Age of Conan ships a million units
by Alexander Sliwinski 
{ Jun 6th 2008 at 10:15AM }
Funcom's VP of Sales and Marking, Morten Larssen, says Funcom's sales data shows that AoC is "the biggest MMO launch since World of Warcraft." He believes the numbers are very promising for the future. Yes, but are the numbers promising a customer base of 10,000,000 players?
Get a WordPress.com Blog
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
NATO_Duke @ Jun 6th 2008 10:31AM
You know a company can make a lot of money with a userbase under 10 million too.
I understand that WoW has been the measure, but I wouldn't be upset to have 400k players in such a short time at all.
Zarim @ Jun 6th 2008 10:35AM
Yep, and people always comparing a new game's user base to WoW's current isn't really fair; it took WoW years to build it up. That said, I've played WoW on and off since its release and I, like many people, are really burned out on the game. I hear a lot of people say "I'm bored with WoW, I'm just waiting for something else to come along that's good before I give it up." Maybe they're kidding themselves, or maybe AoC and other upcoming MMOs are what they were waiting for.
GenBanks @ Jun 6th 2008 11:53AM
Yup, my guess is that those people who do not fall for Conan will fall for Warhammer Online, with a significant number still staying loyal to WoW. What's clear though, is that no single game is likely to replace the WoW behemoth. Instead, a multitude of games will gradually splinter it's base until WoW 2 or World of Starcraft.
JaKa (Because 666 gives a wrong impression!) @ Jun 6th 2008 1:37PM
Ironically, Lineage 2 sold a lot better (14M customers) so WoW's 10M subscription sounds a bit misleading.
Still waiting for some kind of a "It's only for teh West" statement from Blizzard.
BananaBoat @ Jun 6th 2008 3:15PM
Let's not forget that it doesn't matter if your game has 10 million subscribers, or 1 million, if only 10,000-etc people can exist on any one server. Doesn't do you a whole lot of good as a player if there are 9,990,000 people that you can neither quest with, or join guilds with.
In conclusion, never let a playerbase that is healthy but not WOW insane, drive you away from playing a game. There will be plenty of people to play with when you get there.
joeyg @ Jun 6th 2008 10:35AM
i so want this game...i really need a new pc though.
this games is kinda like shadowbane on hgh.
scoob @ Jun 6th 2008 11:58AM
It's nothing like Shadowbane.
Shadowbane was the real deal. Conan is an instance riddled, cookie-cutter piece of dreck.
Shagittarius @ Jun 6th 2008 12:07PM
As much as I'm enjoying conan, I agree, shadowbane was 10 times better than conan.
Shadowbane is one of my favorite MMOs of all time. If it had more PVE content and a story line along with modern graphics I think a new version could give WoW a run for its money.
joeyg @ Jun 6th 2008 12:36PM
i meant like SB in the sense of open world pvp, being able to build cities, and take down others.
the best times i've ever had in video games were in SB when 100+ people would go raid someones city......
Brodie-san @ Jun 6th 2008 10:40AM
I just did a million. I'm ... kinda a big deal.
Anyway ... congrats to FunCom. Worse name ever but nonetheless in the current market with WoW Dominance that's still an impressive achievement.
Mike @ Jun 6th 2008 6:53PM
I am in the game and it is great.
Don't get me wrong it has some issues but so far none of them have broken the fun for me at all.
Pirate Penguin @ Jun 6th 2008 10:47AM
AoC is sort of like a mashup of WoW and Guild Wars.
I didn't like it and cancelled after a week of play, but your mileage may vary. Great graphics (hard on computers) but there are still lots of bugs and gameplay issues.
I'd recommend learning from my mistake and at least waiting a few months to give it a try.
testify @ Jun 6th 2008 11:16AM
I had near the same experience. I canceled my subscription after a few days because the game was so buggy. I also had a real problem with the way they implemented the manual aiming in the game. While a good idea, it really hurts us gamers coming from WoW that don't know the first thing about clicking spells.
Royale @ Jun 6th 2008 11:25AM
"I also had a real problem with the way they implemented the manual aiming in the game. While a good idea, it really hurts us gamers coming from WoW that don't know the first thing about clicking spells."
I lol in your face. They weren't trying to "cater" to you lazy wow players. They were trying to build a new fresh mmo experience and the new improved combat does just that. IT IS NOT WOW. Geez, when will people realize that. Obviously there will be comparisons to wow, but to condemn the game because it doesn't play like wow is extremely short sighted. My advice... stick to wow... Age of Conan doesn't want you noobs.
GenBanks @ Jun 6th 2008 11:42AM
lol you can't cancel after a week of play, you get a month of play minimum for free. What you mean to say is that you won't be extending your subscription beyond the free trial period.
Mr.ESC @ Jun 6th 2008 12:14PM
"My advice... stick to wow... Age of Conan doesn't want you noobs".
But it sure wants your money.
*Drums
Thank you,thank you.Try the veil.
Pirate Penguin @ Jun 6th 2008 2:03PM
"lol you can't cancel after a week of play, you get a month of play minimum for free. What you mean to say is that you won't be extending your subscription beyond the free trial period."
No what I meant to say is that I cancelled, which is exactly what I said. To be specific, I logged into my account, clicked 'cancel subscription' and then filled out a little form that asked why I was cancelling.
Lars @ Jun 6th 2008 5:53PM
I'm still surprised that people jump into brand new MMO's and say "what's this? rampant bugs? I am shocked!"
MMO's are always full of major issues in the first few months. Age of Conan actually has overcome the major issues pretty fast actually, a lot faster than WoW did. The only MMO that had a smooth rollout was EQ2. I was shocked at that.
Long story short, don't expect an MMO to be polished at launch, and certainly don't let the first few months affect your impressions of it.
4MyFriends @ Jun 6th 2008 11:14AM
Good for them. Now lets see them sustain this increase for 3+ years like Blizzard has been doing with WoW.
Martez @ Jun 6th 2008 11:31AM
Eh. I'll continue looking forward to the new EVE expansion.
mundox @ Jun 6th 2008 11:48AM
400,000*$15= $6,000,000 a month
Oh, that's quite bad.... they NEED 15mil players.
GenBanks @ Jun 6th 2008 11:49AM
Definitely has it's fair share of issues, but I think it's a great atmospheric game. Just bought the 'Complete Chronicles of Conan' by Robert E. Howard because I've been so sucked into all of the Conan lore (even though I had no prior knowledge of it).
There are some bugs and stuff, but since pretty much ever bug you encounter someone else will have too, you can just type it into the OOC (general) channel and someone will tell you how to resolve/get around it or whether to just ignore.
Prime example is that there is a quest called "Wounded Child" where you're supposed to find this blind kid that disappeared into the wilderness. You go to the area she's supposed to be and there's no sign of her. That's because the respawn timer is 90 minutes or something ridiculous, so she's basically never there. Every once in a while you will see someone ask "Is the wounded child quest bugged?" and people will answer explaining what's wrong with it.
That's about as serious as it gets, nothing to be too worried about.
The good definitely overrides the bad, at this early stage I would give the game about an 83% rating (based on my experience so far, as a lvl 36), and I would expect that once the end game stuff picks up and the new content gets added over the course of the summer (whole new outdoor areas, more quests with voice acting, pvp xp rewards and punishments, as well as ironing out any remaining bugs or performance issues) that score could go up by 10%.
crsh @ Jun 6th 2008 12:01PM
"They were trying to build a new fresh mmo experience and the new improved combat does just that. IT IS NOT WOW. Geez, when will people realize that."
They *are* trying to build a fresh new MMO; sadly they're bound to run into players who will bring up WoW and say "I could do (action) in WoW, why can't I in AoC?!", not to forget the classic "launch was 3 weeks ago already, why isn't the whole game fixed to my liking?!".
Things will calm down past the first month of free play; the player base will drop a bit because of those who found out AoC is not for them for whatever reason, Funcom likely expects that. And once things settle down, things will progressively get better.
seakae @ Jun 6th 2008 12:46PM
Who gives a shit if they can reach 10 mil? I'd take five to ten percent of those numbers any day. And I'd laugh all the way to the bank.
scoob @ Jun 6th 2008 1:34PM
Conan isn't open world, though. Everything is instanced to the nth degree. I don't classify this game as a MMO.
Zsavior @ Jun 6th 2008 2:09PM
People will continue to compare a 3 year old game to a less than a couple weeks old game cause it suits them. If you like WOW stay with WOW. I never got why blizz fans get annoyed when people insult WOW, tell them to leave then when something new comes out beg for it to die?
UltimateQ @ Jun 6th 2008 3:18PM
Still can't come close to the original glory of EQ1. I am talking early EQ1, before the last 7~ expansions. Then again, EQ was like a 3rd parent to me. It taught me a lot. I'm all grown up now, and it seems to be like a stale piece of bread with little appeal. But I still have those fantastic memories. /tear
Jouten @ Jun 7th 2008 1:10AM
I must be the only one on the planet that couldn't get into WoW. I still log into EQ1 from time to time. My 2 cp's.