Discuss! Game Director Letter - May 2014

[Religolibri]

That was where I was when early access began – but where were you?

I was 5 meters away from where I am, playing consoles only. I did read reviews of AoC since it made so much noise. Thought that game looks damn good and fatalities are awesome, but oh well, didn't had system required to even run it on low. Anyway I tought that MMOs aren't for me anyway.

How many of you came later?

Joined a year after release after I defintely leaved the console market for beeing overpriced for what it is, compared to what PC gaming became (don't cost a lot, games are cheaper).
I was looking for a game in a persisten universe, with low fantasy and that would use my brand new gaming computer well. I didn't even have to had a second guess, only Age of Conan met the requirement I had. It still is the only one these days, and it is not even by default that I still play it.

[Rohaus]

Geesh... You guys act like you pay a monthly subscription with all your demands...

Look, we PvPers finally got some loving so I'm happy!

[Mellaus]

That letter promises very good things, so i don't get all the crying, but i guess some people will always complain no matter what ^^

Now what really baffles me is the fact that Funcom hired a new game designer to work specifically on AoC.
Considering how much it costs to create a spot for a brand new resource, revenues from AoC must be much better than anticipated this year.

So all that sounds great.


About the story sharing, i started AoC despite the fact it was an MMO, which is a format i despise from my very core.

But, it was based on Howard's lore so i had to try it, it was maybe 6 months after the launch.

I rolled my first character, a Conqueror, and thought that it looked awesome, the movements and combats thanks to the motion capture were just perfect for me.

I entered the acheronian ruins in Tortage, had a good look around, and thought "Yep, this is what acheronian ruins should look like", Funcom really had that vision of Hyboria i was looking for.

Later on, i entered the Amphitheatre of Karutonia, seen the son of Ymir raging in his chains, most epic moment ever, i loved it instantly.
Along the road, there were so many awesome details, references to Lovecraft in Khitai, that awesome line from the Entity when you face it with a HoX, the fantastic artistic direction.

Even later, the House of Crom appeared, the most beautiful place ever, with that awesome puzzle leading to nothing less than the Lurker itself.
Just as awesome as Turan and the temple of Erlic, my favorite raid dungeon in game, it's just so gorgeous and engaging.

More recently, Dragon Spine was open, allowing us to follow the steps of Nyarlathotep, through a top notch story line which i loved without reserve, it felt so much like TSW and Lovecraft.
The dungeons also in Dragon Spine are superb, that vision of the Custodian of Yot in the outer dark is fantastic, and battling it while Nyarlathotep stands other there watching adds to the epic of the moment.

Even now, after all those years, i just don't see what other game any Howard fan could possibly play.

[Bibik]

How many of you were there for that first glimpse of Hyboria?

I've not joined ay 1 cause of exams but 1 week later, and was astonished by the quality of quests and climate in Tortage.
6year later, i think it's still the best starting area, thanks to both the day/night quest system (and the specificity of the archetype-themed destiny quests) and the quality of the writing.

To illustrate, it's still one of the few areas where NPC's have a special dialogue line (not the standart "you didn't give me anything") when you refuse to give their quest item ! Some of them being really funny

I remember ganks and skirmishs in Underhalls, even tho they were pathetic skill and tactic-wise. All the fights ended up in the same rezpad spot where people escapped by clicking on the closest door.

How many of you came later?

After the initial disappointement, i've left in august 2008 and came back with my friend with RoTG release, which is the best thing that happened to AoC. Quality and quantity of the expansion were really good and gives a second breath in the game. Originally, we expected to stay only 2 months and finally my friend played almost 1 and a half year and i'm still here
My wish for the future of AoC and funcom is they'll getting better and have the ressources to developp another expansion of the size of the Kithaï, even tho its a wet dream now...

[zeuss]

when can u finaly buy raid weapons/accessories on raid vendor?

when can i finaly after all these years play with friends again in minigames?

will cetriss be out this year?

all i need to know.

I will just quote this since many of us expecting some sort of answer in these three questions.

[Bibik]

PvP streak ... what's in it for those of us that are long long caped on pvp lvls..and pvp gear...and AAs..

Should be tied with the achievement system (even tho we have close to zero news about it, less than the crafting revamp ). However, i'm not fond of personnal achievement/goal/titles in a pvp supposed to be played teamwise. It always resulted on selfish playstyle over teamplay.
That's why achievements in pvp should only be team/objective-achievements : winning streak is one of them.

As for the accessories/weapon vendors, i guess it is somewhat included in the same patch as the conversion-tokens system. I think we'll hear more about this soon on Test-Live forums or by Cirith's voice.

Last but not least, a new developper is really good news welcome to him (will he present himself here or he's one of thoses "shadows" devs ? ^^)

[Naerri]

What about PvE T1-T3 raid gear stats revamp? Shouldnt this be a logical step after PvPers got their revamps?

[elsunga]

In TSW Tokyo will be released today so it was clear 4.3 patch in AoC will be smaller one. New developer is great news and after all these months of silence when AoC looked like very low priority for FC it looks like there are finally changes.

[Kaazho]

A timeline for the "next raid"?

[Bibik]

A timeline for the "next raid"?

When it's ready *_*