Like many other players, I naively said to myself that by buying from time to time in the bazaar this would allow Funcom to offer real new content. Unfortunately this is not the case…the shareholder Tencent is getting rich on the backs of the players, there is no win win.
Players are expecting new maps, not a completely bugged new purge system.
For my part, although present since early access, it is more than likely that my Conan adventure will end this month with the arrival of Return to Moria then Enshrouded. Conan Exiles still had a lot of potential but it only became a bugged showcase for the bazaar and the battlepass…
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Despite a few people loving Siptah, it was a fail.
I got it because hey new map cool, I expected bugs, but I also expected a game with working mechanics. I played though a couple hot fixes then gave up on it.
Now I have not spent a penny in the bazaar, as I have said a few times, I won’t even spend funcoms croms in the bazaar.
And yes this new monetary system is all tencent. It’s the same template they use in all their games.
But I’ll say the battle pass is well worth it. It’s pretty much a one buy system “to keep butts in seats”. Buy it the first time and you are paid to play in cosmetics and croms. Finish it and you’ve made enough croms to buy the next one. Think I bought mine this season and had like 1400 left.
I wont even check for free items.
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What new maps, Exiled Lands is far from finished, the further north you go the less polished the world is and some locations scream to you from far away ‘I am dungeon entrance’… but they are not.
I spent some cash in the Bazaar and personally I am unhappy with some changes and the pace of development. But I don’t know how much money is Conan currently making so it’s hard to measure the level of expectations we should have.
I bought Siptah for the rhinos, never played the map, floated over it once in admin mode, entered the tower and maybe 2 dungeons, never returned to it afterwards. Siptah looks cool, the map design is very interesting, it has some new features, but Exiled Lands murders it with it’s lore and biomes.
I think we should not wait for Conan Exiles to become game of our dreams but look at it as it is.
It’s a mistake to pay for some gadgets in order to support the game hoping it’s going to become some different game.
After 3 years with Conan and watching these “updates” which from my perspective ruin the game and break mods and don’t bring much new - I wouldn’t expect any miracles to happen.
It is what it is, it won’t get any better.
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If you honestly believe this, then you should be moving on and playing something else. Because if Tencent is funneling money off at the rate you all say. Then the game and its servers will be sunsetted in a month or two. You’re wasting your time unless you’re in singleplayer.
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This one also feels that the direction being taken is not what this one wanted to fund.
If revising was the order of the day, there are bugs aplenty to squash rather than reinventing the wheel.
Buyer’s remorse is a funny thing.
Especially when what one is “buying” is further development. No guarantees on what that further development might be, just further content for the base game. Well, we got what we paid for, unspecified tinkering on the base game.
In objection to the decisions on where to apply development time, this one has closed their wallet.
It shall most likely remain closed thru the entirety of the Age of War. Unless Chapter 3 is just amazing and includes both a dynamic and engaging PvE Raid experience.
This one has a touch of PvP experience, raids are nothing new, and from the looks of the fortress so far, it will be a cake walk for even a solo with minimum raid experience. It’s shaped like a Real World fort? Out in the middle of an easy to attack from all sides area?
With God Bubbles gone? And no players online to mount a real counter offensive? Where is this one’s Vince McMahon meme?
This looks like the kind of build an RP player would make. Pretty, possibly spacious and well decorated, but utterly ineffective for defense in game.
Back on topic, the items in the Bazaar are pretty enough, if lacking in function (glaring at you emotes), woefully incomplete (half the build sets), and absolutely not worth the cost (laughing at you Aquilonian bed) to this one.
This one knows they can make changes in the game, they demonstrated that with the reinvisoning at the open of Age of “War”, but the priorities demonstrated and changes decided on are… not a thing this one wishes to support.
When we get more dungeons, or see base game star metal claws, perhaps see an expansion to the list of Dragonbone (claws) Black Ice (Shortsword) Obsidian (Katana, long joke reason) and Seprentmen (Dual Swords) craftables and not a fake @$$ wish version in the Bazaar, this one may- no, will open the wallet again.
This one beat the drum for sorcery, and then bought a stupid amount of CC after it was introduced, more when it was noted they were working on more spells.
But now, no.
This one will not support what is seen of the current development direction.
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Well… I read what you had to say about the game, and I totally aggree with @Taemien … if you dont feel like the RoI is there, then move along.
Now, dont assume im against ur post, im just saying that if the game doesnt make you happy anymore, then take a break 
on a side note… conan was never complete… from the very begining the game was far from being complete, even worse, they filled our heads with smoke n mirrors when they announced that they bought the rights for Conan, so we all thought new content was coming.
Siptah is even worse… vaaaast areas of emptyness with nothing to do but to contemplate how the time slips from our fingers.
Funcom n Tencent are letting the game die, but they´ll make a few bucks out of the ppl who fell in love with the game.
As the time passes by i apreciate more and more games like Tera, where the challenge was real, but lacked that “someghing” where conan excels.
Read my words with a tone of bitterness, sadness and some leftover hope, to maybe one day, they´ll realize how good the opportunity to create something unique was, and how stupid was the decision to love the money more than the adventure.
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Real quick since multiple people have used the word in relation to this game.
What would “complete” look like for CE?
This is a question where you probably get as many answers as people you ask 
Personally for me the game would feel more complete if the dreams Joel Bylos had way back in 2017 during early access, especially some of the things he presented in the below video about the settlement system and Siege Warfare 
It has to be said that we much later got mounts and sorcery, but some of the major things they had planned for early access never became a reality.
I think the mount system was problematic because of consoles couldn’t handle it at the time, from what I heard they couldn’t render the world fast enough when riding at full speed.
A lot of the other features Joel talked may have been possible if it weren’t for the fact that consoles had problems handling what they wanted to do + the fact that they were pretty muich stuck in unreal engine version 4.15 because they had made a lot of customized components which made it difficult to more updated version of unreal engine, so they probably had to make a lot of compromises and scrap some features for it to work properly on all platforms, for example when they found out that they couldn’t make mounts work properly they suddenly announced the maproom with obelisk system as a substitute for mounts… At least that is what I think happened, please forgive me if I remember something wrong, it was 6 years ago and I am not young anymore 
But for me and a lot of other players at the time, the things he said in this video and also in other streams about coming features and things they hoped to add, probably sold us the game, I still would love to see a proper siege warfare and settlement system, but I am also a realist knowing that Conan Exiles while being a live service game, probably won’t get much more than changes to existing mechanics and some events, and that is alright, I have lowered my expectations during the years, it is still a good and enjoyable game
I never really answered your question of what “complete” would look like for Conan Exiles, and I probably can’t, but I guess we will see it once Dune is released, and if it’s succesful I wouldn’t be surprised if Conan Exiles gets even lower priority than it has right now
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The North update ‘completed’ Conan Exiles for me. Everything else was just icing on the cake.
For some of our newer members of the community, the Northern update added pretty much everything that is green north of the desert. The stuff to the east with the swamp and jungle was added after the fact. Isle of Siptah, Sorcery, Mounts, and followers that could gain levels weren’t even on our radar. And the only paid items were the Royal Armor and Atlantean Sword, no DLCs were on the horizon just yet.
And the best mod on the workshop was one that turned trees into rockets when cut down. 
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I just don’t understand this. I’m not arguing it’s not going to happen…just don’t understand it. You put a tail in developing a game as all of that work goes into it and you are hoping for success but after you have market share and are actually promoted (even after 5 years) as one of the premier survival games currently active, it’s not a gamble anymore and you can switch to a model that resources are covered by the on-going revenue stream.
With that in mind, the game would loose support when we stop supporting it. The people working on CE are funded by CE revenue which means it’s a great feedback loop…or at least should be.
There’s not any reason for Conan Exiles to get ‘lower priority’ which is just a buzz word that players here just assume they have any idea what they are talking about. Its true that the people who initially worked on creating CE in 2016-17 aren’t working on the game anymore. And that happened very shortly after release. Why? Because their talents weren’t needed on CE anymore. They created the foundation, and the ones working on it now are creating content on that foundation.
The ones who initially worked on CE have skillsets and talents better used for for the foundation of another project. No one is getting taken off CE for other projects until those projects prove to be viable, and need the skillsets they have, as well as prove that moving these people would result in more revenue than what is happening here.
Taking them now to work on an unproven project is an unnecessary risk. Especially given that CE has a playerbase multiple times over its lowest point. If they were going to remove this team from CE, they would have done it then.
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Conplete?
Mummy of the serpent. If I’m correct, they told that will be implemented into the game. But instead, they reworked the complete journey system.
Before siptah, and before any of this cash-grab mentality, with most of the bugs fixed instead of “new” (copypaste) stuff. And with normal survival.
First of all I want to apologize for my wording, english isn’t my native language, so I may not get my thoughts through in a perfectly good way
I don’t completely understand it either, it is more like a feeling I get because I have seen it happen in other games.
Maybe it is a natural thing when a good game gets older and they release a new game that takes over the throne as their golden goose.
When Conan Exiles went from a finished game with added cultural dlc’s and possible expansions(Siptah) to become a live service game with battlepass and cash shop(deco only), I was a bit sceptical because my previous experiences with such system was that it felt more like keeping players in the loop, mostly doing the same things in the the same world, just a bit differently by changed mechanics.
A good example is the combat/weapons system and thralls/pets, how often have you had to redo a lot of things because what used to be good suddenly may have become really bad…
The best way I can describe it is that I personally don’t really feel that the game is expanding in content and mechanics, it feels more like constant changes to mechanics, temporary content(events), features that are replaced with others rather than adding onto the game with new and more things to do… It sort of feels like the movie Groundhog Day just with some added FOMO because if you don’t keep playing you will miss out on some mechanics and battlepass items that you will never get the chance to see and try.
Where were we?
Oh yes, the “Buzz word”(lower priority) as someone mentioned(not going down the rabbit hole with him)…
To sum it up, this is how I think it is…
I do believe that Joel Bylos and most of the devs working on Conan Exiles felt that it was a passion project, they had their dreams and goals they hoped to achieve especially during early access and some time after, but things changed, Tencent became the biggest shareholder, monetization experts were hired to find ways to maximize profits.
It’s not like they didn’t care about players or the game, but it feels like the actual state and development of the game progression became secondary or maybe even lower.
As long they can keep players in the loop and make profit from cash shop and battlepass + some new sales of base game and old dlc’s, they will still keep the lights on.
However if Dune sell well when it comes out like Conan Exiles did, then some people higher up may consider moving resources from Conan Exiles to that game, simply because it makes them more money.
It is cold and hard business, you put the resources and money where you get the most profit
EDIT:
Speaking of games as a live service and why many don’t really like it including myself, I suddenly remembered having seen a youtube on the subject some time ago, so I dug it up from my Youtube history, it has some good points 
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I wasn’t speaking of right now, but more what I think will happen when Dune comes out and maybe become their new golden goose like Conan Exiles was.
I have no knowledge of how big the playerbase is on consoles, but looking at SteamDB, I don’t really see a playerbase multiple times over its lowest point, but rather a stable playerbase with some peaks, maybe slight improvements, but that is all
They not even fix the servers, a lot of pve-c servers are bugged since the chapter 2 launch and past two hotfix, the fkcng infinite loading screen hits every main update. I believe that they fix it in the production enviroment and forget to attach it to the main development branch, its the only way a bug keeps coming back every update.
PVE-C has always been spotty. I remember 3 years ago I wouldn’t even attempt to try those servers because i would get tons of lag and booted off. PVP? Fine. PVE? Fine. It was like PVE-C got left over server parts or something…either that or there is some weird @$$ coding that makes player damage but building no damage flaky for the entire game.
But here is the thing about this. We have all seen the complaints about these mechanics and trashing of the company for maintaining these things. I completely understand why they redid the purge because their trajectory for the game made the purge absolutely meaningless. It still is but at least its a challenge now and not something you can clear with 3-4 lvl 20 T4 combat thralls, assuming you just don’t skip it all together. As far as FOMO and battlepass things, being versed in several games that had similar models, FC is doing it right. You can literally cheat your way to success with admin functions and within 2 weeks time, have the entire battlepass done with only minor grind of about 30 minutes a day. Less if you understand the key markers of the challenge and can admin spawn the right NPCs. This is the least amount of FOMO you can have and maintain seasonal exclusivity.
As far as the video is concerned, I remember the time before and the dude has some rose tinted hindsight going on. As in he is romanticizing what social multiplayer games were and the issues with what he is pining for to come back literally discouraged casual gamers from investing in the games because the vets all destroyed them because they had the time to do it all. If you have a true job, yeah don’t bother to think you can get the winter camo gear or the nightsight scope or the sword of agromoth or what have you…you won’t have the time to do it and those that do make sure to shame you for that. It was a time where teens and college students dominated every game because they had no life, no real responsibility outside of 5 hours a day of school time. The rest of the 10-14 hours was spent gaming. Yeah hate to say it so bluntly but those of us with money weren’t encouraged to play these games. There still is the grind issue of those that can spend 10 hours a day will usually trump the casual gamer but the casual gamer gets a bump with these items that can keep their interests a bit more. Sure you die the exact same time but at least you die in a pink unicorn outfit to pile on the ridicullous nature of the game.
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So true!
I was thinking of Dune when I said what I did. Dune isn’t out yet. Dune is an unknown. It will do great on launch because its called Dune. But what will it be 2 years after? If its a sure hit and remains so then, and it requires more manpower, then you can see a shift from CE. But we’re also looking at CE being nearly 10 years old by that point. I feel like CE will naturally be considered ‘feature complete’ or sunsetted by that time naturally anyway.
Unless you all are buying a crazy about of crom coin every month, this isn’t Everquest.
It will do great on launch because its called Dune
It’s going to have great launch because just like Conan it’s targeted to adults.
Try to play some top popular game for new generation of players, words like “Conan” or “Dune” don’t say anything to them and sound “cheap”.
Conan Exiles would have been an ever bigger game if it was not released in alpha.
Yet it was a great success for Funcom.
And maybe it’s about scale… Maybe Funcom does not have the ambition to reach the top.
Maybe they are happy with making good money while making average games that could have been great if (you put here whatever you want).
Maybe it’s like with HTC mobile phone brand… Fans ask - HTC why don’t you make this and this, your phones would have been amazing then. And CEO replies - what do you mean? We are reaching our sales targets every year.
So maybe it’s the same strategy at Funcom, try to make something good by the cheapest means possible, get that sack of gold and move to another project.
Their sales target was to sell 500k copies of Conan in first year.
They sold 500k copies in first month. They were not aware they made a hit and they did not know what to do with it.
And maybe this is the case here, they have reached their target.
I agree they neglected the game too much and they should have strucked while the iron was hot.
But now the game is old, it was designed for old consoles so the graphics starts to look bad in second half of 2023 even in cinematic mode with mods.
We should be happy that we are getting anything, but I would not expect any new expansions coming etc. Maybe one more age after this one and that’s it - maintenance mode.
Because it was such a great hit and they sold 500k copies just in first month after launch they are going to bring out another Conan, you will see. And they know we all here are going to buy it. Fresh new Conan in UE5, next gen graphics and all the shit we asked for here
Remember my words…
I don’t think it was. I think it was ported to the most abundant consoles at the time which was the pS4/X1 generation. I think the COVID limitation on the next gen consoles helped in staving back FC ambitions and as the consoles got more integrated into the revision system, it was too late to try to break it off to fit the next gen models into the equation when they became more common. Not to mention the UR engine limitations.