Despite Funcom saying that October the 30th would be the "final release date" for the highly anticipated Age Of Conan, it has once more been delayed. The new launch date will be March 2008, a full 11 months after their public beta testing started, quite possibly the longest public test of all time, which should hopefully mean the game will be released without any annoying bugs or niggles.

Their reasoning for the delay is to ensure that their game is of the highest possible standard, as in the current WoW dominated marketplace, only the best have the chance to succeed. To be fair, this is one of the more valid excuses reasons for delaying games, as it should the end user a better quality product, when it actually does make it to release.

Unlike the majority of MMORPGs that are springing up around Warcraft's success, Conan at least attempts to inject some originality into the tired hack, slash, level up formula by mixing single and multi player experiences into one game. This is done by daytime being an all out MMORPG, and night time, brought on by resting in an in, being a single player role playing experience. It will be interesting to see how this, a long with the apparently "revolutionary" fighting system works out, and whether it can manage to gain enough popularity to be sustainable.

Via GamesIndustry.biz