While many of my friends are already in The Secret World’s third act, I’m still a hardcore resident of Solomon Island, mostly because I’m too stubborn to leave before I’ve done all the quests.
Now granted, part of this is due to the limited time I have to game, but it’s also because I’ve hit the speedbump known as Blue Mountain. I think every MMO has a zone like this: One that is less interesting than the others, with a poorer quest design and flow, annoying mobs, and janky difficulty levels. It’s a zone that you can’t wait to leave, and after the fun of Kingsmouth and Savage Coast, it’s a letdown.
From talking with people, sentiment seems to be near-universal on this zone. I’ve had people recommend that I just skip it entirely, go to Egypt and then perhaps come back another day. But that would bug me so much, so I’m putting my head down and plowing through this as gamely as possible.
Blue Mountain’s greatest sins are that it really ramps up the difficulty level when it comes to mobs and the sheer density of them. I still see combat as some sort of side activity in TSW, so I don’t want to be stopping every two seconds for yet another battle with a winged insect. Oh, speaking of the Ak’abs, can we agree that these are proof that there’s a disgruntled Funcom employee in a basement who hates all of mankind and wants to see us suffer? Geez, I hate these mobs, with their constant charging attacks (which gets exponentially worse if you fight more than one), their aggro radius and wide leash.
In my opinion, Egypt should’ve been a gear check for players, not Blue Mountain, as many folks are still trying to get a handle on their builds and gear up at this point. The zone also needs a little more pop to it. I hate traveling off-road there, since there are so many ups and downs and maze-like crags to navigate, and little is there to capture my imagination.
And while I’m on a somewhat negative streak, I want to talk about something that’s nagging my brain lately. I’m starting to wonder if there’s too much in the way of horror themes vs. the game’s supposed core, conspiracy theories come to life. Yes, there’s some crossover between the two, but after a while the entirety of Solomon Island feels like a big survival horror game and far less of conspiracies and secret societies and whatnot. Within these three zones, we get multiple haunted houses, a gateway to hell, zombies, c’thulu, evil fog, nasty serial killers, a haunted amusement park, and so on. All of which, don’t get me wrong, are quite cool. But it’s so much horror and so little conspiracy anything that I’m often wondering if I’ve stumbled into the wrong game.
The horror should be a supporting member of the cast, not the main attraction. By midway through Solomon Island, I feel completely disconnected with the Templars and anything that has to do with them — except when I get called back for special missions, of course. Maybe this will change in the next two areas, but considering that the third is Transylvania, I’m not holding out hope.
Anyway, right now those are my two biggest complaints about this otherwise engaging title, and it’s nothing insurmountable in my mind.
“Oh, speaking of the Ak’abs, can we agree that these are proof that there’s a disgruntled Funcom employee in a basement who hates all of mankind and wants to see us suffer?”
Yes, we can. Absolutely.
“can we agree that these are proof that there’s a disgruntled Funcom employee in a basement who hates all of mankind and wants to see us suffer?”
You will see proof positive of this when you try to do the Sabotage mission “Cost of Magic” later on in Transylvania.
I feel the same way about the savage coast right now. The mobs in the forest are way too close and if you try to avoid the charge you end up bumping into another mob so now your not only trying to avoid one charge but two charging mobs. Then you’ll end up picking up a third and game is pretty much over at this point. I don’t mind ramping up the difficulty, but lets make it so you don’t have to deal with 4 mobs at once while working out the strategy to survive one.
I also agree that it seems more like a MMO based on Left 4 Dead than a secret world.
lol I have hated Blue Mountain so much that now that I’m finally done with it and leveled past the zone I actually sort of miss it. That has to be proof MMO players are masochists right?
Blue Mountain is quite a letdown compared to the other 2 zones, but really – what could they have added? It’s all been done in the first 2 zones. I did every quest I could find up to Blue Mountain, then just ran through the main storyline and went on to Egypt. I’d recommend you do the same.
Egypt has lots of really interesting quests, but definitely lacks the horror element in Solomon Island. By the time you get really itching for more horror, you’re in Transylvania and you’ll love it.
Templar? The only time you’ll actually remember you’re one is when you do PVP, and possibly in chat.
You’re a real masochist Syp. Especially if you also insist on sticking with dps oriented weapons instead of switching to something like sword/assault rifle.
For everything else that is irksome about Blue Mountain I believe its main sin is the whole New England setting wearing out it’s welcome. By the time you’re done with Kingsmouth and Savage Coast you’re probably spent anywhere from 20 to 40 hours almost entirely spent within that one single setting and it’s just tired by the time BM rolls around.
Not to downplay the other annoying bits like the bugged quests, the bugged moths with no leash range, the general difficulty ramp, the weirdly tuned quests like that damn mansion one or the one with all the shadow wolves, and the really irritating proliferation of solo instance missions. But I like to think I would have been able to handle those eccentricities with greater aplomb were I not also overdosed on Lovecraft County at the same time.
I did enjoy going back to New England to do the new quests this week though. Though true to form the investigation in Blue Mountain was the most annoying of the lot. Bloody visual morse code decryption AND a musical puzzle in a single mission should be classified as double jeopardy.
I didn’t mind Blue Mountain; I particularly liked the questgivers there, particularly Marrianne Chen, who’ll make that fellow at Innsmouth Academy seems like a beacon of sanity. The story finally fully coalesced there, too, so several loose ends being tied up was quite satisfying.
The ak’ab can be a pain, but just require some lateral movement from time to time. Their density can be an issue, and I’ve had plenty of mispulls as a result, but with more practice you’ll learnt to just fight them in a tight circle, dodging consistently around but keeping them more or less in the same place.
I, too, like to finish every quest in a zone. I’ve got 3 more side quests and the Franklin Investigation quest left in BM before I leave for the sunnier shores of Egypt. I won’t exactly MISS Blue Mountain, but I don’t consider it significantly worse than the previous zones, either.
I guess nothing is for everyone, and everything is for someone…
I have to pretty well agree with most of the posters above. The New England setting is awesome for say, the first 40 hours or so. A third zone seems like a bit much. Blue Mountain gets better as you learn the it (e.g., go around the bridge when you first enter the zone, not over it) and get better at fighting those damn moths. But the difficulty spike combined with the fact that it’s overall just not as interesting/ novel as the previous two zones really put me off when I first got there. The quest chain that ends in killing the moth matron had me cursing every developer that ever worked on the game (though in the end it turned out I had misinterpreted something pretty key).
I’ve probably done about half the quests in the zone, but I am not sure I’m stubborn enough to finish it out. I’m likely going to finish the main storyline and head to Egypt some time this weekend.
Never had a problem with Blue Mountain personally. I found the difficulty in line with previous and later zones. But I’ve heard too many horror stories from fellow cabal-mates and on the forums to discount my experience as mainstream.
Blue Mountain is my least favorite zone in TSW, followed closely by The City of the Sun God. I enjoy them less than the other zones for similar reasons, mentioned multiple times above: the zone layout makes travel challenging until you know it well, and the quests often feel very similar to what’s come before.
Having said that, I do still enjoy Blue Mountain, and there’s some really fun stuff there. The Franklin Mansion’s haunting (literally) backstory is pretty spiffy. I largely avoid the Moon Bog though; that place just isn’t much fun to me. The Orochi camp is memorable as well, generally in a good way.
I’m sure you know my thoughts on Blue Mountain from my previous comments. The zone and the AkAb are directly responsible for Mrs Bhagpuss deciding TSW isn’t for her. I’m pretty sure that had we skipped it completely and gone straight to Egypt from Savage Coast she’d still be playing.
It’s a shame you aren’t willing to go to Egypt with Blue Mountain unfinished. Not only is Egypt orders of magnitude more fun, with much more interesting characters and vastly more interesting storylines, it’s much easier. All I did to bypass the gear bump was farm the three-dot group mobs near the entrance to Agartha for a session and I had enough T6/7 gear to get going. Took me a couple of hours. That was before the AH, of course. Now you could just buy your gear.
Once you have mostly T6 gear you can start plowing through everything. Without exception all mobs in Egypt are easier weight-for-weight than their Blue Mountain equivalents. Some are stupidly easy. I’m looking at you, ghouls. (Actually, top tip, anywhere you find ghouls they are stupidly easy – number one farming mob for bootstrapping in a new zone).
I agree with Foolsage that the Franklin Mansion shouldn’t be missed but it will be as much fun, probably more, if you come back and do it in Q9/10 gear. The rest of Blue Mountain, apart from the main story, really you should skip for now and come back to if you must when you’re overgeared. If you insist on doing the whole thing at level I would bet you’d be more likely to give up playing TSW altogether than finish it with appetite left to carry on.
I didn’t have too many issues with Blue Mountain. I completed the missions mostly grouped with fellow guild members so we sort of breezed through it without any issues. If you think Blue Mountain is hard you will absolutely hate the second area of Transylvania. Grouping becomes a necessity rather than an option. I wouldn’t call this a casual player friendly game.
My suggestion: Group up.
More than a “gear check” or anything, I think that Blue Mountains is the perfect place to play along with people. This smoothens the “annoying” part (i.e. fighting one’s way through the mobs) and thus eases the feeling about the zone.
More generally, this game is much much better when played in group. As said a french game magazine: “Of course, you can play TSW alone. But the difference in terms of fun with playing in a group is the same as reading Call of Cthulu’s rulesbook vs playing a game with friends, beer and pizza”.
I’m one of those people that did BM solo, before the patch that made some of the areas a bit more manageable. It was rage-inducing, at times, but since you (like me) do 100% of the missions in the previous zones, you should be ok with the difficulty. I left BM by skipping two quests: the chainsaw one, which I found impossible, and the Filth Amendment which is clearly geared for QL10 players. I’ll certainly get back there soon-ish to take care of unfinished business…