The Secret World — such a tease!
Allow me to preface this with #TSW and #dowant — it's part of my campaign to get noticed and get offered a beta spot. Won't happen, but in the meantime I can annoy a whole lot of people on Twitter with it. DO WANT! And since Syp can post pix of him as a woman, I can post a male pic to represent me. Besides, it's House.
As tweeted by several people (thank God other people pay attention to gaming news and pass it on to slackers like me!), Eurogamer reports that Funcom are offering guaranteed The Secret World beta spots to people who sub up to Age of Conan for three months. So, I guess that makes the price of a beta spot a little under $50 these days. Cynical, moi?
On the one hand — DO WANT! On the other, do not want to start paying for a game I don't really want just to get a beta spot. I've got more than enough games on my plate as it is and, you know, AoC wasn't supposed to be that great to begin with, and not really my bag. I've got my story game (Dragon Age) and my crafting/MMO game (EQ2) and I can find plenty of slayage action in both if I can be arsed, so what for do I need another?
So on balance, I probably won't bother. And in a few months I'll be all pissed when other people have bothered and are neenering me from their spot in the beta.
I could claim I'm concerned about ruining the launch experience for myself, but I've never been particularly motivated to either hide content from myself or be the first to experience everything. I'm one of those relatively sad people who actually enjoy beta testing, provided I don't glut myself on it like I did a year or so ago and thus end up making myself sick of the plethora of issues one should expect with any beta. If I care enough about a game to be excited about it, I also care enough to want to nail bugs and provide systems & mechanics feedback. In that sense, being in the beta won't ruin anything at all for me. But I can always make a virtue of necessity.
If nothing else, at least we know there's currently going to be a beta, and it can't be all that far away. They could tell us more, but then they'd have to kill us.
Oh, given that choice, if it's purely either/or then I would say get Dragon Age for sure. It's a great experience, and it's nice to see a single-player RPG so well put together.
I don't *really* object to linking beta keys to subs, but all the same it makes me wince a little. Not sure why, it's not like it's unethical or I'm being forced to buy or anything.
It can be clever in context. City Of Heroes is giving Going Rogue beta access in several waves.
One wave goes to the five year Vets.
I also do want. I've never understood the irrational fear of beta spots.
Either they confirm what you know (Hate it/Love it/Needs work/Do or Do not Want to be there) or you get hung up on bugs and miss the point.
You get to help them help you have fun.
They need the money from the 3 month AOC sub to be able to finish making TSW.
As to the beta slot, I'm guessing that this is a slot in the marketing portion of the beta, rather than a slot in the extended testing and development portion of the beta. This could very easily turn into one of those marketing fiasco's where people are disappointed when they only get into the beta a week before the public open beta happens.
Judging from the fine print one of my Twitterposse found (Ardua?), you're right: the beta access is only for the final stages blah blah blah.
I read they were making cutbacks at Funcom and it would delay this game. Is that true?
I feel TSW looks really cool and will give it a spin whenever it does release.
I've said it before, and I will say it again, this seems to have too much the scent of desperation, to try and rebuild support for one game by tempting them with another.
Albeit, the AoC reputation has been rather off lately, this does seem like the only way to bring more attention. Though it hardly seems like a valid excuse over actually getting something done.
I just do not believe that Funcom can produce a game that is 1/4 as good as the hype they produce all about it.
I do not understand the "fear of Betas ruining the launch day experience". Maybe the experience tells you "I want this game" or it tells you "I should not bother", how can one be afraid that the game gets spoiled this way, I really wonder about that.
That Hugh Laurie pic is pure win.
I'm quite interested in TSW but am not going to revisit AoC, even if it's free.