12 July 2012 | |
Pherephassa
Curious how devs play their own games? Tomorrow, Friday the 13th at 5pm CET (11am EST / 8am PST), you can find out! Creative Director and Senior Producer Ragnar Tørnquist and Lead Content Designer Joel Bylos will host a livestream of select parts of The Secret World. They’ll offer insights into the game and the development process while they play. I’ve seen pictures on his Twitter account of Ragnar wiping while playing, perhaps tomorrow we’ll get to see it live!
Watch the livestream on The Secret World Twitch TV channel, and check out the official notice on the official forums.
11 July 2012 | |
Pherephassa
The Lannister Group knows that games are far more enjoyable when played with friends, so they are giving away a retail key for The Secret World! They aren’t covering subscription fees, but the retail key does come with a free month, so the winner has time to convince their lucky friend that this is the game to play. This contest is designed to bring friends or family into the game, so it is only open to current subscribers to The Secret World. Entry into the contest is easy:
- Post your official The Secret World forum name in their comments section on the contest page.
- Add a special link to their site to your official The Secret World forum signature. It’s a simple copy/paste of a line of code on their contest page.
On July 16, 2012 at 8PM EDT, they will choose a random winner from the entries on their page. So what are you waiting for? Head on over and try your luck at winning a copy of the game for a friend! And check out the site itself while you’re there, it’s pretty spiffy. For more details, and to enter, check out their
contest page, as well as their
post on the official The Secret World forums.
10 July 2012 | |
Pherephassa
I’m in love with The Secret World. I can admit it. I have my moments of frustration with it – such as every time I look at my ugly character – but by and large, this is one of the coolest MMOs that I’ve ever played. Today just got even better – Ragnar Tornquist, creative director of Funcom and senior producer of The Secret World, wrote up his very first State of the Game. And man oh man, is it an exciting jolt of news for anyone who is enjoying this game.
There is so much in store for TSW players, and I want to know more about all of it! One of the benefits of their questing system is that all new content is applicable to all characters – even if you have a character with top end gear, you can still go back to the very first zone in the game and quest for full xp – which means that all content is applicable to all characters. No more having to make a new character to enjoy all of the new quests and zones! So everything being announced can be enjoyed by everyone, new and old players alike.
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10 July 2012 | |
Pherephassa
One of the worst things about enjoying an MMO is waiting for the servers to come back online after a patch or maintenance. I usually find a sort of combination between enthusiasm and worry while I read the patch notes, enthusiasm for all the bug fixes, and worry that they’ve “fixed” things I enjoy about the game. It seems to happen all to often, logging in after a patch to discover that radical changes have been made.
I am happy to report that the 1.0.1 update to The Secret World seems to be mostly filled with quest fixes. Rejoice! Many quests have had fixes with this morning’s update! Here are a few of the very welcome fixes:
- The Urn for mission ‘The Black House’ should now always be present if you are on the right tier.
- Ravens will now properly fly off during missions when they are supposed to.
- Horror Show – Collecting cameras now awards group credit.
- Taking the Purple : Made improvements to this to help ensure the ambushers will always spawn during tier 2.
- “The Big Terrible Picture” in the Scorched Desert should now reset both the flames and crystals puzzles correctly.
For a complete list of the updates and changes, simply visit the official 1.0.1 patch notes. Here’s to hoping they stay fixed!
8 July 2012 | |
iTZKooPA
Funcom by no means has a clean track record when it comes to launching an MMORPG. However, the company’s latest, The Secret World, a modern day horror MMORPG, was not on the list alongside Age of Conan or one of the most notorious launches in history, Anarchy Online. The Secret World was received well by critics and players alike, receiving positive attention here on Lore Hound as well.
Oddly enough, CEO Trond Arne Aas stepped down from his position the day the game launched. Reducing his role to that of a strategic advisor to the board of directors and chief strategy officer. COO Ole Schreiner will be taking over the position, allowing Trond to focus on the newly announced Lego MMO Funcom secured the rights to.
“The company’s financial position is strong and the foundation of the company’s long-term product and technology strategy is in place,” Aas said in a statement. The company saw its shares fall 40% after the move.
What’s it mean for consumers of Funcom’s wares? According to Creative director Ragnar Tornquist, nothing. Tronquist told Rock, Paper, Shotgun that Funcom has “content plans for a very long time. We have content that’s going to be coming on a regular, ongoing basis,”
Let’s hope this ends the troubles to the relatively smooth launch of The Secret World. Oh, and the game remains on sale.
6 July 2012 | |
Mike
We here at Lorehound are always looking out for our readers, especially when it comes to saving them money. So I figured many of our readers, who are still on the fence about buying The Secret World, might find it of interest that it is already on sale at Amazon for 20% off at $39.99, down from $49.99.
This is of course for the physical box, the digital version is still full price, but if you don’t mind waiting a few days, you can save yourself some cash and use it to buy additional game time.
27 June 2012 | |
Pherephassa
The Secret World‘s server – pardon me, dimensions – information has finally been posted, so anyone playing and wanting to plan with their friends can rejoice! There are currently seven, three of which are tagged with special designations – RP, French and German. Funcom has stated that as they fill up, more can be added on very short notice. It is worth noting that Tarib, the senior community manager has said:
Please also keep in mind that the number of players per dimension in The Secret World is many, many, many times higher than in most other traditional MMOs.
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27 June 2012 | |
Pherephassa
Those of you who have read just about anything I’ve written here at LoreHound are probably well aware that I’ve been avidly awaiting getting my hands on The Secret World for years. That time finally arrived, and I played it as much as I possibly could. By the end of my time I resembled nothing so much as a raccoon from staying up way too late playing this game. I haven’t had this much fun playing a game in years. It has its problems most definitely, but even so, I had a blast and don’t at all regret purchasing the lifetime subscription. I simply can’t wait until this game goes gold and I can start playing to my heart’s content!
It’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a game; freeform character progression, appearance separated from gear stats, references to real world histories and myths, puzzles, difficult challenges, a need for thinking! Just one or two of these things is enough to make me stop and look, but this game combines all of them together into one fantastic whole. While there are many flaws in the game – and don’t worry, I’ll spell out all of the ones I’ve noticed! – I had an absolute blast playing it.
On to the details …
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