Funcom has let us in on some of the big changes it has planned for Age of Conan this year.

Top of its list is the consequence-focused overhaul to player-versus-player battles. This "to the death" update will come later this month, and adds the "fugitive" system where the more you kill lower-level players, the easier it becomes to murder you in return.

That's just the tip of the killing-each-other iceberg, mind you, with an enormous "kingship" patch scheduled for later in the year. Here guilds can band together and form alliances, which can then go on to build castles, and even fancy culture-specific wonders.

These wonders are linked to higher powers; it all sounds very much like Dark Age of Camelot's relics that players fought to control. Funcom is also hard at work expanding the existing player-made villages, with promises of more computer-controlled characters to dot around the place and sell things, or just talk to.