Age of Conan Editorial: She's All That

Funcom are promising us a lot with this game, and so our expectations are high.

"'Age of Conan' is not highly-anticipated for nothing; it offers so much, something unique, and does so very, very boldly."

This fortnight, we ask ourselves if there's a danger in 'Age of Conan' peaking so early or setting the benchmark too high too soon. Can Funcom truly set the standard for MMO gaming with 'Age of Conan'?

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I hardly think that it is too soon for an MMO to set the high standards for the rest of the market, what with a low quality game like WoW becoming the most popular MMO on the market. Already many MMOs that are beginning their development and even those that are already in development are starting to lean towards the strategies that Vivendi* has used with WoW.

With about 5-6million of players that have played WoW, and it being their first MMO, their own standards for MMOs is already biased to what they have experienced with WoW. Now that these players are fed up with WoW and looking for new and fresh games, it is imperative that somebody punches them in the face and gives them the cold and hard facts of real MMOs on a silver platter with a gold lining. If the 'WoW-trend' continues in other MMOs, very soon the MMO market in general will be flooded with low quality MMOs that cater to the masses of ex-WoW players, creating a very big competition for other more original and bold MMOs. Thus, the rest of the developers will follow suit and the MMO market will descend into what the general games market has become recently.

Big companies no longer are willing to take risks and produce original games, rather taking concepts and strategies from other successful games and repeating it with a newer look and feel and very little original content. This has forced smaller companies with a smaller budget to shy away from producing original games as well, in fear that the game will not sell. Up until recently, the MMO market was an exception to this trend, with every MMO unique in their own way, and every newer MMO trying to best the one before it. Now that WoW has been added to the equation, and all of a sudden MMOs have become very popular amongst the average gamer, the same trend as I've described above has started to appear in the MMO market.

If there is an MMO out there in development right now that can reset the high standards of the MMO and wipe out the 'WoW-trend', it would have to be 'Age of Conan'. WAR looks like a good candidate as well, but since Mythic has been bought out by EA, the game's direction has become questionable. This is very similar to what had happened to Blizzard prior to the release of WoW.

*The reason why I say the strategies that Vivendi had used with WoW, and not Blizzard, is because once a small company gets bought out, and becomes a studio working for a bigger company, they no longer have full control of where their game is going. If Vivendi says make the game easy so that we can attract many players, then that is what they will have to do. WoW was highly promising during it's development propr to Blizzard going under, and at launch the game was excellent, with Blizzard's spirit poured into it like they have done with their other games. Since then, every expansion and added content was done with the sole purpose of attracting more players and keeping them playing, using techniques that cater to the masses, and not by improving the quality of the game as would have been done under different circumstances.

Let us hope that the 'Borg's of the gaming market don't have their eyes on Funcom just yet.