Funcom reveals 'The Secret World'

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Sun Jun 30, 2013 8:02 pm

Jag wrote:$10 on Amazon now. Worth it? Anyone playing?

It's one of my favorite gaming experiences in recent memory. It ain't perfect, but I still manage to get in 5 hours per week or so.

For $10, even as a single-player experience, it might be the best bang-for-buck videogame deal out there.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Sun Jun 30, 2013 9:23 pm

triggercut wrote:
Jag wrote:$10 on Amazon now. Worth it? Anyone playing?
It's one of my favorite gaming experiences in recent memory. It ain't perfect, but I still manage to get in 5 hours per week or so.

For $10, even as a single-player experience, it might be the best bang-for-buck videogame deal out there.

Does the lack of a monthly fee mean a lot of prompts for pumping money in?

tapatalk4in'

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sun Jun 30, 2013 10:10 pm

Ive not read this thread in ages and I haven't tried the game since I was in beta. I hated it. But Im in the mood to add a new MMO to my rooster and want something different. I think this game was different enough.

So if I want to play is it going to cost me real money somewhere?

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Sun Jun 30, 2013 10:12 pm

Pyperkub wrote:
triggercut wrote:
Jag wrote:$10 on Amazon now. Worth it? Anyone playing?
It's one of my favorite gaming experiences in recent memory. It ain't perfect, but I still manage to get in 5 hours per week or so.

For $10, even as a single-player experience, it might be the best bang-for-buck videogame deal out there.
Does the lack of a monthly fee mean a lot of prompts for pumping money in?

tapatalk4in'

No, actually. That's one of the amazing things about it.

This isn't an FTP model like LOTRO. You buy the game you get *everything*, which is at least 100+ hours of completely solo-able content. If you want cosmetic stuff like custom outfits or artificial xp boosts, you can buy those with real money if you like in the store, but they're hardly necessary. You can get all sorts of cool outfits just by completing quests and the like.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Sun Jun 30, 2013 10:21 pm

What you get for your $10:

The entire full game, as released.
The first four content updates.
I think they stake you with some funcom spacebucks, too to whet your appetite.

Re-investing real money the game is totally unnecessary. There are some cool outfits in the shop, but you can get all sorts of cool outfits through XP and finishing various quests, too.

The game has 6 content updates since release. You get the first four when you plunk down your ten bucks. You can buy the other two. Content update 7 is on the way some time this summer.

I restarted the game with a new toon last month. She's just out of the first starter area, but I'd be happy to meet up with OO folks for questing and stuff. The game absolutely does NOT require, or even sometimes lend itself to groups, but they are necessary to do "dungeons" at the end of each area. Those are fun, and are obvious places to get good loot.

Otherwise though, it's just good to have folks you know playing the game that you can chat with on the cool and creepy stuff you see and do in the game in a chat channel.

jnecros · Post by **jnecros** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 7:40 am

I'm in for ten bucks, will not be playing that much in the short-term however, as I will have a new son any day now. However, I've started an auto rifle character, and so far it is pretty fun.

Not crazy about the voice acting, I am always amazed at games that go through all the effort to write, script and animate voice overs, but fail to hire quality and enthusiastic actors..at any rate, I started on the standard server, forget its name now, but whatever came up on the top of the list for East Coast North America.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 8:43 am

jnecros wrote:I'm in for ten bucks, will not be playing that much in the short-term however, as I will have a new son any day now. However, I've started an auto rifle character, and so far it is pretty fun.

Not crazy about the voice acting, I am always amazed at games that go through all the effort to write, script and animate voice overs, but fail to hire quality and enthusiastic actors..at any rate, I started on the standard server, forget its name now, but whatever came up on the top of the list for East Coast North America.

No offense, but you're out of your damn mind.

The Secret World may have some knocks against it, but the one thing it has going for it is some of the very best voice acting work ever recorded for a video game, ever.

coopasonic · Post by **coopasonic** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 9:02 am

As I do with all games I floated away from this one, but I agree with trig that there is no need to spend money in the game and it is very solo friendly. I never got to the end, or hell even away from the first island (first 3 or 4 areas are the same theme/story and I think that drags on a bit longer than needed). It's a fun game and it's not WoW.

Jag · Post by **Jag** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 9:10 am

Boughted. Going to try to fire it up tonight. Any starting tips?

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 9:50 am

Jag wrote:Boughted. Going to try to fire it up tonight. Any starting tips?

Absolutely! Lemme edit this dadgum article or three....

First tip: start downloading now! It's a 40 gig download!

jnecros · Post by **jnecros** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:26 am

Well..not for nothing, but this has fair voice acting..compared to games I've played recently, Saint's Row, Borderlands, Far Cry, Skyrim, Fallout, Xcom, just to name a few

Sepiche · Post by **Sepiche** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:10 am

Jag wrote:Any starting tips?

Don't trust anyone with more than two tentacles.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:14 am

jnecros wrote:Well..not for nothing, but this has fair voice acting..compared to games I've played recently, Saint's Row, Borderlands, Far Cry, Skyrim, Fallout, Xcom, just to name a few

Uh, yeah, I'm familiar with all of those games. You shouldn't even bring up the voice acting in a Bethesda game. It's fine for what it is, but c'mon.

I'll let others decide. Here's a very brief, pretty un-spoilery cutscene from early in the game that occurs if you go as the Illuminati. You meet your handler, Miss Geary, who happens to be one hilariously crazy ex-Valley Girl. She's an awesome character, fully-realized, with excellent dialogue and a great delivery by whomever the actress here was: (Language NSFW)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meY9LfAO1J0" target="_blank

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:23 am

Another quick fave from the Illuminati side, good ol' Dr. Zurn:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_riIB5Ly-E" target="_blank

(Again, language NSFW)

jnecros · Post by **jnecros** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:03 pm

Aside from the voice acting, which some people might think is good (I'm sure you can cherry-pick an actor or two that reads their lines with more vigor than a bored housewife, which is the standard from what I've seen so far in game)...I am finding the animation to be god awful and the sounds are very poor, which makes combat pretty ugly overall.

Character creation is very limited compared to some MMOs, but perhaps more in-depth than LOTRO and WOW.

On the bright side, however, I really enjoy the no level system (which is virtually worth the retail price in itself) and the diversity of skills, and the story is excellent. This coupled with how many hours you get out of the game, for what I understand 100+, and that you can solo most of the content, and I have yet to run into any asshats in the 10 hours I have in it, makes for a steal at $10.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:18 pm

jnecros wrote:Aside from the voice acting, which some people might think is good (I'm sure you can cherry-pick an actor or two that reads their lines with more vigor than a bored housewife, .

Actually, I picked two from the first hour of a game that players can easily spend 150-200 hours doing unique content and hearing unique voice work in. I deliberately chose those two because they're non-spoilery. Rest-assured that in the first area--Kingsmouth--you encounter plenty of voice acting and brilliantly written dialogue. In fact, one NPC--Madame Roget--might be one of my favorite NPCs in any videogame.

If you haven't gotten that far, you're simply not qualified to judge. Sorry, but that's how it goes.

The great thing is, as wonderful as the story, setting, and atmosphere in Kingsmouth is, it actually gets BETTER when you get to the second area, the Savage Coast. No spoilers, but I just got my new toon to the SC, and can't wait to re-experience all that content again, fresh and new. I also loved the third area, and even Egypt (which some players don't care for as much) worked well for me.

Jag · Post by **Jag** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:30 pm

Read up on the factions. Probably go Templar. Should I use a starting Deck? Which one? What are good abilities to go with? Figure maybe a damage and healing?

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:35 pm

I was Illuminati in the beta. they were bat shit insane.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:49 pm

Jag wrote:Read up on the factions. Probably go Templar. Should I use a starting Deck? Which one? What are good abilities to go with? Figure maybe a damage and healing?

Great questions.

First off, except for PVP it really doesn't matter which faction you choose. Each faction has its own faction-specific set of periodic quests, but that and PVP and decks and outfits are the only things that separate the factions. You can chat and talk to anyone playing on any world in any faction. Which is nice.

My strategy is to kind of concurrently build two builds for each character.

You'll want to invest your early AP and SP into leveling builds (which are usually called "survival builds" by the TSW community). Those are your solo content builds. They're great to use. What you need to have here is:

1. Damage output
2. A means to survive or heal yourself
3. A means to deal with groups (which usually means area attacks more than it means crowd control stuff.)

If you're interested in doing dungeons at the end of areas and raids at the endgame, though, you'll also want to do some side work on a focused role--damage, tanking, or healing, usually. Survival builds usually don't do enough damage to be DPS in dungeons, don't do enough group healing to be heal builds, and might be suitable for tank builds, but only with damage support and heal support, and only with a way to keep targets interested in you.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 5:51 pm

I've found the starter decks and even later decks to be neat for the outfits, but there might be better builds than those in game.

I use this as a resource:

http://wordpress.tswguides.com/category ... -first-60/" target="_blank

Check out the "My First 60" section. That's essentially spending your first 60 points wisely to help you handle the content and not get frustrated.

Jag · Post by **Jag** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 6:15 pm

triggercut wrote:I've found the starter decks and even later decks to be neat for the outfits, but there might be better builds than those in game.

I use this as a resource:

http://wordpress.tswguides.com/category ... -first-60/" target="_blank

Check out the "My First 60" section. That's essentially spending your first 60 points wisely to help you handle the content and not get frustrated.

Awesome. Thanks.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 9:35 pm

Ha I talk about the game and they send me an email. They also sent me a code for the game. I bet it's only for those days though and I cant play after that unless I pay for it. At least I get to see how it's changed...if any.

We are excited to invite you to celebrate the one year anniversary of The Secret World! Starting on Wednesday the 3rd of July at 12:00 CET / 6 AM EST and lasting until the 8th of July at 12:00 CET / 6 AM EST you can enjoy the following:

THE GUARDIANS OF GAIA

Gather your friends and take on huge monsters that are appearing all across the lands. Defeat them for sweet rewards! Everyone can join these epic fights!

30% DISCOUNT TO THE ITEM STORE

Everything except Membership and Packs is available at 30% discount to everyone!

MASSIVE BONUSES

You will get to enjoy one exclusive bonus every day throughout the celebration, such as Double XP, Double Ability Point and Double Skill Points!

GIFTS

Everyone who logs during the celebration can claim a free flare gun! All Members and Grandmasters also get a unique t-shirt with the number 1 on it.

We would love for you to join the celebrations, so this week we invite you to play without having to buy the client! See for yourself how much The Secret World has grown over the last 12 months. Go to http://register.thesecretworld.com" target="_blank to register your account with the key below, no strings attached!

If you choose to later upgrade to the full game, keep in mind that subscription is no longer required to play the game!

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:10 pm

Daehawk wrote:Ha I talk about the game and they send me an email. They also sent me a code for the game. I bet it's only for those days though and I cant play after that unless I pay for it. At least I get to see how it's changed...if any.

You do realize that Funcom isn't a non-profit, right?

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:14 pm

Dunno if anyone is interested, but let's try:

If you're available to play Wednesday or Friday or any other day on through that weekend (I'm assuming Thursday is probably out for most folks; it will be for me for a good while) let's try to hook up with our lowbie characters to quest our way through Kingsmouth, maybe do that lowbie dungeon (which has some nice gear) and get well into the Savage Coast. Make a new toon. If it's been a while, you'll notice that there are new quests that have been added to Kingsmouth, and all sorts of other goodies.

Anyone interested?

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:21 pm

I see EA published this for Funcom, but there's no mention of an Origin account requirement. Is it just a Funcom account that's needed?

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:30 pm

Pyperkub wrote:I see EA published this for Funcom, but there's no mention of an Origin account requirement. Is it just a Funcom account that's needed?

Yeah, EA pretty much walked away from this last fall.

jnecros · Post by **jnecros** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:38 pm

triggercut wrote:
jnecros wrote:
If you haven't gotten that far, you're simply not qualified to judge. Sorry, but that's how it goes.
.

Sure, invalidate my opinion because you don't agree, this is how the Internet functions isn't it?

I mean..did you, and your family do the voice acting? Is this a personal attack on you if I consider it to be rubbish? Seems like it...

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:45 pm

jnecros wrote:
triggercut wrote:
jnecros wrote:
If you haven't gotten that far, you're simply not qualified to judge. Sorry, but that's how it goes.
.
Sure, invalidate my opinion because you don't agree, this is how the Internet functions isn't it?

I mean..did you, and your family do the voice acting? Is this a personal attack on you if I consider it to be rubbish? Seems like it...

Someone needs a nap!

EDIT: FWIW, having difficulties in critical thinking doesn't make you a bad person, jnecros. There are plenty of valid reasons for folks to take TSW to task, and plenty of valid reasons why the game doesn't work for folks. There are some very clunky things happening in the game.

One of those things isn't the voice acting. That's ok, though. The world needs philistines too!

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:56 pm

triggercut wrote:
Pyperkub wrote:I see EA published this for Funcom, but there's no mention of an Origin account requirement. Is it just a Funcom account that's needed?
Yeah, EA pretty much walked away from this last fall.

good - EA has a habit of doing that and killing game servers at the same time. Still debating... (while I sit at work waiting for a SAN to spin up...).

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 10:59 pm

Pyperkub wrote:
triggercut wrote:
Pyperkub wrote:I see EA published this for Funcom, but there's no mention of an Origin account requirement. Is it just a Funcom account that's needed?
Yeah, EA pretty much walked away from this last fall.
good - EA has a habit of doing that and killing game servers at the same time. Still debating... (while I sit at work waiting for a SAN to spin up...).

The nice thing here is that it's sort of un-servery. Servers only matter in PVP, but from everything I've been told, PVP is just a mess anyway. (I can't speak to it, I haven't done PVP in the game since late last summer).

Factions only matter in PVP and in the faction-only quest line thingies.

naednek · Post by **naednek** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:13 pm

purchased and downloading....

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:35 pm

You do realize that Funcom isn't a non-profit, right?

Oh yes I fully understand this but when a game as great as RIFT can be totally free to play I don't see why others cannot.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:36 pm

Yeah, I'm actually just now downloading the latest patch, which is fairly big.

We should try to set up a chat channel for folks here to be in (everyone's welcome, regardless of your stance on the voice acting in the game!).

I think the Quarter To Three channel is still up at #qt3 in-game. The only folks who used it were people who cross post here and there anyway, like strummer.

/chat join qt3 I think gets you in channel.

/chat list qt3 tells you who's in the channel.

The toon I'm playing is the foxy Illuminati agent Triggercutt.

Teggy · Post by **Teggy** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:37 pm

triggercut wrote:Dunno if anyone is interested, but let's try:

If you're available to play Wednesday or Friday or any other day on through that weekend (I'm assuming Thursday is probably out for most folks; it will be for me for a good while) let's try to hook up with our lowbie characters to quest our way through Kingsmouth, maybe do that lowbie dungeon (which has some nice gear) and get well into the Savage Coast. Make a new toon. If it's been a while, you'll notice that there are new quests that have been added to Kingsmouth, and all sorts of other goodies.

Anyone interested?

I'd probably be up for it. I have one character a tiny way into kingsmouth but was having trouble soloing with a rifle, so I have another character that I was going to go melee with that just needs to pick a weapon.

One thing I find a little less than optimal with the game is performance. Even with 2x 660 Tis I find I have to turn the graphics down quite a bit.

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Mon Jul 01, 2013 11:38 pm

Daehawk wrote:
You do realize that Funcom isn't a non-profit, right?
Oh yes I fully understand this but when a game as great as RIFT can be totally free to play I don't see why others cannot.

Rift has more prompts to buy stuff, though too (although I was happy to see that it was fairly unobtrusive), as well as gimping your bag slots and stuff.

TSW doesn't.

It's a tradeoff I guess. Suppose they've gotta monetize somehow.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Tue Jul 02, 2013 2:13 am

Save vs Will... Fail. Downloading...

triggercut · Post by **triggercut** » Tue Jul 02, 2013 3:02 am

Some stuff the game doesn't explain real well:

1. You can keep clicking on dialogue choices with NPCs to get more spoken word flavor text. Sometimes that text isn't worth it. Sometimes, though, it's sublime in very droll ways. Also, there's backstory hidden in there. Keep clicking dialogue choices until you exhaust them.

2. Similarly, it's tempting to do the MMO thing of gobbling up content as fast as you can here. That's fine...but you'll lose some of the charm and atmosphere of the game that way. The guys behind TSW are the guys behind some of the best adventure games of the last 20 years. They know dialogue, story, and pacing. Take the time to smell the roses, read the lore, click the dialogue choices and sit through the cutscenes. It's worth it.

3. Turn off General Chat (or get out of that channel) right away. Spoilers abound, as does immersion-breaking goofballery.

4. The quest system can take some getting used to. You don't collect them like in other MMO's. Instead, you can carry 1 zone story quest (that's the one in cyan blue; it's basically the over-arching story for the big zone you're in), 1 big quest (sabotage, investigation, or standard mission) and then up to 3 "item quests", which are the smaller side quests you get from found objects and places.

Tao · Post by **Tao** » Tue Jul 02, 2013 3:51 am

Figured what the hell for 10 bucks. Used the official site to download the client, which is now downloading the game. Client says it's a 15.9GB download which is going to take somewhere between 70 and 96 hours to download

I know estimated download times are often misleading or vary widely during the download but I've been keeping an eye on it and it's staying pretty steady over the 70 hour mark so far. I will give it till the morning to sort itself out but I'm not spending days trying to download one game.

Pyperkub · Post by **Pyperkub** » Tue Jul 02, 2013 4:04 am

Tao wrote:Figured what the hell for 10 bucks. Used the official site to download the client, which is now downloading the game. Client says it's a 15.9GB download which is going to take somewhere between 70 and 96 hours to download I know estimated download times are often misleading or vary widely during the download but I've been keeping an eye on it and it's staying pretty steady over the 70 hour mark so far. I will give it till the morning to sort itself out but I'm not spending days trying to download one game.

Notice that the overall count appears to be about 48GB at the base of the download (despite the 16GB print - which may be just the database update). Mine's still running after a couple of hours (cable). That overall count is probably the best gauge of how far you are.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Tue Jul 02, 2013 5:09 am

Took it's loader about 40 min to download for me...or around there. Was playing BL2 while it did it's thing.