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The Secret World: SWTOR vs. TSW A Story Comparison
BillMurphy
Former Managing EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 4,565
It looks like Funcom is also putting an emphasis on story with The Secret World, but the methods employed differ some from BioWare's story-centric Star Wars: The Old Republic. We've recently spent some time in the TSW beta and today we're offering a comparison of the story presentation in both games.
The Secret World does things a bit differently, even from Funcom’s previous game, Age of Conan, which also featured dialogue choices. In The Secret World, quests are broken down into seven types: story, action, item, investigation, sabotage, group/dungeon, and PvP. Your story is based on your faction (Illuminati, Templar, or Dragon) and will guide you through the world Funcom has created. The other mission types are mostly self-explanatory, though sabotage missions are notable in that they are generally geared towards stealthily completing objectives (such as avoiding surveillance cameras). Each mission is broken up into several tiers (sets of objectives) that must be completed in sequential order and you can only have a limited amount of each type of mission. If you attempt to take another action mission while you’re currently on one, for example, you’ll be asked if you want to pause your progress and pick up the new mission.
Read more of Michael Bitton's The Secret World: SWTOR vs. TSW -- A Story Comparison.
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Comments
TSW wins this competition in story telling for me, mostly due to style and delivery. SWTOR just bored me with static camera placement and dull environs. Where as the atmosphere alone in the TSW cutscenes, plus, IMO, some nicely scripted dialog and voice acting, just pull me in to what is being shown. Seems to flow better too in relation to the zone and what you are doing in the Secret World.
Many of the sidequests in SWTOR didn't always tie into the bigger picture very well. They do in TSW. Even small characters have big parts and are more memorable than those in SWTOR.
Intresting......Very intresting. This is looking more and more lkike my kind of bag.
Sounds very reasonable. I eventually spacebarred through most of SWTOR (especially when rolling an alt) and I did find the dead environments, static cameras and constant voice overs mildly speaking irritating while this is very refreshing.
After all, SWTOR is not ME3 where every dialogue was extremely important and I was fully invested in the story.
Oh, you definitely want to listen to everything said and shown in TSW quests. I made the mistake of hitting the ESCAPE key to skip some scenes, so as not to ruin my launch experience, but I ended up ruining my quest experience as I missed vital clues to solving the quest, lol. This game is so tasty.
I havnt played TSW "yet" but as a conspiracy nut myself I think I owuld enjoy TSW's story a whole lot more. SWTOR's mainstoryline was pretty amazing at least it was for me on my Assassin, Imperial Agent and Trooper but your right most of the side quests I hit the spacebar quite a bit to get through it. I am greatly looking forward to the whole "everything is true" mantra that Funcom is delivering and I already know I will greatly enjoy the classless based skill system so I hope the combat animations, which have been greatly lacking, gets polished and the rest of the gameplay, especialy the group dynamics is as well.
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Who just came up with the idea that an MMO needs a pre-determined peronal story which in most cases even is 100 % linear ?
They exist in SWTOR, TSW, GW2. Some are more and some are less entertaining. All have in common that you can enjoy them one time at most and they are completely unnecessary in an MMO. Imo these are wasted resources better invested into other features.
The cutscenes in TSW are actually gamebreaking for me......Way overdone and way too many of them.
While TSW peeks my intrests and has for sometime the review posted today by mmorpg was underwhelming and seemed to validate some of my fears. I'm still tempted to pre-order this game, but, because of Funcom's history I am going to have to wait for a month or so after release to hear if it's any good.
What I fear most is a dead world like ToR or the Matrix Online where everything seems hollow and generic. The review posted today seemed to kind of validate that fear...
As ToR taught me great storytelling and cutscenes are no where near enough to keep me hooked on the game. The PvP and endgame are very, very important, and despite what MMOs seem to be doing, those two aspects are important RIGHT from release they are not something you just decide to put on the shelf for 4 or 5 months.
I think even Tortage in AoC beats SW:TOR handsdown with environment, atmosphere and voice acting.
It's just a shame they didn't had the budget to make more voice overs in the rest of the game, which they got heavily burned for.
SW:TOR is so heavily praised for the whole Voice Over sugar coating, but in the end it's just that. A sugar coating with a dull sour taste. Nothing more.
There is nothing generic about TSW, that's for sure.
Anyway, you can just get the open beta yourself and try it out, no preorder necessary: http://www.gamespot.com/event/codes/secret-world-pc/
Sounds good so far. I'm not a big fan of having to sit through a bunch of dialog in mmo's I play, but if Funcom do it better than Bioware did, I may have to give it a look. Bioware bored me to tears, I found the stories boring and predictable. I couldn't even sit though the class stories. I spacebarred through several characters. Seems like TSW may end up being a surprisingly good game. We'll have to sit back and see. I won't be pre-ordering the game, but as I've said before I'll keep my eye on it, because it does seem so different than other mmo's atm. I like mmo's but the wow clones have been done to death already. We need new, inovative, exciting mmo's to play.
What happens when you log off your characters????.....
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Definitely. I think it's good that you take that mindset, and others as well as it lets a game deliver what it offers without trying to live up to some overhyped unreachable plateau, which is what SWTOR did. I might have enjoyed SWTOR a little more than I did if it hadn't been hyped to kingdom come, but it still fails to deliver in regards to the hundreds if not thousands of side quests that really just don't matter. TSW, so far at least from what I have played, makes every quest matter to the overall story.
Firstoff, SWTOR doesn't have enough story to matter for anything. SWTOR only has voiceovers and is for the majority just a lot of pewpew with no challenges to satisfy the WoW fanbois.
While I feel a LOT of TSW could use some work (graphically it's not very impressive, animations still feel very stiff and there are some control/response issues), it shines in a few areas. They've managed to create an AMAZING aesthetic for the game. The zones look/feel amazing and the atmosphere they create (even early on) is superb. It also has probably one of the best base UI's I've experienced in a MMO in the past 10 or so years.
The cutscenes/dialogue though are probably its highest point. While the lipsyncing makes me want to kill myself (it's really bad), the writing, voice acting, and directing in the cutscenes blows what I experienced in SWToR out of the water. SWTOR cutscene shots didn't feel like they were purposeful, whlie in TSW I've noticed shot after shot that was intentionally framed/lighted to deliver a message or for SYMBOLISM!!!!! The dialogue feels super natural, like things real people would say, and the deliver of this dialogue (it's more of a monologue for the most part since I have yet to see my character talk) is easily some of the best voicework I've seen in a game (especially a MMO) to date.
This game has really surprised me since up till playing it, I had very little interest in it. However after spending a bit of time messing around in it I'm seriously debating pre-purchasing it. I can't remember the last time I wanted to hear everything a NPC had to say about the lore and backstories of a world.
I prefer SWTOR's method. I like making decisions and having a character with a personality, that's part of a complete experience to me with a game that tags "story" as an important element in it.
omfg ,story,cut scenes,voice acting...waste of time for an mmorpg
I'm intrigued, but given Funcom's track record for releasing unfinished MMOs, all the while dazzling reviewers with the entry content, I'll go ahead and wait for the full story, 3 months in.
That and "partnering" with EA for the release doesn't leave me with a good feeling.
Or it's building a better mmorpg by creating a world that feels more alive with NPC's and a story that actually matters to players. There are two sides of the coin and I think the rpg elements have been mostly ignored (or relegated to lore nuts only) for far too long.
I don't understand people who complain about Story and Cutscenes.
Isn't there enough MMORPGs WITHOUT these elements to entertain those who don't like them?
Why rag on games that are trying to appeal to people who DO want these elements?
I don't care for FPS', but I don't go into FPS game forums and bitch about the existance of the genre.
I haven't played tsw much (yet) but seems quite nice, even tho i prefer swtor class quests style, the ones in tsw are still well done. Only thing that irks me, so far, is the clucky animation of the players, not the combat just moving around seems weird to me (especially if you're a magic user), still it's a beta i hope improvements are made here.
As for ppl saying story is not worth the investment time, go play something else,i love that story finally getting into mmoRPGs. Nothing is worse that a grind game with pitiful quests but ppl like it because pvp is great or endgame is fun. I rather take my time enjoying getting to endgame than rushing ahead just to complain like an #$#$. Ppl like that ruined mmo's.
After playtesting this game for the better half of today I have to say the storytelling and delivery is really fairly hands off and refreshing. The story progression isn't all that linear, in fact it's like Guild Wars 2's where you're pretty much just set loose on an area and goof off all you want.
Another interesting thing about some of the quests in TSW is that it actually challenges you as a player to think. Solo instances like the one I encountered has you figuring out how to defuse C4 bombs that are triggered by infrared laser and surveillance cam triggers. Another has you going into a computer to input codes that you find along your quest. The actual quest log doesn't tell you have to figure it out yourself. TSW doesn't hand-hold you and I found that nice.
It's no sandbox but it certainly has elements of it, I think those looking for an MMO with a sanbox feel but pve focus could really love this game.
Sorry but that made no sense...and I dont like SWTOR.
A story cannot be bad because of static camera placement in a dull environment. The one and only thing SWTOR did good was the story, but that is Bioware for you. The fact that the items listed as being bad for SWTOR for you was not even story directed speaks volumns here...just like the article which seems to be trying really hard to find flaws with SWTOR while attempting to trump up TSW while still stating its far more linear and has no choices.
One would think that if you were trying to prove one story was better than the other you would actually be making points about the STORIES and nothing else.
Now I feel dirty for defending SWTOR...
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From the very first scene where the fly comes buzzing through the window I knew this story was going to be different than any other MMO I have ever played.
It's WAY to early for reviews, but this game has serious potential. I'm so tired of fairies and unicorns and knights in shining armor. I want some HORROR.
Bring it
I felt this was a rather odd comparison to make...essentially saying to the effect: Harry Potter is a better book than Lord of the Rings because it isn't as verbose.
Why must this false dichotomy be created when one could simply say BOTH are good at what they do, but one is a different style (Harry Potter) than the other (Lord of the Rings).