End of the Road

I have tons of fond memories of this game, and still a desire to see it return to its glory one day. Either via a sequel that retains all of the things that made AO great (the sci-fi/fantasy mix setting, the deep lore, the ability to over equip, and the varied profession classes) or that somehow funcom finds a way to funnel resources back into AO and revive it. Though I doubt either of these things will ever happen.

I have accepted that the friends I used to play with will more than likely never come back. The game is left in what feels like a very unfinished state; just short of meeting the goals (completed engine and rebalance efforts as well as steam integration) that should have extended its life. The new client was certainly an improvement but remains buggy, the profession balance was a mixed bag improving the game in some ways and detracting from it heavily in others. The steam integration seems incomplete as well, the overlay doesn't properly track your in-game hours and who knows what other undiscovered issues might exist.

I already haven't had an active sub for several months. The community sites like AOFroobs, AO-Universe, Auno - are either already dead and down, no longer receiving updates or merely abandoned. Would it even be possible to play this game nowadays without AO-Universe's resources, should that site ever go down? With the game in its current state even if there was a new wave of players without these community driven sites I don't even believe the game would be approachable enough to hold new players.

I have been considering taking one last month long trip into AO as christmas approaches, and that will probably be the end of the road for me. I have come and gone from this game many times, started playing at a very young age over 10 years ago. I am now 25 and I will never forget my time with AO. So many late night hours, grinding away in ToTW, Ely hecks, inferno missions, grinding for AXP and phat loot. Every new expansion brought new challenges to the game and pushed the limits of what was possible in all level ranges. I watched as merc raids dropped from hundreds of people to individual teams, as the beast went from this bi-weekly side-wide event to instanced org raids, to multibox farmers soloing all the content.

Somewhere along the lines, like all things, people started to get bored and move on. I have never enjoyed any other MMO in any capacity like anarchy online. This game was truly special.

A special thanks goes out to all the people i've interacted with over the years. There are too many names to list, and many of whom i've forgotten. Friends I met from Call of Duty 2 multiplayer who started playing anarchy online along side me. People in my first organization, the first people to help me farm items or credits, the high level engineer who helped me equip a high level bot for the first time and gave me my first taste of over-equipping. Just know that if we ever interacted you were part of what made this game so special to me.

I eagerly await my final step onto rubi-ka. I will be seeing you guys next month, for the last time.