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Wielding a Wicked Weapon

Melee Combat in Age of Conan

Perhaps the most publicity concerning the Age of Conan has been about melee combat. While many have noted how fluid character animations are and how visceral the combat feels, even when watching a player, very little has been noted about the combat system the Jorgen was displaying.

Unlike almost all other MMORPGs, combat does not require targeting of the mob through a UI system. Instead, sword-wielding functions similarly to what you might find in a console game: damage occurs anywhere you swing your sword. While this might present a problem (kill stealing or ninja looting since no mobs are targeted by the player), I believe Funcom will find a solution if they haven’t already.

Combos can also be performed in this type of combat, as a six-pronged circular indicator appears whenever combat is intiated. When one of the prongs flashes yellow, it means that a combo is possible and an attack in that area will initiate a combo. Achieve enough combos and you may succeed in performing a fatality, which are particularly gruesome decapitations and the like.

Controlling combat is easy as well, with a good number of options available to the user. “The game is built for use with a mouse/keyboard combination, a mouse alone, or a 360 controller,” he said. “We had to make sure every culture’s control preference was taken care of.”

And, from what I saw, the combat was as easy as moving and clicking where appropriate. Jorgen preferred a WASD combination that allowed him to operate without a mouse, but he also demonstrated some mouse combat, which required clicking on the circular prongs rather than hitting a key on the keyboard.

Another interesting aspect that has had little press time is the fact that Funcom is hard at work developing “stances” for players to use while in combat. Jorgen described these as offensive, defensive, and neutral, with each stance varying the player’s statistics.

And, once again, I cannot say enough about the combat animations. With nuances similar to those of Gods and Heroes, Conan adds to this by implementing the DirectX 10 textures and lighting technique. Screenshots rarely give the engine its due, watching the characters and their movements is one of the most entertaining portions of the game.

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