We all know that there has been some less-than-happy news regarding Funcom and The Secret World recently, but that hasn’t stopped the game’s Senior Producer Ragnar Tornquist from having a very positive outlook on the game’s future.
In his most recent State of the Game address, Ragnar answers the following questions about the affect the recent layoffs at Funcom will have on the game.

So what does this mean for The Secret World? How will a smaller team affect the delivery of upcoming content? And most importantly, does TSW have a future?

Ragnar’s answer?  Yes… The Secret World has a very bright future ahead of it — complete with monthly updates.  And, while the August update will be a few weeks late due to restructuring, he promises we can expect the next one right on time.

One of the main points that Ragnar seems to want to get across to players is that he knows some of us are going to go off and try out some other games for a bit — and he’s cool with that because he believes TSW has things to offer that these others do not.

Okay, look, we all know there are a lot of alternatives out there — from warring guilds to kung-fu-fighting pandas — but I can safely say that no other game offers what The Secret World offers. Freedom from classes and levels; a modern-day setting with real world locations; a critically acclaimed storyline and an atmosphere second to none; fully voiced characters that you can empathise with and believe in; a deep and unique character progression system, with boundless opportunities for experimentation and character development.

He believes that it’s these differences that make TSW great and goes on to say that the team has no plans to change or back down from their original plans.

Ragnar goes on to list some of the things that players can look forward to in the future, including a 10-person New York raid, new auxiliary weapons, continued improvements to character customization and more.  There’s even a feature especially for Christmas — something about having vampire abilities to play with.

So far, it all sounds pretty exciting.  And it’s hard not to catch some of Ragnar’s enthusiasm.  But I know that some players will be taking a wait and see stance about all of it — which is pretty reasonable.  I, on the other hand, will be busily waiting to play with all the new things that TSW has in its future.