The Secret World

[Credo]

If it didn't crash on my computer at least once an hour I'd think about it, the beta was fun minus all the crashes I had. Also if EA didn't make it This could be the greatest game ever made and I still won't play it because EA had a hand in it.

[Amethyriel]

ribbit

just 3 more to go

[Laeris]

Laeris, for the record, you're the one who finally convinced me. Whatever's between you and funcom, it's poisoned you against them quite thoroughly. But the thing is... Not just thoroughly, but so thoroughly that you reinterpret everything according to it. It's not enough to say that they might not keep promises (which is probably true), you have to say that they will never do anything they say.

And yes, they've been in financial trouble for quite a while. Thing is, one of the things companies sometimes do when a business model is failing them is change their practices. Yes, really. A lot of the things you've said about what funcom does, or how they do it, has been contradicted by some of their recent actions. Yes, it could be an elaborate hoax, but frankly, the hoax would be more elaborate and expensive than just changing their practices and views.

It's a good game. Maybe it's not the best game. Maybe the developer has a bad history. But the fact is, it's a good game which offers some reasonable attempts at challenging standard MMO preconceptions, and I think it deserves a fair chance.

We'll see, I suppose, over the next couple of months.

Well, as the blogosphere has so aptly noted, Erling Ellison (Funcom's PR chief) stated to Massively that the funky animations people were making fun of and are one of the chief sources of complaint in their review would be redone before launch.

Launch is tomorrow and pre-launch for preorders has already begun and they haven't changed a single animation yet. Just sayin'. This is Funcom we're talking about Seebs. Not an actual MMO developer. They create "stuff" but they don't develop it. They just throw things out and let it rot while they work on their next MMO and cash in from box sales.

You're free to spend your money and time however you like. If you like TSW, then great, I hope you do because I don't wish for people to waste money needlessly. I just don't believe that you can make a dog change its bark. Funcom is a small company ran by bankers and financial planners (their CEO and board doesn't have a single video game developer on it). They run the company accordingly and are pretty daft when it comes to making good games because they don't care. They exist to market and sell boxes... not to make games people love and want to play.

[Laeris]

And Seebs, take a peek at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vi6qJxsejNI

Ignore the cliche video title and give it a look through. Note what he says about the core mechanics and such.

[Laeris]

And in case you were wondering, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzzMB...feature=relmfu is an earlier video from the same poster where he says he likes the game. The previous video is done at the end of his beta experience after he's gone through the tutorials and beginning quest areas. So, unlike me, he isn't biased.

[Amethyriel]

Well,

2 more to go

[the_real_seebs]

I tend to make a fair amount of allowance for MMO developers talking about what they'd like to do and then not being able to do it as-planned. Heck, the stylist in Rift was, I think, originally supposed to be in 1.2 or 1.3. And the armor-coloring bug has been reported "fixed" in patch notes at least twice.

I do see room for concern with lifetime subs, but I know people who got them in LotRO and are pretty happy with the stuff they're getting. And I certainly think Funcom's in a rough spot financially, so they have reason to try really hard to get money sooner rather than later, and hope they can grow after that. And they may fail; they may just not have the money to make it happen, for instance.

But I also note that a lot of the things they have a bad rep for are things they appear to be genuinely moving away from. And I think some of this comes down to Trion having been a really positive influence on the MMO industry, by showing that the scorched-earth approach to customer service was not the only one possible.

I have been overall pretty happy with their handling of stuff. Is the game as smooth as Rift was at launch? Not really. But it's smoother than CoH has ever been for me, and smoother than WoW was for me before WotLK, and I see a lot of things that I regard as evidence of good intent. I also appreciate a game that isn't trying for a T rating.

[Amethyriel]

I tend to make a fair amount of allowance for MMO developers talking about what they'd like to do and then not being able to do it as-planned. Heck, the stylist in Rift was, I think, originally supposed to be in 1.2 or 1.3. And the armor-coloring bug has been reported "fixed" in patch notes at least twice.

I do see room for concern with lifetime subs, but I know people who got them in LotRO and are pretty happy with the stuff they're getting. And I certainly think Funcom's in a rough spot financially, so they have reason to try really hard to get money sooner rather than later, and hope they can grow after that. And they may fail; they may just not have the money to make it happen, for instance.

But I also note that a lot of the things they have a bad rep for are things they appear to be genuinely moving away from. And I think some of this comes down to Trion having been a really positive influence on the MMO industry, by showing that the scorched-earth approach to customer service was not the only one possible.

I have been overall pretty happy with their handling of stuff. Is the game as smooth as Rift was at launch? Not really. But it's smoother than CoH has ever been for me, and smoother than WoW was for me before WotLK, and I see a lot of things that I regard as evidence of good intent. I also appreciate a game that isn't trying for a T rating.

still, tsw has a very niche feel to it. i'm wondering if it can outsell age of conan

[the_real_seebs]

still, tsw has a very niche feel to it. i'm wondering if it can outsell age of conan

I suspect not, but... From what I have seen so far, and the people I've talked to, I think it may have decent potential as a thing to keep people interested. If they never add content to it, I will still be far from done finding and trying things a year in, at the rate I seem to be going.

[Annalea]

So, after a beta weekend and the head start, I have to ask...

Are people in this thread saying the game is good just to troll Laeris?

I do like the general setting and premise of the game. The Ability Wheel is a pretty nice way of mixing and matching weapon combinations and I am a fan of homogenous class systems. Everything else is just... I honestly, truly cannot do it.

As far as Funcom itself goes, I just don't see any evidence of Funcom making any significant changes away from how they have been - both in customer support and game design.

To those who have bought the game and plan on playing it, I hope you enjoy! And I also hope that Funcom doesn't... well... pull a Funcom on you, as they did to me!

[Laeris]

So, after a beta weekend and the head start, I have to ask...

Are people in this thread saying the game is good just to troll Laeris?

I do like the general setting and premise of the game. The Ability Wheel is a pretty nice way of mixing and matching weapon combinations and I am a fan of homogenous class systems. Everything else is just... I honestly, truly cannot do it.

As far as Funcom itself goes, I just don't see any evidence of Funcom making any significant changes away from how they have been - both in customer support and game design.

To those who have bought the game and plan on playing it, I hope you enjoy! And I also hope that Funcom doesn't... well... pull a Funcom on you, as they did to me!

Eh, they're free to like what they like. It's just I've seen this all before. New MMOitis be it that it is... when you break it down, there's only 8 zones and 8 dungeons to explore with your mass-less hammer to swing and shoot cap guns that puff little white plumes of marlboro smoke when you pop the caps in zombies' faces from 4 inches away.

[Taptap]

I don't like EA at all, I'm neutral to slightly negative with liking Funcom. But I am playing and liking TSW. More now than when I played its 1st two weekend betas. I like that the factions are actually the same except for the lore. After a bunch of settings tweaking, that I couldn't do during the weekend betas, it runs fine for me on a 32bit system. No lag for me, no crashes, perhaps a slow memory leak though. I think I'll get tired of zombies, but mobs are mobs. I haven't tried the PvP yet but I like that PvP is instanced only and doesn't allow unwanted open world ganking while people are in a browser trying to solve a puzzle based on the real world (and I like puzzles), which is something that open world PvP really would break. However instanced PvP is faction based and gives open world faction buffs, and I expect that will cause issues in time even with 3 factions due to faction over population. I like the crafting system, a lot. I like that you can join another group on a different "home" server, you're not required to be on a specific server or group of servers (because all "servers" are on one physical server by design), you can play with friends who are on different servers.

So far, there's almost nothing that I don't like about TSW. Kind of like when I started Rift during its Headstart and when I played WoW, starting during The Burning Crusade, for years and partly into Cataclysm. I might not feel the same way as the game matures, it might go in directions that I don't find enjoyable. And maybe not.

There was a new Unreal game engine released this year, an old name but really a brand new beast, that promises to bring the cost and time of developing new games way down, and I do mean way down. Really way down. While drastically increasing performance and game design ease. There's going to be a lot of new games on the distant horizon. Which I'm looking forward to, as it will force a change in the status quo in the ways that companies have grown accustomed to practicing, and that's for sure. It will financially help bring back the independent game publishers like existed during the old days. Makes me think of the to big to fail book publishers, that did fail and now have almost no presence or have gone bankrupt.

[the_real_seebs]

So, after a beta weekend and the head start, I have to ask...

Are people in this thread saying the game is good just to troll Laeris?

I doubt it. I really enjoy the game. But... It's a radically different game from Rift, so it's easy for me to imagine someone who likes one but not the other.

I guess... every game is going to reward certain mode of play or ways of thinking about the game. If you approach a game from the wrong mode, it'll fit horribly. I try to figure out what the intended experience is, and play that way, before I form an opinion. There are a lot of things where the way I would normally play in Rift would be catastrophic in TSW, because TSW is intended for different play styles.

I really like the infiltration mission concept. It's hard for me, because I have SPECTACULARLY bad reflexes and timing. No, really; whatever you thought of, it's probably worse. In a game where you can jump or move, and hitting jump and move buttons simultaneously jumps in that direction, I have at best an 85-90% chance of jumping in a given direction if I try to, even with no stress and nothing happening. But I really like the idea and they are sorta fun. But they're totally unlike anything in Rift, and they're missions that impose a very different structure.

Compare CoH's basic model of gameplay (swarms of mooks against outnumbered but stronger heroes, 90% of the time) to Rift's, and think about what would happen if someone who was expecting CoH's model of play tried to play Rift. Or vice versa.

So I like it, but it's not at all the same thing as liking Rift. It's like trying to compare pancakes and hot dogs; I might like either, but they're different enough that it's not really comparable.

As far as Funcom itself goes, I just don't see any evidence of Funcom making any significant changes away from how they have been - both in customer support and game design.

I've seen funcom reps outright apologize for errors and express intent to fix them, which is new. And a friend petitioned with a question about how something worked, and got a GM who spent two hours messing with it trying to figure it out and determine whether it was a bug, and if so what exactly the bug was. So there are definitely some changes. Whether those changes will last, well, we'll see.

[the_real_seebs]

Eh, they're free to like what they like. It's just I've seen this all before.

Huh.

I have to say, this is the first MMO I've played in which the skill system let a single character learn all the skills and switch sets at will, and where there were quests which by design involved finding information on web sites outside the game (and quite likely unrelated to the game).

[Annalea]

I doubt it. I really enjoy the game. But... It's a radically different game from Rift, so it's easy for me to imagine someone who likes one but not the other.

Oh, no it's not that I'm trying to compare it to Rift - I'm fairly open-minded when it comes to games! It's a rare thing that I'll actually try to compare two games together, unless they're so similar that they may as well be an iteration.

Now, like I said, The Secret World has a fun premise and has some good ideas. I do like the idea of the cinematic mission briefings, I like the idea of the ability wheel. I like the modern setting. The investigation missions and such - all good ideas.

Where I feel it falls down is in the execution:

• Their take on a modern setting is bland - but, as someone pointed out to me, there's probably only so much you can do! I think of other modern-setting games that I did enjoy the atmosphere of, such as STALKER and DayZ (mod that it might be). The trick is, what these games have done for atmosphere is likely not to translate quite so well in an MMO. The tension is likely broken as soon as you see a harmless newbie bouncing down the street. However, I still think there are ways to make the world feel alive that I just don't get with The Secret World. In many ways, I felt Age of Conan suffered from the same problem (despite beautiful visuals).
  
• The cinematic dialogues are... well, they just leave you wondering. I linked a good example earlier in the thread - sending that out to people unfamiliar with the game they could not tell me what you're supposed to do or, more importantly, why you're doing it! This tends to be a recurring theme (for example, the Illuminati intro). The game, to me, feels as though it lacks direction and logical flow. This probably won't be too big of a deal for most people, but it is jarring for me.
  
• Abilities. My first impression is that I just don't like them and it seems like there's a mix of stuff that doesn't make sense or tries to be Mathematically complex (but not gameplay-wise; I'll touch on that in a second) for the sake of it. But, without really unlocking enough of the abilities, I don't think I can fairly give it an in-depth analysis of how it ultimately works in the end.
  
• I mentioned gameplay complexity above and should make sure to get that covered here. Despite throwing weird mechanics in their abilities... the combat itself is simplistic. No matter what you use, you're using the exact same resource building mechanic. You're going to push 1, 1, 1, 1, 1... and then one or two finishers.
  
• A side step from the above: healing. After a mission, you'll end up choosing three kits of gear: tanky stuff, damaging stuff or healing stuff. A character with 2,400 HP has the biggest heal of about 140 HP. Overall, they basically have taken the AoC style of healing which, to be honest, wasn't much fun from a healing perspective. Except you don't get the fun cone-style HoT.
  
• Ultimately, I think their implementation of the Ability Wheel is not terribly well done. Logically, it just... has some decisions that don't make sense. The Assault Rifle, for example. You get a buider that fires three shots for 25 damage each. Then a passive to add a shot (for 100 damage total). A finisher and a passive for the finisher. And then you get another builder... for 70 damage. Everyone is likely familiar with how there will be useless abilities and bizarre progressions at times. The ability wheel, while a cool idea, doesn't actually address that. Again, an execution issue.
  
• The final point I think I'll get to here is the animations and spell effects. First of all, I'd first show people what I think is good for animations, trying to give proper feedback and gravitas to heavy weapons: here. Then I'll direct you to an example from Secret World: here. Right, now you'll notice that the Secret World sound effects are out of sync with the weapon. There's no feedback and there's no sense of effort being put behind the axe (with hammer animation) swing. The worst part is that the spell effects are 2D images. This can work well in some situations, to be sure. But do you -really- want your character with one leg in a protective bubble? It just doesn't look good. And those sound effects would drive me nuts.

I've seen funcom reps outright apologize for errors and express intent to fix them, which is new. And a friend petitioned with a question about how something worked, and got a GM who spent two hours messing with it trying to figure it out and determine whether it was a bug, and if so what exactly the bug was. So there are definitely some changes. Whether those changes will last, well, we'll see.

They can make apologies as much as they like! I'm not a prideful person that demands apologies at every sleight. If there's something to be fixed, it just needs to be... well... fixed!