Tough Desicion, Switch from WOW to AOC?

so ive been playing wow for a few months, AOC looks really good, my lappie can handle AOC on the full settings

should i switch?


how is the gameplay compared to WOW and are there alot of players?

ughh i dont knowwwww

 

You could always just try AoC out. Though I could see how you might rather not want to blow 50 bucks...

 

yeah so, has anyone played both? can they do some compare and contrasting?

 

Here's my opinion.

I quit WoW half a year ago because I was burnt out from playing almost 3 years. I swore to myself that I would never touch it again because I was so sick of it. With all the hype surrounding AoC, a friend of mine managed to convince me to try it out. $50 and one week (lvl40) later, I reactivated my WoW account. I have no doubt in my mind that grinding battlegrounds for honor and S2 gear to prepare for WOTLK will be more fun than playing AoC.

Playing a non-Blizzard game really makes you cherish the polish and attention to details Blizzard puts into their games. And yes, I'm comparing them at launch, not WoW now vs AoC launch. AoC (in my opinion) lacks immersion and the feeling that you're a part of your character, which are the most important aspects for me in an MMO. I won't go into the details of why I feel this way, as this is something you can only experience for yourself.

Don't take my words for it though, I'm probably biased as I've been a fan of Blizzard's unmatched quality assurance in the PC gaming industry since the Warcraft II days. AoC may be the right game for you if photo-realistic graphics and button-mashing combat are your thing. I would definitely try to get someone's buddy key and try it out first though, although it might be awhile before they become available.

Call me a Blizzard (not just WoW) fanboy if you wish, I'm proud to be one and have no problem admitting it.

 

Whether you'll like AoC or not really boils down to whether you can tolerate zone instancing in an MMO or not.

If you're used to seamless zone transitions in WoW, the loading screens and zone copying in AoC might take some time to get used to.

It's a personal preference really. Game-breaking for some, not a big deal to others.

For me personally, it's game-breaking.

 

at the end of the day you cant really go off of other peoples opinions...like the poster above would rather play WoW i know whole guilds that have left WoW for AoC and i personally left WoW for AoC because after 2 years of playing WoW im tired of it and looking for more than just either end game raiding or arenas..for me i dont like how blizzard made it so pretty much 80% (ok maybe a bit much/ or not) of the 70's all look the same with bg/arena gear.

im looking forward to new end game raiding in AoC and mass seige battles with mounts/keeps /seige weapons and all that good stuff..

but either way i think you should try it out...you might like it.

 

another thing to remember is that AoC has only been out for 2 weeks so of course its not as polished as WOW. and you bearly notice the loading screens..well thats if you have enough system power for it to load quick

 

i think i might just wait till they have a trial period, then have a test run

because $50 is a bit of a steep investment expecially if there is a chance i might not like it

 

I've played and enjoyed both. I've gotten about 100 hours on my WoW character before I quit July of last year, and only around 6-7 hours on my AoC character. I think if you're looking for something new and exciting that's a lot less repetitive and full of less noobs, AoC is the game for you. I felt WoW is a lot more polished (I played about 40 hours at launch, then quit and came back at the end of 2006 because everyone in my class was playing it) than AoC, but I got bored of WoW. AoC can get pretty immersive, but it doesn't have that WoW feel that's hard to explain. Don't get me wrong, my opinion could easily change once I get further into AoC.

Graphics in AoC look really nice, but, even near maxed, I think it looks like a game from last year with a few nice effects. It has a nice style, but WoW still impresses me with its' artistic style. PVP in both games is a lot different, and they're both really fun. It's cool to be able to talk to and kill anyone on the PVP server, but I like WoW's war-style PVP a lot, too. The combat system in AoC is a lot more deep than WoW's. I've seen some truly amazing powers from every class, and stringing together spells and combos so skill is what'll win battles in AoC, is unbelievably sweet. Fatalities happen once every ten kills (as quoted by Funcom) and they'll always come as a surprise. You'll just be fighting, than you'll see some truly awesome and bloody fatality. I know I'll get bored of AoC in another year, but I think it could last me longer than WoW did. When there's a sequel to WoW (a game that pulls in over $180+ million a month will have an amazing sequel), I'll probably leave AoC for that, but if you're bored of WoW and want a completely new, different, and breathtaking experience, don't hesitate to go out and get Age of Conan. You won't regret it.

I know I didn't cover too much, but if you have any questions about comparing the games, just reply and I'll answer them.

 

If you're hesitating to spend the $50, wait for a free trial or a buddy pass to come out. AoC is just out, and as with any mmorpg at launch, there are a variety of bugs, balance issues, and tweaking that need to be done.

For example,since you're from WoW, you might remember the lack of end-game content that WoW had at launch. You may also remember long server downtimes. AoC suffers from many of the same problems, although IMO they're slightly worse here.

As it is, each patch, regardless of size (bring servers down, update everything, do a check, restart, etc.) takes them a full 4 hours to do--sometimes these 4 hours avoid US primetimes, sometimes they don't. FunCom has been patching the game multiple times a week--sometimes twice in one day (so that's 8 hours in the day that no one can play). You may not get your full 30-days free trial worth if you hop on the bandwagon right now. As of now FunCom hasn't announced any intention of extending the 30-day trial like Blizzard did for WoW at launch due to downtimes.

The last 2 patches were to implement the bank/storage/auction system, and then to fix that same system since it was eating people's money. The next major patches will be to balance the casters classes that are rather underpowered atm.

Furthermore, a lot of feats and skills simply don't work--especially for casters. You may simply want to wait to give them time to fix all those things so you don't end up wasting tons of gold respeccing build after build trying out different feats just to find out the thing simply wasn't implemented (or if it does work, might become nerfed the next patch ).

By the time buddy passes and/or free trials are available, hopefully a lot of these issues would be resolved. It's a game worth checking out, but I'd definitely wait until a free trial of some sort first.

EDIT: when i say "casters" are bugged, i mean mages (necro + demonologist). Healers are ungodly powerful in this game compared to most other mmorpgs

 

server are not down that much at all...sure they are down for 4 hours or so...but im on the west coast and the only problems i have had connecting is the first 3 days or so when early access came up...sure if ur not in the usa i guess it would seem alot more but since those first 3 days i've had no problems connecting everyday.

 

AoC has a lot more going for it than WoW does. In fact, I'm suspending my WoW account until Lich King is released to devote time in the incredible world of AoC. Even though AoC relies heavily on instances the mature themes and players, non-cartoony graphics, and involving combat system has kept me hooked since beta.

However, buying the game on hearsay is still a risk so wait for a guest pass or a demo before plunking down the chump change for AoC.

 

That one made me laugh

Unfortunately, the great majority of people in AoC, in spite of, or perhaps because of, the mature themes, can't quite be called "mature players".

But then, that's true of any mmorpg--WoW and AoC included, especially where nudity and ffa pvp is involved.

I think so far, we have the traditional camps:

1. The "gankers" who apparently derive some sort of superiority complex from camping res spots and kill people 30 lvls lower than them and gloat about it.

2. The "carebears" who whine 24/7 about the above instead of doing something about it.

3. The "mature" crowd who are screaming bloody murder that they can no longer get off on their nipple-less characters ingame.

4. The "QQers" who whine 24/7 about how sucky their class is.

5. The "casual" players who complain about grinding and group-oriented instances.

6. The "elitists" who just spam l2p at Group 4 and 5 above.

7. The "I'm going to quit" crowd who blames FunCom for everything that's wrong in their lives.

8. The "apologists" who freak out anytime someone mentions WoW and think FunCom is the greatest thing since sliced bread, probably just because it's not WoW or whatever else that tends to be popular at the moment in their need to be different.

9. The "drama queens" who, either under the guise of RP, true love, being possessed, or something else, will randomly obsess over something or someone in the game as if it was real.

10. The "trolls" who randomly pick one of the above categories depending on how much PMS they're feeling at the time.

But as long as you turn off your channels, ignore chat, and don't read the forums, grouping can be very enjoyable in AoC (or any other MMORPG for that matter).

At least you don't see random naked bearded ladies dancing on mailboxes in AoC (although that may be because there were no mailboxes for the first 1.5 weeks of launch; or because you tend not to see much of anyone with the instance system they have ).

Still, AoC is probably one of the better mmorpgs out currently that's not horribly dated. Definitely worth trying if you're into MMORPGs - just wait for a free trial. Or wait until Aion comes out (or even WAR).

 

you dont see many people?? what server do/did you play on? i see ppl all the time

 

WoW is less demanding ==> better gaming experience

 

Well, by many people, I mean that the OP used to WoW wouldn't be seeing the same crowds of 100-200+ people in one area at once.

I actually prefer it that way though. The horrors of IF auction houses and FFXI are just nightmares for low-end computers.

Not sure how less demanding matters as the OP already said he can play AoC at max settings. AoC has better graphics than WoW (although I kind of like the cartoonish look of WoW).