Secret World Legends

An outstanding, still relevant game. Not much as an MMO, so definitely do not play it if you're looking for a regular online experience. But as a solo, story-driven game, it's just incredible despite outdated graphics and combat system. The universe, the mystery, the lore, the overall tone, the cryptic collectible legends, the humored way off aproaching the lovecraftian theme, the investigation missions, and and the effort put by the developers on the credible and voiced dialogues throughout the entire game make it worth it and it's sad that it didn't get the recognition that it deserves.

I've played this game on and off since the original "The Secret World" came out. I loved the original, but it had significant performance issues on my hardware at the time that prevented me from playing regularly.
A couple of years later I picked up Secret World Legends, as I missed the immersion and amazing storytelling of the original (and had better hardware). I was pleased to find that they had kept the role-playing and world building intact. However, Legends combat and character building system was a significant downgrade from the original's skill trees, and resulted in a less satisfying combat experience than I'd remembered.
However, even though I preferred The Secret World, I have to say that this game is worth the time to download and try it out. The story alone makes it worthwhile. It's not really an MMO at this point, more a single player experience due to the low population count, but most missions can be accomplished solo. The graphics and performance are somewhat middling for a game in 2024, but the designs, writing, and acting are so good that the glitches don't really break your immersion.
It's also unique gaming experience - there's still really nothing out there like it. The world is incredibly vibrant and horrifying, the characters have extensive backstories, and you're constantly discovering new twists. Plot lines can stretch over hours. It's like the best parts of the x-files, lovecraftian horror, and dc comics happening all at once. It will suck you in, and it's one of those games you'll keep coming back to - despite it's issues. It's very easy to put in dozens of hours and never feel like you're grinding.
All in all, by today's standards, this is a 7/10 game - but it's one I recommend that everyone try at least once. In its own way, it's a forgotten masterpiece that displays a depth and ambition far beyond what passes for gaming worlds these days.

BEFORE PLAYING THE GAME:
In the launcher you should check "full client", switch to directX 9 then click apply and wait a bit to actually download the entire game. Then you might have to click "repair broken data". Now you can play the game with zero issues and no lag.
I moved on to playing on the funcom launcher (so I have quite a few more hours than what it says here). I'm still going through the zones at my own pace but honestly there's no online game like this one in terms of setting and story. This "MMO" is a blend of conspiracy iceberg, horror, love craft and I put MMO in quotes because the game is basically a solo single player story experience where you see people on the side and can maybe team up with a couple of people for group content over the weekend. With it being f2p and having basically the entire experience $0 spender friendly I think it's worth for every single person who clicked on this steam page to download and check it out.
Pros:
- Lore, world, setting, conspiracies
- Investigation missions: This isn't anything related to a typical MMO gameplay, you solve puzzles and investigate things and use clues to finish the mission.
- No class FOMO, your character can use every "class" aka weapon. The starting class is just unlocking the initial weapon to do the content with but you can just unlock more weapons right away. You will also be able to grind and unlock every ability and passive for every class so there's no worry about messing about builds.
The cons:
- Performance is terrible if you don't do the (pretty easy) fix, but it's easy to miss and the game not being playable "out of the box" is annoying. Look above to do the fix before playing the game.
- If you are looking for a COMBAT gameplay forward mmo, this is on the opposite end of the spectrum to something like Black Desert or Blade and Soul. It's a unique "tab target" but instead of using tab you aim your mouse like its a third person shooter, without the third person shooter impact and mechanics.
- Side quest and unlocking story quest structure can get tedious if you aren't really into the world. It's also not too challenging. So imagine doing a bunch of "fetch" and "kill x amount of y" quests and that's basically a big portion of the game you have to push through before getting more story content. But i'm telling you is very worth it if you ever watched a Wendigoon video.

I dont understand why funcom dont want to reinvest this game
- setting and lore is top notch
- the story is nothing ground breaking but for f2p game? Its amazing
The highlight of this game for me
- the puzzle quest, dear god the puzzle quest is probably the most amazing thing i play ever, you dont just click or kill stuff, you actually have to use your brain to solve it, and the best part? Many of the puzzle require real life knowledge to solve it, morse code, searching on google, etc. Its amazing, if you play this for the first time, the puzzle quest will blown you away
- the atmosphere in this game is amazing, there was some quest in this game that made me legit scared, not scary as in monster jumpscare but scary as in you want to keep moving but slowly because you not sure what will happen next, best example? The parking garage quest in tokyo, omg that was spooky as hell
I just dont get it why funcom abandon this, this is literally a gold mine, i really hope one day this game will get update again, or maybe a remake

This is far and away one of the best games I've ever played, even with the Legends version. Legends has some extra content and rebalances most of the game for single player, though it is also missing content, is absolutely predatory in its monetization, and removes some of the more interesting mechanics which set the game apart from other mmos of the era. However, I still recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good secret society story.

The world and quests are this game's strongest points, as all of the sidequests given by npcs have accompanying fully voiced cutscenes, and many npcs have additional voiced dialogue in a simple tree system. The world is also vibrant with many varieties of mythos and conspiracy represented. There is also a good amount of variety to the missions, including vehicle sections, gimmick fights which replace all your skills, stealth sections, wave defense, heists, puzzles, and of course the ARG elements. Many complain about the ARG stuff, but that first quest most people complain about is a little more obtuse than most of the investigation quests in the game.

If I had to list a major complaint other than the monetization, it's that the endgame content is not really worth it. Finding a group is difficult due to the low playerbase and there are only two raids. You also need to optimize your build in ways that the story never requires of you, so you could be quite unlucky and end up having to re-upgrade from scratch a whole new weapon category which is quite expensive. It's also quite depressing that the final piece of content ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. There's not much to the social aspect either; I quested with a random maybe twice in my playtime. There's just no reason to interact with most players via other means than the auction house till endgame.

All of that being said, the presentation and story make the experience more than worth it by themselves, and I strongly recommend the game to anyone remotely interested in the concept. Even though I consider Legends the inferior version, it's still absolutely worth playing and you will never find anything else like it.

I will never get how the playerbase for this game is so small nowadays. I'm relatively new and jesus christ, this game has some unique quest designs and riddles.
If you ever wanted to go for a lovecraftian game, while still having satisfying combat and classic MMO-elements, this is what you're looking for.
Many riddles are genuinely tough to figure out, and it's such a nice change from "oh the riddle to the solution is on the desk next to it with a flashing quest marker".
The microtransactions are debatable, but they're nothing that truly takes away from the game experience.
All in all, i absolutely recommend letting yourself get immersed in this game, especially so to make the multiplayer dungeons more colorful and lively again.

I remember playing this game with my dad as kid lmao. So maybe I'm biased but its fun and more interesting take on MMORPG rather then other cookie cutter MMO (i wont name names).