Daedren pulls no punches on Erling Ellingsen interview

by Shawn Schuster Sep 16th 2008 at 12:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Age of Conan, Business models, Interviews, MMO industry, Opinion

A few weeks ago, we pointed the Massively readers to an article entitled Age of Conan: A post mortem analysis, written by the Daedren over at r1ftgaming. In that lengthy article, Daedren gave his top reasons for AoC's demise, and even offered it as a lesson learned for future developers. Comments on his site, and here at Massively were quite heated concerning players' malcontent with Age of Conan.

Since then, Daedren was able to grab the attention of Funcom, and hence an interview with Product Manager Erling Ellingsen. In true Daedren style, he doesn't beat around the bush and asks the questions plaguing the minds of most former and current AoC subscribers. Where is this PvP system we've heard so much about? Why announce a new expansion when the current game still needs so much work?

In addition, Daedren offers his readers the opportunity to submit their own questions for Funcom, and their responses to the answers given by Erlingsen in this interview. As he says himself, if Funcom hasn't filed a restraining order on him after this last interview, he'll try for another Q&A session in a few weeks.

Even if you don't agree with Daedren's opinion or stance on AoC, it's still good to see that developers aren't afraid to own up to the community and face the more opinionated interviews. Even if the answers they give are a bit on the cookie-cutter side.

Tags: age-of-conan, aoc, daedren, erling-ellingsen, funcom, interview, opinion, r1ftgaming

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Jack said on 1:20PM 9-16-2008

Marketing people are the worst.... Age of Conan maybe was a good game if they waited 1 or 2 years more before release it. At this moment its just junk. Lipstick on a pig so to speak.

Erika said on 1:27PM 9-16-2008

A very very ugly pig with 3 legs.

crsh said on 1:46PM 9-16-2008

I like how EE just sticks to his gun, but for the first time he doesn't sound so convinced himself. Odd, isn't it? Maybe he's getting ready to jump ship.

Anyway, nothing new, they're still in full denial mode; AoC is perfect, the sky is blue and they have a gazillion "real" subscribers.

Too bad WAR is going to steal away some of their players, and after that WotLK will run them into the ground for good.

DaMightyTom said on 2:05PM 9-16-2008

Are you two like the guys in school that fall from peer preasure from the bully that saids "damn that kid sucks" and just because you don't want to be that kid you nod your little heads and agree.

First of all, this is Erling Ellingson job, if he would praise the game he wouldn't work for Funcom in the first place.

Play the game, if you don't like it, switch. Simple, I played hardcore the first couple of months and I thought it was boring just like World of Warcraft, and just like I would if i had any interest in playing World of WAAAGHcrafT?

But not I am taking it easy, exploring the job the quest guys did, the dialogues and the story. It's fun.
At least I think so, but hey maybe I start a blog and tell people about it.

DaMightyTom said on 2:18PM 9-16-2008

Where did all the hate come from?
Really?

Games have promised stuff before that didn't deliver in time.
Do people hate the game so much so they make remarks about peoples appearance that works on Funcom?

Did WoW make it okey to be haters online?

crsh said on 4:29PM 9-16-2008

Are we gratuitously flaming Funcom?

It wouldn't be the case if Funcom came around to not only fix their game, but also deliver on promises made at launch.

Let's recap:
- PvP patch still hasn't gone live (continuously pushed back);
- DX10 client still not delivered (showed off at game event in August, no word since then);
- New zone(s), dungeons, quests; promised since June, still not delivered;
- Crafting and itemization still horribly broken.

I guess if you're into defending crap quality for the hell of it, this is a great case for you.

ScytheNoire said on 2:24PM 9-16-2008

The one nice thing about MMO's is that when they fail, they can't blame piracy like some other game companies do. :)

Nmaster said on 3:30PM 9-16-2008

I think EE handled that pretty damn well.

How the hell is what AoC released with not a basic PvP system? Half the frikkin' MMOs (*glares at WoW*) come out and you barely even have the option to fight other players! AoC's PvP was way ahead of the majority MMOs right from the get-go, one of the big things it always had going for it.

The AoC hate is really tired at this point. FunCom was over ambitious for a small company, dur. So walk away and come back in six months and you'll have an actual damn good MMO. No QQ necessary.

Wjowski said on 3:51PM 9-16-2008

They put out a lousy game and they're rightfully catching hell for it. Sorry but the days of Pay-To-Beta is over.

Nmaster said on 4:18PM 9-16-2008

For one, everyone is drastically overstating it's issues. At the end of the day the game works and there's a lot of enjoyment to be had in the experience.

Second, THEN DON'T PAY FOR IT. Seriously, just cancel your subscription for a few months and try again later. If you feel it's still beta-like, then just don't play it until it becomes more stable. Unless you work in a Chinese sweatshop, nobody's forcing you to play it...

Wjowski said on 5:30PM 9-16-2008

I'm not, believe me. However I'm still going give it all the scorn it deserves and continue warning people against paying for it. The MMO genre has too many garbage-games floating around as it is.

Nmaster said on 6:52PM 9-16-2008

True enough, although I don't think AoC is one of them. I recommend to people they wait a few months and then try it to see if it's of their taste. I find it quite refreshing for a MMO myself.

Nadril said on 2:27AM 9-17-2008

Shit Nmaster, you still play fucking AoC? Who would do that to themselves is beyond me.

Oh and warhammer? Just got finished playing today and I did not have ONE. SINGLE. CTD. I had one que (8 out of 8 so it was like 30 seconds) and was able to play smoothly the entire time, including being in some large PvP battles and PQ battles.

Warhammer just released. Age of Conan has been out for 3+ months now. What happened to the idea that "all MMOs ship buggy"?

I may have gotten off tangent, but really wasn't it you or one of these guys that said all MMOs are buggy on release?

Nmaster said on 2:45AM 9-17-2008

I don't play much AoC lately, been more into Guild Wars while waiting for the PvP patch. I'll be logging back into Hyborea tomorrow.

Don't kid yourself, WO has it's share of problems, although I'm sure it's plenty more stable than AoC, no doubt. I can't imagine why...hmmm...oh wait...what a coincidence...

WoW - Blizz/Activision - Biggest Game Company on Earth
War - Mythic/EA - 2nd Biggest Game Company on Earth
AoC - FunCom -

david said on 3:32PM 9-16-2008

Just posted my crappy experience from their pathetic company. its the 5th one on the list if your interested.

I will never be a customer of Funcom's in the future, screw that company...

Hades said on 4:29PM 9-16-2008

LotD officially pulled the plug on our AOC efforts on Sept 14th, and in all their blunders cost them 150 accounts right there. Our server, Deathwhisper, is a ghost town. What’s left are small groups of players who are trying to figure out how to merge what’s left of the population into 3-5 guilds to keep competition going.

LotD was the only guild on the Deathwhisper Server to have a full Tier 3 city AND a full Tier 3 battle keep. It cost us 480k resources, 4 full months, and several thousand gold to build it all. Its not something you abandon lightly, but at some point you just can’t keep playing a game being run by a bunch of incompetent people who are out of touch with their community. Erling is like Bagdad Bob, he’ll say anything but no one believes him anymore. His credibility is an absolute joke, and I don’t know of a single guild that has moved on that would bother ever coming back to this dung heap of a game.

The community told them what needed to be fixed asap, and they didn’t listen. Instead they increased the exp needed to get to level 80, made guild city building entirely too painful, shut out the smaller guilds, and the list goes on and on to infinity.

In games where you require guilds to participate in the high end stuff like city building, crafting, sieging, etc you don’t just lose a single customer………you lose the whole friggin guild.

The last man in AOC please unplug the servers on your way out.

Daedren said on 4:34PM 9-16-2008

Um, well, thanks for the feedback I guess. ;)

@david: You hit on a point I'm covering in my next article. I know how you feel.

At those saying "if you don't like it, don't pay for it" -- well, most have done that. However, some of us enjoy to talk about the game industry. Age of Conan, even assuming it continues down this downward spiral, can at least be used as a lesson to other design teams on what *not* to do. (Queue the Demotivator)

@Hades: Thanks for that note, that's helpful. I'm extremely interested in how Funcom will handle the subscriber issue in the coming months, what with War and WoTLK on deck.

Leshrac said on 6:08PM 9-16-2008

There's an expression; "falling on the sword for your, and your leaders mistakes" - how appropriate.

possum said on 11:53PM 9-16-2008

The picture of a moron with to much makeup, incredible i missed this earlier, so damn comical, he is wearing more makeup than some women.........the game loses, and so does he/she.

Daedren said on 4:41AM 9-17-2008

@NMaster: People always seem to invoke the "WoW" when it's convenient. No, WOW didn't have a real PVP system in at launch. However, it also didn't advertise itself as a "PVP Oriented Game" - which is exactly what Funcom did.

Now for the best part. In Closed and Open Beta, there was a working PVP system - gear, PVP levels, etc. It wasn't perfect, but it was something.

They ninja'd this out of release and tried to play it smooth -- "Coming soon, in June!"

Advertising a game as a PVP game and then launching with only the ability to attack other people - with absolutely no consequences, reward, or point at all - is just plain silly and unprofessional.

Anyone who defends otherwise is just deluding theirself.