Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Funcom have announced that Age Of Conan’s trial will, up to January 1st, allow anyone who signs in to play up to level 20 for free. That’s the whole of Tortage Island, arguably one of the best bits of the game. Thanks to the dangers of gold-farming scum exploiting this system you won’t be able to trade with other players or use public chat channels during that time, but there are some in-game bonuses if you do decide to sign up for full access.

Aieee! Seems Age of Conan devs Funcom aren’t in the rudest of health – they’ve just announced 20% of their workforce is being let go, and their hopefully-incredible MMO The Secret World has been delayed by “some months.” Conan’s upcoming expansion isn’t affected, apparently. Best of luck to those who’ve lost their jobs, and, selfishly, let’s hope The Secret World doesn’t have to compromise itself as a result.

To all good things, a sequel. To pretty much all things, an expansion pack. News breaks that Funcom are releasing an expansion for Age of Conan. GODSLAYER! Which is the sort of thing which demands capital letters. The add-on pack promises “more brutal, sexy and savage adventure” which is something that RPS is all very fond of, except Walker who prefers kindly, affectionate and sensitive staying-in. The game site is here and you’ll find a screenshot gallery over at Blues. The press release follows…

Update: Added in trailer.
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Funcom send word that they are promoting the encroaching one year anniversary of Age Of Conan with a chance for lapsed subscribers to see how the game has changed in the past months. And it’s expanded fairly extensively, with a region full of giants, a “cityscape”, and loads of tech fiddling, including the DX10 stuff. The re-evaluation offer apparently contains no subs obligation, and will be entirely free for Age Of Conan owners for the next two weeks. Here’s the link.

The other big MMOs aren’t taking Lich King fever lying down. Age Of Conan game director Craig Morrison has said that the latest free update for the MMO, which has just gone live, contains “one of the most epic and memorable monster encounters ever created for the game.” The new expansion, Ymir’s Pass, contains a new tract of land to explore, new quests, monsters and a storyline.

The dungeon Morrison is talking about is one of three high level dungeons due to be unveiled for folks who have stuck with the MMO and got past level 50. CVG have all the details and some spectacular screenshots. Trailer after the jump.
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Remember Age of Conan? That MMO everyone was dead excited about until it turned out to be just a less compelling and slightly broken version of mmmpmmmpphgggrraaamppphmmmle [gagged by his fellows to protect him from death at the hands of Angry Internet Men]?
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Want to try sword-swingin’ MMO Age Of Conan for free? Then you need to poke someone who is already playing with a collector’s edition of the game, and get them to send you one of their buddy program invites. Funcom have said that all retail copies will soon have the buddy program invites, which are free trials lasting seven days.

Folks who have invites to send out and want to share with their fellow RPS readers should do so in the comments below.

“More than 700.000 gamers have registered an Age of Conan account so far,” say the boys at Funcom. That means that it’s in second place behind World Of Warcraft’s twenty-nine-gajiloplex players. I have to admit that I’ve now lapsed and haven’t touched Conan’s glistening textures for over a week. I’ve no intention of going back any time soon. I do want to get to that whole fortress-building stage, but there’s just too much else distracting me. There’s so much good material in Conan, but I lack the time and the in-game chums to want to bother. Eve, TF2 and a host of other toys will keep me entertained.

What about you, denizens of RPS? Are you still beating down the barbarians?

As well as announcing that Turbonegro (above) will be contributing exciting punk rock music to their MMO, Funcom have released some details about what to expect from the next few updates to Age Of Conan. Top of the list is changes to PvP to deal with the ganking of lower level players, as well as some specific PvP gear, in a patch which should appear towards the end of the month.

Rather more excitingly Funcom are now talking about a free update appear later in the year which features guild alliance warfare. This will allow the guilds to be able to team up and “erect unique-looking alliance battekeeps”. This does sound intriguing, I just hope it doesn’t lead to the over-the-top super alliance situation now faced by Eve Online. Needless to say, all this alliance stuff is just a part of attempts to improve and expand on AoC’s endgame, the player-built villages and Battlekeeps. I’ll try and pen something about that in a few weeks, once I’ve pushed my warrior woman up a few more levels.

After the jump: the excerpted relevant bits of the latest Age Of Conan press release, and why I’m not actually sexually excited by Conan updates.

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For people keeping score. Griefing: very funny. Benny Hill theme: makes me want to die.