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Age of Conan's May Director's Letter details new content and tech
Crush enemies, see them driven before you, lamentations of their women, yadda yadda. You know the drill. The Age of Conan Game Director's Letter for this month has hit the interwebs, and the topics of discussion are the recent 5th Anniversary event (and the new event system that it utilized), the impending transition to single-server technology, and a number of updates heading to the game soon. The first phase of Age of Conan's switch to single-server tech (which involved moving all of the servers to the same physical location) has been completed, and the AoC team is now "preparing to move towards the new phase," which means merging all same-ruleset servers. Meanwhile, in Hyboria proper, Age of Conan recently held an in-game event to celebrate its fifth anniversary, and this included the introduction of some snazzy new event tech. In a nutshell, the previous system required that the game be patched in order to both begin and end an event, but with the new system, the devs can run and adjust events on the fly. On top of that, AoC players can expect a smattering of new content over the summer, beginning with the new Coils of Ubah Khan dungeon. Later additions will include new Unchained Dungeons, the Palace of Cetriss, and a shiny new tradeskill system. To get all the delicious information straight from the barbarian's mouth (ew), just click on through the link below.
Chaos Theory: The Secret World's single-server tech
Something went missing during this month's launch of The Secret World. Do you know what it was? No, snarkonauts, it wasn't "fun." The game is certainly an acquired taste, but it's nonetheless doing pretty well for itself in terms of word-of-mouth and happy early adopters. No, what was missing was a parade of lengthy launch-week queues (and QQs for that matter). I've been present for every AAA MMO kickoff since Star Wars Galaxies in 2003, and The Secret World marks the first time I've been able to log in when (and where) I wanted to log in on day one. RIFT, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Aion, Lord of the Rings Online -- all of these were "polished" launches by most accounts, and yet all of them featured horrendous launch queues that often stretched from minutes to hours. Why was The Secret World so different?
