Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
The Secret World: Upcoming Content & Bylos Moving to "New Initiative"
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Funcom's Joel Bylos has penned what may be one of his last Game Director's Letters for The Secret World. In it, he mentions that he will be moving on to a "new initiative" within Funcom. Bylos does not offer any further details but does mention that it will require his full focus and, as a result, he will be (and has been) handing off many of his TSW duties to others on the team.
Prior to that, Bylos lets players in on what the TSW group has been working on and what can be expected to work its way into game in the near future.
First off, the Enhanced Player Experience is working its way on to the Testlive server so players can check out the changes made to Elite Abilities. According to Bylos, those changes include more effects and a sincere effort to make them more powerful. In addition, Elite Abilities that have seemingly been underused, will be given a new location on the player hotbar in an effort to bring them into wider usage.
Lastly, Bylos writes about Issue 11, the Orochi Tower and how this content will bring the Tokyo storyline to its conclusion. Players will learn much more about the Orochi Corporation and will run into some old friends as well as meet up with faction contacts.
As of this writing, the Enhanced Player Experience will be released to live servers first with Issue 11 to follow.
Read the entire letter on The Secret World site.
Comments
"The first purpose was to flesh out the plan for 2015 and turn it from a series of notes, hopes and dreams into a fully scoped development plan. This included breaking down the various planned issues into features. We’ve got a very solid plan for The Secret World for 2015 which includes more issues in new locations, our long-awaited scenario update, dungeons and yes, even a bit of PvP
"
-this is good news! but, hoping Joel will stay behind the scenes!
"Enhanced Player Elite Enjoyment Nirvana or EPEEN"
I'll miss these kinda lines from the dev letters, that's for sure. Or, just remember the bunker series at the Mayan 2012 end-of-world thingy, was hilarious.
I wonder though, what could be this new project?
I make sure to login and at least use my monthly bonus points before they expire to buy the new issues and ability potion things. I think I've earned more ability points from those than I did from playing at this point haha.
"new initiative" suggests new MMO. I wonder what they are working on now?
A later post on the official forums from Joel suggested that TSW and AoC have been fairly successful over the past few months (I assume that means profitable).
The Enlightened take things Lightly
(hint) There's the AoC letter too, Suzie
(hint)
I'm not happy with Joel's moving out, but there's a chance it will bring something new and cool to the table - and as he wrote, both TSW and AoC have a nice year behind, and some great plans on the roadmap ahead. And there were some rumours lately about a new project... fingers crossed. I mean, after Ragnar handed over the leadership and went onto new projects, the result was Chapters in the end. (and Chapters rocked)
True, Joel not starting a brand new group, he'll stay within FC, so the new project rumours just received some weight...
"I haven't died guys, and I haven't left Funcom.
I've been asked to work on something that is super exciting and totally not something I am allowed to talk about, and the time commitment means that I can't keep up my duties on TSW and AoC (AO I have been mostly advisory for a while anyway)."
https://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?84363-March-GD-Letter-Discussion&p=1840031&viewfull=1#post1840031
Hmmmm... a new "project" at Funcom ? Interestiiiing....
Perhaps they're making a MOBA !
/runs-and-hides
/wave You can come out, the DotA-clone bandwagon was already checked / ruled out, there's BLC
Ok, it's not their own project, they're just the publishers, but still: FC and DotA-clones, that's already the past. At least I hope it is. Please don't do an another BLC, guys...
"the Enhanced Player Experience.....".
ok
Well continuing in this vein, I would ask if they have got around, or are ever going to look, at doing something about the "Close Quarter Player Interaction Experience" i.e. melee combat mechanics.
This is simply terrible. Playing a healer Blood/Fist is like watching a string puppet trying to swat an annoying insect when it comes to melee combat.
I keep trying to get past this area of the game - and fail every time.
If only they would look back a bit and improve this, then move onto newer things.
For the last year or so I've been logging in only once every few months to spent my points too (thankfully I've got the issues on auto-purchase).
On the bright side, there's entire issues awaiting me once I do start playing again. It might be a good opportunity to play one of my "lowbies" once the new player experience thingy is live, and get used to the changes with a character that hasn't done much yet.
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
It could be anything really. Even some kind of mobile game. Although with Joel moving there the chances are pretty good it'll be an MMO indeed.
Makes me curious what they'll be coming up with next, as they've always come up with some pretty cool concepts.
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
Not sure how I feel about him working on their new project. This guy is a great person and does his work well, but his vision is often very narrow-sighted. He puts full attention to one aspect of a game he is passionate about, and at the same time completely ignores something else. This is not what a good MMO developer should be doing. MMOs require equal attention in all areas that define the game.
Take TSW for example, almost complete focus on developing the story the entire time he was leading the project. Me and many other people have been telling him countless times that adding only story doesn't help the longevity of an MMO, it will just get people playing for a bit and they will move on as soon as they exhaust the new content. The only area of TSW where I feel like I'm playing an MMO is agartha, because there are actually people and chatter. The adventure zones on the other hand are so heavily sharded that you rarely run into other people, they feel empty and single-playerish. There are also almost no "multiplayer" activities in adventure zones which means people aren't encouraged to use the full extent of the world. They are encouraged to sit in agartha looking for instance groups, and that is very damaging for an MMO. If players outside of agartha feel like they are playing a single player game, their motivation to keep playing this game will be greatly reduced because it doesn't feel like a living world.
Essentially for non-instanced play you have 2 choices:
1. Agartha, many people, interaction, but nothing to do
2. Adventure zones, almost no people, no interaction, just a lot of quests
Whichever of the two you choose, there will always be something missing, and that's bad game design right there. The worst thing you can do to an MMO is make the players feel like the 20-40 people in agartha is the entire population of the game, and that's exactly how it makes me feel, because that's the only zone besides the London AH where i actually see people in the game.
http://www.stunlockstudios.com/2011/stunlock-studios-and-funcom-in-co-production-for-upcoming-game/
TQQdles™