Hrothmund's random ramblings.
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Let me start my post by creating a little bit of a background for my musings. In the past few days I've been playing CD Projekt's excellent RPG, The Witcher. Now, this game has some serious flaws, errors and bugs, but they don't matter, the overall experience is wonderful. The gritty and uncensored atmosphere, along with the unpolished translations create a very unique feeling within the game, that makes it one of the most immersive titles I've played in the last few years.

Now, being a fan of The Witcher, I must type that AoC has many similarities with the aforementioned game. A 'mature' and 'manly' world, drinking and brawling in pubs, semi-twitch based combat and outstanding graphics and overall presentation are all things these two titles have in common. I would be satisfied, if Funcom could just come up with the same level of polish as CD Projekt did, but honestly I expect much, much more from AoC. However, I am truly hoping for the same 'off the hip' attitude from the development team, the same sense of  enthusiasm and love for their title that transferred through so well  to me when I was playing The Witcher. Along with this, Funcom have to accomplish something CD Projekt didn't, 'endgame content' and replay value.

All in all, I am sure Funcom has their hands full. Immersive, read interactive, environments are much harder to create in a MMO setting, when compared to single-player titles. Also Funcom are working with an established IP, which limits their creative freedom content-wise. I hope we can be expect characters and settings that have not been jaded by demands from management or the production team. In short, I wish AoC could finally be the 'made by gamers, for gamers' title that so many of us have been waiting for. I know there are some really creative and understanding games executives out there, but it seems when examining recent MMO releases, that there's always that same '50-year-old couldn't-give-a-horses-cock' type of production executive that manages to bland down the games and tone down the title to a generic and uninteresting game.

I'm in the software business myself, but when developing business tools, the outlook of the producers and managers is a lot different. Yes, ease of use and eye-candy are a factor in this segment of the software world as well, but when it comes down to selling the end product, the criteria differs substantially. The software that is chosen is commonly selected because it can do something the competitors can't, is easy to integrate/adopt into the customer's environment, does not require a vast amount of resources to run, and is cost-effective and dependable. In this regard, the games industry has a few things to learn.

As a conclusion, I'd like to extend my best wishes to the AoC development team and sincerely hope you can get the game finished on time and won't have to make too many concessions. There are many of us out there waiting for your game who do not think the current 'copy and paste' method of creating MMOs is the way to go.