Year of construction: 2008
Genre: Action / RPG (MMOG) / 3D / 3rd Person
developer: Funcom
System requirements for maximum rendering quality recommended by the gameGPU website:
The minimum
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Duo 2.4 GHz
RAM: 1,5 GB
Video card: DirectX®9 compatible video adapter with 512 MBRAM Radeon HD 4770 or GeForce 9800GTX
DirectX: DirectX®9
Winchester: 19 GB free space
Effective
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Duo 2,66 GHz
RAM: 2 GB
Video card: DirectX®9 compatible video adapter with 1024 MBRAM Radeon HD 4890 or GeForce GTX 260 core 216
DirectX: DirectX®9
Winchester: 19 GB free space
Optimal
Operating system: Vista®, Windows 7
Processor: Core 2 Duo 3.2 GHz
RAM: 2 GB
Video card: DirectX®9 compatible video adapter with 1024 MBRAM Radeon HD 5850 or GeForce GTX 285
DirectX: DirectX®9
Winchester: 19 GB free space
Official description of the game
The main feature of the gameplay is fighting according to new rules. The player fights in real time, combining six main directions of sword strike and various fighting techniques. The same approach is used for magic attacks, ranged combat and mounted battles. Gamers will be able to form groups and jointly participate in PvP (Player vs Player) and PvE battles (Player vs Environment).
When you first set foot on the hot sandy shore of Tortage Island, you might think that you have found yourself in a real tropical paradise. However, in the depths of this island there are many secrets and mysteries. Almost all Funcom employees are active players with extensive experience in playing online games. Before Age of Conan, they were already developing online games – their previous brainchild, Anarchy Online, was published about five years ago.
Age of Conan will differ from other MMORPG games due to the unique experience that players receive during the first few hours of the game – once in the world of Age of Conan, you will first have to learn all the equipment and become familiar with the character control system and the game interfaces. Most MMORPG games immediately place you in a game world where you have to immediately interact with other characters and unique game mechanics that all of us fans of online multiplayer games love – and hate at the same time. This experience can be quite daunting, especially for those who are used to playing solo, since there is no one to take you by the hand and introduce you to the world around you. Moreover, the plot in AoS will develop completely differently than in traditional games.
The first few hours in the world of AoS will rather remind you of a solo game. Even though we can technically surround you with other characters, you will spend the first hours alone, immersed in your own world, where all events will develop only around your character. This gives us the opportunity to create more complex and rich stories, similar to those typical for single-player games. This way we can create special, environmentally impacting events, dynamics and a level of interaction that would otherwise be impossible to achieve in a game like an MMOG. In this case, all players will be constantly connected to our servers and will be able to freely communicate with their fellow players.
Review: Playability
Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures has been out for quite some time and numerous sites have long left various reviews on the Internet. Now the game has become practically free, but with a few exceptions. You can only play by leveling up your character to level 20 and there is no support for multilingual servers – only English-language ones.
It is clear that the developers will no longer cook porridge on a paid basis, and it is quite possible that we will soon see either a completely free release of this project, or the closure of all game servers.
As for the game, we can say that the gameplay combines a good plot, an excellent soundtrack and, in our opinion, the most important thing – a good combination of single-player and multiplayer game modes.
Review: Game Graphics
The graphics are simply excellent for online games in Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, but with only one exception – the gigantic resource consumption of the GPU. But more on that later.
I’m very pleased with the presence of DirectX10 and all its gadgets in the game. The availability of graphic settings in the game is simply off the charts. It is clear that the developers took the graphics component very seriously. But in our opinion, they went a little too far.
They crammed in an incredible amount of effects, but forgot about optimization. And the models of characters and buildings do not look very detailed and are slightly blurred, but in principle they are of very high quality.
Fans of good game images will be pleased with this project, especially since it has become practically free and anyone can enjoy the graphic delights of this game.
Review: Resource-intensive game
To play Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures comfortably, you will need a dual-core Core 2 Duo 2,66 GHz processor and 2 gigabytes of RAM.. The game has a terrible appetite for the graphics subsystem.
All video cards were tested at maximum graphics quality in DirectX 10 mode by the Fraps program in the most resource-intensive part of the game. All settings in the graphic menu were turned up to the maximum except for anti-aliasing. When activated, the game becomes practically unplayable on all video cards.
We tested video cards from the lower price segment at a resolution of 1024×768, video cards from the middle price range were tested at a resolution of 1280×1024, and video cards from the upper price range were tested at a resolution of 1680×1050. We tested processor dependence on the HD5870 video card with maximum quality graphics settings.
Testing at maximum Low End quality settings at 1024×768 resolution
In the lower category, all video cards are completely out of action, just showing signs of life.
Testing at maximum quality settings Midle End at 1280×1024 resolution
In the middle range, everything is also very tense and not a single one of our test subjects was able to overcome the barrier of 25 frames.
Testing at maximum High End quality settings at 1680×1050 resolution
Here we see that only the most expensive products can show more or less good smoothness of the gameplay. With a higher resolution increase, the gameplay will not seem very comfortable on them.
Conclusion: Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is a good online project that perfectly combines single-player and multiplayer game modes. But even after such a gigantic period of time, only a few graphics accelerators are able to cope with this project.
