Originally posted by Thenextbigthing

Originally posted by MindTrigger
Star Wars, for example, is Fantasy and Sci Fi.

 

Star Wars is Space Opera, same as Star Trek, character driven and set in space, but with very little science (fiction).

Star Wars is a fantasy with soft science fiction ornamentation written as a space opera.

Star Trek is hard science fiction written as a space opera.

Buck rogers was soft science fiction written as a space opera.

Originally posted by fallenlords
Probably because Funcom billed it more as a Horror/Conspiracy based game.   Or in their words 'A modern day MMO' with real world settings.   They tried to pull it as far away from fantasy as they could manage.  So in answer to your question Funcom made the game technically not fantasy and more horror. Especially with their continued references to H.P.Lovecraft. Many people associate H.P.Lovecraft with a specific sub-genre of horror fiction. So all the way down the line the game has distanced itself from typical fantasy.

and we got Cell phones,.

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Orson Scott Card said it best "If there is a dragon on the cover it's fantasy, if there is a space ship its science fiction."

What is TSW filled with "Zombies" "Monsters" that makes it either horror or urban fantasy. You take urban legends and ask, what if they are true?

I personally would catorgorize it as Urban Fantasy with both sci-fi and horror elements.

I can't remember any MMO using the Urban fantasy genre before which makes it unique. That is what I like about it. Great setting.

Then at WorldCon several times, Card would go on to discuss the science-fantasy subgenre.

I would still probably catagorize TSW as Urban Fantasy.

When I think of Science fantasy I think of Star Wars,, a princess locked in a castle that need saving, young hero with a destiny guided by an old wizard. With he help of a lovable rogue they face an evil black night who once apprentenced under the old wizard. 

Where is Urban Fantasy is Modern times with a Magic twist. 

Either way I am not sure who is saying there are no fantasy elements to TSW, just that it isn't the typical high fantasy setting, (Elves, Dragons, Evil Wizards)

TSW has magic and swords (Fantasy) It has Cthulhu type monsters (Horror) and it is set in modern times, (Urban)

TSW is a mixture of things put together in a way that is fun. I have some criticism for the game but the setting is not one of them. 

Originally posted by Beauman

Actually, Dark Fantasy, Urban Fantasy, and so forth are widely recognized subgenres---- at least in literary circles, and even in the Tabletop RPG hobby. Unfortunately, it's become obvious that the MMO masses are only very basically educated or not avid readers to begin with.

The genre could of been anything, the game needed a hook.  The game didn't have that hook, even if it had been ordinary fantasy with goblins, elves and all that it still wouldn't have drawn the players.  There is no hook, there is nothing new it's all been seen before in some form or other.   

    There's a guy on the TSW forums that will insist that the game is of the Super Hero genre if you ask him.  I mean, you get powers, you fight bad guys. You have a secret identity.  He wants funcom to release capes and masks and unitards so it will be even more like what it already is.

    Speaking of tards, it's not a fantasy game, either.  Just because there's this thing called "Urban Fantasy" that shares an 'f' word with another genre, doesn't mean much.  Yeah, it's got magic and shit in it.  If you really want your genre categories to be so broad that "it's got magic and shit in it" makes something fantasy, then that's your problem. You end up with there being like, 4 possible genres.

      In the end, there's only one criteria that matters.  if somebody comes up to you and says  "What's the setting of The Secret World?"  and you answer "It's a fantasy game,"  then you're being a misleading nincompoop.  You can argue semantics and technicalities all you want. In the end, that's all that matters.

Originally posted by Uccisore

    There's a guy on the TSW forums that will insist that the game is of the Super Hero genre if you ask him.  I mean, you get powers, you fight bad guys. You have a secret identity.  He wants funcom to release capes and masks and unitards so it will be even more like what it already is.

    Speaking of tards, it's not a fantasy game, either.  Just because there's this thing called "Urban Fantasy" that shares an 'f' word with another genre, doesn't mean much.  Yeah, it's got magic and shit in it.  If you really want your genre categories to be so broad that "it's got magic and shit in it" makes something fantasy, then that's your problem. You end up with there being like, 4 possible genres.

      In the end, there's only one criteria that matters.  if somebody comes up to you and says  "What's the setting of The Secret World?"  and you answer "It's a fantasy game,"  then you're being a misleading nincompoop.  You can argue semantics and technicalities all you want. In the end, that's all that matters.

 

My point is, the OP is setting up paper tigers. Who is arguing that there are not fantasy elements in the game? It takes a little from everything, that is the point of the game.

Fantasy has a specific meaning when it comes to genre. It means Dwarves, Elves, Dragons and princesses. If a person says it isn't "Fantasy" that is what they mean.

Fantasy and Urban fantasy have to different meanings.

They OP is trying to say, because people say it isn't a "Fantasy" setting, they are some how saying there are "No fantasy elements to it" that is just wrong.

Who is saying there are no fantasy elements ? Who is the OP dissagreeing with? Where are all these posts making this claim?

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Originally posted by Uccisore

    There's a guy on the TSW forums that will insist that the game is of the Super Hero genre if you ask him.  I mean, you get powers, you fight bad guys. You have a secret identity.  He wants funcom to release capes and masks and unitards so it will be even more like what it already is.

    Speaking of tards, it's not a fantasy game, either.  Just because there's this thing called "Urban Fantasy" that shares an 'f' word with another genre, doesn't mean much.  Yeah, it's got magic and shit in it.  If you really want your genre categories to be so broad that "it's got magic and shit in it" makes something fantasy, then that's your problem. You end up with there being like, 4 possible genres.

      In the end, there's only one criteria that matters.  if somebody comes up to you and says  "What's the setting of The Secret World?"  and you answer "It's a fantasy game,"  then you're being a misleading nincompoop.  You can argue semantics and technicalities all you want. In the end, that's all that matters.

 

My point is, the OP is setting up paper tigers. Who is arguing that there are not fantasy elements in the game? It takes a little from everything, that is the point of the game.

Fantasy has a specific meaning when it comes to genre. It means Dwarves, Elves, Dragons and princesses. If a person says it isn't "Fantasy" that is what they mean.

Fantasy and Urban fantasy have to different meanings.

They OP is trying to say, because people say it isn't a "Fantasy" setting, they are some how saying there are "No fantasy elements to it" that is just wrong.

Who is saying there are no fantasy elements ? Who is the OP dissagreeing with? Where are all these posts making this claim?

    Yeah, I agree with you. There's fantasy elements just like there are superhero elements, just like there are horror elements, and so on and so forth.  Some mild cyberpunk elements too, now that I think of it. 

     I suspect the OP's motivations are something like this-  if he can defend the position that this is a 'fantasy game', then he can defend the position that the game 'isn't original'.  And that's the sense in which calling it a fantasy game is misleading.  There's a difference between what a word means, and what people think when they hear a word.  I suppose the OP is trying to insist upon one so he can exploit the other.

Originally posted by MindTrigger

Originally posted by MagikrorriM

Originally posted by fallenlords

Originally posted by Thenextbigthing
The term fantasy comes from 'fantastic fiction' which originally included pretty much everything like H.G. Wells, Jules Verne and Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burrows. So I think TSW certainly fits into the fantastical. Nowadays we think 'fantasy' is always high medieval fantasy like Tolkien, but that's just one area. TSW is certainly influenced by Lovecraft, but it seems to me also the fantasy of Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast books. Ragnar himself says it's 'dark fantasy'. 

You don't do yourself any favors utilising terms that people have no connection with, that is just stupid.  Dark Fantasy is another sub genre, you are whittling your intended audience down further and further until you have nothing more than a niche group of people with any interest.  

 

Funcom told people exactly what they wanted TSW to be.  A horror inspired game influenced by authors such as H.P.Lovecraft, with a fantastical element all interconnected with secret societies.  Now this might appeal to Ragnar - but as per usual he didn't have his finger on the pulse of the gaming community.  To pull off a Dark Fantasy game he needed to bring something new to the table to get Dark Fantasy as a genre recognised and noticed.  There needed to be some magnificent pull within the game, which would draw people regardless of genre.  When the majority of people realised it wasn't leveless or classless in the true sense, it was just a different way of doing the same old stuff. I think Ragnar lost a lot of credibility.   For an MMO we have been waiting on for such a long time, to just bring the same stuff (different guise) to an already full table is just beyond belief to be honest.

There are no character levels in the game, this is a fact, there is gear and weapon levels, but no character levels. There no classes in the game, there are over 500 abilities, but no defining classes, don't confuse classes with roles, I.E. a Warrior is a class, a tank is a role.

They are adding 9 auxilery weapons, which has it's own wheel, and if that's not enough, abilities from mobs will be learned via kill x number of mobs achievements, Funcom has created something unique, no MMO has made a sandbox out of abilities, Ragnar is gonna pull it off.

Effectively though the QL is a level.  It's just not a traditional way of looking at levels.

Role playing games have progression. There are different types of progression.

1) There is level based progression, you character starts at level one gains exp then progresses to level two.

2) There is skill based progression, you gain skill as you use them or as you gain exp.

3) There is item based progression. You progress by aquiring more powerful gear.

4) there is rep based progression. You gain rep with a faction which offers you benefist with the faction.

TSW does not have the first, Level based progression. It does have both skill based progression and Item based progression.

because there are vampires there, and they are real : /

Peace

Lascer

     The 'level based progression' argument is exact the same as the 'fantasy' argument.  People who want to say the game isn't original will streeeeeeeeeeeetch the technical definitions of 'level' or 'fantasy' until they can make the terminology fit, so they can in turn say "this is a fantasy game with level-based progression".

     Play with words all you want.  The fact, however phrased, is that the game's two most original features are the setting and the progression system.  Saying otherwise isn't fooling anybody who is familiar with the game, and serves only to mislead those who aren't.

Originally posted by Uccisore

     The 'level based progression' argument is exact the same as the 'fantasy' argument.  People who want to say the game isn't original will streeeeeeeeeeeetch the technical definitions of 'level' or 'fantasy' until they can make the terminology fit, so they can in turn say "this is a fantasy game with level-based progression".

     Play with words all you want.  The fact, however phrased, is that the game's two most original features are the setting and the progression system.  Saying otherwise isn't fooling anybody who is familiar with the game, and serves only to mislead those who aren't.

 

Yeah, I agree. It is sort of like arguing with a chick (No offense) Instead of hearing what you said and meant, they will latch on to one single word, twist it out of contect in the worst possible way, then claim you meant the opposite of what you really said.

Originally posted by Johnie-Marz

Originally posted by Uccisore

     The 'level based progression' argument is exact the same as the 'fantasy' argument.  People who want to say the game isn't original will streeeeeeeeeeeetch the technical definitions of 'level' or 'fantasy' until they can make the terminology fit, so they can in turn say "this is a fantasy game with level-based progression".

     Play with words all you want.  The fact, however phrased, is that the game's two most original features are the setting and the progression system.  Saying otherwise isn't fooling anybody who is familiar with the game, and serves only to mislead those who aren't.

 

Yeah, I agree. It is sort of like arguing with a chick (No offense) Instead of hearing what you said and meant, they will latch on to one single word, twist it out of contect in the worst possible way, then claim you meant the opposite of what you really said.

     Chicks, liberals, and strangers on the internet tend to argue that way because it's the easiest way to win without actually knowing what the hell you're talking about.  

Originally posted by fallenlords

Originally posted by MagikrorriM

It's a gear level, not a character level. They stated no character levels, which there aren't.

Tornquist said freedom from classes and levels.  They insinuated through their literature that this is a major selling point of the game.   They still bang on about it, but when you look under the facade it's the same old thing done slightly differently.  

 

 

Tornquist is making out like they have made something special with TSW that the majority of MMO gamers are not seeing.  It's like the guy is blinkered.  The majority of MMO gamers I think were waiting for something special in TSW.  When they saw very little of interest and found the genre not overly appealing, well the sale figures say it all  Tornquist in his ivory tower thinks he has started some sort of MMO revolution - when in actual fact he has probably put another death nail in the coffin.

 

 

The game is not perfect, and FC is not reinventing the wheel here, but to me, playing a multitude of roles in one single toon, that is freedom from the conventional classes in MMOs. II don't have to log to get an alt that can fill the role my group needs, everything can be done on 1 single toon.

As for levels, gear level is very different from character levels. Ragnar and company promised a game with no character levels, and they actually delivered that. I can always put on a set of gear QL 3 and the starting zones are challenging again. or I can put on my QL10 gear and I can be overpowered in those same zones. Again, they are not reinventing the wheel, but they actually delivered a game with no character levels. It's kinda like what GW2 did with the downscaling, but I think TSW does it better providing options to play how you want to play the content, and to me, again, that is freedom, and they delivered on that promise.

Now you're free to express your opinion, and it's perfectly fine with me if you believe the game is not special, or if you think Ragnar is full of it, but to me, the less than stellar sales only prove the game is not popular, because the world that Ragnar delivered, again in my opinion, is a superbly crafted story-driven experience in a modern day setting, filled with mystery and supernatural stories, legends, and myths, and that makes the game very special indeed.

I waited many years for a game like this, and I am quite pleased to be a part of this world that Ragnar created, and yes, that includes bugs and issues, etc.

The game is not for everyone, and indeed might have a very limited audience, but for that small audience, intended or not, it truly is a gem of a game.

People, typically the fans, will trump the game an non-fantasy due to the setting to try to give the game more weight.

But the game is fantasy, making it a modern time setting does not make it non-fantasy.  It has all the creatures of fantasy, it has swords, magic, all the properties of fantasy but is held in a modern setting.  Want a non fantasy game?  Look up EVE and Planet Side 2.

Originally posted by Uccisore

     Play with words all you want.  The fact, however phrased, is that the game's two most original features are the setting and the progression system.  Saying otherwise isn't fooling anybody who is familiar with the game, and serves only to mislead those who aren't.

 

Originally posted by fallenlords

Originally posted by Uccisore

     Play with words all you want.  The fact, however phrased, is that the game's two most original features are the setting and the progression system.  Saying otherwise isn't fooling anybody who is familiar with the game, and serves only to mislead those who aren't.

 

Two most original features of the game are setting and the progression system.   Now you see why the game didn't sell.   If the setting has mass appeal then you are on to a winner, well no the setting does not have mass appeal.  If the progression system is that far advanced that it is termed revolutionary, a word Tornquist likes to use, then perhaps that would of been a draw.  But you scratch the surface on that and you can see levels and classes reworked - in fact opting to get away from traditional levels could be argued has been detrimental to the whole game.

 

Like I said before where is the hook to this game?  I don't' see the hook anywhere.

Originally posted by smh_alot

 

? TSW doesn't have levels or classes, at least not as you see them in most MMO's. In most other MMO's, when you selected to be a priest or pure healing class, you can't be a tank or AoE nuke, and not all the available skills ingame are free for you to choose from. Sure, there have been other MMO's that didn't have that class structure, where you could pick your own skills and build your own role, but all in all they've been a very slim minority: when you pick your class, you get your list of skills to pick from and that's it, other ones won't be available to you. Same with levels. TSW has a progression system, just like other MMO's that don't use character levels. But once again, MMO's without (character based) levels are very, very rare.

 

The hook in the game is the different setting that hasn't been done like that in MMO's yet, incl the atmosphere that provides its own richness to quests, exploring and dungeons. It's not everyone's thing, just like scifi in modern literature is far less mainstream than fantasy, or how a game like Amnesia, one of the better horror games, is still more niche than other mainstream horror games. So be it. I like it, that the MMO scene has come to offer more variety in themes and setups than it did in former years.

Been discussed over and over again, TSW may not have traditional levels or classes but it does contain both in a different guise depending on how you look at it overall.  Certainly what Funcom produced in this area was certainly not worth the wait. 

If the hook is the genre, then why pick a genre that has such a niche following.  Don't they want their game to do well?  If the only hook is the genre, pick something that has a bigger following like mainstream fantasy.  It kind of makes no sense in this instance to rely on genre as the hook.   What it needed was a game mechanic that would draw people to play the game and ignore the genre.   Half the problem with TSW is the genre not being appealing to many people apart from Tornquist and a few chums.

As has no doubt been said multiple times so far in this thread, it's urban fantasy.

There's a shed load of books in classed as urban fantasy these days, some of them are pretty good.