So guess what..? Funcom has sent me YET ANOTHER offer to come back and play for free. And naturally, they are hoping to suck me into buying their lame expansion pack. And as a part of the deal, they have actually GIVEN me the entire expansion... but I gotta pay for it if I wanna access certain parts of it. It took almost an entire hour to download.
Well, whoopie..!!! Another free trial from Funcom, for AoC veterans. I feel so loved. What are we up to now... something like seven free trial offers in the past year..?
So naturally, I said "Sure, I'll go poke my head in again for free." Why not..?
And here is what I found:(1) The graphics in AoC are still buggy as hell... almost as bad as they were on launch day. I'm running brand-new hardware that far exceeds ANYTHING that was available back when AoC first launched, and yet the overall framerates still suck... the video randomly stutters and freezes every ten minutes or so, even when my character is not moving. And textures still fail to load properly on a regular basis... particularly when logging in or changing zones. That bug has been in this game since BETA and they have NEVER fixed it... not in TWO YEARS.
(2) The chat window is still unreadable in most situations... and the overall suitability of the chat system is essentially just as horrible as it was back on launch day. Seriously... no change in chat functionality AT ALL, even after
two years of "exciting new enhancements" by Funcom.
(3) The post-80 game has been augmented by an alternate advancement system that looks as if it was more or less ripped off directly from EverQuest. And it also has a "feature" that is very much a rip-off of Eve Online. Because here's the best part about Funcom's new AA system: you don't actually need to work towards obtaining any of those AA points. You don't need to EARN anything at all. Just click on the AA ability that you want, and then select "Time" as the way of "earning" that ability. And then, log off and go do something else for two days. Go visit your grandma... go find yourself a real girlfriend... or whatever. When you come back two days later, SHAZZAM..!!! Your toon will magically have a new AA ability... no actual gameplay required. No need to work for it... because Funcom is handing out candy for free. Anything to keep miserably bored post-80 players from canceling their subscriptions, eh..? FUCKING PATHETIC EZ-MODE BULLSHIT.
(4) The new zones from the expansion look pretty. They even have bird people in them -- kinda like the Arrakoa bird people in World Of Warcrap. Aside from that, there is nothing remarkable about the expansion at all and actually, it is just as repetitive and uninspired as the plain-vanilla game. No wonder Funcom is offering free trials in yet another effort to lure people into paying for A BORING GAME with an EQUALLY BORING EXPANSION PACK.
(5) There is still no improvement in high-end raid content. I asked several fellow level 80 players if any of that had changed significantly in the past year or so. All of them emphatically said "No, but they did add a bunch of pretty new uber gear." Well, yay. I guess this explains why all of the level 80's that I spoke to were all standing around in Khemi and picking their noses:
because they had nothing else to do.Oh yeah, I almost forgot: they gave me a free "drinking cape" as a reward for coming back. Except that I already had one, for being a member of the beta community. Well cool... so now I have two, I guess. Except that I never even used the first one, because it's lame. It just lets your toon get drunk for free. Yay. I suppose that item would have been significant, if Funcom hadn't cut drunken tavern brawls out of the game right before release day. But they did... so it isn't. Just more silly hype for the kiddies that ultimately amounts to... nothing.
It is clear that Funcom has been putting their last gasp behind this lame expansion pack of theirs, in the fervent hope that it will somehow resurrect Age Of Conan and keep Funcom from going bankrupt. Well... good luck with that, Funcom. Instead of spending the past two years hiring COMPETENT developers... and fixing what was already miserably broken, misguided and inadequate about AoC... you have instead invested whatever is left of your capital into hiring some entry-level trained chimps, to forge a bloated piece of hype called "Rise Of The Godslayer." Once again, Funcom is making the same mistakes that have plagued this game ever since its release: they are placing style and hype over substance and originality... and in the end, they have achieved none of the above.
I know there is a certain percentage of people out there who think that I rant against AoC for personal reasons. I suppose to some small extent, that may actually be true. I am very angry with Funcom and the way that they
deliberately sabotaged third-party mods for AoC, yes. That's no secret. But my personal anger towards Funcom does not have any bearing upon the validity of my criticisms. Either something is true, or else it isn't true. Regardless of whether the messenger is angry or not, that doesn't make it any more or less true. And so far as I am concerned, ALL of my negative criticisms regarding Funcom and their broken Age Of Conan game are legitimate and supported by factual examples. And the most damning fact of all can be found by looking at the steadily dwindling number of actively playing AoC subscribers. The people are clearly unhappy with AoC... and so far, Funcom has done little to nothing about fixing the most fundamental problems with their game. Instead, they just keep piling on more and more hype, freebies and deceptive advertising... along with a decidedly mediocre expansion pack that is just as boring and uninspired as the rest of the game.
Avoid the Age Of Conan and its parent company like the plague, folks. Just spend your money on something else... preferably something which is not a mediocre, misguided and buggy pile of fancy-looking
crap. And somebody please tell Funcom that no amount of gold spray paint is going to turn a dog turd into a work of art.
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