• Age of Conan:
  • House of Crom has been released. This “is a massive new location, with a lot of great new content for maximum level players to enjoy. [...] This epic location brings with it many new dynamic encounters [and] new loot”. House of Crom is composed of two dungeons: ‘The Threshold of Divinity’ (“a social dungeon for up to four six-player groups”) and ‘The Vile Nativity’ (“six-player group dungeon”). “These areas are the largest indoor dungeons [the AoC team] have created to date”. Source: ageofconan.com – House of Crom

• Bloodline Champions:
  • The Steelseries Sensei Winter Tournament started on 15th December 2011. The teams ‘x6tence.ESET’, ‘ZEPH NO DISBAND TEAM’, ‘MrDandiktory’, ‘iShareMyBrewnArrows’, ‘YEAH BUDDY’, ‘Mid Range Mayhem’, ’4Kings’ and ‘Godzilla Goes Sweden’ qualified. For the record, ‘x6tence’ is the team which won the Bloodline Champions tournament at DreamHack:winter. “Due to technical issues causing lag for some of the players”, it has been “decided with the qualified teams to postpone the tournament until the problems are solved.”
    Source:
    bloodlinechampions.com – Announcement: Steelseries Sensei Winter Tournament! \o/
    bloodlinechampions.com – SteelSeries Sensei Winter Tournament Finals – Sun Jan 22nd
  • The game has turned one year old. In order to celebrate this, players got a birthday gift and there has been a “25% sale on everything in the Marketplace” (“except Bloodcoins and Bloodcoin boosts”), “an extra 50% Blood Coin gain over the weekend” of 14th and 15th January and a tournament. Source: bloodlinechampions.com – Happy Birthday BLC! \o/
  • A picture of the bloodline ‘Headhunter’ has been released. Source: bloodlinechampions.com – Weekly update #4!

GAME INFORMATION

• In Remyx99′s article ‘Martin Bruusgaard’s holiday answers‘ brought new information.
  • Clothes and outfits:
    

    Clothes will be available from vendors, shops and marketplaces, but many items will also be reward based. One thing I’m particularly excited about is the template deck outfits. Template decks are a set of powers that enable the player to fulfill a certain role, and this is comparable to Magic the Gathering’s starter decks. On completion of any of these templates the player is given an outfit that reflects what that deck is. So for instance, if a player completes the Ninja deck, he or she is given a Ninja costume. All of the templates are faction specific, meaning that there will be different outfits for Templars, Illuminati or Dragon!

  • Cross faction organizations:
    

    We have plans for umbrella organisations that can go cross faction, but this will not be in for launch. We need to focus on getting the core gameplay tight, but we plan to make steady, and plenty of, content updates.”

    Then, he added on DDCG:

    All I can say is that it won’t be in for launch, and if you want to be 100% sure to be in the same cabal as your buddies, you should roll the same Secret Society.

    With a studio audacious enough to break from now long established concepts such as classes and levels, one could speculate about plans to make factions face internal dissensions and re-group differently. Time will tell…

  Source:
  crygaia.net – Martin Bruusgaard’s holiday answers
  Martin Bruusgaard’s post on DDCG

• Senior Designer Brent Ellison explained how dungeons are designed. “Dungeons in The Secret World are challenging and intense, an opportunity for players to test their builds, skills and teamwork to the utmost. They serve as very focused content, in sharp contrast to the wide sandboxes of the playfields. In a dungeon, players live and die by the strength of their team and their ability to strategise to meet the odds.” More details on TheSecretWorld.com.Source: TheSecretWorld.com – BLOG: Dungeon Making Process

• Week of the Illuminati:
  • Screenshots and artworks have been revealed here and here on thesecretworld.com. Source: thesecretworld.com – Week of the Illuminati is upon us
  • The Illuminati’s backstory and one of their ranking missions have been unveiled on MMORPG.com. Source: thesecretworld.com – In-depth look at Illuminati backstory and ranking mission
  • An Illuminati video has also been made available. Source: funcom_tsw’s tweet
  • IGN interviewed Lead Content Designer Joel Bylos about the Illuminati here. Source: funcom_tsw’s tweet
  • Lead Content Designer Joel Bylos attended a Q&A session organized on Facebook.
    • Nathan Hart’s question asking for more insight into Kirsten Geary got the following answer:
      

      “Kirsten is the model Illuminati – ruthlessly capable. The last decade of Illuminati stars all owe their start to Kirsten, and usually end up owing many other things to her as well. She is upfront about the viciousness of the organization – she honestly wants her charges to succeed, not least because of the kudos she racks up because of it, but she is absolutely prepared to sign a death warrant on your third strike.”

    • Sarah Thomas’s question “Will there ever be a chance to befriend those in the Illuminati if you’re not part of it or is the rivalry in the game pretty set in stone?” got the following answer:
      

      “Players in the Illuminati are free to form alliances (PvE grouping) with who they will. NPC’s in the Illuminati will talk to the members of other factions – even work with them if they need to – but it would be a stretch to say that they will ever be friends.”

    • Reed Dickerson got the following answer to his question “How will the Illuminati being located in New York affect gameplay? Will there be chances to interact with city?”:
      

      “Players will travel to locations within the city to complete some missions, but perhaps you refer to other types of interactions? I can give one example: Very early in the game, the player follows a trail of Illuminati surveillance cameras through the city. Later the player will be able to access a computer which allows them to view live feeds of the city streets through those very cameras.”

    The complete Q&A session can be read on TSW’s Facebook page.

• The Hydra Initiative interviewed Lead Programmer Øystein Eftevaag who gave interesting details:

  • HI:In a video released in March of this year, an investigation mission was showcased. In that mission, the player had to use their browser to look up information on said individual. Will The Secret World still be implementing an in-game browser? How will this work? Since you used Google Chrome, would that be the browser of choice or would the player be allowed to use their default browser? Will use of the in-game browser affect performance? If the in-game browser is not implemented, will users with one monitor (who play in full-screen) be able to alt+tab effectively?
    ØE: The in-game browser is already in and working, and is looking great! Due to the way browsers have to interact with our client there can’t be a choice of browser, unfortunately. In practice, it’s a version of Chrome (wrapped in a 3rd party framework called Awesomium) which is tightly integrated with our client; and not a browser which is already installed on the player’s machine. When the browser is closed, there will be no performance impact at all. Even when it’s running, the browser runs in a separate process and not have any noticeable impact.

    Note Eve Online uses Awesomium since 1st December 2009, which should prove the technology is mature.

  • HI: nVIDIA APEX was stated to be implemented as well. Is the APEX system going to be used in The Secret World?
    ØE: APEX is something we’re looking at with great interest, but it’s not something we’ll have ready by the time The Secret World is released.

  Source:
  hydraInitiative.com – Interview with Lead Programmer Øystein Eftevaag
  wikipedia.org – Eve Online: Dominion expansion

• Lead Designer Martin Bruusgaard talked about gear and chakras:
  • Gear:
    

    There will not be pvp-gear in TSW. You will be able to obtain gear through pvping, but they will not have a particular pvp stat(s). Power wise they can compete with the best PvE gear.

  • Chakras:
    

    In addition to stats, they will have triggers like:”Every time you block an incoming attack, you knock the attacker down.”
    “Your crowd control abilities last 10% longer”.
    “Every 10th time you receive healing, you do a pbAoE” (imagine that with leech heals from assault rifle…)

    These arent abilities. These are stats/triggers on chakras!

  He then added that “getting the right gear to complement your build will be an important part of deckbuilding, and when building group builds, and that’s why we have gear in pvp”.

  Source: Martin Bruusgaard’s post on DDCG

• An article on MMORPG.com, pictures and a video all about the Blue Mountain have been released. This “is one of The Secret World’s New England areas”. Source: TheSecretWorld.com – Newsletter #8 is out!

• Senior Community Manager Oliver ‘Tarib’ Kunz confirmed ‘The Secret War’ is still on the agenda. Source: Oliver Kunz’s post on DDCG

GENERAL INFORMATION

• The Hydra Initiative launched the last of its three bi-monthly contests, in partnership with The Secret World Uncovered. This time, contenders will have to produce a faction-based fanvid. “No use of previously released material from Funcom and The Secret World (i.e. videos and pictures)” is allowed. The prize is an XFX NVIDIA GTX 540 TI. The contest is open to all factions and will run from 2nd February to 18th March. Source: Announcement

• Hermetic Order of Trinity describes itself as “the largest and the oldest Polish Cabal”. It numbers 20 members and was founded last 24th September 2011. The cabal focuses on PvE, RP and, to a lesser extent, PvP. Announcement

• Knights of Astoria is “organizing a Valentine’s Day event”. Contenders must produce a letter or a comic or a story fulfilling the requirements detailed in the announcement of the contest. “The Winner will receive a $25 iTunes Gift Card”. The contest is open to all factions and will run until “February 20th 11:59 PM 2012 (EST)”. Source: Announcement

• Exodus-ICCP is the sister community website of the Russian-speaking cabal Exodus and is where the guild reports information about the game. Announcement exodus-iccp.org

CABALS

• Duplicity is a social and casual cabal founded and led by Luisa. Although it is based in Europe, it accepts members from everywhere. Its goal is “to have fun, explore the content of The Secret World and progress at a steady rate”. The cabal wants to be friendly and do some light RP without drama. Applicants must be at least 18 years old but exceptions can be made depending on the application quality. Announcement duplicity.guildlaunch.com

• Les Fiscalistes is cancelled. Its leader Mathias Brightward thanked everyone in a last post here. Announcement

• Misfits Asylum is a small cabal focusing on PvE and PvP (no RP). It “accept[s] both hardcore and casual gamers.” Using Ventrilo is compulsory. Most members are American. Announcement misfitsasylum.enjin.com

CABALS

• LooT Junkies will be present in all aspects of the game and is looking for active and mature players. Both casual and hardcore gamers are accepted. The guild is however limited to the US Eastern time zone. Announcement lootjunkies.com

• G&M Inc is a cabal doing RP, PvE and casual PvP. RP is a key element in this cabal. Announcement gandminc.freeforums.org

CABALS

• Lunar Dynasty finally announced itself under its current name. For the record, this guild was initially known as Envy, then as Last Centuria. Announcement  lunar-dynasty.com

• Exodus is a Russian-speaking cabal focusing on both PvE and PvP. Speaking Russian natively is however not required to join. The cabal also has a community sister website where it reports information about the game. Announcement exodustsw.org

It’s Lead Designer, Martin Bruusgaard. Everything is on track so far and all is as planned, he says, as he teases us by sharing just how much everyone is enjoying “playing” the game – just as much as making sure it gets finished in time. It’s all good and well meant, and they are surely eager to show us their baby soon enough. It won’t be long now, and within that short period there are still a lot of secrets we would like to learn about this world.

He makes sure to calm us down by telling us that the offices never are completely empty, not even in the holidays.

“Holidays or not, you will always find someone at the office working on their game. People are incredibly dedicated. We feel such ownership over what we do, and we know that in just a few months a heap ton of people will play our game, and everyone wants it to be as perfect as it can be. A developer might be 99% done with something, but he will still come in on his day off just to get that 1% perfect. This is something I love about working for Funcom, and in the game industry in general; seeing the dedication and the hard work people put into the games they make.”

That is so nice to hear for any player and fan, but holidays  can often bring more to the player as they often come with special events. Martin tells us that TSW will be no different, but it might not be as predictable as a normal holiday event:

“I remember an event from when I was playing Anarchy-Online (before I worked at Funcom), where the Dust Brigade (an NPC faction) suddenly started assassinating the biggest guild leaders on the server as a part of an event. I remember how the rumors started to spread and how it engaged a whole server, and I find stuff like that incredibly fun.”

Fun indeed! Often events are not just a holiday thing and the addition of something that’s a little tougher can make a game far better. It can create more fun than normal for any player participating. Special events with something behind them are great for the community and create a spark that makes everyone happy.

But what will those happy people look like? Of course they will have big smiles on their faces, but they can’t walk around nude either. Well, in this game maybe they can, but usually everyone likes to have their own style when it comes to in-game clothing. We have heard lots about how many pieces of clothing there are in the game, so everyone will be able to look the way they want to, but we still haven’t heard how we can get hold of them. It seems like we won’t just be able to go shopping for them right away either:

“Some of the clothes are purchasable from vendors, some are available in the item shop, but most of it is reward based. One thing I’m particularly excited about is the template deck outfits. Template decks are a set of powers that enables the player to fulfill a certain role, and this is comparable to Magic the Gatherings starter decks. On completion of any of these templates the player is given an outfit that reflects what that deck is. So for instance if a player completes the Ninja deck, he or she is given a Ninja costume. And all of the templates are faction specific, meaning that there will be different outfits for Templars, Illuminati or Dragon!”

And let’s face it, who doesn’t want to have a ninja costume to run around in? Yeah, thats what I thought! Of course we all want one. Many are sure to come with mandatory bragging rights. Showing of that new cool outfit, throwing out some cool dance emotes while at it… or not…

Did you know Martins favorite ice-cream is "Maple Walnut"?

But what if our friends are in other factions? We already know we will have to fight it out in PvP on game realease, but there are hints of more. In PvE it is confirmed that we can create collaborative parties with friends or help out anyone that needs a hand. Helping out is a key to defeat the evil that lurks in The Secret World, regardless of the faction the one you are helping is from. But there might be more, and it’s exciting to hear Martin give little hints about what is to come after release as well:

“We have plans for umbrella organisations that can go cross faction, but this will not be in for launch. We need to focus on getting the core gameplay tight, but we plan to make steady, and plenty of, content updates.”

Ohhh yeah! Lots of steady, plentiful content updates! We like the sound of that, but we aren’t forgetting the idea of umbrella organisations, which is already a pretty neat addition to the faction specific cabals we will have on release. What’s equally as neat, Martin says, are the sounds and music of the game:

“Funcom has always had an amazing sound team, and fantastic composers, and The Secret World brings it to a new level. It’s hard for me to describe the sound, but it’s beautiful, eerie and motivating depending on where you are and what you’re doing. We also have a really cool system for the combat music where the music intensifies depending on how many enemies you’re fighting, what type of enemies you’re fighting, if you any get adds etc.”

Aaarrrggghhh!!! How ready are we to see, feel and touch these systems, and to explore a world filled to the rim with secrets and mystery? We keep comforting ourselves with the fact that after years of waiting it’s not long now, and there is still so much we dont know about the game. Soon™, I hear a voice in the back of my head say,  maybe soon™ we will know more about crafting and character customization.  4-5 months is not that long, but still lots of time to release loads of information, and the community is eagerly waiting for it, just as the developers are eager to get the game out on time. For some it might give them chills of the good kind:

“I hope it’s going to be like when we launched Conan. The whole team gathered in a room and watched server statistics. Might sound weird, but I got really emotional seeing tons of people pouring into the server and into our game we worked so hard on. I felt really proud and happy, and hopefully I can feel the same this time!”

And we hope you will as well. We hope you can be just as proud of this game as you are with your Skruf castle building.  Such dedication to both projects is sure to bring success! But, after you enjoy the success of The Secret World, what will be your next project?

“Good question! I just moved my desk so I decided to change it up a bit! Instead of making a mini castle, I started building a real sized one! I figured I snus enough to complete it in 2016. Currently working on the walls, with those thingies archers can shoot from.” (See picture)

With that we will like to thank Funcom and Martin for answering some questions this holiday, and we would like to wish everyone a happy new year!

• Age of Conan:
  • The House of Crom update should be released around 11th and 12th January 2012 and take “advantage of the new lighting tools that came with the infrastructure update”. Public testing will be held “over the holiday period”. Source: ageofconan.com

• Anarchy Online:
  • At the end of December, Producer and Game Director Colin ‘Means’ Cragg will be replaced by Dave ‘Ilaliya’ Williams as Producer and Fia ‘Lindelu’ Tjernberg as Game Director after having been a member of the AO team for eight years. Source: anarchyonline.com

• Bloodline Champions:
  • Stunlock Studios announced its “Child’s Play Charity Pack”. It costs 240 Funcom Points and the profit goes an organization which gives toys to children’s hospitals. “The pack contains an Avatar [...] and a Title (Santa’s Helper).” Source: bloodlinechampions.com
  • The new bloodline ‘Stormcaller’ is available for both Blood Coins and Funcom Points. A gameplay video has been released here. Source:
    bloodlinechampions.com – Gameplay video announcement
    bloodlinechampions.com – Release announcement
  • The game is finally available in Russia. Source: bloodlinechampions.com – Winter Holiday Dev Update
  • Bloodline prices have lowered. “The 16 original Bloodlines now cost 360 Funcom Points and the Bloodlust ones 480 Funcom Points as standard price!” Source: BLChampions’s tweet
  • The Steelseries Sensei Winter Tournament is taking place from 15th December 2011 to 22nd January 2012. The teams ‘x6tence.ESET’ and ‘ZEPH NO DISBAND TEAM’ qualified. For the record, ‘x6tence’ is the team which won the Bloodline Champions tournament at DreamHack:winter. Source: bloodlinechampions.com

• Funcom:
  • CEO of Funcom Games Canada Miguel Caron has been “named on the Board of the Canadian Video Game Award” (Marketing and PR). Source:
    miguelcaron’s tweet
    canadianvideogameawards.com
  • Funcom is recruiting:
    • Durham, USA is looking for customer service representatives fluent in English, French and German (one per language) and a French-speaking community manager.
    • Montreal, Canada is looking for a text coordinator, and French and German localization QA testers. The text coordinator should preferably have a “knowledge of the works of Robert E. Howard, H.P. Lovecraft, Edgar Allan Poe, Bram Stoker…” So, Howard (author of ‘Conan the Barbarian’) because of ‘Age of Conan’, Lovecraft and Poe because of TSW… Stoker (author of ‘Dracula’) perhaps because of TSW too.

    Their job descriptions (except, weirdly, the one for the German customer service representative) state “Funcom is currently developing the Massively Multiplayer Online game The Secret World and one unannounced project. They are also operating the MMO’s Anarchy Online and Age of Conan”. It seems to confirm what Senior Assistant Community Manager Glen ‘Famine’ Swan said to JeuxOnLine.info here last October:

    JeuxOnLine.info: In which languages will be the game for its release in April 2012?
    Glen ‘Famine’ Swan: In French, English and I believe German.

    Besides, Montreal, Canada is also looking for a Senior Rendering Programmer.

    Then, what “unannounced project” could they be talking about? Could this mean the long-awaited return of April Ryan?

    Source:
    funcom.com
    Interview of Glen ‘Famine’ Swan by JeuxOnLine

GAME INFORMATION

• An interview of Creative Director and Senior Producer Ragnar Tørnquist performed by Gamespot brought new information and clarification:
  • “The idea behind death in The Secret World is that you lose consciousness. You are separated from your body. Your spirit is left to roam inside this shadow world. While you are in the spirit state in The Secret World, you might see things that are invisible to players who are sort of conscious. You might have certain missions that might have to be solved in this spirit state”.
  • Ragnar Tørnquist confirmed players will make Internet research thanks to an in-game browser so they don’t have to leave the game. There could be more linkings with Twitter and Facebook.
  • Funcom prefers to see more activity on the console MMORPG market before entering it. An Xbox 360 version should not be expected short-term although Ragnar Tørnquist “really really want[s] to make a 360 version or” a version for the next Xbox console generation. For now, the team focuses entirely on PC which it estimates is the core market of the game.

  Source: gamespot.com

• A new video showing Egypt has been released: The Scorched Desert. Source: TSWAlerts’ tweet

• The Developer Journal published on MMORPG.com informs us that, after exploring Kingsmouth, players will go to al-Merayah (Egypt) to fight the god Aten‘s “worshippers, minions and servants”. This is not the first allusion to ancient Egyptian mythology we see. Indeed, our March 2011 edition already reported Dartfrog had found “a blue Eye of Ra spray painted on the wall” next to the character in the Overlook Motel picture from TSWonline.de. Players will also struggle alongside the Marya soldiers against ghouls, hand of Aten, locusts, mud golems and traitors who chose to worship Aten (note there are no zombies in Egypt). They will have to deal with a black Filth which poisons water, land and every living being. It seems the pumping station Joel Bylos referred in June 2011 in his blog “Creating the world – Part one” is in Egypt. This pumping station “irrigates once healthy fields with the corrupting slime, and great numbers of cultists stand ready to defend it”. Players will have to “infiltrate this camp of fanatics, study their patrols, steal any information they can find and plant powerful explosives, before sneaking off unseen.” Then, the players will “join with the Marya for the all-out assault on the accursed installation.”

  Source:
  thesecretworld.com
  Developer Journal on MMORPG.com
  Cry Gaia Journal: March 2011
  Cry Gaia Journal: June 2011
  Joel Bylos’s post on DDCG

• Comments from Age of Conan’s Game Director and Executive Producer Craig Morrison to Zam.com seem to hint the single server technology will be ready for TSW’s launch although some features might require more time.Craig Morrison talking about the implementation in Age of Conan:
  

  “Early next year the technology infrastructure will go in, essentially pulling all the players together onto our new single server technology. Then we will start to roll out the features that this opens up over the course of next year.”

  Source: zam.com

• Joel Bylos explained you can have simultaneously:
  

  1 Story Mission
  1 Main Mission – These can have any kind of goal but are always given by NPCs
  1 Side Mission – These can have any kind of goal but are always given by items found in the world.

  If, for example, you had a story mission which asked you to kill zombies, a main mission that asked you to kill zombies and a side mission that asked you to kill zombies – all three would tick upwards on a single zombie kill.

  “Paused” missions are restarted by returning to a quest giver (or having a friend share the mission!)

  You can make custom markers with custom notes on your map.

  There are a few reasons for restricting missions. Some of them are:
  - The oft quoted “immersion factor”
  - We don’t want you to spend 30mins in cutscenes when in a quest hub, while you run around and gather all the missions.
  - We have many mission types and we want people to “switch” mindset when they choose between action, sabotage or investigation.

  If I had to compare it to anything out there, I’d say the restriction feels somewhat like in GTA or Red Dead Redemption. You take a mission – you can leave it and do something else – but you have to return to the mission giver and pick it up again (and because we are nice, you pick it up where you left off).

  Try not to think of “paused” missions as something you care about. For all intents and purposes they don’t exist on you until you return to the quest giver.

  He also gave an example of item mission: You’ll have to find Danny’s iPhone and bring it back to him. “Yes, item missions can be that simple as they are often about directing you to people”.

  Other missions can ask you to “follow strange footprints in the sand” or ask you “who has been ravaging these boxes of fresh squid”.

  Source:
  Joel Bylos’s first post on DDCG
  Joel Bylos’s second post on DDCG
  Joel Bylos’s third post on DDCG

GENERAL INFORMATION

• TSW received MMORPG.com’s Rising Star award. Source: mmorpg.com

• The Templar logo on the official forums has been updated.

• The Hydra Initiative launched the second of its three bi-monthly contests. This one, running from 2nd January to 4th February, is “strictly for fan art inspired by The Secret world”. “A poll will be opened up for the community to vote on [the] submission[s]. After the polls close the top three submissions will be voted upon by the commentators from The Secret World Uncovered” and they’ll announce the winner on their podcast. The winner will receive 2400 Funcom points. The contests are open to all factions. Source: Announcement

CABALS

• ISP – Illuminati Service Providers‘ leader Cinq explained by pm that the cabal is called off due to a lack of time. DDCG thread

• The Fallen is a casual guild moving from Age of Conan (where it is “known as Kaaos/Circle of Mercenaries”) to TSW. The guild will focus on PvE and PvP. Expanding to RP is however possible if members wish so. Despite its laidback gameplay, the guild aims for good ranks. It is “looking for mature (+18) players” from all over the world. Announcement thefallen.guildlaunch.com

• Virtus Animae is a social German-speaking guild interested in both PvE and PvP. Some members also do some RP. Members must be 18+ and aware that RL comes first. Announcement in German Google’s translation

• Mayday made an Illuminati Christmas card. DDCG thread

• The Gentlemen describe themselves as “a friendly, relaxed and mature” cabal composed of 30+ year old gamers from Finland and UK who played numerous MMOs. They will be present in all aspects of the game and intend to remain a rather small group. Applicants should ideally be at least 18 years old. “There’s no geographical limits, but most of [the members] are at GMT +2 time zone”. This is the cabal behind the Leaflets from a Crazy Guy. Announcement

CABALS

• Ludere is a French-speaking cabal with a family atmosphere. Their goal is just to have fun while keeping in mind that RL goes first. They however intend to achieve great things in-game and are expanding to multigaming. The cabal accepts all kinds of players. Announcement ludere.fr

• Agora is a social French community of gamers aiming to last and stay together, to regroup people by regions so they can have RL contacts if they wish so and to regroup players having the same profile. Members are generally 25+, preferably able to speak English, liking to out-game read & write and in-game chat rather than in-game VoIP. Agora is not looking to be the best of the best but is not casual either. It is involved in Age of Conan, Aion, Guild Wars, Lord of the Rings and Rift. It intends to expand to Guild Wars 2, SWTOR and The Secret World. They have groups in Aquitaine, Ile de France, Languedoc-Roussillon, Rhône-Alpes and more are coming. The Agora community has chosen the Templar faction. Announcement guilde-mmo.com

• Die Schwarze Hand is a German-speaking guild focusing on PvE and PvP. Members must be 16+ and play at least 3-4 days per week. Announcement in German Google’s translation schwarzehand.cwsurf.de

• Nine Swords is a cabal formed by ex-members of Ouroboros. Their creed is “teamwork, community and order”. Regarding the RP, it is a “melting pot of new bloods and old guards” who “don’t favor or shun, [they] get the job done”. The cabal has “nine divisions, with their own dedicated officer. Members will be able to participate in as many divisional activities as they want, and can even join a department to help along their fellow cabal mates.” Recruitment will start in January 2012. Announcement nine-swords.com

• Age of Conan:
  • “More than 600,000 players have tested the free-to-play version of Age of Conan since July”. To reward all gamers, Funcom enabled them to claim the pack of potions “The King’s Reward” if they log in before 21st November. Source: ageofconan.com.
  • AoC’s “development team [supported] Movember in efforts to help raise vital funds and awareness for men’s health, specifically prostate cancer”. Source: ageofconan.com
  • “Composer and Music Producer Knut Avenstroup Haugen has won the award for Best Song in a Video Game at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards for ‘The Coast of Ardashir’”. Knut Avenstroup Haugen’s interview Source: ageofconan.com
  • A contest with Xfire is running from 21st November until 4th December. More information here. Source: funcom_conan’s tweet

• Bloodline Champions:
  • “The Metal Warden is now fully released”. Her gameplay has been presented in this video. “Additional items such as Outfits, Weapons and Emotes are also available.” Metal Warden’s profile
    Source: BloodlineChampions.com: 1, 2
  • The game has now a Google+ page. Source: BLChampions’s tweet
  • The game was played at DreamHack:winter, had discounts and a tournament which “Mty, Verosk and chipshajen of team x6tence” won.
    Source: BloodlineChampions.com, BLChampions’s tweet

• Fashion Week Live:
  • “The development of Fashion Week Live progressed well. The game will soft-launch during 4Q11, with the marketing push following shortly thereafter” (“significant marketing for the product in early 2012″). Source: Funcom’s Q3 presentation

• Funcom:
  • “Due to the positive development of The Secret World, Funcom has decided to strengthen its cash base mainly to maximize the potential of the game. Funcom will raise USD 10-15 million through a convertible loan.” This “additional funding will enable the Company to:
    • further increase the amount of PR and marketing spent on TSW before launch and also directly after launch
    • start the development of the new high-end MMO game to follow TSW
    • increase the Company’s cash reserve in general”

    Source: Funcom’s Q3 report

• Age of Conan:
  • Knut Avenstroup Haugen got a “Hollywood music award nomination for the Coast of Ardashir song” (source).
  • Eight screens of the “new mounts coming to Hyboria as part of the various winter game updates” have been released here on Facebook (source).

• Bloodline Champions:
  • A teaser presenting a new bloodline has been published here (source).
  • The game is available on Steam since 28th October (source).

• Extra Life:
  • Funcom supported “Extra Life with multiple gaming events tied into their flagship titles to raise awareness and donations for the ‘Children’s Miracle Network’”. $9,639.00 were raised. Read Iolanthe’s article.

    Source:
    darkdemonscrygaia.com
    thesecretworld.com
    extra-life.org

• The Longest Journey:
  • Funcom’s point & click masterpiece The Longest Journey will be ported on iPhone (source).

GAME INFORMATION

Screen from RockPaperShotgun.com

• A new developer diary entitled “The Secret War” is available here.

• New artworks and screenshots have been released on mmorpg.com (source).

• Funcom presented TSW at the New York Comic Con. Video by MMORPG.com

• The cabal Hydra Initiative covered the presentation here and recorded the new demo “Tokyo Flashback” (source):
  • The video shows “the first [eight] minutes of TSW gameplay where the player receives their starting abilities.”
  • “Unlike most MMOs, The Secret World’s combat allows for full movement in any situation. The player will not be rooted during the use of any skills, a huge departure from the typically static casters and rangers of most MMOs, past and present.”
  • Shotguns are “close-range, cone AoE weapon[s]“, “pistols are a mid-range, high-dps, single target weapon” and “assault rifles are the ranger’s weapon of choice and can be multi-targetable”.
  • Blood magic involves necromancy and dark arts. “Elementalism is a scientific branch of magic that utilizes an understanding of the sciences to control physical properties.” Ragnar Tørnquist compared chaos magic to the butterfly effect, explaining it “is more subtle than the other branches, where one tiny event will set off the dominoes to something massive.”
  • “There are no intentions of developing a player-based government or economy.”
  • “There will be smaller factions affiliated with the Council of Venice, and Ragnar reminded us of the Phoenicians, but they will be unplayable.” “There are factions that originate from Africa, though whether they maintain residence there or not is unclear.”
  • “Open PvP is not being considered but if the community clamours for it after launch, Ragnar will consider an alternate server with a different ruleset.”

• Another worth reading article was published by RockPaperShotgun.com.

• Massively pointed out here that “combat (or shotgun combat, at any rate) uses a combo-point-esque mechanic wherein certain attacks build resources on a target, and other “finisher” attacks expend those resources.”

• More information related to the Dragon has been revealed: backstory and ranking mission, a video and an interview.

GENERAL INFORMATION

• Our article analysing the Monsters of Maine has been released:
  Part One
  Part Two

• Fragworld is expanding to TSW. Announcement secretworld.fragworld.org

• The Secret World Uncovered is a new blog and podcast. Announcement thesecretworlduncovered.wordpress.com Twitter

• DocHoliday’s MMO Saloon is a news site dedicated to TSW, Rift and LOTRO. There is also a podcast for TSW here. Announcement of the website Announcement of the podcast docholidaymmo.com/category/secret-world-2 Twitter

• “Over 500,000 [people] registered for ‘The Secret World’ Beta” (source).

CABALS

• Veneficus Ordo Saeculorum has been announced. Announcement Facebook

CABALS

• Split Self Society presents itself as following: “A cabal that denounces all other cabals as imposters. We are the only true Illuminati who follow the only true God, the infinitely splitting fractal God-self. Our split selves roam the world in search of power to bring about chaos which is the pure and divine form of freedom.” Announcement

• Sineco focuses on RP but will also be present in PvE and PvP. It will “buy and sell information about in-game individuals and cabals”. No off-game information will be gathered. Members must play a “minimum of 8 hours a week”. Announcement sineco.dk

• Oculus intends to be a tight knit 18+ cabal of 20-25 members. It will be present in all aspects of the game. Announcement oculustsw.guildportal.com

CABALS

• The Consulate is the new name of The Aldermen. Its RP has been revised and indicates The Aldermen were recruited to form The Consulate. “The Consulate is a social guild, with an RP slant.” Announcement theconsulate.co.uk

• The Temple announced it will play TSW. This guild is currently present in Age of Conan. Announcement thetempleguild.com

• Fallen Angels has its own team on Folding@home thanks to ksabers. Announcement