Age of Conan Beta Clarification, License Extension

There may have been some disputed E3 2006 awards between the three major gaming websites - IGN, GameSpy and GameSpot - but when it came to recognizing the best Massively Multiplayer Online game of the show, the trio's decision was unanimous: Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. Funcom's barbaric MMORPG was also nominated as IGN's Best PC Game of the show, so it's no wonder that fans of the genre everywhere are eagerly awaiting to try this game as soon as possible.

Under normal circumstances, the first such opportunity would be a public beta testing phase. And indeed, speculations have been flynig high ever since director Gaute Godager and other Funcom devs hinted at E3 that the beta is expected to start in early summer. That may well be, except for one tiny little thing: the first phase will be a closed beta, with only a small number of hand-picked, NDA-bound individuals selected for testing Age of Conan. Funcom made sure to clarify this issue on the game's forums, while also stating that the closed beta phase will be followed by one or two public betas, later in the year.

Just a few hours ago, the developer also issued a more formal announcement regarding its license with Conan Inc., which grants Funcom the exclusive rights to develop any and all MMO games based on the Conan license. According to the new announcement, Funcom holds the license until 2018, and has an option to prolong the agreement with five additional years - all the way to 2023! I wonder how many of us will still be alive by then, at the rate World of Warcraft players are dropping dead...

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)