In honor of the Halloween season and the upcoming The Park release, here are seven creepy screenshots from The Secret World!
Whatever happened in the bathroom of Susie’s Diner has always disturbed me. I think it came from the toilet.
Considering you only see this scene when you’re dead… it’s unnerving. Reminds me of Blair Witch Project a bit.
When all of the car lights snap on in the middle of the pitch-black parking garage…
The Black House’s poltergeist, while dead.
The misshapen and lumpy design of the Bogeyman always struck me as monumentally creepy.
Taking something that used to be human and then twisting it somehow is one of this game’s fortes.
I really, really do not want to go into there.
Bio Break 
The Secret World is a game that had so much potential with it’s story, setting, and unique skill design, but has clunky, slow combat and may have been better as a single-player game.
Since the game is buy to play, character progression has been smoothed out and most of the content (with the exception dungeons and raids, which provide loot you don’t need for anything but this kind of gameplay) can be done solo, what’s stopping you from playing it as a single player game? I mean, most single player games by now also have the option to play with friends, the difference is more of a label than anything else.
And on the topic of “clunky combat”, this statement will forever remain a mystery to me. I can name a number of shortcomings of this game, but i never saw a reason to complain about combat, once i understood the character system and managed to create a reasonable setup. (Which still was far from “good”, but you never stop learning. )
Actually i find combat in TSW to be more cohesive and sensible than in the other MMO i actively play: GW2. Admittedly, combat in GW2 is way more flashy and spectacular, but in TSW it is more consistent and provides essential information much better.
Yet for some reason, people repeat the “clunky combat” statement, but nobody ever was able to explain the issue to me in a way which does not boil down to “many other MMOs use the very same mechanics and are fine, but i begrudge TSW for also using them without giving them some flashy names”.
Sylow, I have already seen others explain their issues with TSW combat and I don’t think it is fair to say the arguments boil down as you describe, but I’ll give it a shot here.
Some of my issues with “clunky combat” in The Secret World:
–Impact
This seems to be specific to the type of weapon and other players tell me they don’t experience this with things like the rifle, but fighting with fist and blades I have not felt like most skills give any feel you are actually fighting anything. For most* of my skills there is no feedback beyond watching the enemy health bars tick down.
(*there are specific skills that do knockdowns, pulls, etc where it has a much better…visceral?…impact to the combat, but for the basics, eh)
–Targeting
NOTE: I hear there may be addons to assist with the quirks and bugs of targeting in TSW, but my complaint here is about the game as provided.
Targeting while in combat in TSW is shaky at best and downright dangerous at worst. Again, some of this may come down to play style and choice of weapon, but when trying to use the heals on fist weapons it is very annoying to get a “can not assist selected target” or whatever just because the game decided that instead of your assist target being yourself or a group member, it picks the enemy or an inanimate object. Or, when in a big crowd, you think you are healing yourself, but actually end up healing some random person you just happened to face for 2 seconds 5 minutes ago. Gah!
–Mouse-look/target mode
When it comes to games with active or semi-active) combat, I have come to like using what some call mouse-look mode. TSW lets you do this, but it seems to be a somewhat incomplete feature.
You can target using the center of the screen, but it seems to only work when that was exactly where you had your cursor when you went into mouse-look.
There is no easy way to temporarily use the cursor if needed to do something like click a loot roll button on screen. (to be fair, the only game I have seen do this in a way I like is DDO; I am finding that Wildstar has the same issue)
Switching targets can seem a bit random, but I think this might have to do with what I mentioned above with where the cursor happened to be when you went into mouse-look
–Movement
This is not always a problem specific to combat, but movement is TSW can seem somewhat “floaty”. When fighting multiple enemies in an area that is not flat, this can lead to some interesting situations where you might have trouble avoiding environmental damage because you just…can’t…jump…on…that…ROCK! Or whatever.
Now, overall TSW is still one of my favorite games. I love the missions, the atmosphere, the dialogue, even the interaction of the skills in a deck…but when it comes to the actual combat, I can only say I tolerate it because everything else is so good. I hope that explains why I see it as I do.
These are great shots! Another place that always creeps me out is the Langmore Bridge in Kingsmouth. If you got there in the spirit world, you’ll see people hanging from the rafters. I can’t ever cross that bridge without thinking of that. Not my screen, but a good shot of it below:
Hey, Tanek. My response to yours was so long, I posted it on my own blog: http://ihavetouchedthesky.blogspot.com/2015/10/another-dead-horse-clunky-combat-in-tsw.html It’s argumentative, but hopefully you don’t see it as hostile. đŸ™‚
@Tanek: Interesting. You are the first who mentions some points which i can understand. But in detail:
– Impact: i just don’t see the difference on what you describe to any other MMO out there. No matter which MMO i look at, it’s always “swing at air, with perhaps an enemy being there”, damage number, done.
–Targeting: i haven’t experienced that problem on offensive targets the way you describe it since a while, but i agree that when the game launched this issue was big. On defensive targets, yes, it can happen that you click on something friendly out of curiosity and then have it as defensive target instead of yourself. That’s something to learn and handle and i guess i have an advantage here, as warhammer online used the same system of offensive and defensive target and i learned to handle it there already before coming to TSW. But yes, i guess for somebody who doesn’t come with some experience there, this system indeed can be troublesome.
–Mouse-look/target mode: Yea. It’s crap. Never use it, so i also don’t consider it. But i also think that very few people really use it. (It’s not like you even have something like that in most MMOs. )
–Movement: Now this is something i really don’t experience. I get stuck on whatever way more often in GW2, and also remember several other MMOs there, where people never say one word about movement problems, which had way bigger problems here.
Wow. I should’ve read Rowans article before posting. He writes almost the same as i did. đŸ˜€
Alright, you guys talked me into buying this. Not like I don’t have an entire hard drive full of games I need to finish and I need a new one like I need another hole in the head. đŸ˜‰
Thanks for the recommendation!
Hmmm, is it wrong that my reaction to the diner screenshot is “I am SO not ordering the curry!” đŸ™‚