Age of Conan

Age of Conan: Unchained
North American cover for Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures
Developer(s)	Funcom
Publisher(s)	Funcom Eidos Interactive[1]
Designer(s)	Gaute Godager
Composer(s)	Knut Avenstroup Haugen, Composer
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows[2]
Release date(s)	‹See Tfd› NA: May 20, 2008[3] ‹See Tfd› EU: May 23, 2008[4] ‹See Tfd› Steam: February 22, 2013[5]
Genre(s)	MMORPG
Mode(s)	Multiplayer

Age of Conan: Unchained (formerly known as Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures) is a fantasy-themed massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed by Funcom and published by Eidos Interactive for Microsoft Windows.^[2]

Age of Conan is the first installment in the planned Age of Conan series. Age of Conan takes place within the continent of the Hyborian kingdoms, a year after the events depicted in Robert E. Howard's Conan novel, The Hour of the Dragon.^[6] Hyborian Adventures' release celebrated the 76th anniversary of the Conan franchise.

Characters

A screenshot of the character creation and extensive customization featured in Age of Conan.

Characters in Age of Conan are registered to a unique user account on a specific online server, with characters created on one server unable to be played on another. Players are able to create characters which function as their virtual avatars in the online world of Hyboria. During character creation, the player may choose from four playable races. The character is one of four archetypes (in bold) and one of three class selections for each archetype. The Rise of the Godslayer expansion brought on a new race, the Khitan. Earlier only some classes were free to play but on December 13, 2012 all classes were made available in the free model.^[7]

Combat

Combat comprises striking a target from different angles, such as hacking down against the head, slashing diagonally down from the left or right, and slashing diagonally up from the left or right. These directions are designed to be strung together in combination naturally during combat. Difficult-to-perform combinations cause additional damage and faster strikes.^[8]

Funcom has said that their "Real Combat" system, a combat system designed to offer more real-time options than traditional Dungeons & Dragons-inspired "turn-based" combat systems that are more commonly used, will be a prime attraction of Age of Conan: Unchained. This "Real Combat" system is a first-person melee approach in which every enemy has three different areas that players can target. Combinations can be performed by stringing together consecutive attacks in particular directions. Feedback from players has pointed out that this system requires a certain degree of dexterity. Character statistics and item bonuses also play a role in this system, however item bonuses have less effect on a character's power than in comparable games, so that whilst equipment does play a certain role other factors also have an impact, such as the player's skill or their analysis of the scenario. The idea of "Real Combat" is to eliminate the dullness of typical MMO fighting, which often consists of an auto-attack feature.^[9]

The "Real Combat" system is used in one-on-one weapon battles, as well as during spell-casting, ranged combat and mounted combat. In some situations however, players will choose to band together and unite their skills to face other bands of players or non-player armies. Players can then work together and build on each other's strengths, for example a character standing in line with a 'Conqueror' when he is running will have a greater resistance to knockback effects.^[10]

Players are able to take part in large scale siege operations. Adventurers can cooperate with one another to build cities with walls, towers and catapults that can protect player-owned taverns and merchant facilities.

The dance moves were made using motion capture on the dancer Hallgrim Hansegård, who is a backing dancer for the winning song of the Eurovision Song Contest 2009: "Fairytale" by Alexander Rybak.^[11]

In July 2011, a Hardcore PvP server was launched for the EU and US servers. This hardcore PvP server removes the guards from the various cities and playfields and re-opened PvP on the instances around the city of Tortage. This hardcore server brings back the basics of MMO PvP combat in that players will have a chance at dropping loot from their inventory when they are killed in player vs player combat. Also, players are only able to have one character on these servers. This was a fresh-start server which doesn't allow any character transfer to it, does not allow the use of offline levels, or free level 50 characters.

Setting

An Aquilonian character in Age of Conan gazing at the snowy mountains of northern Cimmeria

Age of Conan is set in a low fantasy pseudo-historical ancient world called the Hyborian Age, created by Robert E. Howard. The warlord Conan has seized the throne of Aquilonia, but ancient evils seek to overthrow him.

The Hyborian Age is like a dark, decadent, twisted and corrupt version of Euro-Asian history. Mix a bit of the Roman Empire, Mongolian culture and Babylonian mysticism with '30s-era myths of undiscovered Africa...^[12]

The lead artist Terje Lundberg said that the look and feel of Hyboria was based on the interpretation of the stories written by Robert E. Howard:

"When you read Howard's work you're immediately drawn into a gritty world of dark and ancient forces, and mighty and decadent civilizations. You feel the great weight of the ages and sense the very history in the crumbling mortar and the ruins. Therefore we've been mindful from the outset to create a world which is true to Howard's writing. There is majesty in Hyboria but it's of a monolithic, brutal and primitive kind – it certainly isn't "high fairie" where everything appears as though it was built only yesterday and is devoid of context."^[13]

Lundberg said the game at launch will contain three countries, Cimmeria, a northern country with snow and highlands, Aquilonia, which contains "green hills, lush riverbeds, and the marvelous city of Tarantia", and Stygia, which consists mostly of deserts and "some beautiful cities" — as well as the island of Tortage which "has a diverse geography ranging from jungle to harbors".^[13]

Music and sound

Five principal individuals worked on the music and audio for Age of Conan. The Audio Director is Morten Sørlie, who created the soundtrack for Anarchy Online – Shadowlands. Simon Poole (Lead Sound designer on "Dreamfall – The Longest Journey") took over as Audio Director in May 2007, and saw the project through to completion. The sound designers are Tord D. Nikolaisen and Fredrik Martol. Composer Knut Avenstroup Haugen wrote the musical score for the game.^[14] To create a musical score for the Hyborian universe, Haugen turned to many different sources: For the music of the different ethnic groups, Haugen studied traditional music from relevant parts of the world. For the overall sound of the Hyborian Age, Haugen studied ancient and medieval music as well as the romantic orchestra repertoire and film scores, while avoiding conventions that connect too closely to specific historical periods.^[15]

The female vocalist heard in the score is Norwegian singer Helene Bøksle.^[16] The lyrics of the music is in the Old Norwegian language and comes from the Völuspá, the first and best known poem of the Poetic Edda.^[17]

Norwegian punk rock artists Turbonegro contributed three bonus songs to the soundtrack CD, one of which was written specifically for the album.^[18]

Knut Avenstroup Haugen won the IFMCA award for Best Original Score for a Video Game or Interactive Media for his score.^[19]

Over 40 actors voiced the large cast of characters.^[20] The recording was done at Side UK^[21] in London, Side LA in California, and at Funcom in Norway.^[22]

Music used in video by Breivik

The music accompanying the propaganda video which the perpetrator of the 2011 Norway attacks, Anders Behring Breivik uploaded to video sharing sites including YouTube at the same time that he published his manifesto, comes from the Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures soundtrack. Breivik writes of Bøksle's voice that it is the perfect sound to listen to when one commits acts of martyrdom. During his trial he also testified that he uses this music, particularly the song "Ere the World Crumbles" when he meditates, as he did in preparation for his terrorist acts on 22 July 2011. Bøksle said in a press release in the week following the attacks that she distanced herself from Breivik's use of the music. The music's composer, Knut Avenstroup Haugen, has done the same.^[17][23]

Technology

Tortage City, the backwater capital of the Barrachan Isles, as seen in Age of Conan

The game makes use of following technologies:

• 'Cheetah'. Shader-oriented proprietary render engine re-written from scratch by Funcom featuring a Phong per pixel lighting system. This engine allows for improved graphics and ambience. This is coupled with a trapezoidal shadow system, an in-house system developed by Funcom that allows all objects to cast shadows onto everything.^[24]
• 'Perlin noise-based cloud generating system'. Five-layered procedural system that enables multiple layers of dynamic clouds; thus, visually realistic cloud behavior.^[24]
• 'SpeedTree'. Programming package that aims to produce high-quality virtual foliage in real time.^[25]
• 'DreamWorld'. The graphics engine has been developed by Funcom circa 2000. When Funcom began developing Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, the company reviewed its existing technology base and decided to focus on the further evolution of their proprietary DreamWorld engine as opposed to licensing a third-party engine as many online RPG companies do. As such, Funcom began to retool their engine with the overall design. Pipeline and implementation process was taken into account. In light of these changes, the DreamWorld engine has been rebuilt for Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures with new features, special effects, and optimizations.
• 'DirectX 10'. A major update of DirectX API. Although advertised on the gamebox, the game did not include support for DirectX 10 at the time of launch. The DX10 client was finally released for all live servers late March 2009.^[26]
• 'Umbra'. Umbra is GPU-accelerated occlusion culling software developed by Umbra software Ltd. Umbra's aim is to speed up the rendering of large worlds with a lot of overdraw.

Development

Promotion at the Games Convention 2008

Funcom delayed Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures on January 21, 2008^[27] and again on March 24, 2008.^[28] The delays were widely reported by online game magazines such as IGN.^[29] Once released, the game sold over 500,000 copies worldwide by June 1, 2008.^[30] Six days later one million copies had been shipped in total.^[31]

Between March 2005 and January 2006, Funcom periodically revealed concept art and screenshots from Age of Conan. The Art Director for the Conan project is Didrik Tollefsen, known for such classics as The Longest Journey and Anarchy Online – Shadowlands, which won the Outstanding Achievement in Art Direction award in 2003.^[32]

On January 24, 2006, Funcom unveiled the community portal for Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. By this time, much of the pre-launch community had gathered around the forums and IRC chat of the official Age of Conan website. There were informal events such as IRC chats with the developers and, in summer 2006, community contests.

In April 2006, Funcom created a forum for guild recruitment entitled the Guild Hall for its pre-launch community, allowing forum members began organizing their player guilds.^[33]

In January 2007, several important updates were announced regarding the expected launch window for the game. Also on January 12, 2007, Funcom announced the original twenty-three classes had been merged down to fourteen classes to avoid the lack of diversity between them.^[34]

On February 7, 2008, Funcom and Eidos announced that over 500,000 people had signed up for the Beta Testing of Age of Conan.^[35]

On May 19, 2008, GameZone.com presented a series of original fictional stories by Michael Lafferty, stemming from the massively multiplayer online world of Age of Conan – Hyborian Adventures. The stories were written with the permission and cooperation of Funcom. The tales explore the world, the characters and the lore involved in Hyboria.^[36]

In September 2008, Gaute Godager, the Producer and Game Director resigned from his role in Age of Conan and from Funcom, a company he had been involved in for over 16 years.^[37] In his press release, he revealed that he was not happy with elements in the game's development since release. He was succeeded by Craig Morrison, previously live Game Director of Anarchy Online, and community manager for various Funcom community forums.

On August 18, 2009, Funcom launched a website showcasing the upcoming expansion, Rise of the Godslayer. Set in the mythical land of Khitai, it features a new Eastern theme. The expansion was released on May 11, 2010.

On June 30, 2011, Funcom began marketing the game with the new title, Age of Conan: Unchained (as opposed to Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures), and altered the subscription model to a hybrid one. A hybrid model incorporates free-to-play (no monthly fee is charged) and premium plans. Premium players may choose from 1-, 3-, 6-, and 12-month recurring payment, while free-to-play players have limited access to characters, features, and areas. Some of the limitations can be removed with the use of the new "Item Shop" (available only in the game), where items can be bought with the help of Funcom Points. Funcom Points can be earned either by subscribing or by buying them with real cash.

On August 31, 2011, Funcom released the Savage Coast of Turan adventure pack as a promotion for the upcoming 2011 Conan film Conan the Barbarian.

In his monthly letter for August 2013, Joel Byos revealed a new major PvP event titled The Great Hyborian Race. A new server called the Blood and Glory ruleset server which will be started specifically for this event. The players will have to create a new character on this server in order to participate in this event. The objective is to reach level 80 in all classes by joining a guild or by going it alone. Those first to reach the level will be awarded special prizes. Those who reach a certain threshold of PvP experience within a given timeframe will be given bonus rewards. For the duration of the event, participants will be unable to use offline levels and restrictions will be placed on XP potions. Players have to earn experience through PvE and PvP fights. The developers are aiming to start the event after the server merge which was delayed due to office move by Funcom.^[38]

The game is AMD Eyefinity validated.^[39]

Additional content

Expansions

Rise of the Godslayer

The first expansion titled Age of Conan: Rise of the Godslayer was released on May 11, 2010 and can be bought for Funcom Points from the item shop by all players. It provides new areas for medium-level characters in the form of a home zone for the new playable race, the Khitans; and four additional regions for high-level characters. The new content also includes new companions that can be trained for use as combat pets, or as mounts. A faction system was introduced in order to add variety and re-playability to the new zones. Through new quests, group instances, and raids, players are able to gather tokens to buy new armour sets. An additional incentive is the Alternative Advancement system; a new tree of character feats or perks that are acquired by means of a dedicated point system. It also expanded the raiding in the game to add Tier 4.^[40]

Adventure Packs

The Savage Coast Of Turan

On August 31, 2011, Funcom released "The Savage Coast of Turan" adventure pack, which can be bought for Funcom Points from the item shop by all players. The pack includes a new playfield known as "Coast of Ardashir", two new solo instances, a group instance, a new 24-man raid instance called "Temple of Erlik" and a new combat pet. The new content was aimed to launch along with the 2011 film Conan the Barbarian, so that players had the chance to see some of the characters, armor, and weapons from the film.^[41]

Secrets of Dragon's Spine

On September 3, 2012 Funcom announced that it is planning a new adventure pack called "Secrets of Dragon's Spine" which will be released in a series of updates. The pack introduces a new zone called Dragon's Spine, a row of small peaks in the southern wastes of Stygia. It will feature new quests, dungeons, challenges, a new mount type, a new raid instance and a new PvP area.^[42] The first update was released on live servers on January 10, 2013.^[43] On August 13, 2013 a new dungeon which also contains a city of the Serpent Men was added in the Dragon's Spine.^[44]

Reception

The game received "generally favorable reviews" according to Metacritic.^[46] The game was "very inviting and plays well" according to VariableGHz.^[56] Player reactions were overwhelmingly negative in the months following the release, as the game was plagued by a vast number of bugs, missing zones, broken encounters and total lack of end-game content. Since release, Funcom has made improvements to performance and changes and additions to the game which were not ready in time for launch, as well as in response to feedback from players. Additions have included new adventuring zones, and revamps of existing dungeons.

Seth Schiesel, writing for the New York Times, stated that the development of the game would have benefited from a few extra months of production.^[57]

See also

• List of games based on Conan the Barbarian

References

External links

• Official website