FunCom decides Age of Conan needs more time, aka delay

by Kyle Horner Jan 21st 2008 at 6:15AM

Filed under: Fantasy, Age of Conan, Launches, News items

Many massively game developers make mistakes during the development of a title; both minor and major. Sometimes they can be financial, while other times they can be launching with technical bugs -- like Anarchy Online back in the day -- and then sometimes it's launching too early. That's why even though it may seem like the most terrible thing in the world to people already tired of waiting, Age of Conan getting pushed back eight weeks to May 20th is probably for the greater good of the game and its future community.

It's not like there's too much competition in terms of new massively games this half of the year. Some people have been speculating that we may end up seeing a fall release for Warhammer Online as opposed to one sometime in the spring. From what we can tell, FunCom is betting on the same prediction and taking more time to make sure players feel like they've purchased a well polished game at launch.

[Thanks, QforQ]

Tags: age-of-conan, anarchy-online, aoc, breaking, delay, ea, ea-mythic, eidos, eidos-interactive, funcom, release-date, warhammer-online

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

GRT said on 7:26AM 1-21-2008

Good to see that they learned from the mistakes they made with Anarchy Online, e.g. you only get 1 chance to make a good first impression.

Ghen said on 8:34AM 1-21-2008

I still don't like it :P A delay either means that the PR people made an unrealistic prediction (IE: a lie) or the developers screwed up somehow to get beyond the normal bug fixing time window.

All these delays aren't jiving with me. While yes now that the game is still broken it only makes sense to delay the release there is something to be said for finishing a project in the time you estimate for it. Anything less can seem unprofessional, like you didn't plan enough time for the unknown.

Eli Shayotovich said on 10:14AM 1-21-2008

Of course this happens right after I finally go and buy the collector's edition pre-order last week. Murphy's Law apparently. Oh well... it's not like I don't have anything to play at the moment. I'd just like to get into beta at some point. Anyone here IN the beta?

Green Armadillo said on 12:37PM 1-21-2008

I haven't heard that the NDA has been lifted as of yet, so they probably can't tell you if they are. :)

skeez said on 10:48AM 1-21-2008

If players gave developers the same leeway they give to Blizzard when they say "It's done when it's done, and we make no promises", then there would be no complaints. After all, a game should be released when it's done and good to play. I was not an early adopter of World of Warcraft, and I'm glad I didn't have to suffer a year of patches to make the game work.

Frankly, I'm tired of console games being released with the mentality that broken elements can be fixed post-release with patches. Thank you Nintendo for not succumbing to this (yet).

Eli Shayotovich said on 12:45PM 1-21-2008

I'm with Skeez... I'm perfectly fine with the "it's done when it's done" mentality." IMHO it's better for the players and the long term viability of the game. I mean, it's not like any of us are short on games to play, right? But by Crom... I can't wait to try on my virtual Drinking Cape! ;)