Not only are the growing numbers a very strong indication on Age of Conan's popularity pre-launch, the entire development process is also reaping the rewards from the constantly increasing numbers of gamers signing up to join the beta test． This allows Funcom to thoroughly test numerous aspects of the game, contributing to a smoother launch and a more enjoyable gaming experience from day one．

Do things this way and you'll always have the best items you can have for your level． The only thing I can fault is this．．．At level 40 your won't have enough money to get a mount．．．but you won't need one until lv60．

You buy it, you start playing it, you don't stop． Start it on a free weekend, hammer on until you get to lv80．．．what you'll notice

Dungeons seem pretty interesting so far, with some being easier, outdoor locations that can be beaten solo． The more difficult ones, like the Sanctum of the Burning Souls, require a group and have better loot drops, as should be expected． Within the Sanctum were spiders and lost souls, a stone-walled ravine section with blood waterfalls and a pool below, and a boss encounter against a giant skinless demon． I got a piece of blue medium armor for myself with a nice design pattern on it, and it differed significantly in appearance from any of the equipment I'd seen previously． Even though the armor and weapon designs in the game are simply fantastic, it's annoying to see that after 20 or 30 levels your character's armor and weapons look largely unchanged, a result of a lot of the world drops and non-dungeon quest rewards having much in common in terms of visual appearance within their armor type categories．

Of course, as should be expected, the 1 to 40 experience isn't exactly bug-free． Tortage is fairly stable, but some of the quests in the Wild Lands of Zelata are busted and mob behavior occasionally bugs out． It's still very much playable, though． The quest lines in those 20 to 40 zones have some interesting narrative threads that connect multiple dungeons, which at keeps things more engaging than if you were doing random kill quests． NPC quest-givers interact with you through cutscenes, letting you select from dialogue options like in a single-player RPG, which at the very least lends a little more personality to the process of scooping up a zone's quests． If only the cutscene camera didn't so often bury itself in the grass or in the back of another player's head．

The spoils of all this harvesting, crafting at level 40, and eventually setting up structures in your guild's city are interesting, though．

At level 20 you get the ability to start harvesting resources, which has so far proven to be mind-numbingly boring． Thankfully the game's auction and bank systems were brought back online last week so there's more of a point to the whole system, as you finally have a convenient way to sell items, but the way the resources are laid out makes harvesting extremely tedious． The game features three resource zones, all of which are set up for you to just run around and chop wood, mine ore, pick cotton, and launch arrows at prey． Resources can be harvested in the questing zones as well, but trying to track everything down and label it on your mini-map isn't exactly entertaining, particularly if there are others roaming around competing for resource nodes, as there frequently are．

As for the content, things seem to start to tail off in terms of solid quest lines and more engaging content once you hit 40． In the Field of the Dead, the game's zone for those between 40 and 50, things start off at a decent clip with a few quests near the zone's beginning, but then seem to sputter to a slow crawl, offering only a few tasks and meager rewards． Compared to the polished level 1 through 20 experience in Tortage and large number of quest chains available in the 20 to 40 zones, Field of the Dead doesn't really stack up． Leveling is still entirely possible through grinding as downed mobs around your level give out pretty good experience bonuses, but opportunities to gain quest experience rewards that can so quickly propel you along the leveling curve seem to dry up．

In addition to the in-game music the album also comes with a special bonus CD, which includes eight more orchestral songs from the game plus three songs Turbonegro． Amongst these will be "Destroy All Monsters", a brand new song inspired by legendary feats of Conan． This is the first new material recorded by Turbonegro featuring their new drummer Tomas Dahl．

June 12, 2008 - Hot on the heels of the release of the Age of Conan videogame, Funcom has announced the release of the Age of Conan soundtrack．