Return to Sender

It’s not you it’s me

 

Dear Funcom,

 

It’s time to call it quits again.  We had some fun. Two years ago we started podcasting because of your game Age of Conan. Do you remember that podcast? It was called Age of Conuns.  Show 55 with your community managers Glen “Famine” Swan and Oliver Kunz was great fun. After listening to the two of them talk we were anxious to give Age of Conan another chance. After all, there is a new expansion out now right? And we love the setting!

 

But once we had our account back and logged on again, it was more of the same.  We thought with two years gone by and another expansion out it wouldn’t be like this.  But it was more of the same. Frame rates that never exceeded 20 frames per second and usually hovered around 10 to 14 frames per second – sometimes dipping as low as 3 frames per second.   Now we could understand if we had the same computer now as we did then, but that is not the case. Now even our laptop exceeds your recommended system specifications.

 

So just like the old adage says, fool me once shame on you – fool me twice shame on me.

 

So it’s not you – it’s me.

 

Sincerely

 

The No Prisoners, No Mercy Team

There are some games that we want to like – Age of Conan is one of them.   As our long time listeners know, it was nearly two years ago that our podcast started out as an Age of Conan podcast over at Online Gaming Radio called “Age of Conuns”.  (For those who feel nostalgic we still have old copies of those shows we can post on our website). Our own Julie was a fan of Arnold Schwarzenegger back in 1982  when he made Conan the Barbarian and  a Chicago reviewer said Mr. Schwarzenegger should get an Oscar for “best actor in a foreign speaking film”.   She even spent a year and a half living in Asia, and as a result was anxious to try out the new expansion for Age of Conan because of its setting.

We wanted to like it – but sadly we can’t.

Every now and then we read someone in the blogosphere accusing writers and podcasters of schmoozing industry professionals and even being a toches-lecker for the sake of getting an interview.   We will admit to having a soft spot in our heart for independent developers like Ilfonic, and Icarus Studios.  We will even acknowledge rooting for the underdog, trying to make a comeback – and such is the case with Funcom and Age of Conan.  Even our detractors will admit, we are sure, that we live up to our No Prisoners, No Mercy name, to the point of even having to make the occasional on air apology for being wrong.

It’s not you, it’s me – or is it?

Mind you we aren’t saying anyone over at Funcom is a nebbish and we certainly understand that what makes a game good or bad is a matter of opinion.  Still we now find ourselves in the place of having to apologize to all of our listeners and readers who may have caught our over zealous attitude and tried Age of Conan again - and had the same experience we did over the weekend.

It wasn’t a pleasant one.

When Age of Conan was released two years ago, like any game it had some problems upon release. Funcom has worked to solve some of those problems.  When we played through the first 20 levels of the game we saw what promise it had. It could have been great; it could have been a contender for the WoW crown. There are many flaws we can overlook in a game but there is one we can’t, and that is the tendency some developers or publishers (we aren’t sure who is at fault here) for purposefully understanding not only the minimum system requirements but the recommended system requirements for a game. Two years down the road, and two new computers later, our computers exceed the recommended system requirements for Age of Conan.  Yet when we logged on over the weekend, even in an under populated area with no one else around, our frame rate per second never exceeded 20 frames per second (FPS). In fact most times it hovered around 10 to 14 frames per second, dipping as low as 3 frames per second on medium video settings in game.

…our frame rate per second never exceeded 20 frames per second (FPS). In fact most times it hovered around 10 to 14 frames per second, dipping as low as 3 frames per second on medium video settings in game

We could understand this if our computers just met the minimum requirements, but that isn’t the case here. Even when we set the video on low quality video settings for the game our frames per second never went about 20 frames per second. This isn’t about lag that is prevalent in CCPs game Eve Online when there are 100 to 1000 player battles in the same system – this is one player standing out in the middle of nowhere. In fact, just before we set what must be a record for the shortest return to a game ever, we noticed people in the general chat channel asking “what video card can I get for less that 150 dollars that will raise the frame rate above 20 fps”.

An educated guess

Mind you one of our staff members, Fran, is a professional artist/designer.  Many is the time we have all sat around the kitchen table, talking about professional design work.  Fran tells us how she often created a design to the specifications of her first line supervisors, who loved the work – only to be told by someone at the top of the echelon, who had little knowledge of the market, that everyone was wrong but the person on the top run of the ladder.

So we will admit to being excited by the interview we had with Glen Swan and Oliver Kunz.  And we can only say a collective mia culpa  because we didn’t try the game before we did the interview. To us there seems little excuse for producing an expansion without solving the most basic of issues with the original game –low frame rates per second.

All we can say is that we were so anxious to love playing this game that we didn’t try it out before we did the interview. For that we are sorry.

The No Prisoners, No Mercy Team.

Update and Full Disclosure

As I am sure you are aware (and are about to be if not) the Federal Trade Commission looks over the shoulders of those of us in the blogosphere .  Our contact at Funcom offered to send our system specs and direct x report to the game developers to have a look at.  He has also offered to forward a message from No Prisoners, No Mercy to the developers (see below).   As a matter of full disclosure you should also be aware that Funcom has offered to mark our account for free game play (no one on our staff has, as yet, confirmed whether or not this has taken place).  That’s were it sits now. Will there be a third time, and will it be a charm? That we can’t answer yet.

Here is the letter sent to the developers of Age of Conan for us, via our our Funcom contact:

To Funcom Developers,

We have always had a soft spot in our heart for independent developers
and those who the gaming community considers “the underdog”. However,
we also take our responsibilities to our listeners and readers very
seriously as we know the Federal Trade Commission here in the United
States is looking over our shoulder from time to time.

Don’t get us wrong, we want to be able to endorse your game. The first
20 levels of Age of Conan is second to none, and your combat system
has a wonderful feel to it. However we are finding that many people in
the gaming community are having the same problems we are – low frame
rates per second.  When we tried to give the game “another go”
recently after interviewing your community managers we had the same
problems we always did.  Had it been limited to us we might have
dismissed it all. However we find that it seems to be a common problem
and even a topic in your own global chat and ooc chat channels.

We do see a ray of hope in the words we found on the forums of “The
Older Gamers” (a gaming community about 14,000 or so strong based out
of Australia to which we belong):

“There is another significant update that we will be working on behind
the scenes and that is the next integration of our Dreamworld engine.
This involves an update to the games engine, including new versions of
the render engine. Some of it is ‘under the hood’ maintenance as it
were, but some will also be noticeable in game as we look to improve
the DX10 version of the game further, amongst other things. This
process will start shortly and is a complex one.” – Funcom

We know how hard it is to bring customers back who have “left the
nest” so to speak, and we sincerely hope this addresses this issue. If
it does we would like help bring people back to the game.  We implore
you to address this issue.

Thank you for your kind attention.

Ms. Julie Whitefeather

Co-host, The No Prisoners, No Mercy Show
www.virginworlds.com
www.noprisonersnomercy.com
Itunes

RETRACTION for Age of Conan

This is the first time we have ever found ourselves in the position of having to post a retraction.  We are aware that the overzealous attitude we expressed on  No Prisoners, No Mercy Show 55  and our recent article entitled The Reports are exaggerated  may be a bit catching. If you got caught up in our excitement and  had a great time we will say “Bravo, good for you.” If, however, you had a bad time like we did, we apologize.  When we returned to Age of Conan this weekend we found the same problem that has plagued the game since day one, over two years ago – low frame rates per second (FPS) Even on our computer which exceeds recommended system specifications our frame rate per second never exceeded 20 fps, and usually hovered around 10 to 14 fps, sometimes dipping as low as 3 fps.  If anyone had as bad a time as we did, we apologize. We have, in fact, posted about it . While the letter in the post is not the one we sent to Funcom, we did send a letter to our contact at the company.

 Quite frankly we are a bit hurt by the whole thing.

The No Prisoners, No Mercy Team

Did you guess which developer is not like the others?
Did you guess which thing just doesn’t belong?
If you guessed Activision is not like the others,
Then you’re absolutely…right!

One of these developers is not like the others,
One of these developers just doesn’t belong,
Can you tell which developer is not like the others
By the time I finish my song?

Activision, Cryptic Studios, or Funcom – which one of these game developers/publishers is not like the others? Can you guess the right one? You did? I knew you could.But maybe not for the same reasons I am thinking.

I am sure that there are those past employees of Infinity Ward that would relate to an old Smith Barney advertisement and claim “Activision makes money the old fashioned way…they steal it (by not paying royalties due – natch).”  Time and the court systems will eventually tell who is right, Activision, or the former employees of Infinity Ward, including Messers West and Zampella.  But no matter what you think about Activision or Bobby Kotick, there is much truth in the words of a former guest on the No Prisoners, No Mercy show who promoted them from “800 pound gorilla” to the “1 ton gorilla” on the block. When Activision speaks, people listen – even if it is to curse the name.

But all three companies mentioned above have had members of the gaming community curse their name at one point or another. And what’s more, while the outcome of the Activision/Infinity Ward lawsuits may change it, the Call of Duty series is still going strong.

No, that’s not the difference.

As long as Activision can include “Blizzard” in its name it will be more like the zombie gorilla than the 800 pound gorilla; no one will be able to defeat it.  In 2007 Richard Garriott denounced Worlds of Warcraft’s “carrot and stick” approach to end game as the “harbinger of failure.” Before that, Brad McQuaid launched Vanguard and originally pronounced it to be the next “Wow killer”.  Still, I don’t think there is anyone who will seriously consider predictions of the downfall of Activision for more than the briefest of moments (at least not in the near future).

Not so with Cryptic Studios and Funcom.

All one has to do is Google the names of either of these studios along with the word “failure” and you will find pundits who seem to have considered themselves the gaming version of the Oracle at Delphi and pronounced the doom of Champions Online, and Age of Conan.  And yet both mmos are still here; Champions since September 1, 2009 and Age of Conan since May 20, 2008. Not only are they both still going, but both still seem to be going strong. Consider that Cryptic is a subsidiary of Atari, and is in turn owned by Infograme – who, being one of the largest videogame developers in the world is not business of beating dead horses hoping they will eventually get up and win the Kentucky Derby. In fact a game developer friend of ours tells us that Atari is known for having a particularly short leash as a publisher. True or not, it seems that the death of Champions Online, Star Trek Online and Age of Conan, so zealously reported across the blogosphere at one point, has been greatly exaggerated.

Recently we had the pleasure of spending an hour talking with Glen “Famine” Swan and Oliver Kunz from Funcom about changes to Age of Conan, and their new expansion Rise of the Godslayer.  If you don’t believe us, you can go read Jef Reahard over at Massively, Gordon over at We Fly Spitfires , Brian over at Blue Kae  and listen to Brent and Darren talk about it in the return of the Virgin Worlds Podcast Number 147. In fact both Mr. Swan and Mr. Kunz were so convincing that they turned my prognostication into provocation to turn my WoW “parking fee” over to Funcom instead.  But it isn’t the improvements to the game that have me wanting to return. No, as our regular listeners know, I love animals, and the prospect of raising my own tiger or wolf mount is something that I find irresistible.

RETRACTION for Age of Conan

This is the first time we have ever found ourselves in the position of having to post a retraction.  We are aware that the overzealous attitude we expressed on  No Prisoners, No Mercy Show 55 and our recent article entitled The Reports are exaggerated  may be a bit catching. If you got caught up in our excitement and  had a great time we will say “Bravo, good for you.”  However, if you had the same experience we did, we apologize.  When we returned to Age of Conan this weekend we found the same problem that has plagued the game since day one, over two years ago – low frame rates per second (FPS). Even on our computer which exceeds the recommended system specifications, our frame rate per second never exceeded 20 fps, and usually hovered around 10 to 14 fps, sometimes dipping as low as 3 fps.  If anyone had as bad a time as we did, we apologize. We have, in fact, posted about it. While the letter in the post is not the one we sent to Funcom, we did send a letter to our contact at the company.

Quite frankly we are a bit hurt by the whole thing.

 

The No Prisoners, No Mercy Team

The link for the show is on the right or you can listen here.

The early release of the No Prisoners, No Mercy show 55 is live, for those of our listeners who demanded the ability to hear it before the show goes public to ITUNES and the Virgin Worlds collective.  After all, Saylah, of Mystic Worlds fame and a regular guest, tells me it is one of the only three podcasts she listens to.

Now many of you may see the picture above and think we have become an Age of Conan podcast. However that isn’t the case. Some of our long term listeners will remember that we actually started out as an Age of Conan podcast entitled “Age of Conuns” back “in the day” as they say.

This time, the picture is actually in honor of this weeks guests, who are Glen Swan and Oliver Kunz, two of the community managers from Funcom.   The community managers talk about many topics, including where the name “Famine” in Glen “Famine” Swan comes from, they talk about the new Age of Conan Expansion, debunk some of the opinions  by the blogging community about the decisions made in the development of Age of Conan, and talk about their new mmos (including The Secret World) as well as other topics.

We hope you enjoy listening as much as we did producing the show.