Interviews// Andreas Öjerfors - Age of Conan, Quest Co-ordinator

A lot of people create cute, attractive characters. Do you have normal-looking characters?

Andreas Öjerfors: You mean player characters?


NPCs and stuff like that.

Andreas Öjerfors: We have a lot of (characters) that just look like real people.


[b]But all people play as cute characters…[/b]

Andreas Öjerfors: I don’t think that’s true… I think a lot of players are creating ugly characters. I think that’s part of what Hyborea is. Not everything is pretty and strong and cute and brave. There’s a lot of ugly… I think a lot of people appreciate that and want their character like that.


The Red Sonja license sprung out of the Conan comics. Are there any plans for that character in future instalments of the game?

Andreas Öjerfors: No. The license holder of Conan does not hold the license for Red Sonja, I think.


So, there are no plans to get that license?

Andreas Öjerfors: No. We have enough to dig out from just Howard’s Hyborea.


What are the plans for additional content after launch?

Andreas Öjerfors: Right after launch we’re gonna publish a roadmap, and of course expansion will be part of that.

We’re gonna have both free content – or, it’s not free, you pay for it with the subscription – and then we’re gonna give you expansion packs…

I can’t tell you how often it’s gonna happen, but we already have stuff in production.


With the soundtrack, did you take inspiration from the films?

Andreas Öjerfors: We had a Norwegian composer called Knut Haugen – he’s very good. I think they took some inspiration from that, but I think it was mostly his and Godager’s vision of what they wanted to portray. What moods they wanna portray. So, I think we have something far more epic in many places.


You said later in the game you’ll be questing for Conan. Can you do it the other way, and fight against Conan?

Andreas Öjerfors: No, you can’t. It’s an interesting thought, but no.


Does that mean it will be in one of the expansion packs?

Andreas Öjerfors: (Grins) We’ll see what happens.


Do you have a secret for building a game?

Andreas Öjerfors: The thing I learned in my very first game is that it’s very difficult to see how things are going to end up. It takes a little bit of faith, because until you’re actually 95% complete, it’s not gonna look good, it’s not gonna play good, it’s not gonna seem like a solid product. You construct all these different parts, then it all comes together and you have this shining and brilliant game that we have now. So, that tip is a little bit of faith.


Was going with a low-fantasy game - one that doesn’t have clear cut good versus evil and so on - was that a conscious decision knowing that WoW is out there and is a high fantasy game?

Andreas Öjerfors: The production of this game started well before World of Warcraft became huge. So, a lot of the ideas and concepts of this game were started before World of Warcraft came out.


A lot of the games that have come after WoW look a lot like it.

Andreas Öjerfors: I think that’s very true. A lot of games look very much the same. But, I mean, it’s not like WoW really was… They made a very, very good game, but it’s still in the same philosophy as many other games. Some people talk like, ‘oh, it’s a WoW clone.’ In a way maybe, but it’s also an Everquest clone and a clone of so many others. It’s that philosophy of that kind of game.


It’s that way for shooters.

Andreas Öjerfors: Yeah. Every time someone released a shooter, first of all it was a Wolfenstein killer, then Doom, then Quake. It’s exactly that kind of thing.


Thanks for your time.