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The Secret World 1.6 and 1.6.1 Full Patch Notes

March 17, 2013 by

hellfallen2In case you didn’t know, the Last Train to Cairo expansion is now live, so as always we bring you the full patch notes. Enjoy:

 

UPDATE 1.6.1 – MARCH 16TH

 

GENERAL

  • Fixed the cause of a server crash.
  • The Scorched Desert – All ghouls who were previously lying down at Hotel Wahid will now sit down instead.
  • Male characters will no longer experience invisible arms while wearing the Village Garb coat with certain shirts.
  • Fixed an issue with too many sounds being played during the Darkness War end boss fight.
  • Slightly reduced the intense glow of the Orochi skin Whip.
  • Fixed a visual issue that occurred when switching Coats while wearing a new multislot uniform.
  • The uniform graphics for Basic and Rank 1 PvP armors for male and female Dragon characters no longer look the same.
  • Corrected an issue with Flame spirit npc patrols in The Scorched Desert.
  • The Silver Bullet, Blouse and scarf, black and white no longer has visual issues when worn with certain coats and pants.
  • The Harbinger of Nameless Days will no longer wander around The Savage Coast.
  • Fixed an issue with the Whip Binding affix effect.
  • Resolved a few exploits.

 

GUI

  • Icons should now react properly and display correct cooldowns for abilities such as Charge-Density and Polstar-Oblivion.

 

ITEMS

  • Fixed an issue where if the last buff counter of a Signet of Castigation effect was used on a Burst attack, only the first hit would get the bonus effect.

 

MISSIONS

  • Fixed an issue where several dynel items could not be interacted with to update missions.

 

KINGSMOUTH

  • Something Wicked – You can now interact with the ravens during tier 4.

 

THE SCORCHED DESERT

  • Pets will no longer set off Proximity C4 explosives placed for the mission Mean Streets.
  • Replacing the Ark in ‘The City Before Us’ now properly provides a group update.
  • The last goal of the first Tier of O Tempora! O Mores! will now update for groups.
  • Mean Streets – Atenist patrols now avoid the truck in front of the packing plant.
  • Five Ways to Kill a Man – ‘Go the Spoiled Farm’ goal now updates closer to the waypoint circle.
  • Five Ways to Kill a Man – Bosses’ death animations now plays before the bosses despawn.
  • The Defence Never Rests – Assault now correctly tracks player as they enter and leave the assault area.
  • A Time to Every Purpose – Stealing any Ancile will now close the doors to the room you steal it from.
  • The Last Train to Cairo – Corrected a few discrepancies between onscreen text and voiceover during the cinematics.
  • The Prisoner – The upstairs cameras should now become disabled when you disable the generator.
  • The City Before Us – Added a cinematic before the boulder spawns.
  • NPCs in the Date Factory now play the correct fight animations.
  • It is no longer possible to become stuck inside the Ancile room in Sol Glorificus, during the mission “A Time to Every Purpose”.

 

CARPATHIAN FANGS

  • ‘Where it Doesn’t Belong’ now displays the correct requirement text.

 

PVP

  • Fixed joining minigames that are already in progress.
  • All text instances in El Dorado should be properly localized.

UPDATE ISSUE #6: THE LAST TRAIN TO CAIRO – MARCH 14TH

DLC #6 is now available for $10/€10. Discounts for Members (10%) and Grand Masters (20%) apply. Customers who have set up DLC Autobuy from their account page now has unlocked DLC #6 for their account, with the item that gives access available under “CLAIM ITEMS” in the Item Store.

A range of new outfits and clothing is now available.

Veteran and Recruitment System

  • Members (and Grandmasters) get ten Veteran Points each month they are or have been a member.
  • These Veteran Points can be used to purchase unique and helpful new items in the Item Store.
  • Recruiting someone who purchases The Secret World gives the recruiter one month worth of Veteran Points. Recruitment is done on your account page.

A brand new mission line is now available:

“The Last Train to Cairo”. Play through a new, deep and revealing story within Egypt. Travel back in time to unearth powerful artifacts which can help you in the future, and see how the wondrous locations of The Scorched Desert looked in ages past. The new missions are:

  • Mean Streets
  • The Prisoner
  • The Escape
  • A Time to Every Purpose
  • O Tempora! O Mores!
  • The City Before Us
  • The City Beneath Us
  • Know Them by Their Works
  • Daily missions
  • The Coveters
  • Five Ways to Kill a Man
  • The Defence Never Rests
  • The new “Whip” Auxiliary weapon is now available.

GENERAL

  • The Time Accelerator item can no longer be deleted.
  • Flashbang grenade now has proper sound effects.
  • Corrected the cause of a server crash.
  • Fixed an issue that could crash the community server.
  • Client log file should no longer grow very large so quickly.
  • Fixed the buff description for the Coney Island Band.
  • Fire Manifestation damage has been increased. Lightning Manifestation damage has been decreased.
  • Resolved an issue where players continued to live for a while with 0 HP.
  • Fixed a clipping issue with Dae-su in Seoul.
  • Fixed a clipping issue with the Ninja mask and female faces.
  • The Third Core Capacitor can no longer be used in place of an Astral Fuse.
  • Added a description to the spawning buff used by monsters found in the Spoiled Garden lair of The Shadowy Forest.
  • Description added to the Affliction Counter buff that appears on monsters in the Installation 10 Lair in Carpathian Fangs.
  • Fixed a location in The Ankh where your character could get stuck.
  • Fixed a location in Seoul where your character could become permanently stuck.
  • The J-pop jacket will no longer change the visual look of your shirt sleeves.
  • The Scorched Desert: Moved Shani further away from the wall to avoid her spawning into it.

COMBAT

  • Fixed in error in Expulsion’s barrier calculation tooltip.
  • Seal the Deal should now modify consumers more reliably.
  • Closer should now modify consumers more reliably.
  • Anima Charge with High Voltage will now allow Inferno to critically hit.
  • The fact that Shot of Anima does damage is now mentioned in the tooltip.
  • Fixed a problem where auxiliary affixes could stop working for some time after dying.
  • Updated the description of Bond, Strong Bond to include number of allies and radius of effect.
  • Anima Vessel will now work as described, as in everyone damaging the target will get a heal.
  • Trucker will now work correctly with Thrill of the Chase.
  • Misdirection now works correctly.
  • Fixed an issue with Lock, Stock & Barrel.
  • The Minor Ward effect from Fluid Defence will now apply more reliably regardless of which attack should trigger it.
  • Rocket Launcher Augur effect will now trigger even if another weapon is used before it expires.
  • Description for Grounded passive ability was updated to show that it only triggers when a purge ability is used.
  • Fixed a problem with Powder Burn.
  • Updated the description of the Criticality ability.

GUI

  • Heal over time and damage over time ability effects applied by players no longer display heal or damage values, fixing an issue where 0 was shown to other players.
  • Fixed an issue where tooltips could appear blurry.
  • Dodging will no longer cause the expanded Ability Wheel description cells to collapse.
  • You should no longer randomly swap to the Quantum Ability wheel while using the main Ability wheel.
  • You should no longer see an incorrectly placed Equip button when rapidly selecting different abilities on the ability pane list.
  • Added a cooldownbar for a swapped abilities count down.
  • Health Bars no longer turn yellow when part of them is off any side of the screen.
  • Ability Wheel’ss navigation buttons are no longer enabled when the Power Inventory panel is open.
  • Barrier absorbs are now displayed in combat chat even if they reduce damage to 0.
  • Swapping two items on the shortcut bar should work more reliably now.
  • Your shortcut bar will now accurately reflect when an item in the inventory is removed or updated.

ITEMS

  • Blue quality Signet of Vigour will now increase max HP as stated by 330 (was 329).
  • If a glyph is not upgradable anyway, it will not say that the reason is because a PvP toolkit is used.
  • The damage from the gadget ‘Bitterness’ will now appear in the combat log.
  • Signet of Corruption should now properly increase Affliction effect damage.
  • Description of Kindle passive ability has been updated to show a range of healing values.

MISSIONS

New York

  • Crossroad of the World – Coda: the mission can now be resolved by visiting Dave Screed.

Kingsmouth

  • Kingsmouth Code: Missing tier text now appears again.

The Savage Coast

  • A sound effect is now played when using the Library Ward during the Breakfast cult.
  • To Sir, With Love: Breaking the mirrors in the classrooms should occur no more than 4 times before the goal is updated.
  • To Sir, With Love: Group members will get a goal update to Tier 6 even if they enter the media room after the fight with the wraith.
  • Theme Part Tycoon: The Angry Clown should spawn normally in the future.
  • The Strange Boat House in the Mist: The mutilated corpse should now be present.

Blue Mountain

  • The Search for Tyler Freeborn van wreckage cinematic should now have audio.

The Scorched Desert

  • The Big Terrible Picture – Door to the metallic ankh will open if the player is outside the room with the goal “Collect the metallic ankh”.
  • From Carthage to Cairo: The laptop now starts the tier 4 event, and the detonators can now be activated.
  • A Shadow Over Egypt: Elemental Guardian respawn is now every 30 secs, and the Elemental Guardian waypoint has been moved to more accurate position.
  • From Below: Dr. Shirui and the experiment will now respawn 30 secs after being killed.
  • A Lion in the Streets: NPCs no longer duplicate unnecessarily when respawning inside the cage.
  • The Big Terrible Picture: Ritual of Lineage will now reset correctly.
  • Between a Rock and a Hard Place – Event will now reset correctly after being completed multiple times.
  • Tainted Dreams: Eye of the Dream will now remain interactable throughout the mission even if the player gets out of the dream state.
  • The Traitor: The Informant should now respawn after getting killed.

City of the Sun God

  • There is no longer a placeholder name when using the scales during ‘The Stained Oasis’.
  • Adjusted the formatting for the mission text of The Black Pharaoh’s Guard.
  • Ravine of the Champion portals are now more multiplayer-friendly.
  • Reduced the damage of the General’s subordinates in The Corrupted General.
  • The 3rd Age: You can no longer get stuck by pausing the mission.
  • The Stained Oasis: Aspirants now wield swords.
  • They Were Beautiful Once: Slightly weakened the Dredge and The Excavator NPCs.

The Shadowy Forest

  • Fixed a typo in Tier 2 of ‘Root of the Problem’.

NPCS

  • The Savage Coast : Sam Krieg no longer has red eyebrows.

PVP

  • The minigame system has changed to support a team that comes in second place. This team will get higher rewards than the team to finish last. As a result the token and XP rewards for the minigames has been adjusted. All minigames reward more XP than before.
    • El Dorado
      • 1st: 20
      • 2nd: 10
      • 3rd: 5
    • Stonehenge
      • 1st: 15
      • 2nd: 8
      • 3rd: 4
  • The Seoul Fight Club resurrection point now works correctly.
  • Fixed an issue with the world domination buffs not showing up correctly.
  • Added new PvP rank uniforms to the mobility vendors in faction HQ.
  • It’s now possible to sign up for multiple minigames at the same time.
  • Players may now select respawn points in Fusang Projects.
  • Swapped the position of the Decline and Join buttons on the join window.
  • Added a PvP XP bar to the GUI.
  • Players no longer get removed from their group before accepting a minigame start notification.
  • Dead players will now be revived when they leave a PvP playfield.

Stonehenge

  • Fixed an issue where players would not get teleported out of the playfield correctly after finishing the minigame.
  • Fixed an issue that could make the Untouchable buff not get rewarded correctly.

El Dorado

  • Fixed an issue that prevented players from switching their abilities while standing in the resurrection area.
  • Fixed an issue where you would sometimes not be rewarded the “I want it all” achievement.
Filed Under: Patch Notes, The Secret World Tagged With: ,

New To The Secret World? Check Out The Guide

March 13, 2013 by

tswIf you haven’t played The Secret World before, you may be wondering what the hell it is all about. I know I had no idea until I had a serious attempt at playing it.

So it’s good to see that Funcom have belatedly posted a nice overview of the game and what it offers. Called Experience The Depth Of The Secret World, it gives a decent snapshot of the key gameplay aspects. It covers off dungeons, gear, glyphs, signets, PvP and mastery of the game.

If you know someone who’s been considering checking TSW out, point them to the guide so they can make a more informed decision. But first, we’d love your thoughts on the guide and whether it covers all the bases. Does it paint too rosy a picture? Let us know in comments.

Filed Under: The Secret World

Funcom’s Joel Bylos Takes Another Step Up

February 26, 2013 by

bylos-promoFuncom have just announced that The Secret World’s Game Director, Joel Bylos, has been promoted to head a centralised live team covering The Secret World, Age of Conan and Anarchy Online. Here’s his letter to the community outlining that, but even more importantly, the TSW content update plans up to issue #12:

Hi all,
As you may have heard, I recently agreed to take on the mantle of Creative Director for Funcom’s live titles: The Secret World, Age of Conan and Anarchy Online. It’s a huge honor to step into this role on multiple projects and have the ability to drive forward the creative direction of three of the most unique titles in the MMORPG space.

It doesn’t change my role on The Secret World – the shared new team means that updates for The Secret World will continue like before – and we have plenty of exciting things coming up!

Today I want to take a little bit of time to talk about the content roadmap for the game in 2013. Normally I would have done this in January, but I preferred my previous letter to focus on the restructuring and the upcoming Issue #6.

So what does 2013 hold for The Secret World?

Let’s take a look at some of our current content plans, but keep in mind that things might change. MMO development is a constantly evolving, dynamic process, and we need to make sure we don’t lock ourselves down too tight. The further out the plans are, the more they are likely to change, but as of now, this is a rough outline of what we want to do going forward.

We started out last week with a few small additions for the romantic among you. Head to London and try out the new compatibility tester to find your perfect match within The Secret World, and send that special someone a card, flowers or any spare body parts you have lying around.

Coming up very soon is Issue #6: The Last Train to Cairo. We are working towards releasing this in early March, with our members and life-time members being allowed in two days earlier.

Issue #6 contains a new multi-layered storyline involving Said, Nassir and Abdel Daoud and leads you through the past and the present to steal a valuable artifact from a roman cult and thwart the atenists plan to turn Cairo into a second Tokyo. We are planning to reveal the issue cover and a lot more information about Issue #6 soon so stay tuned!

Issue #7 will see you returning to Transylvania when your Council of Venice contact, Carmen Preda, asks you to look into the appearance of a strange new monster in the region. In tracking down the creature, you will work with the Vampire Hunter, revisit old friends at the Romany Camp, and be introduced to a new character who will lead you deeper into the mysteries of the Carpathian Fangs and the Orochi presence there.

If I had to describe Issue #7 in one sentence it would probably be “James Bond vs Eldritch horrors”. Of course, we will be adding another new Auxiliary weapon in Issue #7 and we’ll talk more about the features of the Issue as it grows closer.

Issue #7 should end with a bang, a bang that starts a new in-game event that will run right up until we introduce the Tokyo zone.

In Issue #8, we will change things up a little, moving away from our story arc DLCs to introduce a new repeatable content feature. This feature will add value to everybody who plays the game, from relatively new players to veterans in the best gear. More details on the feature will be announced as we get closer to the date.

Issue #9 – 11 we plan to release our first new urban adventure zone, Tokyo. We are still deciding the exact breakdown of the Tokyo DLCs, but Tokyo is the continuation of the story mission and will contain a new lair, a new dungeon and a plethora of new action, sabotage and investigation missions.

Issue #12- ? Now we are getting into forbidden knowledge! This is another new adventure zone, directly tied to revelations in Tokyo and exploring the background of one of the more notorious factions in the game!

So that it is, our current plans for the PvE content roadmap for The Secret World for 2013. Note that it doesn’t include new features – those are a part of a separate roadmap which also includes our plans for PvP. Soon we will be putting out a blog update on the PvP system and our plans for it, so keep your eyes peeled for that to hit soon! As mentioned earlier we will also reveal the cover for Issue #6 and more information on its content and features, hopefully early next week.

Thanks for listening, and I look forward to seeing you all in the game!

So – what do you think? That’s a hell of an ambitious content plan for the coming year – do you agree?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World

The Secret World Issue 6: Details

February 22, 2013 by

tsw-issue6After a much deserved ‘break’ (although I somehow doubt any holidaying has been occurring) after the frenzy of the End of Days event and Issue 5’s release, Funcom’s TSW team have announced some details on the next content expansion: The Last Train To Cairo.

Slated for release in “early March”, and with Members getting access two days early, here’s what you get:

In this update you will play through a new, deep and revealing story within Egypt. Travel back in time to unearth powerful artifacts which can help you in the future, and see how the wondrous locations of The Scorched Desert looked in ages past.

There’s some more story and side missions and a new auxiliary weapon:

The vicious Whip can be used for great area damage, but also for buffing your team or sneaky crowd control. Use the Whip to encourage your team mates to run faster or snare tricky opponents and pull them towards you.

But wait, there’s more – a new recruitment and veteran system that rewards you for hanging around:

A new Veteran and Recruitment system will become available. For each month you are or have been a member you receive points which can buy unique rewards. Every new person recruited also gives you an amount of points equal to a month of Membership.

And for PvP’ers, a ranking system will launch with Issue 6:

A completely new ranking system will also be introduced to Player-versus-player combat. You gain PVP experience points and eventually ranks when you or your team kills other players. As you go up in ranks you are awarded with new tokens, which can be used to buy fresh PVP uniforms.

Here’s the few screenshots supplied of the new content (click on a pic for the full size):

What’s your take on what you see – anything you particularly like or dislike about the details unveiled?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With:

The Secret World DLC Content Pricing Clarified

February 7, 2013 by

The Secret World DLCThe TSW dev team have posted an update on how the pricing of future downloadable content will work.

For what it’s worth, I quite like the approach and if you’re a Member or Grandmaster you’ll want to read about how to set up an auto upgrade to the new content.

Read on:

The current price of the Issue #5 DLC (The Vanishing of Tyler Freeborn) has been adjusted to 750 points for non-members, 675 for members (after 10% member discount), and will remain at 600 (after 20% Grandmaster discount) for Grandmasters. This pricing change was meant to further reward Members and Grandmasters because the 10% Member and 20% Grandmaster discounts for shop purchases are now also applied to DLC.

Note that it is now possible for Members and Grandmasters to select to automatically upgrade to the DLC once it is available! This option is called “Set up DLC Autobuy“ and is available from your account page (http://register.thesecretworld.com). Note that this setting is set to “off” by default, so you must actively change it if you want this functionality.

We are also instating a cap on the DLC price for Grandmasters and Members. Regardless of the base (non-member) cost of a DLC, even if it starts at above 1200 points, the price for Grandmasters and Members will not be above 1200 points. This is also an additional bonus for Grandmaster and Member accounts, since it means they will always get enough points in a given month to purchase the newest DLC package.

For future DLCs Members and Grandmasters get access to the content 48 hours before non-members. This will be live with DLC #6.

Prices in the shop are always subject to change (up or down); prices for future DLC will vary based on the amount of content included and may be more expensive than this first DLC.

We hope this announcement sheds some light on recent DLC pricing changes and we thank you for your patience as we continue to adjust and improve the Grandmaster and Member experience.

What’s your take – do you like how things are now set up?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With:

The Secret World Issue #5 Full Patch Notes

December 26, 2012 by

The Secret World Issue #5Better late than never, below are The Secret World Issue #5 full patch notes. Enjoy!

UPDATE “ISSUE# 5: THE VANISHING OF TYLER FREEBORN” – 19TH DECEMBER

NEW MISSIONS

  • A brand new mission line is now available: „The Vanishing of Tyler Freeborn“. This is the first DLC mission.  All current players and all players who purchase the game in December 2012 will receive it for free.  To access the mission please open the Item Store and claim it from the Boosts / Account tab.
  • The Uncertainty Principle – the mission to the new Auxiliary weapon ‘Quantum Brace’ has now been activated. To get started in this mission, talk to Moose in Kingsmouth.
  • From Carthage to Cairo – Tanis in the Scorched Desert needs help in covering her tracks in her involvement of a certain shipment.
  • Obstructive Persons – help Alina Florea in The Shadowy Forest with her plans to leave Morninglight.

GENERAL

  • A new Shortcut Bar is now available, which provides access to inventory slots that can be linked to hotkeys.
  • The maximum number of Gear Manager slots has now been correctly set to 100.
  • Equipping the chainsaw will now play a sound.
  • Fixed an issue where purchased items haven’t been delivered promptly.
  • If you log out or disconnect during the Ground Zero tutorial event, you will now be able to advance when you return to the game.
  • There is a new ‘smile’ emote available.
  • The chest category no longer shows empty when opening the Dressing Room GUI.
  • Albion Theatre: fixed some issues with sound from the stage being occluded on certain occasions.
  • There is now an animation shown from standing to sleeping when using the ‘sleep’ emote.

MISSIONS

  • Just a Flesh Wound – Tier 5: Dr. Aldini is again rewarding players with the Chainsaw.

ITEMS

  • The Time Accelerator item can no longer be deleted accidentially.
  • The Casting Toolkit can now create a mould from Shield of Barbarossa and Black Eagle.
  • Fixed a clipping issue with the Cosmonaut suit.
  • The ‘Suit Pants. Dark grey’ no longer appear white with blood splatters in the preview.
  • Fixed a clipping issue with the head piece of the Mercenary Multislot Deck outfit.

PVP

  • Fixed an issue that prevented the PvP role buffs from not showing their stats anymore.
  • Slightly increased the effects of the Integrated Anima Conduits uniform buff.
  • You can now queue for the PvP minigames while in Fusang.

Fusang

  • Getting killed by Fusang NPCs no longer causes durability loss on equipment.
  • Fixed an issue where the Custodian would walk in the wrong direction before turning around and proceeding in the correct direction.

WORLD DESIGN

  • You should no longer get stuck in the Red Hand Observatory area of The Besieged Farmlands.
  • You should no longer get stuck at the bottom of the Breach area in The Carpathian Fangs.
  • Fixed an issue with a floating propane bottle in The Carpathian Fangs.
Filed Under: General News, Patch Notes, The Secret World Tagged With:

The Secret World Issue #5 Is Live

December 19, 2012 by

I tell you what, I’m starting to wonder if the folks at Funcom ever sleep. The Issue #5 content update for The Secret World is now live.

Titled ‘The Vanishing of Tyler Freeborn’, this update has a number of new bits and pieces for you. Lots of new story content, a new weapon and some nice interface improvements. It’s all showcased pretty nicely by a preview vid that Funcom have released:

I love the look of the new Quantum Brace weapon, and am hanging to start the new story arc. That said, the highlight for me is a simple one: hotkeys for inventory items. I’d argue it’s well overdue and I know it’ll help me improve my gameplay considerably.

The casual player in me hopes that the TSW crew are taking a little break so I have time to catch up with all the new content!

What about you – what catches your eye the most with this update?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With:

‘End Of Days’ In-Game Event for TSW

December 18, 2012 by

End of DaysFuncom have just posted a developer blog post detailing the in-game events for the ‘End Of Days‘ fun occurring at the moment.

There are going to be three Harbingers spawning in-game that will require some teamwork to bring down:

The Mayans called this Age’s Harbinger Bolon Yokte’ K’uh. The Mayans envisioned this as an anthropomorphic “God of Nine Destructions”. This may have simply been a way to cope with the incomprehensible. We’ve gone all the way with the “big dude with attitude” interpretation, and he’ll be a boss fight available for a limited time at two different difficulties in a corrupted El Dorado, run amok with blood sacrifices and dark storms.

Sounds like a bit of fun! There’s a contest running for players who knock over a bunch of Harbingers alongside El Dorado and the odd zombie, with the prizes being a unique pet and title.

Will you be going for the prize?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With: ,

Start Your End of World Missions

December 16, 2012 by

TSW End of WorldAs we reported last week, The Secret World’s Alternate Reality ‘End of Days’ game is coming on December 21st. In the lead-up the fun’s already started, with two missions released to date. It doesn’t matter if you own TSW or not, although if you don’t own it you won’t be able to claim your in-game prizes.

Having done both missions so far I have to say it’s a lot of fun and the atmosphere of things syncs beautifully with the game. One shameful admission though, for Mission 2 I had to resort to spoilers to solve the investigation mission (and I’m so rubbish at maths morse code I gave up on those routes as well). Shame on me.

If you want to jump in and check it out, here’s where you go.

Now it’s over to you: have you enjoyed the missions so far? With mission two, which route did you choose and did you try to do them all?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With:

The Secret World Goes Free To Play

December 12, 2012 by

TSW F2PWell knock me over with a feather. After recently saying how I doubted TSW was about to go F2P, that’s just what it’s done*.

Funcom have announced that as of now, a TSW subscription is optional. All you have to do is buy the game up-front and that is your last cost if you so choose. A subscription is still an option, at the same price as it currently stands, which nets you:

  • Time Accelerator (Clickable item which increases experience gain for defeating monsters by 100% for 1 hour, 16 hour cool-down – only usable by Members and Grand Masters)
  • $10 worth of Bonus Points (given out every month)
  • Item-of-the-month gift (given out every month)
  • 10% discount to everything in the in-game store

As a lifetime subscriber I was worried how things would work, but apparently lifetimers get the bonus points etc each month, which is more than is needed to be able to purchase the downloadable content. Game Director Joel Bylos has confirmed this:

You get points which will more than cover the DLC. The reason that we give you points rather than giving the DLC is because the DLC will cost *less* than the points you get.

Which means instead of getting nothing as a lifetimer except free content, you get the content and whatever you want to spend the points.

Also consider if we were to slip in delivery by a month – you still get real tangible value that can be spent.

There’s an FAQ for the changes, and I expect there’ll be lots of further clarifications in coming days. Funcom have also released a 2-minute trailer to coincide with the F2P launch:

So it’s over to you – What’s your take: is this a good move for TSW?

*Yes I know that the model isn’t strictly F2P as you need to buy the game up front, but I take a broader interpretation and it’s also a more commonly used term than Buy To Play.

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With:

It’s The End Of The World: TSW To Go F2P?

December 11, 2012 by

Regular readers will know that to a tee the team here who have played The Secret World love it. For the first time I think I have some more insight into why it’s so good: the sense of humour in the team behind it.

TSW’s Game Director Joel Bylos (link to our podcast interview with him here) has created part 1 of a video log, and I have to say it’s a hell of a lot of fun:

There’ll be lots of talk about the scene where Joel argues for the subscription fee to be dropped from TSW. To me it seems part of the humour and context of the piece rather than a very obvious int on a near-term move to Free-To-Play. It could also mean a period of time of free access for everyone to attract more players.. Finally, it could be the start of the move to F2P done in a funny way, but my money’s on one of the first two options.

Do you agree?

Filed Under: General News, The Secret World Tagged With: ,

The Secret World’s Alternate Reality Game Starts Dec 21st

December 4, 2012 by

The Secret World ARGFuncom have some history running ARGs for games and they’re about to unleash it in a big way on The Secret World. The email teaser just says that the ‘End Of Days Is Coming’:

The End of Days is Coming

Mankind has been warned. On December 21st there will be a cataclysmic event that marks the end of time as we know it. It is time to prepare.

Leading up to this world-changing event is a brand new alternate reality game (ARG) set in and around The Secret World universe, which will allow you to better prepare for what is to come. If you have never participated in an ARG event before, this is your perfect chance.

And quite possibly your last.

This might be your one chance to save yourself from this inevitable cosmic event, and we encourage you to pre-register to take part in the ARG. Pre-registration is free and available on this page. The ARG will start in a few days and this is one train you do not want to miss.

You do not need to be an active The Secret World player to take part, but if you are, note that exclusive prizes will be offered to all those who participate and that you will be able to enjoy these before everything comes to one last, screeching halt on December 21st.

 

The prizes aren’t too shabby either, particularly if you’re a TSW outfit junkie:

I’ve always been looking for a reason to get involved with an ARG and now I have no excuse to do so. My only selfish criticism is that this is one hell of a time of year to be running it – so here’s hoping that not too many hours need to be sunk into it.

Over to you: will you be taking part?

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