Age of Conan: Please Play Me!


09NovemberPBEdit
This Article has nothing to do with naked women...

If Age of Conan could be transposed into a human being, it would probably call you up at two in the morning, drunk, and wondering why you dumped it so long ago. Whenever it phones up, it has brand new explanations for why we should take it back, new incentives we may not have had several months prior, and new tricks it learned that it can’t wait to show us.

But let’s keep this about the game, shall we? Recently Funcom launched a slew of price reductions on the game, and its subscription rate. The boxed copy currently runs you around twenty dollars USD, and multi-month subscriptions were slashed, up to 45% cheaper as you increase in time prepaid.

Is it working?

“I can’t comment on any numbers,”
-Erling Ellingson

Gee…Thanks, Erling, chief spokesperson for Funcom.

What Funcom can tell us, however, is that the updates have been a huge success at least with the current players. Funcom also launched a veteran system recently, where players accumulate points for each month of subscription, that increases incrementally the longer you sustain a subscription. Funcom is continuing to address concerns of content gaps, and the title has its first expansion pack in the works: Rise of the Godslayer.

Here’s hoping this helps Age of Conan’s subscriber numbers. Otherwise, Funcom can always make the title freemium, offer a free basic version with a paid upgrade, similar to that of Anarchy Online. Doing so might entice more people into putting a 30 gigabyte game on their system.

Funcom: Age of Conan Unaffected


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Earlier this week I did an article on Funcom laying off 20% of their workforce. While the layoffs have officially delayed Funcom’s upcoming MMO, The Secret World, by at least 3 months, I questioned how this would affect Age of Conan, namely its upcoming expansion: Rise of the Godslayer.

I can happily say that, in this bad news, there is good news. Rise of the Godslayer has not been affected by the layoffs. There is still no news on the Xbox360 version of Age of Conan, or a release date for either the upcoming new MMO, or Rise of the Godslayer.

More on Funcom and their upcoming titles as it appears.

Funcom Layoffs: Delays Imminent


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As September draws to a close, Funcom ends the month on a bad note: The developer of the MMO Age of Conan announced today that they are laying off 20% of their workforce. The developer is looking to reduce redundancies in its ongoing focus to move the company to Montreal, where they can enjoy more tax breaks and lower wages.

Funcom’s upcoming title (pictured above), The Secret World, has been officially delayed by “several months.” The title does not yet have an announced release date, and a release date of late 2010 to early 2011 is expected. It is unknown if this will affect Age of Conan’s upcoming expansion, Rise of the Godslayer.

Also unannounced is what effect, if any, will be had on Funcom’s current titles: Age of Conan and Anarchy Online.

Age of Conan: Still An Interest


An expansion pack tells us a lot about an MMO and its developers. Foremost, it says that the developers continue to put a lot of vested interest in keeping the title alive, as they are willing to set aside a group of developers to work on their own project that does not immediately net in money (Instead being a longer project that has more of a gradual effect). Expansion packs regularly involve a vast new area to explore, possibly bringing along with it new classes or races, and with it balances and tweaks to the existing gameplay.

Continue reading “Age of Conan: Still An Interest”