Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures
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ESRB:
Blood and Gore,Intense Violence,Language - Mild,Nudity,Sexual Themes
Publisher: Funcom Genre(s): MMORPG Home Page: http://www.ageofconan.com/
Hope You Like Quests The M-rating did not come just from blood and loose body parts. So, what is there to do while leveling up your character? Age of Conan is very traditional in this regard - bulk of the Player vs. Environment play is questing, and regardless of the early hype, often that means the usual drill - kill 10 doodahs, loot 15 thingies, fedex this package to Mr. who-knows over there. Sometimes quests combine goals - you may get to kill 10 doodahs and 1 master doodah. I must admit that the actual quest storylines are mostly very well written, especially as it must get hard to think of new ways to explain why you should go out and massacre the local wildlife after the first hundred quests or so, but deep down it's all very familiar. Biggest "innovation" seems to be breakable walls that you get to smash down while completing some quests. Quests also involve chatting with the NPCs with multiple choices that, in theory, can open up new quests otherwise not available. In practice the dialogue choices are mostly window dressing. Initially the NPCs even speak with proper voiceovers, but that fun is over by level 20 as the development resources allowed such immersion-enhancing perks only for the initial newbie area of Tortage. After that, only the NPCs involved in your destiny quest line utter any words - rest of the world is mute. As an added "bonus", while you discuss the quest details with the NPC, you are still fair game on the servers using the PvP rule set, and the same retards who stole your lunch money back at school are still around, and their kind enjoys waiting for opportunities gank you while you can't fight back. Nice idea, but has some implementation issues. Grouping support is... well, the first 20 levels of the game were originally envisioned as a single-player adventure, and that's still pretty much what it is. There are a couple of group quests in Tortage, but you can skip those, and many of the single player quests are a pain to do in groups. Same problem is present in the main adventure zones between level 20 and 40 - group-specific quests are rare, and many solo quests are not designed to be grouped - you'll have to constantly sit around and wait for quest-related objects and monsters to respawn if you insist on grouping. Long quest chains don't exactly help you to form questing groups, unless you enjoy to backtrack bits you have already done to fill prerequisite quests. Past level 40-50 AoC doesn't seem to know if it's supposed to encourage grouping or not - some single player quests are still pain to group, but you are quickly encouraged to group up for numerous areas designed for just that. Additional pain comes from the UI issues and instancing - gathering up a group is an exercise in frustration and should you lose sight of someone, it can be hard to get the group back together. For me, Age of Conan feels like a Massively Multiplayer Single Player Game for most of the time as poor design decisions actively discourage cooperative play.
Zone design is as uneven as the graphics - some areas are wide open and for a moment you might think you are adventuring in a wilderness. Others are designed like single player levels from a crappy first person shooter - one or two narrow paths, filled with enemies ready to attack you as you advance - and should you have to return later to do some quest at the far end of such a zone - yes, you get to kill a pile of mobs on the way again. In fact, some outdoor zones appear to be little more than dungeons without a roof, and the number of open adventuring zones is shockingly small, just nine zones.
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