I’m hoping to lure a few more folks back by keeping the thread active ;) I guess I should NOT mention the less than stellar investigations and focus on what’s awesome. For example, most of the new 1.6 content is absolutely excellent, AND it hands out great rewards for pretty much any sort of player (a new weapon, high end gear, cosmetics, a title, etc.)
Tom could even do a re-review now that they’ve unfucked a good portion of the original content, since he apparently single-handedly doomed the game with his original review ;)
Giaddon
1842
You’re doing the lord’s work, MrPerson. This is really the only RPG I’ve cared about since Skyrim.
Oghier
1843
I’ve been playing this game lately, too, after a long break. It has improved. Things I have noticed:
-
The new content is excellent, up to par with the good missions in the release version. The writing, voice acting and creativity are just top-notch
-
It’s less buggy. People still bump into disappearing quest mobs, but it’s now fairly rare
-
The raid is a lot of fun. It’s short and sweet, similar to the original Onyxia (very little trash, a multi-phase boss fight that requires people to learn the moves, excellent loot at the end). There’s a new raid coming with Issue 8, tuned toward people in blues/ starter purples, as well
-
The dungeon content remains fantastic. There are nightmare versions of everything now. You can spend a lot of time dungeon crawling, and it’s a good time in a good group
Of course, some downsides remain:
-
No (functioning) LFG system or LFG channel. You can stand in Agartha and try your luck there, but the endgame is going to frustrate anyone who isn’t in an active cabal or does not maintain a good friends list
-
PvP is as hostile to new or casual players as any system I have seen (of course, some people consider this a positive). You’re either in a good pre-made or farmed near the spawn point
-
The pace of new content releases has slowed, due to the layoffs
-
The character system and investigation quests are still quite complex, which will put off many people
TSW will never have the massive amount of “keep you busy forever” grindtastic content of a WoW, and the locusts hit the “nothing to do” complain-point faster than they expect. The content is really good, though, and those of us who don’t want to play 8 hours a day will always have interesting stuff to do :)
Giaddon
1844
I returned to this after setting aside BioShock Infinite. I just finished up the unburnt bush and the oxford investigation missions in Egypt – such a blast! The unburnt bush gave me over a million XP, which was awesome. Really enjoying the game, and bummed no other developers seem interested in a similar mashup of real-world and fantasy.
They want to get people to play the game but cant be arsed to implement a LFG system… after so long… Funcom must be smoking something.
Still the game had a lot of great features, it just lacked a little polish here and there.
Someday the World of Darkness MMO will probably release, which is a modern day setting with fantastical elements. But I’m sure it will be much more like EvE (same developer) which I can’t stand, than TSW.
Yeah, it should be a core feature by this point but every MMO developer seems to think that their game doesn’t need one.
Phred
1848
I don’t think so. CCP put an indefinate hold on that a year ago and laid off most of the staff. I haven’t heard of any staffing up being done there either.
The forums for these recent MMOs that didn’t have one (SWTOR, TSW and GW2) had arguments raging about this.
I can understand the “community building” argument against prioritizing the kind of automatic LFG that’s popular nowadays and that people seem to clamour for. I cut my teeth on CoH, I don’t have a problem with the kind of LFG system where you can see all the info re. people who are LFG and not, what class they are, but have to open up private conversations with them in order to recruit them. It’s actually a great way to build teams because you have that initial chit-chat contact, and you can more easily assess whether someone’s going to be suitable (it’s good for both the team builder and the prospective team members to assess each other).
But those days when community spirit mattered seem to be long gone in MMOs, people seem to have lost the knack and habit of using that older type of LFG system, and one gets the feeling that developers would do well to cave in because the backlash seems to be so horrendous.
Still, when you look at when Blizzard introduced the automatic LFG system, it was comparatively late in the game’s life - i.e. even they held out for a long time. There’s just something soulless about it.
Although at this point I suspect the Dungeon Finder method of finding groups is probably what people are going to expect over any other form, it’s not just that games aren’t shipping with functionality of that sort, it’s that virtually every MMO that comes out seems to launch without ANY functionality for finding a group beyond a dedicated chat channel. And that’s nowhere near adequate.
Giaddon
1851
TSW has a kind of bulletin board for groups (shift-c) but not many use it. I rarely group so it doesn’t affect me. I can definitley understand why more social players want one, though.
Giaddon
1852
And finished (sort of)!
I completed the story quest and have the exploration achievement for all zones. A fantastic experience. I’ve played 2/8 dungeons, and I can see myself working through the rest (and finishing up the main missions I missed), but there’s no way I’ll climb up onto the nightmare dungeon/purple gear grind. No way no how. I can’t believe how player-hostile that whole part of online games are. But it’s easy enough to avoid for those uninterested.
Anyway, great world, great writing, great skill system, even the combat grew on me once the enemies got more interesting. And those investigation missions! Damn. So great.
I was initially disappointed there was no single narrative, but I came to really enjoy the structure of small narratives all in the context of the secret world. And the cutscenes for each mission were really well done. Someone literally pulls a gun on someone else’s dick. I liked how each zone had its theme–new/American horror on Solomon Island, Biblical/Religious horror in Egypt, and European folklore horror in Transylvania (plus Soviet sci-fi horror!).
This was the first MMO I spent significant time with (I played SWTOR briefly), and though I mostly played it alone, I liked having other players around and the option to run the dungeons.
I’m really bummed its lack of success has hurt Funcom so badly, as this is one of the most interesting and engaging games I’ve played in a while. It deserves fans! Awesome game. Super-high recommendation from me.
Yea, it deserved better.
It also could have used less bugs at launch, a working chat system, a dungeon finder and more PVP maps :)
Only MMO I’ve played since UO where I paid attention to all the lore, and not just speeding through it to ‘get bacon’.
My funcom stocks are hoping they’ll get back in business, but I fear it was three strikes — out. (AO, AC and then TSW…)
Giaddon
1854
Well, I can’t argue with any of that. Have you seen the Field Agent Locater Mod? It’s a fan-made tool for getting groups together. Really slick and widely used.
A lot of great low-level content was added with the first four issues as well. The game launched too soon, no doubt about it. But as a questing experience it’s now top-notch.
If I’m thinking of taking the plunge, anything I should know? I’ve been pretty burnt on MMO’s for the past year (used to be my favorite genre) but I’ve had my eye on this for a bit. Seems quite different and potentially immersive. Is it still going strong? Any QT3 community still playing? Are there any “must bookmark” guide sites for builds/missions?
Thx for any help you can give. :)
Delta
1856
Me too. Does anybody have a spare buddy key so that I could give it a shot?
Fozzle
1858
Secret World is pay once I thought?
Buddy keys are sent by entering the friend’s email address on the official website. They only give you 72 hours of gameplay, though.
Yeah, buy the client, play as much as you like. That’s not the same as F2P. If you really like it you can pay a subscription to get a few perks and monthly bonus cash for the item store but I’m not sure I’d bother if I weren’t a lifetime subscriber. (That said, as a lifetime subscriber I’ve gotten all of the paid content, plus some handy conveniences and silly cosmetic items - I’m currently rocking a horsehead mask - that have done a fair bit to enhance my game experience in a nonessential sort of way. So I’m glad I made that particular investment.)
I don’t know if anyone else from Qt3 still plays much. I know the Qt3 Dragon guild is a ghost town. I’ve hit #1 out of the entire guild in pretty much everything and I’m only recently as far as Egypt. It’s hard to say how it’s doing from a business standpoint but I definitely still see random people wander through as I play on a regular basis, not that it makes a huge difference. The quests are eminently soloable (some of them require you to solo them for some or all of their steps), and there isn’t really a good way to run dungeons without a solid group of friends as like many another MMO, they never really implemented a useful group finder tool. If you go in, go in with the expectation that you’ll mostly be soloing quests and you should be more than satisfied. Every time I come back to the game it impresses me anew with the quality of writing, worldbuilding, and (for the most part) quest design, and I re-fall-in-love with the flexibility and combotastic nature of the skill system.
The dungeons -are- awesome, but you’ll need to bring your own party.
