Age of Conan

Well, I built a new machine and bought Age of Conan so I can see how nice it looks. I've become rather bored with Pirates of the Burning Sea and EverQuest II. However, I haven't figured out whether I am into Age of Conan yet. I'm enjoying it so far, but some of that might just be due to the newness.

One of the nice things I like about Age of Conan is that the combat system is more interesting. Playing soldiers and hybrid classes like the Bear Shaman is fun as you have to balance the enemy's shields with the kinds of combo's you are trying to unleash.

I like the dialog system. The game goes into a cut scene (rendered in game in real time, so you can still see other people moving about the world), which adds a cinematic quality to the dialog. I think this helps make the world feel more immersive.

On the other hand, so far, the game is incredibly linear. I haven't gotten too far in game because I've been rerolling and playing each character class up through the starter quests, and quite frankly, I'm getting rather sick of killing the slave master and the ape king and getting my shackles removed over and over again. Having only one starter area makes rerolling an unnecessary chore.

The game also doesn't feel very "worldly" like EverQuest II does. This is partly due to the linearity of the quest line, and partly because the zone design seems very constrained such that you don't really have a lot of room for exploration. The zones aren't as wide open like in Vanguard or World of Warcarft, or many EverQuest II zones. They are more like Guild Wars zones where you have paths that you can follow that you can't deviate very far from.

I guess we'll see how I feel about the game when I pick a main and get it out of the intro zones into the "real" world...