I love Ragnar Tørnquist's stories, and the world that Funcom created for Anarchy Online is truly original and beautiful. I haven't been worried for a split second about TSW, it's going to be marvelous.
The Secret World Updated Q&A - More Templars
Game director Ragnar Tornquist sheds some new light on the Templars of The Secret World.
Norwegian game developer Funcom, which is responsible for Anarchy Online and Age of Conan, is now working on The Secret World, a massively multiplayer game in which you play as a member of an ancient secret society doing battle with occult forces that threaten the world. We previously shared new trailers and some new details on the Dragon and Illuminati societies. For our final update, game director Ragnar Tornquist covers the least secret of the secret societies: the Templars.
GameSpot: Give us an idea of the combat specialties of Templar characters. We've seen a trailer in which a character, presumably belonging to the Templar secret society, uses a shotgun to defend herself from a crowlike monster. Will the Templars specialize in firearms?
Ragnar Tornquist: The Templars are crusaders, and the society operates like a private army. A giant private army. They pretty much have the resources of a small country. They could take Luxembourg in a second; maybe even Belgium; definitely Iceland. And they don't hide it. Take one look at their headquarters: These guys are not subtle. But they've got confidence to spare and the track record to go with it. No one's better at this "war on evil" thing than the Templars. They don't restrict themselves to firearms--anything goes. But players who join the Templars will certainly have access to some pretty cool weapons--shiny, pretty weapons with fancy logos. What's the point in hiding who you are when you rule the world?
GS: And in the trailer, we watched the character use some sort of holy relic to create a burst of white light in her battle with the monster. What kind of occult powers will Templar secret society characters possess? Holy powers to banish dark creatures? Blessings to increase their strength? Healing?
RT: In their eyes, the Templars don't participate in the war on evil--they are the war on evil. And they believe they're protected, untouchable, holy, even, though not necessarily in a religious way. It goes deeper than that--to the very core of the mystery of this world, which is a central part of our story. And they see magic--the occult--as their birthright; something they've inherited, something that's in their blood; the pure blue blood of their ancient order. Players may find themselves looked down on to begin with, but they'll soon fit right in and gain access to the powerful relics that this society has accrued through the centuries.
GS: We understand that members of the Templar secret society are so driven by their beliefs that the group is perhaps the least secret of the game's secret societies. How will this trait affect their questing and dialogue abilities? Will they use intimidation to get the details they need from interrogations?
RT: The Templars are quite arrogant. After dominating much of the secret world for most of the past millennium, this cockiness has hurt them in the past. But there's pressure from within their own ranks to change with the times--to adapt to the new world order--and this dynamic plays a big part in the Templars' story mission. As an initiate of the order, you'll definitely see for yourself how these guys operate, and you'll be able to use their methods to get the information you need. But, yes, they definitely use their massive might to get what they need, and players will get to experience that for themselves.
GS: What sort of player will most enjoy playing as a Templar character?
RT: Anyone who likes structure and order; taking--and giving--commands; being part of a massive and ancient organization; and waging a crusade against evil across the world and throughout time. Also, who doesn't want to march under the Templars' red flag? Best of all, you get to show those bloody Illuminati who truly rules the secret world. Might makes right…right?
GS: Finally, is there anything else you'd like to add about this secret society?
RT: There's so much history to these guys, which makes them an incredibly fun and deep secret society to dig into. Everything you've heard may be true or it may be a clever lie. But the Templars go way back, and they've been involved in pretty much every major religious and political event in Europe during the past thousand years. And further back than that. Much, much further. Think "cradle of the civilization" further. The Dragon may have their mysteries; the Illuminati their incredible wealth and, you know, rocking parties. But the Templars have history; they have depth; and they have the best tailors. And class. Plenty of class.
98 comments
The mature themes in AoC got nerfed very quickly after launch. Conan had so much potential but failed to come through in the end. Funcom may as well drop the 'fun' part in their name and get swallowed up by EA's Games for Preschoolers division. Funcom's aloof attitude towards their game-playing customers has ruined all expectations for me. Pass.
My fear is they prepare a communication campaign based on mystery to make a sort of buzz and sell a maximum at the launch of the game with a content and game mechanic not very well done ... May be there is a market model in this way of doing mmo but i doubt it can last very long time. I played Aoc when it cames out and like many people was disappointed because unlike Funcom sayed the game was nearly empty of all the features they promised. Nevertheless I stayed several month and there were no improvements (at the contrary some patches were disasters). So i don't trust funcom anymore...
Just get to work on something in the Longest Journey series. I thought Dreamfall had a powerful story and some really nice environmental artwork. I know that MMO games make more money but the reason Dreamfall sold badly is because it was released at a bad time- right before the 360 came out.
There isn't much anyone can say about Secret World yet. So i'll join in with the Age of Conan thing because it at least gives us something to expect. Although it was nice to be the first MMO to feature nipples, it's combat system felt daft and inconsistant. I mean, why should an assassin have to press left, right, left, right to perform a combo where a bear shaman just presses button 1 and does some 'whirling tornado' hammer strike knock down move? Also, the defence thing was useless, everyone just kept the shields on the three angles, no one sticks full forward, left or right. Your oppenent will be like "oh look he's stuck all his shields to the left, i'll stab him on the right then" pointless, totally pointless. Also the instances felt hollow, they forgot to give the bosses weapons so they all go around headbutting people, bit silly really. Did look pretty mind, and it had nipples.
@shinyary2: Thanks for the opinion. it´s a good idea, but i stick with my original comment... i know they think that they can make more money from an mmo, but they could´ve at least give us a combination of single+multi game... they would sell to both audiences
I have and never will play WOW that kind of nintendo style cartoon has never appealed to me in the slightest. I played AOC for the simple basic reasons that it was a mature bloodthirsty mmo with a non autocombat realtime system and i was already a fan of the conan strories + they promised amazing things. I think the game had/has great potential and so did loads of others due to the initial sales @ launch. My beef is with Funcom they totaly ignor there community and dont support there games to there full potential they are the ones i blame for all AOC short commings because if they listend to what there community are screaming @ them all this time i would still be playing it now ,part of me is wating to return once they fix the problems i left for ,but over a year later they have done NOTHING!! and most of the problems from day one are still present The guild system is a total embarrassment , the guild renown is a step in the right direction but diplomatic settings between guilds & a custom guild structure and titles are needed. The fact that funcom is releasing this game before fixing there last says everything about there lack of support to there products.as most of there dev team were moved to this and now a skelaton crew work on AOC.
I found AoC to be a far superior game to WoW, both narratively & visually. The combat system is also superior, but I stopped playing AoC when it decided to place an emphasis on gear. I finally stopped playing WoW after about 4 years mainly due to the boredom of the obligatory grinding, the way they murdered the PVP system, but most of all the moronic whining brats. My biggest hope for TSW is that they put an 18 certificate on it & a hefty monthly subscription so that all the whining WoW children stay the hell away from it.
Everyone is of course entitltes to their opinion, and here is mine. AoC is a great MMO, buggy yes, not perfect yes, broken? far from it. It gives a sense of interaction with ite new combat scheme, great visuals, and all round good lore. I loved the Conan Books and when the game is patched up, will be a great representation of the book. WoW on the other hand has made a culture of whiners and addicts. I was a WoW fan...for a good few years...and it wasn't until i took a nice long break from it, only to pick it uop and realise i wasn't having any fun at all...AoC i can return to and i still love it. AoC good..not perfect WoW, needs to bury the hatchet and just stay the way it is...and not expand its head anymore...But dont get me wrong i love Blizzard and i never knew a thing about Funcom...but i have had no probles with staff from FC and they can tend to sort things out quickly..other than blizzard who are flooded with millions and cannot obviously handle the line of complaints or support needs.
All aboard to join the FAILCOM train. AGE of conan could have been the most amazing MMO of all time but Failcom totally messed it up by holding there community in such contempt and. I can't count the amount of times ive seen awesome suggestions and improvments made by those in the AOC forums to help FC get the game in order just for FC to cast them aside like they were worthless comments i guess then knew better huh. And it so it now seems that FC's new method of fixing neglected games is to throw them & the community to the 4 winds and start making a new game ....so tell me what do they learn form this ,with all the effort they put in to making a new fail game they could have atleast put the effort in to make the last one sucseed first. Judging form there last MMO dont expect even the basic MMO features that are common to most because AOC was broken form day one and still is now,they create more bugs with every new patch and then dont fix them either it takes almost 6 months fix the most simple of things. This company dont deserve to be in the MMO business PERIOD!!!. AOC fails = Funcom Fails. keep you £ for the better MMOS comming out in the new year i most certianly will. FC never again dam liers
Having played AOC for over a year and being a fan of R. E. Howards original storys tha game had so much potential and in some ways still does But only if FUNCOM pull there heads outta there asses. I hold funcom solely responsible for why AOC is failing now & i have never had the missfortune of playing an mmo by a company that ignores its community so much no matter how loud they shout about what impovments they need and the content they would like to see Infact say anything negative and the power crazy admins delete or close your threads. From launch day they lied about what was in the game including drunken brawling which never got added, dx10 graphics which were implmented a year later. Time and time again failcom ignore the community until they just give up asking and quit the game hoping to return when they finally get around to fixing issues. Well over year later not 1 of the 12 issues im wating to be fixed have been including. Basic guild rank functions & diplomatic settings between them. OP casters. Gladiator arenas which was being asked for day 1. Dedicated pvp zones and working segies. Proper mounted combat. Better guild citys. and fix the sound bug over a year later still there.!!! Better pvp mini games that are not full of premades caster groups. there is so much potential in this game if only they gave a dam , IMO funcom deserves to go down when AOC truly fails and i for one wil NEVER toutch anoghter FUNCOM product EVER.
i dont trust funcom anymore, i think ill pass this game. and i lost all of my hope for a new good mmo..
I don't know about you but the whole time i was reading this i was thinking "Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed Assassin's Creed"
One way to do things is to make a game and keep making it the best it can be. Like AoC, it was nothing good but thay got it a bit better. I guess this is the kill blow for AoC. Try focusing on one game this time. Take your time and then when its finished, KEEP working on impoving it for 2 or 3 years.
Ok AO was ahead of its time and it showed. AoC was a WoW clone cash in attempt and it showed. I know you guys have some talent at Funcom, I have been playing your crap for 10 years now. So FFS do this one right. Take your time, forget appealing to 12 year olds and make something decent. Focus on your vision not on what your marketing suits are telling you, they dont know dick, if they did AoC would have been better. Now get on with it and DONT COCK IT UP!!
im a fan of power and depth... I really like these crazy guys, even if their home is in a ridiculous country. Plus, you cant even go doggin on SMG,s man... aughta light you up with a couple.
Good luck with this one Funcom, u fixed AoC, now look into it that u'll rellease Secret World FIXED at the start.
@ iRevive - Relax there "happy". This is a site where people can submit their opinion on what ever the subject is, I did just that. I didn't break any rules. If u cant take peoples different opinions then YOU should not be here.
ProVail - Dude, its a concept art. Pack your sh*t and leave than, ppl sure dont want to play with a complete jerk
if i played mmo's this would be it. definitley. it looks awesome. templars! illuminati! whaor this has my name all over it!! ahh well, shame i wont touch an mmo with someone elses appendage. next!
just what we need, ANOTHER mmo, these developers gotta get their heads outta the corporate trash heap here and quit milking us for cash and just deliver. This is gonna b a wash to WOW...AGAIN.LIKE EVERY OTHER MMO THAT COMES OUT.
Neo Sarevok - If you played a Funcom game, you'd know they are incapable of making a quality game. They took the best IP in Age of Conan and made it horrible. I used to think Sony was bad, but once I realized what games are like outside the SOE empire I quickly changed my mind. Funcom can come up with some good ideas, but they inevitably ruin them will even more ridiculous ones coupled with horrific PR and CS... I swore to never again invest in a game under the Funcom brand... But chances are I'll succumb to the desire to try this, I'll waste my money to remind myself how incompetent Funcom is and I'll hate myself for it again...
Yea that's great logic people... fault the game just because it shares the name "Funcom." I'd reserve judgment until we know more about the game.
A game made by Funcom...lmao!...yeah, I wont be falling for that again. On release they will proably only have 4 guns and 2 different armor types...AOC still sucks and it's been out for over a year! File for BK now FUNCOM!
"They could take Luxembourg in a second; maybe even Belgium; definitely Iceland." Yeeey Belgium :P
@ PandaBear86 I work 40 hours a week, I'm married, I have a daughter, and I still have time to play an MMO. MMO's are only time sinks if you have no self control.
@Oracleas: I disagree. I think the reason they make MMOs is because they think they can make a *lot* more money on them and it's a continual revenue source. Blizzard literally makes millions a month from WOW--money which they can then pour into their games with great single player (a la Starcraft 2). The fact that Blizzard has completely cornered the market there is another issue entirely. I think this has potential though. I'm a huge fan of Ragnar Tornquist and I'd to see this be a huge success so he can go back to working on Dreamfall Chapters, which is what I really care about from him. It would also be great because I'm sure those games could benefit greatly from the added revenue from the MMO--I can't imagine their grant is covering all of their costs.
MMO = fail. How anybody with a full-time job and a girlfriend can somehow invest time into an MMO (games with no endings or sense of accomplishment) is beyond me. Just stick with regular games like Mass Effect or Dragon Age, unless you sit at all home all day and have no job or girlfriend.
That's the problem with most MMO developers. Their working on 4-5 MMO's at once. Their not going to get lucky & take off with one of them.
Um from what i've seen from Assassins creed aren't templars spos to have swords and crap like that. I dont think a modern day templar would be such a great idea.....
@RussianRAGE: This is the game producer Ragnar ALWAYS wanted to make. Their experience (bad, I agree) with AoC will help better this game, and from the stuff we've seen on it, it's going to create a whole new style of MMOs where grinding/quest-fetching isn't the status quo. Looking forward to this one.
RussianRAGE: i agree 100% with you, they need to stop making MMO´s and start giving us some single-players... this game will probably suck, but not that hard.. ill buy it. i think the reason they make so many mmo´s is that they don´t have to think so much about a story, gameplay (yeah, press an enemy to attack and just wait for it), it´s very easy to make, and it makes quick money. funcom has really good ideas, with AO and now this game (which i can just imagine playing offline... game of the year) they need to invest in making an offline game, no more MMO´s!!! anyway, great comment RussianRAGE
Templars = freemasonry = bunch of guys who drink and pretend they make a difference Illuminati = hidden, most likely fake = bunch of rich guys who make a difference without knowing it.
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The Secret World's puzzles, storytelling, and atmosphere make for captivating exploration--but occasional frustrations threaten the journey.
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The Secret World
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- Publisher(s): Electronic Arts
- Developer(s): Funcom
- Genre: Role-Playing
- Release:
- ESRB: M
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