Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures Beta Journal #1

WarCry got permission to post logs of their experiences in the Age of Conan beta, and it makes for interesting reading. Be warned of spoilers, though.

The devs and product managers weren’t kidding when they said their character creation tool in ‘Age of Conan’ was “flexible”, I mean, it really adds a whole new meaning to the word “customisation”. The character creation tool in ‘Age of Conan’ boasts around 40 sliders ranging from the height of your character, your cheek height (the ones on your face, that is), cheek width, chin length, chin width, how big or small you want your arms (from Ghandi to Arnie, just to give you an idea), how big or small you want your thighs, all the way to which way you want your nose to be crooked. I was completely free to make my character shovel-faced ugly or sculpted-by-the-gods handsome, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder after all. I was satisfied with the look I had given my Aquilonian Ranger, so I entered the game where I found myself washed up on the shores of Tortage, greeted by Kalanthes.
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I’ve only ever gone as far as reading about Funcom’s style of storytelling in their roleplaying games, and have only seen NPC dialogue in action in gameplay videos and what not, but I have to say that I was really quite impressed (and to be honest quite surprised) by how the NPC dialogue and interaction pulls you in to this dark, sleazy, and mysterious Hyborian age. Before experiencing it for myself, I thought, “Oh yeah, this is just going to be your standard ‘talk to NPC and get quest'” just like it is in other MMOs, but the NPC interaction and dialogue took me back to my single-player RPG days, namely, when I played ‘Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic’ those Sierra adventure games that I was addicted to, namely, the ‘Gabriel Knight’ series. What Funcom had given me when interacting with NPCs was the opportunity to be in character, i.e. “roleplay”, or simply to select the dialogue option that suits me or that I feel fine with. Funcom has graced the MMO genre with their cinematic storytelling style, and something tells me that it is now here to stay. When I met up with Casilda (the “lady of the night” that you rescue on the shores of Tortage) at The Thirsty Dog Inn, she offered me that “special” reward, but just because I could, I asked her simply for a beer as if to say, “Fetch me a beer, wench!” Her reaction to such amused me quite a bit as I’m sure I’m not the only guy in the world to be met with such a reaction. Basically, she says something to the effect of, “Here I am throwing myself at you and all you can think of is beer?” What can I say? I’m in a tropical climate, and I’ve been slaying Picts and Bat-Demons all afternoon, for crying out loud, woman, it’s a hard-earned thirst! Of course I want a beer!