Though players have lost themselves in The Secret World, apparently Funcom expected much more.

In a recent investor report, Funcom acknowledged the drop in share price that coincided with the launch of TSW, but attributed the depreciation to an unlikely source:

"Following the launch of The Secret World on the 3rd of July 2012, Funcom's share price has decreased significantly. The company attributes this mostly to the aggregate review score, the "Metascore", for the game at MetaCritic (www.metacritic.com) together with other public sources for tracking the performance of games.

While there are very positive reviews, there are as well mixed or average reviews from various press outlets, giving an aggregated score for The Secret World of 72 out of 100, which is to be considered low, and not in line with the positive feedback received during the beta phases from both press and players."

To acknowledge that the game hasn't been universally received with glowing praise is one thing. To blame a Metascore as a direct cause of a pronounced stock price fall is entirely another.

It’s a little over thirty days since the final, released version of The Secret World found a home inside my PC. Although I’d been playing beta versions of Funcom’s latest MMO for several months before that all-important launch, it’s the one that goes on sale that counts. Since then, I’ve been delving deeply into this mysterious echo-world.

The end of the first “free” month is usually the end of the honeymoon period. Existing players are weighing up if they want to continue subscribing, while potential newcomers are looking on and trying to decide if they want to dive in. Funcom’s decision to throw the game open to everyone recently for a free weekend of celebration and adventure certainly didn’t hurt. But for those of you still on the fence, this long-term review should end your agonizing quandary.

If you haven’t already seen it, Chris Tom’s first impressions of the launch are well worth a read. Unlike me, he deliberately avoided spoiling himself as the release date crept ever closer. I’ll be continuing where Chris left off, taking a closer look at how the game holds up to sustained play.

Getting lost in The Secret World just got a lot easier.

Funcom's TSW is now available on Valve's Steam platform.

In case you all missed it, ZAM's Mike B. finished off his two-part BFF Report feature on The Secret World! In Part I of his review, Mike checked out character creation, combat, and the environments of TSW. Now, in Part II of his BFF Report, Mike went further into the content to try out PvP, missions, and what happens when your investigations go a little too far. It's all right here in this week's BFF Report #116!

 You can watch Episode #116 of the BFF Report right here!

Another week, another BFF Report! In Episode #115 of ZAM's BFF Report, your host Mike B. aka fony jumped into The Secret World, where he hopes to investigate all facets of the game. In Part I of his two-part series, Mike kicks things off with the character creation, the environments, and the combat of the game. It's a no-holds barred BFF Report, so get ready for Mike's honest opinion!

You can watch Episode #115 of the BFF Report right here!

Be sure to tune in later this week for Part II!

If you wanted a shot at The Secret World, there's finally a free beta weekend poking its head out, during August 3rd to August 6th. Signups for the celebration are open right on their website, so if you don't have an account, better get to sign up. But, better yet, it's not just any weekend - each player gets 15 fireworks for free to fire off into the night sky, thus ruining the atmosphere and creepiness in the best way possible. Plus, thirty missions will be available for all, and the top 100 mission accomplishers get to be on a special leaderboard. But you get to play The Secret World! So, what're you waiting for?

Whatever opinion you may have on The Secret World (and it appears that the general population of players are enjoying themselves), there really is no doubt that Funcom has been putting in a lot of work to ensure their game remains stable and bug-free. Of course, there's still some distance to go (invisible death rays in the Facility, I'm looking at you!), but the speed with which Funcom is deploying their patches is downright impressive.

Beyond their general bug-fixes, however, Funcom has also been hard at work on new content as. a few weeks back, they announced that their first monthly update (issue) would be coming at the end of July. Dubbed "Unleashed," this new update promises new missions, nightmare mode dungeons, the highly anticipated marketplace launch, and more. All of this comes in line with Ragnar Tørnquist's State of the Game post on July 10th, where he outlined some of the major game highlights to come in the next few months (new outfits, more character customization, new auxiliary weapons, new zones, a PvP dungeon, and more? Yes please!). We caught up with Ragnar to talk about the current state of the game, as well as clarifying some of the information announced back in their State of the Game address. Read on!

You, like me, probably noticed that the dungeons of The Secret World are kind of awesome. Funcom, as they are wont to do, designed it that way on purpose, as explained in a new blog post. It's pretty reassuring stuff for those of you who haven't gotten TSW yet, most notably this excellent money line;

"We wanted to make the Dungeons in The Secret World as entertaining as possible, so every one of them offer a string of challenging boss fights. We have done away with the need to wade through endless hordes of boring trash mobs, so doing dungeons is one awesome boss fight after another. The bosses themselves are not only more powerful monsters which do more damage and have more hit points, but all have their own tricks up their sleeves, which you need smart tactics to beat. These tricks can for example be the ability to call down meteors, turn soldiers into walking bombs, freeze you in a block of ice or change the very fabric of space and time itself with a deadly gaze."

Beginning with Age of Conan, Funcom has been known for their "State of the Game" dev posts, where the team updates players on what things they can expect around the corner. For The Secret World's first State of the Game update, the team has some particularly nice things to promise, as as they are teasing a lot of upcoming (and completely free) content.

In it, Funcom is promising new monthly mission packs, featuring a variety of investigation missions, action missions, and sabotage missions, all complete with voiced cutscenes. Also promised is new changes to combat, including the first Auxiliary weapon, as well as upcoming raids in New York, PVP dungeons, more with the Chronicle, more adventure zones, a dungeon finder, and (of course) more combat polishes. Sounds like Funcom has a lot on their plate, and we only hope they can deliver!

We've also got a faction t-shirt / dog tag giveaway for The Secret World! Tell us why YOUR faction is the best, and we'll be giving out a prize to the three best entries!

It's no secret that, in the past few months, we have been playing a lot of The Secret World (yes, those are all separate links). That being said, however, once the closed beta weekends began back in May, I decided to lay out some of my thoughts before taking a step back to watch from afar. While it would have been enjoyable to experience Funcom's development process as they tinkered away in between betas, I wanted to come into TSW's launch day with fresh eyes and an improved experience.

Let's get on with it.