Age Of Conan: Hyborian Adventures - Collector's Edition

First off, for the people who have played beta and complained about bugs, I beg you to re-consider buying this game. Everyone is saying how polished it is since beta.
Also this is not a full review, I've been in Early Access and played the final product alot so this review is to try and give you an idea of the game and what to expect. I will delete this review eventually and write a full blown review when I reach end-game level.

Do you remember when you played your first MMO and you got that magic feeling in your stomach that you just couldnt get rid of?
I never thought I'd feel that again... untill now.

Well first things first, character customisation. You can make anything, from a rugged bearded barbarian, to a beautiful femme fatale. So the girls who were worried about not being able to create a 'pretty' character do not fear because you can.
This game is very similar in the way Oblivion's character customisation worked with sliders, but the face models… more »

First off, for the people who have played beta and complained about bugs, I beg you to re-consider buying this game. Everyone is saying how polished it is since beta.
Also this is not a full review, I've been in Early Access and played the final product alot so this review is to try and give you an idea of the game and what to expect. I will delete this review eventually and write a full blown review when I reach end-game level.

Do you remember when you played your first MMO and you got that magic feeling in your stomach that you just couldnt get rid of?
I never thought I'd feel that again... untill now.

Well first things first, character customisation. You can make anything, from a rugged bearded barbarian, to a beautiful femme fatale. So the girls who were worried about not being able to create a 'pretty' character do not fear because you can.
This game is very similar in the way Oblivion's character customisation worked with sliders, but the face models for AoC look completely different, and in a good way.

They have some really interesting classes also. But I'll leave that for you to read up on. But dont expect if your playing a Bear Shaman for it to play out like the WoW shaman. Remember this is a different game and this means the classes are regarding Conan Lore.

Okay next part, you enter the world, first thing you notice, talking NPC's. This does add that next level of immersion in games. Your not required to read a wall of text before you do quests. You can sit back and listen to the NPC talk or just skip and quest.
Firstly the Guide will pop up onscreen.
This is basically there to remind you that this is not a 'point and click' game. You still have to point and click at times, but YOU designate where your sword is going to swing.
Sounds difficult? it isnt.
Imagine the AI enemy your character is about to fight has 100HP.
Three arcs will appear on him indicating which side of his body he is defending, if he is fully shielding one side and you hit the side he is shielding, then it will knock about 5HP off and he'll probably kill you before you kill him if you keep hitting that side. If you hit the side he ISNT shielding, you will take roughly 30-40 HP off. But the AI are very clever, if you continue to hit the same side, they will change their shielding to that side and so on.
I was quite surprised to see the enemy constantly changing their shielding arc to where I was hitting.
Very clever indeed.
I was mowing down three enemies at a time within five minutes.
The graphics are by far the best graphics on any MMO to date. You can argue all you want, but on DX10 with high settings... I havent seen anything as good as this in the MMO genre. The sound and environment immerses you instantly. Sound is a big part in any game for me, and from the wild grunts of me swinging my sword, to the background music in new area's it really is to put it bluntly... awesome.

I've already shown my friend this game, he started as an Assassin. After getting through the first few levels he got the ability to hide. He hid, then walked up behind an enemy, and did a fatality move. Which is basically a death move, remember Mortal Kombat?
His dagger flung straight into the back of the enemies head, and then watched his corpse just drop to the floor with a massivle critical. His next words were 'I'm buying this game'.

The brutality is always there in this game, so if you like easy point and click and fairies, then dont get it. If you like decapitations, blood and gore then get it. Its quite polished, I have not encountered any bugs yet. The interface could do with some improvements as with other things, but these will come as the game develops.
I'll see you in Hyboria.

Playing this game for 6 weeks now it's a real disaster extremely bugged and giant memory holes with the worst client I have ever seen client crashes constantly and freezes up
Would be a wonderful looking game if it was not a mega memory hole beast
I have a 2.4 duo Pentium with 4 gig memory and a 8800GTS (640 meg ram) and I can only play it on the lowest settings not a low end machiine well above game specs. If I play it at full spec which I should be able to, I would get 3fps. if another player was next to me doing spells ie TOS I would get 1fps or a slideshow.
I will not be renewing my next month in fact I cancelled the £10 per month they charge.
As one of the most expensive games online it should have great GM support it has none.
I am being truthful not spiteful. If I thought the game was really better than anything else out there I might have put up with its pathetic pre beta release; but its not.
I still play World of Warcraft and Guild Wars both… more »

Playing this game for 6 weeks now it's a real disaster extremely bugged and giant memory holes with the worst client I have ever seen client crashes constantly and freezes up
Would be a wonderful looking game if it was not a mega memory hole beast
I have a 2.4 duo Pentium with 4 gig memory and a 8800GTS (640 meg ram) and I can only play it on the lowest settings not a low end machiine well above game specs. If I play it at full spec which I should be able to, I would get 3fps. if another player was next to me doing spells ie TOS I would get 1fps or a slideshow.
I will not be renewing my next month in fact I cancelled the £10 per month they charge.
As one of the most expensive games online it should have great GM support it has none.
I am being truthful not spiteful. If I thought the game was really better than anything else out there I might have put up with its pathetic pre beta release; but its not.
I still play World of Warcraft and Guild Wars both are superior games in that the devs know what they are doing this is sadly not the case in this game.
I gave it a mid mark as they graphics are astounding just unplayable. The devs have tinkered so much with the game that levelling beyond 70 plus is impossible now by doing the quests.
Both my toons are level 80 so I have gave this game some serious gametime.
Its really your choice but if you don't mind wasting money on it like I did its worth a look. Bet you don't renew it though.
All games especially online ones are bugged at the beginning I know I have tested and played at least 20, but this one is not going get fixed anytime soon
Best points nice graphics: ooo it's a new game and im bored with the one I play :XD
Bad points Memory holes, pathetic client, non working trade skills, repetitive quests (nothing new) no GM support (not that many online games have), expensive monthly fee
Just being honest not hateful and I have played the game till endgame on PVE and PVP so I am not judging it on a few hours.
On the forum all threads pointing out the games faults get deleted but most games do this. They had to put one thread back as people noticed it was gone it is now 100 pages long and the most posted thread funny yet sad at the same time. I might go back to the game in the future so I am not giving it a bad review for the sake of it its just it s a bad game at present.