Dark Days Are Coming - New Funcom Project

[Ghambit]

wth are you smoking dude?  Have you ever seen/played/read stuff like Cyberpunk, Shadowrun, D20:Modern/Future, Call of Cthulhu, etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.   They all BLOW AWAY virtually any Fantasy system there is when it comes to gear and stats.
Fantasy systems are slight variations on the same crap... it's all sword and board, but with different stats.  In modern/cyber settings, you have EVERY weapon known (or unknown) to man at your disposal (meaning all of fantasy of course), including magic, psionics, genomics, cyberware, etc. [the list is endless really]
There isnt an MMO system I've seen that can even come close to handling the shear volume of crap you can play with in any one of the settings I just stated... Shadowrun especially.

Sufficiently Advanced.

hmm... why the hell havent I seen this before?  Intriguing.  And free too.  Got a good review on rpg.net.

A roleplaying game of the far future. Characters work for AIs who can send themselves messages from the future. Attributes are based on built-in technology, and players can use Twists to affect the plot.

[UnSub]

*TSW begins where other MMOs end.*

wtf does that mean?  We start at level 80 in full raid gear?  j/k

The aim is that your character starts off capable and gets better. So they won't fight giant rats, missing 75% of the time, but will fight (say) zombie hordes, blowing away 5 at a time.

Sounds like EVE's skill system - not necessarily the advancement method - has been looked at extensively, should they need a MMO reference.

[Draegan]

I take that statement that there is no level grind.  They are going for the feeling of not rushing through the boring stuff to get to the good stuff.  The game starts and you play it.  Should be interesting because Tornquist is speaking about a lot of story telling too.

[FatuousTwat]

How are you supposed to know if it's "the good stuff" unless you have ground out 60 levels first?

[UnSub]

There won't be a level grind because there are no levels (and I'm assuming hahaha this means that there isn't anything like levels, such as ranks).

There may be a skill grind, however. I really hope they take lessons from MxO which had the most flexible skill system I've seen in a MMO.

[Falwell]

Puzzle solving time yet again....

http://www.darkdemonscrygaia.com/showthread.php?t=2795

date: Thu, Apr 9, 2009 at 9:11 AM
subject: Repaying old debts
mailed-bygmail.com

I hate to say this - and don't let it get to your head - but I need your help.

And you know, I think you owe me that, all of you. Last time around,
you made my life very difficult. I should be pretty fucking upset. I
AM pretty fucking upset...but I also recognize that you guys are
smart. Or at least tenacious. Tenacious will do.

Understand that I don't turn to you because of who you are or what you
represent. To me, and I'll put this bluntly, you're nothing but a
means to an end. But like it or not, you're involved, you know things
you shouldn't know - useful things - and apparently you have the
respect of those playing that ridiculous 'game' of yours. For better
or worse, you and your friends have the power to help me.

I've spent the last few years searching. I'm close...okay, so I THINK
I'm close...to finding what I'm looking for and then you probably
won't hear from me again. I'm close, but I'm stuck.

Not long ago, I found something that relates to my family - and that's
all I'm going to tell you about that, because I don't think it matters
and it's definitely none of your business. It's a probably a code.
It's always a code. From what I've gathered, it relates to a place. I
think there's something waiting for me there. I just can't crack the
code. And you guys? You guys have proven yourself to be the ultimate
code nerds.

What I have is two series of numbers:

54 - 10 - 122 - 29 - 14 - 83 - 26 - 101 - 61 - 7 - 64 - 31

and

25 - 06 - 18

That's all. There's no clue as to what the numbers mean. It's
addressed to 'Wagtail'. I believe it's for me. I remember my great
grandmother using that word when I was only five or six, before she
passed away. I know it's a bird - it's not like I can't use Google -
but I don't know the significance of it.

If you guys can help me - then help me. Call it repaying an old debt.
You almost got me killed. Or call it playing a game, because by the
looks of things, you like to play games.

I'll do you a favor in return. The Sanctuary of Secrets? Bunch of
idiots. Trust me, I should know. They're not malicious, just stupid.
They're children. They think they can save the world by spreading
information. By documenting secrets. No. This world, if it can be
saved at all, will be saved by people keeping their mouths shut. It's
worked so far.

Get to work. I'll be in touch.

A.B.

[Draegan]

Those guys are going insane over there trying to crack the code.  Interesting to say the least, but no one has gotten it.

[ClydeJr]

The aim is that your character starts off capable and gets better. So they won't fight giant rats, missing 75% of the time, but will fight (say) zombie hordes, blowing away 5 at a time.

That was one of the great things about City of Heroes. A level 1 hero could easily take on 3-5 level bad guys with no problems and could head to the next fight with little downtime.

I got #290 with the gauntlet thing.

[Hoth]

The aim is that your character starts off capable and gets better. So they won't fight giant rats, missing 75% of the time, but will fight (say) zombie hordes, blowing away 5 at a time.

Also, you’ll be fighting kick-ass demons and hordes of undead using cool weapons from the moment you create a new character – I swear to God, no dinky swords and diseased rats.

Source

And the riddle is solved after 119 pages of madness.

[UnSub]

The first number sequence served to locate words in the letter from Nicolas to his wife, taking the first letter of said words you got the name of a ship, the Bergensfjord, the second group gave you a date, that date the ship arrived to Halifax, all cool :P

It's a nightmare because you've got a thousand monkeys at keyboards trying to work out something cryptic. The good leads get buried under a ton of crap.

[Hoth]

Yeah, basically the last 60 pages in this thread were "what we  thought of so far" and maybe 2 new ideas. 
Thanks to the influx of a lot of new folks there solving  the riddles got much harder then before.

[Ghambit]

If I were them I'd only allow possible solutions to be posted on the forum and discussion only allowed on IRC.

[UnSub]

They need a discussion thread and a solution thread. Or some kind of forum better suited to such investigations.

It worked when the audience was small, but the whiff of beta / ARG has seen the forums explode.

[Aez]

Why are you even bothering with Funcom?  Here's a pretty accurate prediction :

[Tale]

Their lore is always awesome, if nothing else. Probably we want to know the story.

[UnSub]

I have no expectation of Funcom. However, they have tried to do things a bit differently for AoC and now TSW, which means I'm a ton more interested in them than whichever company does the next WoW clone, even if they do a top notch job on it.

[gryeyes]

TSW and the World of Darkness MMO are the two things on the horizon i even have the faintest hope for. And next to nothing is known about either of them.

[eldaec]

Remember this picture from page 4?



I'm very dubious about this 'no classes' thing.

[UnSub]

As I said on the forums, there might be no classes and levels, but there might be builds and ranks or something like that.

But it's pre-alpha. As I said elsewhere, pre-alpha forums (and pre-alpha promises) may have no resemblance to the final title.

[K9]

Remember this picture from page 4?


I'm very dubious about this 'no classes' thing.

I really really don't see how you get 'classes' from that picture.

[Rishathra]

Well, let's see.  Going from left to right, I'd say assassin, mage, pet class, vampire/witch hunter, maybe a sword master(can't really tell definitively with that one), a kung fu/chi power type, and going by the vest and belt on the last one, perhaps a merc/firearms expert.

[eldaec]

Remember this picture from page 4?


I'm very dubious about this 'no classes' thing.

I really really don't see how you get 'classes' from that picture.

From a picture of a bunch of traditional dikummog archetypes I'm interpreting that the development team envisage characters fitting into traditional dikummog archetypes.

It's only a picture, could mean anything theoretically. But I don't really see what would make funcom represent their game in that way if they weren't thinking of traditional archetypes.

EDIT: Not that there is anything wrong with traditional archetypes in some sort of 'soft' class structure.

[gryeyes]

All of the concept art we have seen so far has been similar. To the point that i believe that those guys are actual characters and not just random examples of NPC's.

[Falwell]

If they stick with 360 development for this, they're gonna get burned.

The 360 is well on it's way to it's fourth year in retail. Certainly the backend of it's top tier lifecycle. Considering TSW is a good two years out minimum, seems like a way to piss away money.

[schild]

I *think* they've figured that out by now. Even continuing with the 360 version of AoC is a waste of time.

[eldaec]

If they stick with 360 console development for this, they're gonna get burned.

If anyone can bring us a proper console mmog, it isn't funcom.

They are right up at the niche/serious-gamer/complex-gameplay end of shit. No way on this earth I see them figuring out the best way to simplify this for consoles.

[Lucas]

So, over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun there is a new interview with Ragnar Tørnquist:

click the
Sigh, in theory there is something refreshing about the whole approach but...:P

[NiX]

Ragnar seemed to be the most honest person when it came to AO and I recall him openly admitting it wasn't going down the right path.

[palmer_eldritch]

I liked that interview. I'm getting that "this could be great feeling", which I always tell myself not to have about MMOs because it's usually a let-down in the end. But it sounds good.

I think he also nailed down the setting a bit too. It's Hellblazer Online (not the Keanu Reeves version)

[gryeyes]

I do not acknowledge the Keanau Reeves versions existence.

[Falwell]

I do not acknowledge the Keanau Reeves versions existence.

The only redeeming quality of that atrocity is a soaking wet Rachel Weisz.

[UnSub]

I do not acknowledge the Keanau Reeves versions existence.

The only redeeming quality of that atrocity is a soaking wet Rachel Weisz.

It had a great supporting cast and Peter Stomare made a great Lucifer.

[Surlyboi]

Yes, but everytime I see that, I keep hearing, "Where's zee money, Constantinski?" in my head.

[Sunbury]

Is that a MMO he is describing, it sure doesn't sound like it.   Reads like a single player linear RPG - that you can't finish yourself.

Isn't someone ever going to invent a dynamic world?  All I read about is more and more static quests and single thread 'story' lines - which only means: read wall of text, go to place X, fill N Foozles, get M items, repeat until done.   Also each player repeats the same quests, please someone invent something new!

[UnSub]

Isn't someone ever going to invent a dynamic world?  All I read about is more and more static quests and single thread 'story' lines - which only means: read wall of text, go to place X, fill N Foozles, get M items, repeat until done.   Also each player repeats the same quests, please someone invent something new!

Not possible. All that can change is the way such things are delivered.