what? they never said "crafting will be pointless". "all the zones will annoy you" etc..
in fact it was tauted as the next great mmo. no way of knowing if it were true unless you buy it.

AoC is just like a politician, full of promises and hype about  you are going to get. Then a massive dissapointment that delivers nothing in the end.

Age of Conan is a lame duck.

Put simply, its a sub-standard World of Warcraft clone with a few gimmicks thrown in to try and make it seem different. The only real areas where you have an improvement over WOW is in the graphics, and in order to enjoy the graphics you need a ridiculously high spec computer. My machine met the 'recommended' requirements on the box, yet I had to play it on low graphics settings in order for the game to be playable in any shape or form.

There are simply no areas apart from the graphics mentioned above where the game improves on World of Warcraft, and in most important areas, the game just doesn't even come close to the standards set by Blizzard (note* I dont play wow anymore either - bored of it). So basically, if you like this type of game (fantasy mmo) there's really no reason to play this game over and above WOW. If you've never played AOC or WOW, just play wow. If you are bored of WOW, like loads of people that tried AOC, you wont find anything new in AOC that isnt simply an inferior version of what WOW offers.

Just a few issues to make a note of:

- The combo system sucks. Its far more clunky than the wow pvp system. Its a regression if anything, not an innovation or an improvement. Think of those stupid guitar hero games for the WII and you will have an idea of how it functions.

- The game is heavily instanced and it feels extremely small as a result of this.

- Character progression is a joke. Many talents dont work in the talent trees. Stats dont actually do anything so upgrades just feel pointless.

- Itemisation is terrible and feels as though it was just tossed in without a moments thought or care. Level 20 items are in some cases superior to level 60 items.

- PVP system doesnt yet exist.

- Bugs galore. I dont like criticising a new game for bugs as all new games have them, but Ive never encountered the vast numbers of bugs that were and are present in this title.

- Chat interfaces are counter-intuitive and poorly thought out, as are guild UIs and the main UI itself is your usual standard fare. Nothing new or interesting.

- Customer Service doesnt exist. For those used to having a wow GM answer a ticket within 1-2 hours tops, prepare for a lesson in appalling customer care from Funcom if you decide to try this game. I think I opened 7 tickets within the first 4 weeks playing the game. Not a single one was ever answered. They either timed out and got auto-deleted, or they sat in queues numbering 100s for days, with no sign of the queue shortening. It got to the point where if something went wrong, you just accepted it as there was no possibility of a GM fixing anything, or even trying to it seemed.

- Grouping is another lesson in frustration with a litany of bad design decisions and bugs making the experience one to be avoided while levelling.

- The game also seems totally unstable at certain times. As others have mentioned, memory leaks and lag spikes plague the gaming experience.

---

I know a lot of what I have typed above is extremely negative, but Im afraid those are my honest impressions of the game after 2 months of playing. I genuinely enjoyed the game for 2 weeks as I gritted my teeth through the release bugs but eventually I got bored. There is nothing new here that hasnt been done better by others in other MMOs. Its a shoddy, badly designed game, and it will sink very fast in my opinion.

Of the 30 people that moved to AOC from my wow guild, only 2 still play the game.

You will probably never really know until you buy the game. This could be the game, you have always been waiting for. However it wasn't for me.

Out of about a dozen different subscription mmos, AoC was my absolute shortest sub, at 2 weeks. My longest was 8 months. In fact there were many incomplete beta tests that entertained me over a longer period of time than AoC did at release. Your mileage may differ, depending on how much depth you are looking for, however if I personally felt there was anything remotely enjoyable with the game past those 2 weeks, I would have played it longer. But it seemed pretty clear to me that I would be waiting a while before the fun got patched in.

"You will probably never really know until you buy the game. This could be the game, you have always been waiting for. However it wasn't for me."

lol you could say that about computer checkers!

Keep in mind that the volunteer mods on the forums ban people for asking about the game's features.  Keep in mind that the game has been losing mature content from the day it launched.  Keep in mind that while the #1 complaint was that the game lacked content at launch, they've only added a handful of quests since then.  Keep in mind that when in doubt, Funcom blames YOU for any problems you have with the game.

So, if you are submissive and want to get slapped around like a dog, play AoC.  Otherwise, move on.

Well i play AoC since january - and I loved evry minute of it!

Is full of bugs - check

It needs balancing and tweaks (not class vs class - that was never thei aim of the game) - check

Is NOTHING like WoW - check

It dose not have itemisation (a full epic player is better than a green player by 2-5% at most) - check

A player lvl 40 can kill a lvl 60 - AS INTENDED - check

Has BattleKeep fights (48 vs 48) (bugged as hell atm) - been in 2 of them - and OMG did i Love it :) - check

It has PLENTY of 'features' that favor to build a community/guild (need of ppl to work together for a common goal) - check

It has RAID instances - bugged - not balanced - but due to the way close combat/healing/LineOfSight works - is alot more fun (for a healer) than WoW style

All in all is a matter of taste - but imo for an old scool mmo gamer - is far more atractive than what the market offers atm.

Prometeu - Bear Shaman - Wildsoul server

Originally posted by ngille

Originally posted by Crnobog

Originally posted by ngille

Just my opinion but overall the game rocks, graphics are the best of any mmo I have been in.  Gameplay is fun and most of the people I have met in game are great.

Bad points though are intermittent lag spikes, memory leaks combos not going off or going off and doing little to no damage.  Hotbar lag (hit the button and it takes a min).  Cutomer service is a joke, billing department is the worst I have encountered in ANY business mmo or otherwise.

 

If you can get over the bad points though, the game is pretty solid but they definately have some things to work on.  If they can fix the bad points I mentioned they will blow the mmo genre away.

 

Just out of curiosity, what reasons did you have to contact Customer Service and their Billing Department?

account@aoc.com sent them a mail, got an instant copy/paste response read it (though I knew it wouldn't help) and replied explaining AGAIN what the issue was (tried to pay the account last night and as of noon today they STILL haven't fixed it or charged the card even once).
 

Damn i hate those copy/paste responses... Blizzard are the kings at that , emailed them about my email being changed on one of my accounts once without me knowing, about 7 months ago, still no reply. Sent others too, only to get some useless copy/paste crap.

But from the comments in this thread, you should probably be happy they haven't charged you

Originally posted by Prometeu

Well i play AoC since january - and I loved evry minute of it!

Is full of bugs - check

It needs balancing and tweaks (not class vs class - that was never thei aim of the game) - check

Is NOTHING like WoW - check

It dose not have itemisation (a full epic player is better than a green player by 2-5% at most) - check

A player lvl 40 can kill a lvl 60 - AS INTENDED - check

Has BattleKeep fights (48 vs 48) (bugged as hell atm) - been in 2 of them - and OMG did i Love it :) - check

It has PLENTY of 'features' that favor to build a community/guild (need of ppl to work together for a common goal) - check

It has RAID instances - bugged - not balanced - but due to the way close combat/healing/LineOfSight works - is alot more fun (for a healer) than WoW style

All in all is a matter of taste - but imo for an old scool mmo gamer - is far more atractive than what the market offers atm.

Prometeu - Bear Shaman - Wildsoul server

Sounds like it can be a pretty decent game in time... its like Vanguard all over again.

Originally posted by Prometeu

Well i play AoC since january - and I loved evry minute of it!

Is full of bugs - check

It needs balancing and tweaks (not class vs class - that was never thei aim of the game) - check

Is NOTHING like WoW - check

It dose not have itemisation (a full epic player is better than a green player by 2-5% at most) - check

A player lvl 40 can kill a lvl 60 - AS INTENDED - check

Has BattleKeep fights (48 vs 48) (bugged as hell atm) - been in 2 of them - and OMG did i Love it :) - check

It has PLENTY of 'features' that favor to build a community/guild (need of ppl to work together for a common goal) - check

It has RAID instances - bugged - not balanced - but due to the way close combat/healing/LineOfSight works - is alot more fun (for a healer) than WoW style

All in all is a matter of taste - but imo for an old scool mmo gamer - is far more atractive than what the market offers atm.

Prometeu - Bear Shaman - Wildsoul server

Nothing like WoW? You have got to be kidding me right? Its almost identical to WOW apart from a few minor things here and there.

The only part of the game that isn't virtually indistinguishable from WOW is the graphics. It doesnt LOOK like WoW but that's an aesthetic issue only. Apart from that it is basically an attempt to copy WoW with tits and blood thrown in to make it seem 'more mature'.

Lets go through the game shall we?

Dungeons: Same as WoW except the boss encounters dont have any design. Basically every single endgame encounter is a tank and spank fest. No innovation from Conan here.

Quests: Exactly the same as WoW. 'Go collect 50 X and bring it back to me' or 'Kill 50 x to complete the quest'. You know the drill. Unfortunately there isn't even half of the variety of quests that are present in WoW, and there is zero innovation from Conan in this area either. AOC even copies WOW with quest givers having ! above their heads and ? for completed quests. They dont even try and change the colour.

Character Progression and levelling: Same story as WoW. You learn new abilities as you level up and spend points in 'talent trees'. Again, same as WoW.

Gear: Same as WOW again except for 1 important area. In AOC gear is pointless. You could be wielding an epic (yes you guessed - epics are purple, and rares are blue in AOC too!) sword or a green stick from level 20 and you wouldnt know a difference in damage output, so gearing up is pretty pointless. The reason for this seems to be that stats dont seem to work well and dont seem to matter much to your character. As a result its hard to appreciate when your character 'grows in strength' through gear or levelling.

Combat system: There is a slight difference here due to the new 'combo system' in AOC. This could have been made interesting, but its tedious and boring. Instead of some abilities just happening when you activate them, with this system you must follow a little onscreen queue to press directional movements. The result however is not a more fluid and skillful combat system but one that is more clunky and over-dependant on running around like a headless chicken. Which leads naturally to...

The Stamina system: This is new and different from WOW i will admit. However the system is so fubared, it basically needs to be removed completely until they get it right. Using stamina allows all classes to sprint, and functions as the equivalent of a 'mana' pool for melee offensive abilities. This 'novelty' is such a total mess at the moment that its probably, in my opinion, the biggest reason why the game is totall imbalanced between classes at the moment.

PVP: Same as wow. Several mini-games to play and world pvp. There are sieges to take part in but servers cant seem to handle even the 10 v 10 mini games, so ill be astonished if they can handle 48 v 48. This however is a part of the game that admittedly I never really got to experience. I just got bored before the opportuntiy arose.

--

Basically Im dying to know where exactly this game is DIFFERENT to wow in any meaningful area (apart from its looks). Its the same old nonsense with a few gimmicks to make it seem different. And in the many areas where this game offers the same things as wow, it doesnt do it as well.

Again my apologies for the negativity of the post, but Im needing a bit of a vent about this game. I find all the sneering about WOW frankly laughable when this game is basically WOW with different clothes on and with a million more flaws.