The first online community of Age of Conan was set around various fan websites since this game launched in 2003 with an unknown and debated future. However it was a website without any official announcement. It played a polymerized role till February 2005 Funcom and Conan Properties LLC jointly confirmed the in-development status of Age of Conan in an official press release on April 20, 2005.
On January 24, 2006, Funcom opened the community of Age of Conan. Since then, other former communities gathered around this official one and IRC chat of the official Age of Conan website. There were informal events such as IRC chats with the developers and, in summer 2006, community contests.
In April 2006, Funcom created a Guild Hall for its pre-launch community and, within hours, forum members began organizing their "player guilds." These guilds consist of individuals who typically share the same playing styles and gameplay opinions. In January 2007, several important updates were announced regarding class merges and the expected launch window for the game. On January 12th, Funcom announced the original twenty-three classes had been merged down to fourteen classes due to beta feedback.
On February 7, 2008, it was reported that more than 500,000 people played AOC in the world. On May 19, 2008, GameZone.com published a series of tales of Age of Conan which was coorperated and permitted by Funcom. The tales deal with the world, the characters and the lore involved in Hyboria.
On August 16, 2008, Arminius AS, sold 400,000 shares in Funcom N.V. at NOK 17.2824 per share. Arminius AS, is wholly owned by Mr. Trond Aas, the CEO and Managing Director of Funcom N.V. Arminius AS sells the shares in Funcom primarily to cover Mr. Aas’ acquisition costs of the shares as well as accumulated wealth tax costs of the past six years as a result of the holdings in Funcom. Mr. Aas and Arminius AS have over the course of those 6 years not sold any shares in the Company. The sale represents 18.7% of his outstanding shares and exercisable options.
After a long development, Age of Conan community has progressed into a mature and abundant resource that provides all kinds of information about the game and platform for players to communicate with each others. Funcom announces that he will keep better this community in the near future.