There is not a whole lot to write about right now when it comes to Funcom's The Secret World. Let's face it, information has kind of slowed to a trickle and we are all left waiting for Ragnar and crew to come out of the woodwork with some juicy details. Luckily, though this waiting is the hardest part (thank you, Tom Petty) we won't have to wait much longer. Funcom will be bringing their game (literally and figuratively) to Gamescon in Germany, PAX Prime in Seattle, and most importantly... They'll be showcasing the game at EA's Showcase next week in San Francisco.
We've confirmed it with Funcom and I think we're all going to be waiting with bated breath because next week we will finally get to see not only some pure unadulterated gameplay but also the first ever live demo of a dungeon for The Secret World. We can only speculate what it is we will see, but we are sending our own Carolyn Koh to the event in San Francisco, so we'll have folks on hand to peep what it's all about (not to mention any Old Republic news too).
So what will the dungeon be like? Your guess is as good as mine, but if I have to venture one I'd say we should expect to see much more than a traditional tank & spank affair. TSW is priding itself on its mix of the mysterious with the arcane and I highly suspect that any dungeon in The Secret World is going to reflect as much. Will we see puzzles? Absolutely. Will there be team-based mysteries to solve within the dungeon? Probably. But what I'm mist anxious for as a player is to see how TSW's combat shakes out.
Seeing the dungeon itself is a big step towards finally knowing more about this game, but the one thing everyone's going to be watching is: just how does it handle? Funcom has never been the type of MMO developer to just lift and paste the trends from other games. Both Anarchy Online and Age of Conan prove that much. And with over 500 unique skills to build your character around without classes to restrict you, I'm betting we all could be in for a treat when it comes to combat in Funcom's next game.
After next week's EA Showcase, will we finally have a good idea of just what The Secret World is all about? I think it's safe to say that this summer is the season of reveals and solved mysteries from Funcom. Whenever I've had the pleasure to speak with them and try to weasel comments out of them, the folks from Oslo are always keen to tell me that they can't say anything just yet. But today when I reached out and said, "Look, you have to give me something... we are dying for more info out there." I finally got a promising reply, "Just wait until next week."
And so I wait, and we wait... And next week I'm sure we will all have plenty to discuss. What do you think the Showcase Dungeon Reveal will tell us? Feel free to toss out theories below. I'm all ears... er, eyes.
