Here's another milestone for the yet-to-be released Xbox 360 and MMO title Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. The game's official community has finally broken the 500,000 mark.

Funcom and Eidos Interactive really value the interest gamers are showing during the pre-launch of Age of Conan. See what they have to say after the jump!

Localization is always a good thing, right? It keeps developers at the closest reach possible to the grassroots level. That's why it's such welcome news from Funcom that they will be launching their own Spanish Forums for their highly-anticipated MMORPG, Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures.

To find out more about when these forums will go up, head on to the full article.

  

By Crom! Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures (for the PC and Xbox 360) picked up the Best Online Game award at the 2007 Games Convention in Leipzig. This MMORPG beat out other online games from every genre and platform to get the prestigious accolade.

Obviously both Funcom and Eidos were extremely happy that their work on the game did not go unnoticed. To mark this occasion, Funcom CEO Trond Arne Aas said that "this is a great honor to everyone working on Age of Conan. These awards really show that our massive efforts are paying off and that the public, the press, and the industry are recognizing the very strong qualities of the game."

The MMORPG was heavily featured at the GC this year, with it being shown at the Microsoft and Eidos booth as well as behind the scenes to select members of the press. The Director of the Game Gaute Godager pinpointed a few of the reasons on why their game has captured the attention of the online community:

Siege warfare and player-versus-player battles are some of the most anticipated features in Age of Conan. We recognize the tremendous importance that Games Convention has in the industry and that is why we chose this to be the arena for first showing off these features, letting gamers play player-versus-player for the first time

Gamers excited to play the full version of this game will have to wait a bit since the developers and publisher decided to push its release back to March 2008. They did this because they believe that the combat system isn't up to par, despite the massive demand from gamers. It's that kind of dedication to quality that may push this MMORPG above and beyond its contemporaries when it comes out.

Funcom's Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures will not be out this October 30, but is now slated to be released on March 25 next year. This is because the developers want to focus on honing, polishing, and improving the game. In that case, we still say "By Crom!"

Anyway, while this is a bit of a letdown for people waiting for Hyborian Adventures (also coming out on the 360), its nice to know that they're willing to hold back the game for a few months so that we'll be getting a better gaming experience.

Funcom CEO Trond Arne Aas announced this decision and provided the following details through a recent press release saying

We naturally regret that we have to push back Age of Conan. However, after careful consideration, and analysis of recent Beta feedback, we believe that the new release date is in the best interest of the gamers, our company and our owners.

We are fully committed to delivering games with absolute qualities, and in the current MMO marketplace we know that only the best is good enough to truly succeed.

With the new release date we have therefore given ourselves more time to meet and deliver on the massive expectations for the game. We are certain that our choice will ultimately pay off, and that all Age of Conan players will get a special online experience.

So it looks like gamers will have to wait a bit to fully explore the lands of Hyboria. Hopefully, this delay will be enough for Funcom to provide us with a good if not the best MMORPG experience. Keep checking back here for more updates on Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures.

 

Want to be on top of your game? Perhaps you simply want something a little extra without going through the trouble of working doubly hard for it in Anarchy Online? Well, the days of endlessly grinding to purchase sweet stuff are over. Funcom has announced the arrival of virtual item sales to Anarchy Online, allowing folks to purchase select virtual items, content and services.

The new arrangement introduces some sweet new items that won't interfere with gameplay balance, but will still be worth every penny you spend to get them. You can now purchase jetbikes and hover boards to get around the lands of Rubi-Ka. Scout mechs, luxury apartments, and leet pets will also be made available through the service.

Said Trond Arne Aas, Funcom's CEO,

Funcom has long been a pioneer on new MMO business models, and with the introduction of virtual item sales we are once again moving our game in an exciting new direction. Selling virtual items and smaller content upgrades is now a prevalent MMO business model in Asia. This has yet to be fully explored in the west, but we believe that the time is now right to test a limited version of such a model. At the same time we remain committed to the overall evolution of the game, making sure that Anarchy Online will be a success for many years to come.

  

More screens of the bikes and the boards after the jump!

Most MMORPGs take us to fantasy universes, future worlds, or alternate realities. Now the makers of Age of Conan, Anarchy Online, and The Longest Journey have announced a new MMO which is set on a contemporary world.

Yup. This universe, same earth, same time. Called The Secret World, it focuses on the stuff of legend, mysteries, conspiracy theories, and myth. Imagine a real world and a secret world that co-exists with ours. The basic difference is, in the secret world magic exists and ancient enemies fight for domination. Oh and did we mention the monsters? Funcom">Ragnar Tornquist, producer and director at Funcom, had this to say about the upcoming video game for the PC and Xbox 360:

We started envisioning this contemporary online world more than ten years ago, and as the years passed the ideas grew and improved. We always wanted a different kind of online world, something scary and contemporary, something deeper and closer to our reality. Our goal now is to create a detailed world where players feel empowered and part of something big, something mystical and epic.

Trond Arne Aas, Funcom CEO is enthusiastic about the contemporary setting, saying that players will want to "explore something beyond traditional fantasy and sci-fi games". Currently, The Secret World is in a playable state. It has been in development since last summer and jointly produced by Funcom Oslo and Beijing. As of the moment, Funcom's tight-lipped about the release date of The Secret World.

We'll be keeping you posted - this writer is definitely waiting for beta on this one. For now, check out the character art and the screenshots of various cities. Enjoy!

The rest of the screenshots right after the jump!

 

By Crom! 100,000 players have already signed up to beta test Funcom's Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures MMO game for PCs. It's no surprise considering that 50,000 players signed up within 24 hours of the online game's beta test announcement.

Gaute Godager, founder of Funcom and Game Director, is very proud about the game and excited about how many people wanted to be part of the beta test.

We’ve been developing this incredible world for years now and today more than 150 people are working hard on achieving the ambitious goals we set out for the game. The team is very excited about the number of gamers who have signed up for the Beta so far, and we can’t wait to see them charging into the brutal battlefields of Hyboria!

In our previous coverage of this event, we discussed the sign-up procedure for the game. The sign-up process that Funcom implemented was to ensure that it only allowed players who were dedicated to the testing of the game. It's also said that as the game's launch date approaches, further moves to expand the base of beta testers will be implemented.

From what's been announced, the game already has a large base of beta testers. Trond Arne Aas, CEO of Funcom, has commented on this huge turn out.

We’re naturally very pleased to see that so many dedicated gamers are signing up for the ‘Age of Conan’ Beta at such a rapid pace. With more than 100,000 gamers signed up in such a short time-frame our confidence in the game’s potential and its ability to be a major contender in the MMO genre continues to be strengthened.

Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is slated to be released on October 30. The game has won the "Best MMO of E3" award from IGN, GameSpot, GameSpy, and Yahoo. In addition to this, it is being used as a showcase DirectX 10 title for nVidia. It's understandable that some consider this game to be one of the most anticipated MMORPGs of the year.

More money's rolling in for Funcom, and this time it's in the form of a grant from the Norwegian Film Fund. The grant enables Funcom to establish a core technology team which will research online-only delivery methods of episodic content, as well as lay the foundation for a later pre-production phase of Dreamfall Chapters.

Dreamfall Chapters begins right where Dreamfall: The Longest Journey ended. It will be released in episodic form, and as Funcom seeks to further strengthen an already established IP through this online-only continuation, the potential for a future The Longest Journey MMO increases.

"We will be researching an online-only continuation of the epic Longest Journey saga, and we very much look forward to develop new chapters to the Dreamfall gaming community," said Trond Arne Aas, CEO of Funcom. "To see the Norwegian government take such an active role in nurturing the local game development industry is impressive. In return for their trust we aim to deliver a modern adventure game with unique qualities."

The grant is part of the Norwegian government’s active endorsement of the Norwegian game development industry. Since the inception of the program in 2004 the government has supported a wide range of games, including Dreamfall: The Longest Journey.

Forget the ambiguous "Spring 2007" release date. Funcom and Eidos have finally given Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures an official release date, and guess what? Both Funcom and Eidos have decided to "further hone the qualities of the game." The new release date is set to October 30 and will "further ensure an online experience with truly stunning impact."

Let's take a while to read up on some marketing talk from CEO Trond Arne Aas:

Age of Conan brings something brand new and highly innovative to the MMO genre. Age of Conan today looks and plays fantastically, as countless press previews and industry feedback attest to. Even so, we believe that by spending even more time and effort into polishing and enhancing the game we will ensure that the game reaches its full potential in terms of quality and subscriber base.

We are confident that our fan base will appreciate this commitment to quality. The prolonged development time reflects our ambition to meet and exceed the expectations of our fans for this game.

Personally, I think they're delaying it just so both the Xbox 360 and the PC versions get a simultaneous release, but hey, as long as the game delivers then I'm all for waiting a few more months. Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is currently in closed beta, and Funcom will soon be announcing a unique chance to secure a spot in the open beta of the game.

Lush, tropical, and rugged is how barbarian likes it. Here be a tonnage of screens from Funcom's Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures to sweat to. Big, hairy barbarian also very happy to see a few scenes of combat against fellow barbarians and big, scary spiders. Doesn't take much to make barbarian happy, don't it? (Especially if Funcom throws in a drunken brawl every night...).

Ah, but big, hairy barbarian want to take 360 wireless controller and beat big scary creatures with it. Now it's possible. Funcom announced that Microsoft "gave them the green light" to dev their MMO for the Xbox 360, too. Says Trond Arne Aas, Big Barbarian Chief of Funcom, "This is a groundbreaking leap forward for Funcom. The fact that we now get the chance to develop Age of Conan for the Xbox 360 means access to a potentially whole new and large MMO market."

Interesting to see where this goes - Age of Conan is one of the Windows Vista showcase titles, and we're quite curious to see simultaneous Windows Live/Xbox Live multiplayer in the same manner as Shadowrun's. More puny skulls for barbarian to crush.

More screenshots at the full article.