Admittedly, Funcom has focused their promotional efforts on Age of Conan, but after an initial buzz, the talk surrounding their other MMORPG in development has been almost nonexistent, and to be honest, I really like this one, since I’m a sucker for myths, legends and conspiracy theories. From the Funcom press release back in May 2007:

For there really is a world within ours, a secret world, where magic exists, monsters roam and ancient forces are fighting for the dominance of earth. It is a world of legendary stories, ageless conflicts and powerful cabals. In this world, even modern cities hide secrets. In this world, players can take part in the greatest conspiracies of our age, and battle the forces of darkness across the world and throughout time.

This is one of the more original “Why didn’t I think of that?” MMO concepts I’ve seen so far.

And it’s been in development since the 2006.

‘The Secret World’ has been in development since last summer and the game is in a playable state. It is produced at the Funcom studios in Oslo and Beijing. A release date is not being announced at this point, but players are already getting involved in the fast-growing community.

Of course, there’s a huge gap between “a playable state” and “ready to play”, but still…that was said in May 2007. From what has leaked out, the Age of Conan team will be transferred to TSW after AoC goes gold, presumably to put the final polish on it.

What’s interesting to me is the level of secrecy that Funcom has managed to keep around this project. Usually, when a game is announced, various thing start to leak about the game, and especially in the two years after it’s announced. But as of today, no one knows:

• What the play mechanics are
• Whether it’s skill-based or level-based
• How combat will work
• If there will be PvP
• If it will be instanced (as in the case of Guild Wars), or have an open world
• When the game will enter beta
• What the financial model will be (subscription-based, RMT, microtransactions, sacrificing small animals at the base of your computer tower)

What do we know?

• It’s going to reportedly have a “Lovecraftian” feel to it, with myths and legends like Bigfoot, the Chupacabra and the Illuminati involved
• You’ll get to play it on either the XBox 360 or PC if you want
• To figure out the initial puzzle to find the forums, you had to use your knowledge of Sanskrit, Leonardo da Vinci and numerology.

That’s it. Period. And this is all that’s known despite the fact that a website was launched on May 6, 2007, providing a puzzle for folks to figure out, which led to quite a conspiracy theory scenario on the forums, which you can read about here.

I really recommend reading that thread…I think you’ll agree it’s the most novel approach to promoting an upcoming MMORPG you’ve ever seen, involving a conspiracy within the promo puzzles, two or three members of that conspiracy communicating with the forum members, and enough secrecy to protect all eleven of the Colonel’s herbs and spices. Picture “The DaVinci Code” crossed with “Call of Cthulu”, and you’ll get some idea of what type of game this is going to be.

This game looks like it has a chance to appeal to fans of conspiracy theories, cryptozoology and Lovecraft. That’s a fairly large audience for a game that’s not based on a licensed IP, and that will probably work in its favor. Of course, the game is going to have to deliver when it comes to gameplay (and most especially atmosphere) to cash in.

If it can do that, this may be the next big MMORPG success. At the very least, they’re doing things differently than most, and that’s not a bad thing in my book. And the best part is this…if The Secret World does become a success…no one will have really seen it coming.

(If you’d like a peek at the concept art that’s been released, head here.)

Tags: Funcom, games, gaming, mmo, mmog, mmorpg, The Secret World