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The Secret World's business model to feature subs and cash shop
Funcom has taken the wraps off its business model for The Secret World, and the upcoming horror-conspiracy MMORPG will ship with a traditional subscription model. That's not all, though. In a post on the official forums, community manager Oliver "Tarib" Kunz says that the game will also feature microtransactions and a cash shop. The blurb mentions Funcom's desire to steer clear of "pay-to-win" scenarios by limiting the item store to clothing and convenience items. "Character power in The Secret World will be determined by how well you play the game, not how much money you are willing to put into it," Kunz writes.
Age of Conan 2.0.7 coming today after extended downtime
If you had your heart set on a little Hyborian hooky this afternoon, go ahead and cancel that sick day and head on in to the office. Funcom is in the process of uploading Age of Conan version 2.0.7 to the live servers, and according to a post on the official boards by senior community manager Tarib, the downtime has been extended from six to a full eight hours (it began early this morning at 7:00 a.m. EDT). The good news is that the patch looks to improve performance in Khitai's Northern Grasslands zone (often called Northern Crashlands due to its low framerates and frequent lockups). While the jury is still out on the success of this aspect of the patch, it's gratifying to see Funcom taking action on the matter. 2.0.7 is also tweaking the ranger class (yes, again), in the seemingly neverending struggle to bring Hyboria's bow and crossbow crowd into line with the rest of the classes. This time it's not a nerf but rather a series of mini-buffs, including more damage for the deft stabs skill, a better snare effect on pin down, and more. You can view the patch notes from the Test Live server, but you'll need to sign in with a Test Live forum account.
Age of Conan unveils offline leveling
Funcom has announced their new Age of Conan offline leveling mechanic, introduced in the 1.07.2 patch that hit the live servers today. Senior Community Manager Oliver 'Tarib' Kunz details the system in a post on the game's official forums. The new feature kicks off by giving each active account four levels which can distributed to any characters above level 30. Every four days, an additional level will be added to your offline leveling pool, again enabling you to bump up one of your post-30 avatars. The levels accrue regardless of whether you actually log into Age of Conan every four days provided you maintain an active subscription. if you've got a gaggle of level 80 characters sitting on your select screen, the additional levels will be waiting for any new character that you create and advance to 30 or higher. Finally, Tarib notes that levels are permanent once assigned, so choose wisely. "Customer Support would not be able to take that level away from your character and add it back to your pool. So please be careful when assigning these levels," he says. Check out the official announcement and stay with Massively for more details as well as Rise of the Godslayer info. [Thanks Inthracus!]
Age of Conan reintroduces free trial
Age of Conan has seen its share of ups and downs in this first year since launch, but the ride seems to be smoothing out lately. The first expansion is on the way, new content has been offered, and the PvP side is getting some extra attention. Community manager Oliver "Tarib" Kunz even took a bit of time lately to lay out a patch timeline for players, to let them know what's coming up. Back in July, a list of "10 reasons to give it another look", included free account reactivation for two weeks.Now Funcom is issuing a similar invitation to everyone, reintroducing the free trial for players looking to try Age of Conan, and those wanting to take a second look at the new and improved game. This time they're offering 7 days of full game access, although there are some restrictions on things like trading, public chat channels, forums, and in-game mail.)If you want a closer look at what Funcom has been up to with Age of Conan lately, visit the trial website to take them up on their offer.
Age of Conan's patch plans laid out
Timelines are always subject to change, but it's still nice to know them, right? Age of Conan's patching timeline was just laid out by community manager Oliver "Tarib" Kunz in an informal manner on the forums.Patch 1.05.6 is currently on the test server, and it will be staying there for about another 2 weeks before it makes its way to the live servers, barring any unforseen testing mishaps, of course. That's the patch that has the new Iron Tower instance and the veteran rewards system.Once 1.05.6 is out on the live servers, patch 1.06 will be pushed onto the test server. Patch 1.06 is the big one, featuring new tier three dungeons, the House of Crom "social dungeon" where multiple teams of players will work to overcome unknown obstacles, guild renown, and tower PvP. 1.06 will be added slowly to the patch server, however, focusing on the bigger updates like guild renown and tier three dungeons before moving on to the other features of the patch.
Age of Conan's anniversary hiccup
In what some are calling "their biggest debacle since launch," Funcom's anniversary bash for Age of Conan (EU) experienced a hiccup this past weekend, and unfortunately, it wasn't alcohol-related. A combination of miscommunication and technical glitches left hundreds, if not thousands, of party-goers in poor spirits.Funcom's initial announcement invited players to take part in "small festivities" outside Conan's castle at a particular time and urged them to bring along celebratory fireworks obtained with a "/claim" command. Due to some time zone confusion, many players showed up over an hour early. When the event didn't even kick off when it was supposed to, the forums lit up with agitated players.The Senior Community Manager, Tarib, showed up and explained that the festivities were actually intended to be player-driven rather than a scripted or GM-led world event. This did not sit well with many in the community who pointed to the event promotion, which led them to believe otherwise. Tarib apologized for the miscommunication and also stated that technical issues prevented certain merchants from showing up in certain instances. He later called off the North American event of the same name.Funcom is now running an Easter egg hunt where fans can search through their favorite community sites in search of special silver and golden King seals. The prizes are quite good, including: free lifetime subscriptions, monthly and multi-month subscriptions, in-game items, and custom forum avatars.
Funcom implements PvP XP rollback in Age of Conan
Funcom has sent a clear message to the number of Age of Conan players who've been exploiting a flaw in the PvP XP system: START OVER. Oliver 'Tarib' Kunz, Senior Community Manager for Age of Conan, addressed Funcom's recent decision to roll back the experience gained by some players who unfairly saw a meteoric rise in gains, as confirmed in a player-by-player investigation. Kunz stated, "We have then taken what we consider to be appropriate action against those players by reducing their PvP Levels to what they were before it was possible to take advantage of this flaw and removing all PvP Gear." Of course, Kunz says, Funcom is open to discussing the removal of experience and gear from those who believe they were unfairly targeted, and have stated that if they've misidentified an exploiter, the character(s) in question will be restored to their former status. Having fun in Conan's homeland? Make sure to check out all of our previous Age of Conan coverage, and stick with Massively for more news from the Hyborian Age!
Plans revealed for coming Age of Conan patches
Keeping up the new Funcom focus on communication (so far so good), Tarib has given us a look at what's coming this week and next week in Age of Conan. Funcom are apparently aware that a big stumbling block for AoC players is the existence of memory leaks, so those are first in the firing line for bugfixes. Caster pet behavior has also been corrected, after former patches left them acting too passively. Expenditure on feat point respecs is being reset, so the next one a player does will be treated as if it were the first - the closest thing to a 'free respec' that Funcom has offered so far. Next week's update will see changes to the Pyramid of the Ancients and Toirdebach's Tomb. We're keeping a careful eye on the former, as it is one of the areas of the game where players fear the censorship falchion may strike. We'll soon discover if these fears were at all warranted. Finally, there are major changes to the resource and building zones, which had previously been rather grindy and boring.
