Dark Days Are Coming

I am genuinely excited about the Secret World.

Funcom, the company that are producing the game, have not had a particularly great track record with multi-player online games so far. They got a lot of interest and early enthusiasm with Conan, but poorly thought through design cost them a lot of their player base, and the game is still fighting to recover; Anarchy Online was just a fiasco from the start. In both cases, they’ve promised more than they’ve been able to deliver, and cost themselves subscribers in the process.

So it’s difficult to know whether they’ve learnt their lessons and are going to deliver with the Secret World, or whether it’s going to be another horrible mess. Going by what the designers are saying though, it actually has a shot at being the first genuinely post-Warcraft online rpg.

The designer, Ragnar, has been plotting the Secret World for years. It’s an urban fantasy action adventure game, set in — and behind — the real world. Dark forces are breaking through into reality, and the players are called up to help drive it back again, and to get one over their rivals, if chance permits. It’s hardly a unique premise, but it’s not an area that online games have really addressed so far.

But it’s in the details that the really exciting stuff is lurking. No character classes. No levels. No forced progression of play zones depending on character skill. An open world, where a freshly-minted character can play effectively alongside pals who have been going for six months or more. Combat without auto-attacks, where the process is actually engaging. Fluid strategic situations driven by selections from a basket of skills. Gameplay options involving puzzles, story progression, and social interaction. Exploration of the world being a valid way of actually getting to grips with the game. Character costume and appearance being a matter entirely of preference, with no game ramifications at all. Lots of cool toys and effects for more experienced characters, just for the hell of it. A dark, sinister atmosphere. Even the option to learn Voodoo, for God’s sake.

It sounds, on paper, like all of my gaming dreams come true at once.

OK, it may well be horrible. But the game’s marketing campaign to date has been sophisticated, atmospheric, and utterly uncompromising towards the ‘lowest common denominator’. It started with a few teaser web-sites with stylish splash-screen city-scapes. If you clicked on the correct (small) spot in the picture, you got an enigmatic puzzle. Play with it for a while, and you’d discover how it worked mechanically. Actually solving it took a lot of thought. Months later, a bizarre, grainy video gave hints which led to a different site, packed with arcane imagery and a fiendishly tough problem to solve. It’s been a game equivalent of the writer’s “Show, Don’t Tell” rule. The Secret World has laid hidden, where the curious might stumble across it, and get sucked in — a great analogy for the game world itself, and one that suggests perhaps Ragnar really can pull this off.

Today, an ‘inititation test’ appeared on one of the game’s several anagrammatical websites, www.darkdaysarecoming.com. Complete the test, and it tells you which of three rival secret societies you’re best suited to — the ruthless Illuminati, the zealous Knights Templar, or the shadowy Dragons. You can also enter an email address for the chance to win a Beta-test key, which is attracting massive attention.

Significant further details about the game are expected over this weekend’s Penny Arcade eXpo in Seattle, so there’ll be much more available in a few days. In the mean time, the game’s latest cinematic trailer is pure awesome urban fantasy action. Don’t be put off by the Norwegian web-site (Ragnar is a Norwegian chap), the trailer doesn’t have vocals.

One way or another, Dark Days are Coming.