Cinemassively: AoC vs. WoW

by Moo Money Jun 11th 2008 at 12:30PM

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Video, Age of Conan, Cinemassively, Machinima

They're on the opposite sides of the alphabet, yet both extremely popular games. World of Warcraft has the intense raids, and Age of Conan has the ... boobs. It's understandable that some fans of both games would go back and forth, and some would be more interested in one over the other. This video's creator, nalus, seems to like the more realistic looking violence of AoC.

Now that the game has been out for almost a month, do you think that it beats WoW, or has it let you down? Is it even worth comparing the two?

If you have machinima or movie suggestions from any MMO, please send them to machinima AT massively DOT com, along with any information you might have about them.

Tags: age-of-conan, aoc, blizzard, cinemassively, funcom, machinima, world-of-warcraft, wow

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Nadril said on 1:02PM 6-11-2008

@ Video: Pretty funny, even if I can't understand german XD.

@WoW vs AoC: right now I've had more fun in AoC than WoW. In their current states I would still place WoW as "the better game" simply because of the amount of content.

However once a few content patches come out, smoothing the leveling experience in AoC and adding in PvP rewards I think it will be the vastly superior game. The only thing holding it back are the few technical issues left and the lack of 60-80 (really 50-60) content.

WoW had its moments for me but those are well past. It's a PvE and/or Casual's game, hardcore PvPers need not apply.

Origosis said on 1:32PM 6-11-2008

I feel really sheepish, cause I feel WoW is lacking content in a big way I can rarely find things to do at lower levels... 20-40, and in AoC I shot from 20-40 with my quest log filled to the brim and it still is. I always have bunches of quests to do and many many quest lines to work on. I do 5 quests and before I know it 1/5 of my quests are grey to me.... I can't do them fast enough before I out level them. so maybe the content will disappear somewhere along the line, but I am 42 and still have ALOT of things to get done.. alot of quests I outleveled and I see PLENTY of exclamation points everywhere I go.

Nadril said on 1:42PM 6-11-2008

@ Origosis: the content from 1-45/50 is great. There is so much to do it is unbelievable.

However 50+ or so there are much less quests and it takes longer to level, forcing players to grind. Now, this is a problem that funcom has awknolwedged and should be fixing anytime this month but it is a problem.

I agree though, 1-45 for my conq was so much better than 1-45 on any of my WoW guys.

Moo Money said on 1:46PM 6-11-2008

This is some great feedback. I played WoW in the beginning, but I was bored by a lot of the quests that were offered. I quit around level 30 when I was stuck in the Barrens. I'm just not a grinder.

Rational said on 1:48PM 6-11-2008

AoC doesn't suck you in as strongly as WoW. When I'm playing AoC, I'm enjoying myself. But when I'm not, I don't feel drawn to play it. I find myself catching up on other activities. Despite the fun combat system, the game really loses momentum around level 30.

My primary current frustration is that after level 30, I still haven't figured out where to go to get 30+ quests and activities. I finished up the entry area and the first adventure area, which leaves me at just over 30. But there are no quests that lead you off in the right direction for future adventures. This is a subtle but important feature of WoW; there are always quests that introduce you to and lead you into higher level areas so you don't have to wander around looking for them yourself.

The thing is, if AoC were designed from 30-80 with the same care and attention to detail as the 1-20 game, it would be brilliant through and through. But it isn't, and in the presence of such formidable competition as WoW, this may be a fatal shortcoming.

Moo Money said on 1:51PM 6-11-2008

Do you think that they have time to fix this to save the game?

Nadril said on 1:58PM 6-11-2008

If I remember right there are most certainly quests that point you to the three main zones for 20-40 (that being Conals vally, Khopshef Providence and Wild lands of Zeltra). Going between these places doing green/yellow quests is the best way to level. Almost certainly there are quests that will point you to "deliver" something to another zone or talk to someone there, perhaps you missed them.

@ Moo Money: my experience with WoW is that the 1-60 game sucked as far as leveling, I didn't enjoy it "that" much except on my rogue/warrior because I enjoyed those classes so much. Of course after the 2.3 patch I found 30-60 to be much more enjoyable. However pre 2.3 there were some absolute horrid spots in the leveling system. For example I found the 35-50 levels were filled with quests very far and few in numbers, forcing you to perhaps not grind but just waste a lot of traveling time.

60-70 was quite fast, however, and pretty entertaining. The quests were all right around the same zones and didn't force you to hop zones a lot. I find that, at least in the early AoC content, it feels much more like levels 60-70 did (minus the time investment) to me.

Moo Money said on 2:04PM 6-11-2008

I really think that my main problem with all of these MMOs are the crafting systems. I was spoiled by Ultima Online, which had a really cool and diverse system. You could make jewelry for decoration, furniture for housing, etc. It didn't necessarily have to do with the combat system itself. I miss those days.

If anyone is familiar with UO, can you please recommend a game with a similar crafting system?

Steve_S said on 2:14PM 6-11-2008

AoC and WoW do things differently of course. I like somethings in one and some things in the other. The interface for AoC is pretty poor compared to WoW and crafting in AoC doesn’t seem very well implemented. The graphics and story feel better in AoC than they do in WoW. In WoW I feel like I’m playing a cartoon while AoC feels much more rich and realistic. Which is better? I can’t really answer that question objectively. I’ve played WoW for 3.5 years and AoC for less than a month. I fully expect to return to WoW when Wrath comes out, or at least after the mod makers have everything up-to-date.

Nadril said on 2:16PM 6-11-2008

WoW does have the advantage though of having a near 3 years worth of modifications and upgrades to its UI though. If you just took it's default, bare-bones UI from back in the day they are fairly similar.

Nadril said on 2:15PM 6-11-2008

@moo: They say they are apparently upgrading crafting a bit for AoC, not sure what that all entails however.

If I remember the Everquest II crafting system wasn't that bad. It was a bit more interactive than most, but not near as in depth as ultima online's system.

I'm not really aware of any (good) game that has in depth crafting to where you could make a profession out of it like in UO. Most systems today in place are much more focused on making objects that are useful for combat only.

fake edit: Just dawned on me, I believe you can make furniture in Everquest II. At least I know there is player housing, owned a house (horrible house, but still) in game when I played. I never got big into the crafting but I explicitly remember people making tables and the like.

dade said on 8:53PM 7-16-2008

aoc vs wow.....(Currently alot of issues in aoc).

Eh no comparison...i enjoyed wow from day 1.
Very polished and finished game in the end.
Aoc, Its got an atrocious travel system, walk for miles and then no way back but port, or take an eternity getting a mount, the money system is wowful.
Either way quicker to get killed and use the death points if u like, but then that currently is crazy because when u becomehigher than the mobs in the current zone, they basically cant kill u or it takes ages + ages to die.
As i suggused if no flying mounts or other ground mounts then change the port to 5 min instead of 30 min and when u port, have a list of the places u have been so you can select a place to go, be a much better system.

The tin needs to be removed and introduce more money per drop like silver alot lower lvls so the ah can work.
Currently ah broken, because of the lack of money not worth even bothering to ah anything no one can buy it of any value.

I certainly will be going back to wow when lich king comes out, and maybe when aoc is more polished then return at a later point. Currently frustrating game.

As far as the lvling, yes id agree there is alot of qsts, alot
more than wow, and lvling is much faster this side of it is
first class. Now after the latest patches, alot more mobs
lvl 50 and up. Map size currently is smaller than wow, but again in time this will change and it has huge scope to add new content and maps etc.

Fore most ppl its all about the gameplay more so than the gfx. yes the gfx in aoc is brilliant, but the gfx in wow were engineered for everyones comp in the last 5 yrs.
Even in warhammer the gfx are similar to wow, and i think ppl dont have a problem with that at all, more so they are a cross between wow and eq2 just another evolution combined. Again gameplay is more that makes or breaks a game. So we will see if conan will stand test of time.

And as for the pvp, wow was brilliant at pvp on pvp servers, currently aoc no where near as good pvp, but again in time this will change no doubt. One on one aoc feels brutal very realistic but in auctual pvp, wow kills it currently.

Drakk said on 6:18PM 7-14-2008

Aoc fails in many areas wow has been out what 3 years? Ive been around playing a ton of mmos since the begining of it all. After 13 years I have no patience for companies to release a pos. AOC lacks in to many areas and ive seen a ton of people quit the game cancel their accounts and go back to wow. Until wotlk comes out or warhammer when either do aoc will take another hard hit again. Check Funfails stock its taken a massive hit due to folks quitting the game. Siege battles are broke, crafting worthless pos, to many bugs no class balance, no one wants to pay for a beta test anymore.