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Thread: Why I'm letting my sub lapse...

  1. #1

    Default Why I'm letting my sub lapse...

    https://bearshamanproblems.blogspot....sub-lapse.html
    (There's a few hyperlinks in the blog post and some screen shots - text of post below):

    People have been saying AoC is going to die since it launched. At some point, it's even outlived at least one of the games that were supposed to kill it (Warhammer Online). It's natural that an MMO that doesn't continue to expand will eventually close down. Evolve or die. Age of Conan is dying and I have a weird mix of fatalism, apathy, and sorrow about it.

    I started this post a long time ago and just sat on it. Much like how I've sat on this blog and done nothing recently. Originally I didn't want this to be a doom and gloom post because I was naively hoping it would turn around. Then Slith left the community over a year ago and I felt like that was a sign of the times. Nothing has happened since to make me rethink that.

    As I type this, I realize AoC and I are also fading apart. When I log in and really play, I still enjoy it but with minimal content being developed my relationship with this game is changing. It's like your fun yet undependable college buddy. A few years after college, you hang out and have fun from time to time, but you tend to drift apart as you grow up and time becomes a precious commodity.

    The announcement of Conan Exiles told me where their resources for the Conan license were going to be spent. I haven't tried that game, and based on the reviews I've read, I don't want to. Funcom abandoned Age of Conan to work on Exiles. This felt worse than when development resources went to The Secret World. That was a new IP and felt like something that could help Funcom stay solvent and could possibly create some cross-over content (monsters and some environments). Exiles just feels like a re-skin that is trying to latch on to the new survival game fad and was released far too early, but I'm sure that last part sounds familiar. But Exiles allows you to model your character's schlong. Too bad it's size isn't automatically tied to the quality of your gear.

    Here's the timeline of updates on the Age of Conan website:

    June 30, 2016 - New Premium Membership + True Freedom to Play
    October 18, 2016 - Face the Slithering Chaos
    May 17 2017 - Age of Conan 9th Anniversary Celebration
    My 31, 2017 - By Popular Demand: Celebration Extended
    [Undated - August 2017?] - Gamescon Community Event (not AoC-centric)
    [Undated - October 2017?] - 720 Day Loyalty Rewards

    So in 16 months, the business model changed slightly, a six-man dungeon was introduced, and a few trinkets were given away and some old content reusing old areas was brought back. And someone wrote six short blog posts. Can you at least act like you give a crap? As my subscription winds down, I'm trying to figure out why I should continue to put money into this game. And more importantly, why I should continue to care.

    Forums have a few dedicated posters but it's become toxic except for a few defeated loyalists. There's only a handful of new messages a day, so it's not even active enough for daily reading. I stopped reading it regularly about a year ago and weirdly didn't miss it. All the signs point to a game that would've had its plug pulled if run by anyone other than Funcom. As much as fans malign them, they do tend to keep their games online unlike larger corporations like Sony.

    As for the blogging community; Cynara still posts occasionally as does HenryX. And that's it for the blogging community. Two. Three if you count this (and I wouldn't - I haven't written AoC in almost two years). Conan College is gone offline, Slith's site is still there but he retired from blogging with a wordless post, and This Machine Age went silent three years ago (killer gout). There weren't many to begin with and we're down to two who've written a total of 6 posts in same time as Funcom. Now Henry and Cynara spend waaaaayyy more time writing their posts than Funcom as Cynara essential builds loot tables for everyone and Henry makes beautiful videos that promote AoC better than Funcom ever did.

    There was an opportunity to snare board gamers during the Monolith campaign and during the Modiphius RPG campaign, yet it felt like Funcom didn't try hard enough. Those Kickstarters had in-game items for people to try AoC. Funcom: could you at least try to act like you give a crap?

    I've routinely paid for the subscription a year at a time and not thought much of it. For the past two years, I've mostly only logged in to update offline training. Is this worth about $100/year?

    "Your subscription helps keep the servers running," will be the response. And they're correct, subscriptions and in-game purchases keep games like AoC alive. I love the music, running through Tortage for the 30th time, and questing in a lot of different areas. I've leveled more than 10 characters to 80 and have countless hours spent running around Conan's world. It'll be sad when I can't log on and get that Conan fix. I left and played other games like SWTOR, Dragon Age Inquisition, WoW, the Witcher, and TSW. But I'd always come back and AoC was always there. I compared many of these games to AoC. I even wrote a post I never finished comparing DAI to AoC. DAI's mind-numbing combat is so bad I don't ever want to play it again, despite my love of that dark fantasy world.

    One of the reasons I went in on the Monolith board game so hard was it utilized some of the art of AoC. I felt like it was a way to have a tangible thing to remind me of this game, besides the soundtrack and collector's edition book, as well as an outlet to adventure and battle in that world.

    May 2018 is the tenth anniversary. I'd love for Funcom to do something cool for it. But I'd be delusional if I think there will be anything other than some useless items for subscribers and a subscription offer.

    If/When they announce the shut down of the game server, I will probably log on watch the server countdown to zero, watching the chat until it dumps the remaining few players to the load screen. I expect a mix of "Good bye Conan!", gold-sellers, and [You know who] yelling, "AoC is dead! I told you all it would happen!". Until then, I'll most-likely go F2P and just pop in and out and enjoy the game a little bit here and there when I have time.
    ----
    Kalur - 80 Bear Shaman, Brunstol - 80 Dark Templar, Tallas - 80 Assassin, Gilben - 80 Conquerer, Pangert - 80 Barbarian, Xoltal - 80 Necromancer, Matzui - 80 Herald of Xolti, and a bunch of lower level alts.
    Wiccana -> Set -> Crom

  2. #2

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    I think there is absolutely no reason for them to shut down the game.
    Sure, they don't make any money from it but it's probably more than enough to keep the servers on and pay a few people to do maintenance. Games like Anarchy Online and Dark Age of Camelot are way older and even more deserted, yet are still running.
    I understand the blogposters feelings but he is a vet who has seen and done everything in the game and it simply doesn't have anything new to offer to him. However, I myself am a new player and I see tons of other newcomers ingame. And it will take months for us to explore all the content of this game. The game is still a blast for newcomers and it's still fairly populated, just saying.

    Edit: I just looked up Funcom on wiki, and it says they made a complete relaunch of TSW. So who knows, maybe when they have more time, resources and money on their hands they can do a reboot of AoC.
    Last edited by xpeh-bam; 8th November 2017 at 10:57.

  3. #3

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    Quote Originally Posted by xpeh-bam View Post
    I think there is absolutely no reason for them to shut down the game.
    Sure, they don't make any money from it but it's probably more than enough to keep the servers on and pay a few people to do maintenance. Games like Anarchy Online and Dark Age of Camelot are way older and even more deserted, yet are still running.
    I understand the blogposters feelings but he is a vet who has seen and done everything in the game and it simply doesn't have anything new to offer to him. However, I myself am a new player and I see tons of other newcomers ingame. And it will take months for us to explore all the content of this game. The game is still a blast for newcomers and it's still fairly populated, just saying.

    Edit: I just looked up Funcom on wiki, and it says they made a complete relaunch of TSW. So who knows, maybe when they have more time, resources and money on their hands they can do a reboot of AoC.
    Its over 20 active guilds on crom, plus alot of solo players subbed that mainly do RF and WB. They surely make profits from conan, not much, but its way more then it costs to keep it running. You can tell the servers are heavily reduced in performcance, the servers almost crashes at WB week, so the servers cant be expensive to rent. Letting the secret-world devs do server-restarts is not expensive at all, takes a couple of clicks. Having a MMO shut down is a heavy hit on the companys reputation, so I think it would run even if it went +-0 in profits.

    Having it re-launch is a dream. TSW have always been the game they cared for, AOC actually made the same money TSW did back in the day, but the updates AOC got couldnt be compared with what they did for TSW.
    Last edited by magnum92; 8th November 2017 at 12:18.
    Moriala - The Ivory Tower

    [Youtube Channel]

  4. #4

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    So much room and gloom. Bro it's just a game. If you are no longer satisfied with it then simply move on. Funcom doesn't care. At this point we're lucky they haven't shut down the servers. It's a niche game. Love it or leave it.

  5. #5

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    Quote Originally Posted by xpeh-bam View Post
    [...]
    Edit: I just looked up Funcom on wiki, and it says they made a complete relaunch of TSW. So who knows, maybe when they have more time, resources and money on their hands they can do a reboot of AoC.
    I wish I still had the optimism of a newcomer...

  6. #6

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    The game still feels really active, world boss week had multiple Kheshatta instances going, it's not hard to get into RF and Global chat is active at all times, you can get a group going for anything at most times. The content drought is pretty sad, but I'd hardly say it means the game is "dead"... that's the opinion of fatalists who're burned out on the game and just lurk these forums to spread gloom and misery, because of their life-long vendetta against Funcom. Yes, AoC doesn't deliver content like other bigger MMOs on the market, you won't hear anyone talk about this game in mainstream circles, but who cares? AoC has its own niche community and the Crom server feels as populated as it should be, you can play the game just fine.

    Conan Exiles is scheduled for a full release next year. After that, who knows if they won't allocate some people back to AoC to develop something new... or even to recycle assets that were created for CE. It's not likely that this game will see another expansion with the scale that ROTGS had, but the game already has plenty of things to do.
    It's not as if more content really means an MMO will get better... take WoW for instance, the game was good until WotLK, but everything past that was pretty mediocre, the overall quality effectively dropped... it'd have actually been preferable for the game to stagnate on its third expansion, than to have to play through Cataclysm, Pandaria, Draenor, etc. People actually bothered to make private servers just to *play* old content, since the expansions had made it irrelevant and it was far better than what newer expansions brought... Perhaps there's a good side to AoC having grown stale, because at least the quality is consistent; it won't get better, but it also won't get worse.

    The lore, OST, gameplay and art direction make AoC my MMO of choice. I've been involved with the genre for several years and have tried a lot of what's out there, including GW2, FF14, WoW, etc. I wouldn't go back to play either of those, with their cookie-cutter settings, generic high-fantasy tropes and unmemorable writing. AoC is far better, in my opinion. I have a running sub, intend to stay subbed and will eventually purchase Dragon's Spine. I wish the game was more popular, it's sad that it's not, but what else is there? I've tried getting back into FF14 when the expansion for that came out, but I just can't do it. This game created a standard for me and other games feel inferior now, I can't join the flock of normies playing the newer MMOs.

    If you want to play AoC and still have things to do in-game, then the servers are there and decently populated (at least Crom is) for you to be able to do so.

  7. #7

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    Based on the continued existence of Anarchy Online, I don't think AoC is likely to get the cord pulled anytime soon. Plus with it seemingly being a good portion of Funcom's income, it's even doubly so the game to keep online. The last paragraph was my emotional response to what will happen to every online game at some point. If WoW went offline tomorrow, despite my time there, I wouldn't care. AoC, even if five years from now, would be something I'd log into to watch because of how it was (and is) a special game to me.

    AoC is still a helluva game. I've love and loved it. This post/rant was part frustration for Funcom not caring anymore (which isn't news to anyone) and my realization that I'm drifting apart from it. I noticed and tried to capture the odd combination of emotions. Yes, it's a game and there's way more important things in life (which is one of the reasons I have limited time!). But it's also a place I've spent a lot of time, have had a lot of good memories, and want to continue to exist as much to relive those memories as make new ones. I remember the issues opening weekend when you had to do an extra step just to get the game to run (after watching it hang for an hour or more at the load screen). When if you played for a few hours, the game would slow down and crash to a memory leak. And my first guild that had guild city horse races and human lawn darts off the keep. AoC was beautiful, glitchy, and fun as hell. And so many people missed out on it.

    This wasn't a rage-filled protest of "you've lost me as a customer, you're doomed!" post. I'm a single person and not even a huge part of the community in any way shape or form - nobody will or should miss me as a subscriber. It was that moment when I calmly decided I'd rather put my next $100 into a different form of entertainment. If someone loves fantasy MMO's and hadn't tried AoC, I'd still suggest they try it out for a few months. There's a ton of great game here. But for me, with my limited time and lack of desire to actually get geared enough and study up to do T3 and beyond, there's nothing on the horizon.

    New adventure pack? I'd immediately pick it up hoping it'd be good. I'd play and probably review it objectively good or bad. I get there's limited resources to invest here. I get there's limited profit in a game in maintenance mode.

    And that's why it's hard for me. This is a game I've wanted to succeed since the first time I logged in. It's a game I've cheered for, that I've told friends about, that I've compared to more successful games hoping others would try it and realize that it's fun.

    But it is only a game. It's only entertainment. And it's only a temporary distraction.

    But it was a hell of a lot of fun.
    ----
    Kalur - 80 Bear Shaman, Brunstol - 80 Dark Templar, Tallas - 80 Assassin, Gilben - 80 Conquerer, Pangert - 80 Barbarian, Xoltal - 80 Necromancer, Matzui - 80 Herald of Xolti, and a bunch of lower level alts.
    Wiccana -> Set -> Crom

  8. #8

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    Conan Exiles is literally the original conan game. If you search youtube you will find a demo from around 2005/6 of what Age of Conan was going to be, and then they changed it drastically to be what it is now. AoC was going to have a lot of the RTS elements that Exiles had, and look at the development of exiles, just out of the blue .." here's Conan Exiles". They sat on exiles as their last resort for a revenue stream, because every title they have simply is not doing well. Secret World's populations is only marginally better and there is no real revenue stream from the items they have in the item shops of their titles.

    The item mall is literally the worst item mall i've ever seen in an mmo. Compared to Tera Online item shop, not even in the same universe . Then add the insanely poor payments system, wow, it is literally designed to fail.

    Then the real question, how is Funcom even a float right now if it isn't for government subsidies...
    Last edited by Solareus; 10th November 2017 at 20:42.
    "This games community is not a community at all, it's a cancer." Altaro | Goldenboy is my biggest fan. His shrine to me is flattering yet scary.

  9. #9

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    I'm just an ordinary player, not in the same league as the individuals named above, but I too am letting my AoC sub lapse. I stopped WB a long time ago, and got tired of RF and running the same raids over and over (often taking an hour or more after the designated start time for to find out if the raid would even go), so now I only log in now and again to chat with some guildie friends. A few months ago, I ported to Secret World Legends which Funcom is actively developing in stark contrast to AoC. A few excerpts from Funcom's Q3 report ( http://cdn.funcom.com/investor/2017/...Q17_report.pdf ) lay it all out:

    After the initial relaunch on 26 June 2017, Secret World Legends was launched
    successfully on Steam on 31 July 2017.
    • A series of updates were made to the game to add content and additional retention
    features to the game, such as:
    o A revamped Whispering Tide event to celebrate the launch of Steam and the
    upcoming Tokyo release
    o The “Tokyo: Back to the Beginning” issue in August 2017
    o The “Tokyo: Beyond the Wall” issue in September 2017
    o The “Manhattan Exclusion Zone” Raid with scaling difficulty and with group
    finder support
    o The “Future-Tech Cache”
    o An ARG “Kiss of the Revenant” in cooperation with Alice & Smith
    o Several updates addressing player concerns, stability, and quality of life fixes.
    • Regarding future updates and additions to the game, in 4Q 2017 there will be a focus
    on improving Key Performance Indicators and in 1Q 2018 the focus will be on major
    gameplay and story content release to improve retention and provide a more
    complete experience for the players.

    It's too bad AoC isn't getting the same treatment, cause I certainly loved the game and played it almost non-stop for nine years. Now, I'm just as happy to play SWL - but it will be interesting to see what it's like nine years from now if I'm still around then

  10. #10

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    I enjoy(ed) the game immensly, and could play it for the music alone.

    Currently the subs are inactive, but I do have the urge to resub even tho Funcom isnt doing anything to increase activity.

    I have played Conan Exiles quite alot too, which I actually enjoy. It does almost require a relatively active clan if you decide to play on PVP servers (like I do).

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