New Secret World Vid

[FrithRae]

also found this little blurb quoted from a dev post ont he forums or something like that..

Funcom has taken the wraps off its business model for The Secret World, and the upcoming horror-conspiracy MMORPG will ship with a traditional subscription model. That's not all, though. In a post on the official forums, community manager Oliver "Tarib" Kunz says that the game will also feature microtransactions and a cash shop.

The blurb mentions Funcom's desire to steer clear of "pay-to-win" scenarios by limiting the item store to clothing and convenience items. "Character power in The Secret World will be determined by how well you play the game, not how much money you are willing to put into it," Kunz writes.

Yea..we'll see.

[Deth]

Well it is a ARG and we have made the first advances in the search it seems.

[FrithRae]

ARG?

[Deth]

Alternate reality game. Once the timer blew up on the webpage Tweets from in-game characters started appearing giving hints that it was not truly technical issues..... well to some and we kept thinking we were chasing a red herring at first. But the hints kept coming and things where changing with the web page. Earlier tonight we finally got our very first confirmation that it was an ARG. They have done 5 or 6 or more of them. This one has been fun and I wish I had followed more on the others. There is another going on where they mailed people on the forum puzzle pieces and other clues.

[FrithRae]

well..I aint signing up for no damn tweets or any FB crap or whatever to keep "updated".

That type of spam pisses me off lol. Just obnoxious! If they require that for any of the beta signups, oh well I just have to miss it.

I aint going to go begin or banging on anyones door for the "privelge" of beta testing their stuff . If they cant keep me updated with just regular emails, oh well. guesss I miss out..lol.

I'll check the website from time to time but..yea..lol.

[FrithRae]

*casts resurrect*

*its supereffective*


All this just got sent to my email - intersting what they are trying to do (though I notice with the first article - not every character of course has the 500 skill option; depending on yoru faction you have 140 skill options..)

Sounds like they are doing what Spellborn was attempting to do with building skill decks.

The words of course make this sound like some huge independent system; but clearly with "names" for skill decks..its not goign to work that way *chuckles*. Course, for it to be REALLY a huge independent system...I thnk that's a much bigger bite than anyone could successfully pull off.

Intro explanation of deck system:
www.gamesradar.com/exclusive-secret-world-introducing-deck-system/

Examples of basically, "class" deck systems (though supposedly with independent vareity available for all!)
www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/404/feature/6082/The-Secret-World-Deck-Templates.html

Good luck to them - somehow I don't see them getting away from what basically will come down to actual "classes" all that much.

[Deth]

From what I understand the deck system is optional. It is basically here a pre-build deck, BUT if you feel up to it, here are all the cards, build your own deck.

You could think of it like Magic the Gathering. They sale pre-built decks for you to get the hang of the system but once your hooked then you can buy boosters to build you own decks. This is the same thing. Here is a starter deck/"class" to see how the system works. These skills will work together well, when your ready to remove the training wheels you can move on to build your own deck.

Should be interesting to see how many of the 500 skills are the same skill with just a different faction name. I imagine there will be some cross over but I do hope some skills at least feel different from the others.

Also have you see n the Easter Egg found for the main site? Go to www.funcom.com/ click anywhere that is not a link then type 33.

[woooooooo]

Mines of Moria

[FrithRae]

...I have no idea what that means..other than its LOTR.

[Deth]

I take it he means the easter egg looks like the Mines. There is, as usual, a big dissection of the image going on over on the forums.

[FrithRae]

oooh ok I hadnt looked at the easter egg yet...ha!

[Algenon]

As Deth said, I also got the impression the deck system was optional.

You shouldn't underestimate what Funcom is capable of, despite its obvious screw ups in the past. The crafting system in the original Anarchy Online, for example, was extensive and fascinating. Unfortunately the game got rather taken over by PvPers who seemed to pretty much dictate the direction the game went in.

[FrithRae]

I dont thnik its optional as in "you can pick a class or a deck"...

I think its optional as the interviews kinda went into - there are "easy" build-combos and they are more complicated ones. If you want you can go for the "easy-standard-class-type-decks" and just go into those 14 or 21 or whatever skills and never do anything else.

But I do think you *have* to build a deck one skill at a time and you *have* to plug them into a deck to have them activate/use/work/whatever.

I'm sure by day one there will be templates for the "standard type class-easy decks" that tell you exactly where and when and how to get the 14 or whatever abilities you are looking for if you don't want to go any further than that. (Hell the article already lists several)

There are 140 skills per faction, so it also implies you do have the option of finding/gaining every one of the 140 and doing something totally different with your deck if you like.

It does not promise (nor do I believe) that every combo of those 70 passive and 70 active skills will be viable or even useful heh.

You shouldn't underestimate what Funcom is capable of, despite its obvious screw ups in the past.

I won't overestimate either; nor would I believe any current dev company who claims that they would be able to take over 500 skills and make every possible combination balanced, useful, and efficient for whatever job you wanted to do. I have no doubt there will be repeats, pointless skills, fluff skills, skills that you never use together, etc - and that the actual "choice" will be far more along the lines of what we normally expect (very little) in an MMO in general.

"The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior."

I'm more hoping the entire theme part will be well done than the reliability of a skill-deck mechanic .

[FrithRae]

Ok wont be linking them all here but if you go to the main Secret World site - they have just complete a huge Press Review weekend or something and all that stuff is out.

There are like 8 seperate interviews you can reaad through most of htem all addressing different aspects of the game and its development/future plans.

There are another 7-8 preview weekend videos of gameplay and discussion as well.

LOTS of good infromatin in those interviews and the the play sessions of stuff I had not read before about what they are doing and and how the mechanics will implement it all (and the Stephen King influenced mad writer at a lighthouse in Maine...) *awesome*

Again - everytihng they talk about, if done well - is really setting a high bar. They have undertaken some huge ideas (imo) that if they pull off will make for a great game and interesting innovations to the genre.

Its Funcom so I have highdoubts they are going to pull it off - but hey even if they only touch the surface that doesnt mean the ideas wont get picked up by the next dev group and improved upon (right?!).

The genre and the story on how they are doing this game I have really been looking forward to - a definite change off the "pure high fantasy and/or spaceships" of the rest of the genre so Iim just hoping that THAT PART will be pulled off.

Oh, and incase like me you had no idea, new release date is now june of 2012. I expect MoP to be coming out no earlier than July (though I expect no later than Sept.) so should be interesting to see how those numbers pan out.

I keep trying hard not to get exicted about this game but after reading all those interviews I find myself getting amped...DOH! LOL

[Deth]

Here is a really good read on character progression. thesecretworld.com/news/blog_lead_designer_martin_bruusgaard_explains_character_development Having read through that I am looking forward to the game even more and I hope they can live up to all of this.