat - There is no auto-attack. It took me little while to get used to this. You have 3 attack buttons: left, center, and right. There are “shields” surrounding your enemy which move around. If all three shields are on the right side of your opponent, you want to attack on the opposite side. They have a lower chance of defending against or deflecting your attack if it’s not reinforced by these shields. So you actually have to pay attention to what you’re doing. You can’t just attack something and walk away. Combos incorporate the different melee attack directions for powerful damage. I’m playing a Dark Templar, which seemed similar to a Shadow Knight when I was choosing my character’s class. I rely on melee weapons, attack combos, and a few spells. I created a necromancer, but he’s only level 4, so I have no idea what being a caster is like. I also made a Bear Shaman, which is considered a priest class, but she’s very low level also, so I can’t comment on that, either.

Grouping - The largest group I’ve been in consisted of only three players. I’ve tackled most of my quests so far solo since I don’t know anyone else playing this game. Usually I drag my husband along with me, but he’s waiting for Warhammer, so no dice. My Dark Templar has a number of attacks designed specifically for pulling aggro or hate. Once I got the hang of actually using them in a group, we were able to kill things very efficiently. I would take the majority of the damage while my other group members would just damage the hell out of it. Similar to World of Warcraft, group battles are fast paced and often involve fighting groups of enemies. At times, it felt kind of frantic, though, which stressed me out.

Destiny vs. Normal Mode - The first twenty levels of the game take place in the newbie area or Tortage. In this area, you could play multiplayer or solo. The solo game is part of your destiny quest chain, which continues through level 80 (max level). During your destiny quests, the game creates a personal instance just for you. No one can enter the instance with you. It’s all about you. This serves to create a feeling of importance to the storyline. The only other MMOG I’ve ever played that made me really feel like I was a part of the world is Final Fantasy XI, where your character actually becomes a part of the cutscenes. I really enjoy feeling like I’m not just a random player. I realize that everyone experiences the same destiny quest, but it really pulled me in. The destiny quests are done at certain level ranges and if you’re not high enough, you need to play multiplayer mode and do quests alone or with other people. This part of Tortage is full of npc’s, players, and things to do. I did every quest available, so I didn’t actually leave the newbie area until level 22 or 23. I’m only level 25 right now and my next destiny quest is at level 30, so right now I’m doing a lot of exploring. I really should go back to leveling, but I’m not in a rush.

Gathering & Crafting - At level 20, you can learn to gather resources. These resources are used by crafters. You can’t learn to craft until level 40. So right now I’m gathering. Or at least trying to. Resource nodes have HP bars and they need to be above 10% in order to harvest anything from them. They respawn and regenerate rather slowly so I’m having a difficult time gathering, since everyone and his dog is out there harvesting. I haven’t experienced any crafting yet, but I’m hoping that it’s not as irritating as gathering. I’m not holding my breath, though. I’ve never played an MMO where crafting wasn’t an incredible time and money sink.

Other Thoughts - So obviously I haven’t ventured far enough into the world of Hyboria to really be able to say if Age of Conan is truly a great game. I’m loving it, though, and I’m planning on continuing past my free 30 days. I love the fatalities. I can decapitate someone and blood spurts onto my screen. It’s awesome. As with all MMO’s, Age of Conan is certainly not without bugs. I consider myself lucky that I’m not one of the players that has been having technical issues with the game. My map and some of my skill/spell icons disappear sometimes. Gathering cotton doesn’t seem to be working right now. But all in all, the game is playable. A lot of people are QQ-ing about all the problems, but that’s normal for any online game launch. Stuff will get fixed eventually. My biggest complaints so far are the gathering system and the fact that the newbie area seems considerably more polished than the rest of the game. Aside from that, though, I’m totally hooked.