Age of Conan Open Beta - 1st of May

[beanbandit]

I gave it a short try on the 1st. Not impressed at all.

How many patches? Just stupid for a game that has gone gold.
Jerky movement.
Low frame rates. (27fps)
Stupidly long load times. Not just getting into game, but loading up the char select screen.
Talk to a char, and have the "cut scene" or whatever they call it, cut my head and the other chars head off. Plus not being able to move camera around while in said scene.
Chat box is pathetic.

This game just feels like its trying too hard tbh. I know its early days, but some of these faults are unforgivable.

If they want to compete in the MMO environment they need to come up with something that doesn't require stupid system requirements. From my short time so far, it looks like they've concentrated on the gfx, which may look nice, but they just slow the game up so much.

I know lots of wow players, most of them don't have modern PC's, they won't upgrade or buy new PC's just to have a try of AoC.

[Barrichello]

I gave it a short try on the 1st. Not impressed at all.

How many patches? Just stupid for a game that has gone gold.
Jerky movement.
Low frame rates. (27fps)
Stupidly long load times. Not just getting into game, but loading up the char select screen.
Talk to a char, and have the "cut scene" or whatever they call it, cut my head and the other chars head off. Plus not being able to move camera around while in said scene.
Chat box is pathetic.

This game just feels like its trying too hard tbh. I know its early days, but some of these faults are unforgivable.

If they want to compete in the MMO environment they need to come up with something that doesn't require stupid system requirements. From my short time so far, it looks like they've concentrated on the gfx, which may look nice, but they just slow the game up so much.

I know lots of wow players, most of them don't have modern PC's, they won't upgrade or buy new PC's just to have a try of AoC.

Sounds like wow in beta tbh. Funny that.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

but wow owners cant use teh same old 6 year pc forever. many will have to upgrade at some point. no point making mmo's look piss poor like wow for todays hardware. i mean correct me if im wrong but aint the main advantage of pc gaming is to do with companies always pushing the envelope in terms of technology?

if you want games to stand still, go play console games

[beanbandit]

Sounds like wow in beta tbh. Funny that.

What part? I played WOW in beta, never had any real issues. Plus i wasn't playing on top-spec hardware. So come on, post some views to the game to counter my comments.

but wow owners cant use teh same old 6 year pc forever. many will have to upgrade at some point. no point making mmo's look piss poor like wow for todays hardware. i mean correct me if im wrong but aint the main advantage of pc gaming is to do with companies always pushing the envelope in terms of technology?

if you want games to stand still, go play console games

Your sole reason for wanting this game, based on all your comments on this thread, is the GFX. Comments in other threads point to the same thing. GFX doesn't make a game, never have done never will do. It's all about gameplay. ESPECIALLY in an mmo. You don't seem to be able to grasp this fact. When you do people may listen more to your views, but until you do, your views and comments will fall on deaf ears.

You also seem to make plenty of comments concerning WOW, even though you've never played wow, let alone an MMO. Go spend 10 days (240 hours gameplay) then come back and make some real comments.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

no its the gameplay i like too. i hate auto attack like in GW and wow. the attack system sounds and looks good. by your impressions you want mmo's to not improve apon graphics. like i said this is pc gaming not console gaming. i want things to move forward to backwards

[beanbandit]

no its the gameplay i like too. i hate auto attack like in GW and wow. the attack system sounds and looks good. by your impressions you want mmo's to not improve apon graphics. like i said this is pc gaming not console gaming. i want things to move forward to backwards

I don't give a monkeys about gfx, nice for all of about 2 seconds. then its just, meh, so what.

Auto-attack in WOW? I have no idea what your getting at here. None of my char have any auto-attacks, i have to start the fight, i have plenty of different abilities that have to be used at certain times, non of them are auto. Why does an attack system look good?

I want to see real improvements in MMO's. GFX are not an improvement, mearly just a means for people to e-peen on how good it looks on their 980000000000000GTTX 20Gb card. Games, especially mmo's, can look good, but they should not be the main selling point, which frankly AoC has been to you.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

no the selling point for me is the gameplay battles. gfx is a real improvement.s top living in the stone age and accept the fact that mmo's need to start pushing on all fronts not just gameplay. good luck play wow while the rest of us play aoc a game looking and sounding 10x better then your beloved wow.

time to move on lad, let it go lol

[shackahn]

I think graphics are important to us all, but not at the expense of gameplay.

I am sure if they brought WoW out with a new graphics engine then you wouldnt stick with the old one. We all want our games to look nice.

I think you have a slightly biased view because your beta of WoW was flawless. Having taken part in many beta's not MMO specific I can say the finished article is rarely a reflection of the beta.

I think its good that AoC has pushed the graphics barrier in MMO's because as stated above we certainly dont want to be stading still, and even if the game comes to nothing due to a lack of gameplay then least it sets a new GFX standard for other MMO's.

Complaining about the amount of patches just seems plain silly to me, its like saying that you would rather have a buggy game.

Why are the faults unforgiveable? You cant honestly be telling me Wow has been perfect from the word go, I know first hand it hasnt but I will agree it was a very polished product.

I think if you played the game with an open mind rather than comparing it straight to WoW you might have a better experience. I like what FunCom is tryong to do with AoC even if the execution may be a little poor.

I havent tried the beta so I cant specifically comment on the problems you have experienced.

I think maybe you need to revisit AoC and at least give it another chance

[j.o.s.h.1408]

well said shack. his a type of person that doesnt want gfx to move forward. he wants aoc to fail liek every otehr up and coming mmo. he wants his beloved wow to be the best forever

[shackahn]

I never meant as a flame as I can see both sides of the argument and in fact I agree that gameplay is paramount.

I hope there is a challenger to WoW's dominance in the near future just to add a breath of fresh air to the genre.

There is certainly no denying what an impact WoW has had and its eay to understand why everyone uses it as a benchmark

[beanbandit]

good luck play wow while the rest of us play aoc a game looking and sounding 10x better then your beloved wow.

You keep saying your interested in gameplay, then you keep posting things like that. Its looking better, i don't deny that, Doom 3 looked better than Doom2, your point being? You have no point, they play well no matter what the gfx look like.

Sounding better? What's sounding better?

Have fun playing AoC, hope you enjoy your gfx experience, sounds like a riot.......

I am sure if they brought WoW out with a new graphics engine then you wouldnt stick with the old one. We all want our games to look nice.

That depends on what else was added. If it was just a new gfx engine and no added content i wouldn't bother. If they added lots of new content, of course i'd have the new one, but for the content.

I think you have a slightly biased view because your beta of WoW was flawless. Having taken part in many beta's not MMO specific I can say the finished article is rarely a reflection of the beta.

I've been involved in a number of Beta, i've played some real pigs in the past, the WoW beta was one of the smoothest i've ever encountered. Of course i'm going to be biased, wouldn't you be if you had the same sort of experience?

I think its good that AoC has pushed the graphics barrier in MMO's because as stated above we certainly dont want to be stading still, and even if the game comes to nothing due to a lack of gameplay then least it sets a new GFX standard for other MMO's.

I never said we should be standing still, but when a game comes out that has extremely high required spec's (for that time) you just know your going to have some issues. Being ingame and seeing people moaning about jerky frames is not the sort of thing to instil confidence.

Complaining about the amount of patches just seems plain silly to me, its like saying that you would rather have a buggy game.

I complained because the game has gone gold, its finished. An open beta 3 weeks before release means to test server load. Having a couple of patches added at the very last minute, again doesn't instil confidence.

Why are the faults unforgiveable?

Jerky framerates in this day and age shouldn't be happening, i know the difference between server side problems and system issues. My system is no slouch, but i found that a real turn-off in any game.

Cut scene type scenarios should not be cutting peoples heads off. Especially when its your first quest pick-up.

You cant honestly be telling me Wow has been perfect from the word go, I know first hand it hasnt but I will agree it was a very polished product.

God no. Lots of problems have happened, slow patch downloads, servers dying, mobs misbehaving, i could go on. But when you have the content of WoW + TBC and the thousands of quests, you expect some issues to happen. **** happens in any game, just look at the crash issue with GTAIV. No game can be 100% perfect from that point of view, especially an mmo where changes happen all the time.

I think if you played the game with an open mind rather than comparing it straight to WoW you might have a better experience. I like what FunCom is tryong to do with AoC even if the execution may be a little poor.

I always play games with an open mind, i didn't go into AoC with comparision to WoW in mind. What i was looking for was a new experience, i just didn't like that experience. I did the same with RF-Online 2 years ago, but hated the chat system & the control system. Didn't go beyond beta with that.

I think maybe you need to revisit AoC and at least give it another chance

I very much doubt i will give AoC another try. Summer is upon us, the weather is good, i have no intention of staying indoors playing silly games when the sun is out

well said shack. his a type of person that doesnt want gfx to move forward. he wants aoc to fail liek every otehr up and coming mmo. he wants his beloved wow to be the best forever

Can someone give me a translation please, i have no idea what Josh is saying!

I never meant as a flame as I can see both sides of the argument and in fact I agree that gameplay is paramount.

I hope there is a challenger to WoW's dominance in the near future just to add a breath of fresh air to the genre.

There is certainly no denying what an impact WoW has had and its eay to understand why everyone uses it as a benchmark

I didn't see your post as a flame, you've thought about your post, and written it in a constructive way. Its just a shame that Josh can't write those sort of replys, he'd rather not answer and just skip the real questions at hand.

I'd love to see a real competitor for WoW as well, i'm hoping that WAR is going to be that game. It has lots going for it already. It has a good fan base from the previous games, a massive fanbase with the table top game, and has plenty of lore to bring into the game. Just hope i manage to get a closed beta key, will be on the open beta anyway

I agree that WoW has had a major impact on the mmo market. Before it came out, mmo's were seen as a rather small market. 3 years later, 10million+ sales and you have Blizzard coining it. They are the dominant force, you can bet that if something come out that has a hope of challenging WoW, Blizzard won't waste time in countering that.

[shackahn]

I too am looking forward to WAR its appeal should be massive, and as you say the fanbase is already huge. Not sure how the transition from table top to PC will go but I await the results eagerly.

I read your responses with great interest and I must say you have put me off the game slightly.

Having played LOTRO for almost a year now and never really feeling like it was a finished product, I dont want the kind of experience you are describing in AoC.

That said I have to give it a try, if nothing else I will be able to come on here, re-post and completely agree with you

[Barrichello]

What part? I played WOW in beta, never had any real issues. Plus i wasn't playing on top-spec hardware. So come on, post some views to the game to counter my comments.

The clue is in what i wrote before - I am playing with my res at 1920x1280 and i have a near constant 60fps. My PC is far from "cutting edge" yet i do not seem to be encountering the issues you refer to. You sure you have all your drivers updated etc? You are also playing in and around Tortage the start city with loads of other people have suddenly started playing all at the same time. Part of this beta is that they are stresstesting their servers. Once you level into your twenties (which you are unable to in the silly fileplanet giveaway) the world opens up you will be in a larger area - lets call it a bottleneck you are in at present.

My character is well into his 30s now - and im not really seeing too many issues - and most importantly im loving it I played wow for over 2 years and to say that aoc is refreshing is a understatement. Of course it will not appeal to everyone, the combat will be to difficult and off putting to people in their "wow comfort zone" and fair play to them. But i can safely say that this game will, and more relevantly is appealing to allot of people right now.

Auto-attack in WOW? I have no idea what your getting at here. None of my char have any auto-attacks,

Ok, right click/select/highlight any "red" player/mob - then take you hands away from the mouse keyboard and watch what happens - if you do character does not auto-attack i would be very surprised

[TiG]

Barrichello, out of interest are you playing a melee char then?, it seems you've not experienced the poor balance of caster classes that AOC are now looking to resolve as well as the fact you seem to be of the opinion that priests in WoW are worthwhile auto attackign with a 41.4dps mace

IF so maybe its time you stop playing a melee character, the enemy has been hitting you in the head too much.

As for why i'm bothering to post here, given the fact i've played wow for a long time, i've tried RFOnline, Eve, LOTRO, AOC, Lineage 2. I'm trying to find a good replacement for WoW, currently there isn't one in my opinion, all have faults and flaws that have caused me not to pick the game up. I'm now waiting for WAR to come along and hoping that they address some of the issues.

AOC is far too much of an action mmorpg for me, the strategy and thinking elements just don't exist, just outward nuking everything isn't interesting for me, the dodge which has been mentioned a lot doesn't get used as it "just wastes" time.

Nothing else has come close to WoW's instance running imo, the combination of the classes is still far superior to everything else, sadly i've not see anything like that come together in AOC in my limited level trial. Maybe it changes later on. I just don't think i'm going to get there as i've always played a caster as my main char, AOC really doesnt hit the mark when it comes to that.

WAR on the otherhand will hopefully step back from this action front and put it all about chosing your attacks to match up against your enemies.

TiG

[Splash]

I gave it a shot. It took nearly 8 minutes to zone. I gave up at that point.

I've since been told that this was a known issue and has been patched out, but... I'll give it one more shot I guess. It didn't grab me in the way that WoW, Tabula Rasa and the WAR beta really did.

I know a lot of people are feeling very positive about AoC, but to be honest I can't see it lasting a year: most people that I know who are in the beta are referring to it as a filler until Blizzard bring out WotLK or EA release WAR.

To clarify - I think that Funcom are being brave in what they're trying to do with the combat, but it may yet prove to be their biggest downfall (assuming that they've fixed the stupid zoning bug and the odd targetting issues I had)

(and yes, I know there's not supposed to be any targetting. That's what makes it odd that I would randomly spin around in combat and find myself facing the NPC I was supposed to be protecting)


As for those who are going on about how MMOs seemingly need shiny shiny graphics (and I really don't think WoW is creaking at the seams as much as some people seem to think) then it may be worth taking a look-see at Jumpgate Evolution. Now THAT is looking awesome.

[Geist]

Well took most of yesterday to download and patch... and it wont run.

It starts, I can hear and skip the starting movies (eidos etc.) but then it tries to load some screen with a dais surrounded by a couple trees (character selection screen from looking at screenshots) and it all goes mental and wont go further. Or the screen just stays blank from the start.

Ok background music though...