Dark Days Are Coming - New Funcom Project

[HaemishM]

This one is pretty blah gameplay wise.

[Draegan]

I would wait a month or so. 

[Furiously]

It will go f2p.

[Engels]

My biggest issue thus far has been the game's atmosphere. You can't do hidden societies and conspiracy governments when absolutely everything in the environment is about those societies. There's zero sense of secrecy or anything remotely mysterious going on. You're joining the elves/dwarves/gnomes with spells and/or machine guns and killing monsters that somehow have waltzed into the world and NOONE KNOWS ABOUT IT. Cept, of course, you know, that wouldn't be even remotely possible. In other words, immersion is out the window from the first time you step into the newbie zone.

[Draegan]

I was never able to grasp how you have a mystery game that based purely on DIKU combat.  This game would be better served in a EVE style system where you are LARPing 99% of the time, and fighting 1% of the time.

[Mrbloodworth]

The Secret World Livestream - Part 1 - Faction intros, character creation, ponchos

The Secret World Livestream - Part 2 - Sockpuppets, Slime and Shotguns

[TripleDES]

Funcom is a publically-traded company, there's not a lot of comparison to be made between them and an indie studio in this sort of thing.

In what way? Sitting on the cash doesn't help any of the shareholders. Launch is only a month away, anyway, and this will probably roll in enough cash to make up for the development costs.

[Ingmar]

Funcom is a publically-traded company, there's not a lot of comparison to be made between them and an indie studio in this sort of thing.

In what way? Sitting on the cash doesn't help any of the shareholders. Launch is only a month away, anyway, and this will probably roll in enough cash to make up for the development costs.

Companies have to maintain enough cash on hand for a variety of reasons; the biggest one is probably just that cash on hand represents your ability to deal with emergency circumstances, like a global credit crisis or a game launch that fails. Low cash reserves can make it harder to get operating loans, makes it so you can't make acquisitions or big technology investments that would otherwise make sense. It is a sign of low liquidity which means a company is walking a tightrope without a net risk-wise. All this stuff can drive investors away.

Sitting on TOO much cash can be bad, sure, because you're wasting potential. 12 million for a company with nearly 300 employees in an expensive country is not too much cash; it is dangerously low.  I work for a company of similar size and there was a lot of wringing of hands going on when we got down to 50 million on hand, I think if we ever got down to 12 we'd already be on our way to liquidating everything. If TSW does well, they're probably OK, and I assume that's what they're betting on.

Granted I don't know that much about how Norway does things; maybe there is some giant safety net for local companies that they can fall into if it tanks.

[tmp]

The Secret World Livestream - Part 1 - Faction intros, character creation, ponchos

The Secret World Livestream - Part 2 - Sockpuppets, Slime and Shotguns

Part 3 is up now as well - The Secret World Livestream - Part 3 - Health and Safety Concerns

[Daeven]

This one is pretty blah gameplay wise.

Right. More Max Payne 3 and Diablo 3 then.

Hmm. Maybe this can be the 'Year I only buy games with 3 in the title'.

[Riggswolfe]

This one is pretty blah gameplay wise.

Right. More Max Payne 3 and Diablo 3 then.

Hmm. Maybe this can be the 'Year I only buy games with 3 in the title'.

I think it's still worth a look. They nailed the setting and the atmosphere and while the "mechanics" of gameplay have some issues (some of which I hear the latest patch in CB helped with) the skill system is fascinating and has tons of possibilities though I suspect is a balancing nightmare. Websites give away keys for beta weekends all the time, try to snag one and give it a try.

[Kageru]

Setting and atmosphere rely on high quality content which is rapidly consumed.

Given release is imminent have people been able to see the higher level content and estimate its depth and re-playability or are we looking at the possibility of another Tortage?

[trias_e]

To be honest I don't really get the complaints about combat.  I thought the gameplay was better than Rift's, but I think I may be in the minority here.

[tmp]

For these still interested Livestream, part 4

edit: goddammit, having watched about half of it i'm pretty tempted to close the video to avoid further spoilers and buy the damn thing, to see if i can solve these puzzles in the game on my own.

[Falconeer]

It might still be Tortage, but would comparable to about 80 levels of it instead of 20. Yes, I heard and read a lot about the other 7 zones after Kingsmouth, and seems like the content keeps being good. It's still a "finished" amount though, so when you are done with it, given the nature of the game... you are done. But it's a lot lot more than Tortage.

EDIT: Mind, not all quests are puzzles.

[Ingmar]

EDIT: Mind, not all quests are puzzles.

That's a good thing, since nothing has less replay value than puzzles.

[Riggswolfe]

I have heard there are something like 10-20 puzzle quests total in the game. The other types of quests far out number them I'm guessing because they are a lot more effort.

I have also read on another forum that I go to that there is content all the way through and that in fact, some of the later zones are better than the early zones. I seem to remember reading that this time instead of working on a zone at a time they had teams assigned to each zone and made them more or less simultaneously.

[Surlyboi]

Also, keep in mind that a lot of those puzzle quests are long, multi-stage affairs, so the small number of them doesn't reflect how much content they actually represent.

[Falconeer]

I have a key if anyone is interested. PM me.

Gone.

[palmer_eldritch]

I too have a key if anyone wants to DM me. Gone

[Xuri]

I have four keys. Requirement to get one: Pretend to be my friend. :P

[Draegan]

Get keys here: http://www.alienwarearena.com/giveaway/the-secret-world-closed-beta-giveaway/

[HaemishM]

I finally got in to play it a little more. It's definitely been improved. The models are better, the combat animations are better. Instead of doing the same thing over again, I made a blade/chaos magic Dragon character, and it feels a bit more responsive. It still feels like most of my abilities are in a rotation - one rotation against single targets and one against multiple targets. It's better, but I'm still not convinced I want to spend $60 on it.

[Draegan]

I got to play last night for a few minutes and I have to say the game feels a lot better than when I last played it (Pax East).  The female character models in the character creator are awwwwwful.  The character models in the cut scenes are equally retarded looking.  So many sharp edges and poorly animated.

The music and UI are still fantastic in the game, and I love the skill system.  I just upgraded this game from never to maybe some day.  There are still some combat animation delays and hiccups I didn't like.  Things don't fire off fast enough and the GCD is too long.  Swinging a sword I felt like I was swinging through water.

[Falconeer]

WHAT?!

Draegan, I beg you to check again. The GCD is the fastest in ANY hotbar based MMORPG, clocking at 0.9 secs last time I checked.

I could be wrong, of course, and that's why I am asking you to check again. One of us is seriously confused and if it's me I need to know so I can have my head examined.

[Rasix]

So, are we doing NDA with thing or not? Or is there even one in place? I can't remember.  

[Falconeer]

There is an NDA for the closed beta but I don't think there was one for the open beta weekends, and a few pages back Schild decided that as long as we don't post screenshots we can say whatever we want about it because it wasn't cool for them to ask for money but not let us talk about it.

4. You may SAY in TEXT whatever you want about the game. In my opinion, customers have a fucking right to talk about something they can spend money on - I don't think anyone will fight me on that.

EDIT: Also, nothing discussed here so far really refers to anything that is closed-beta material. Kingsmouth and the basic game systems are NDA-free at this point.

[palmer_eldritch]

The "weekend" events do not have an NDA.

The actual, real, proper beta, aka closed beta*, does have an NDA.

*even though the weekend events are closed events too, despite keys being available almost to anyone who wants them

[Rasix]

Well, my first attempt to play was comical.  Had the opening quest glitch out.  Something I was supposed to be following disappeared and never reappeared when I veered off the beaten path.  Then I hopped on a car, slipped between the car and a building, and got stuck.  The client, however, told me I was not stuck, despite being VERY STUCK. 

Ahh, Funcom.  I'm guessing that I'll have to reroll.   


Atmosphere is excellent, however.  Bears more exploration.

[Riggswolfe]

Well, my first attempt to play was comical.  Had the opening quest glitch out.  Something I was supposed to be following disappeared and never reappeared when I veered off the beaten path.  Then I hopped on a car, slipped between the car and a building, and got stuck.  The client, however, told me I was not stuck, despite being VERY STUCK. 

Ahh, Funcom.  I'm guessing that I'll have to reroll.   


Atmosphere is excellent, however.  Bears more exploration.

Most of the time you can fix this kind of thing by logging out or totally exiting the game. Though the one time this happened to me I got free only to fall through the world. I /bugged it. Then somehow got teleported back to the game proper and was able to continue.

Draegan, Falconeer: I've got to side with Falconeer on the GCD. It's so short I pretty much forget I have a GCD in this game. I'm thinking they put it at the bare minimum their servers could handle.

[Falconeer]

There's a /stuck command and a /reset command that instantly kills you. Problem is, I can't remember the ACTUAL command but I am pretty sure it's not /reset. (Yes it is).

On the GCD, lots of "basic" skills have a casting time which is counterintuitive for what they are (a shotgun burst for example) and is somewhat longer than the GCD. That is what gives a very bad first impression of the combat. But with instant, spammable skills you will soon realize it's pretty damn quick. 0,9 if not 0,8 sec. WoW is 1,5. SWTOR is 1,5, and Rift is 1,4. Lotro is  

[Miasma]

The /stuck command usually calls you a filthy liar and refuses to work however.  Didn't know about /reset.

[Draegan]

There's a /stuck command and a /reset command that instantly kills you. Problem is, I can't remember the ACTUAL command but I am pretty sure it's not /reset.

On the GCD, lots of "basic" skills have a casting time which is counterintuitive for what they are (a shotgun burst for example) and is somewhat longer than the GCD. That is what gives a very bad first impression of the combat. But with instant, spammable skills you will soon realize it's pretty damn quick. 0,9 if not 0,8 sec. WoW is 1,5. SWTOR is 1,5, and Rift is 1,4. Lotro is  

That's what I meant.  The GCD might be 1 second like some games, but there are animation delays which amount to the same thing.  It's 1 second just like Rift's Rogues.

[tmp]

First experience -- game installer claims 15gb of disk space needed and 13gb in files to download, then proceeds to allocate and fetch 2x as much, before even getting to the actual installation part.

wth, funcom

edit: well it's done and fortunately didn't require any more space on top of that, but still 31 gb vs 13 claimed... ehh.

[Phred]

If anyone want's a key for the June 15th weekend Nvidia is giving them away. http://www.geforce.com/games-applications/pc-games/the-secret-world/deals-promotions