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POLL: TSW, GOOGLE, and Investigation Missions

The investigation missions are one of TSW’s more unique features. They are fun but typically insanely hard from deciphering Morse Code by hand, to understanding cryptography, to finding obscure notes from a mostly forgotten classical song, to listening to cell phone buttons being pushed to figure out a number to call...

 

The game includes an in game browser with Google as the default page to begin searching the web for clues. However, there are a plethora of walkthroughs available online now. I used to try and puzzle through them and avoid all the answer pages. But somewhere along the line that changed and I just took to looking up the answers and going on my merry way as I was playing for the story more than the the work involved in solving it.

 

You see, I once thought Google made me smart. Then? I realized that there were smart people with written words and utilities accessible through Google, and I was still stupid. Thus, I am happily ashamed. :)

 

Yet, I grew curious as to how other people are handling them.

 

 

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Comments

  • QuailmanQuailman Member Posts: 165
    So far, I haven't looked up any walkthroughs and I don't have any plans to. That being said, in the future if I get stuck on a mission for 3 hours or so and make no progress, there's a good chance I'll look for a spoiler free guide. If I still can't figure it out after that, I'll reluctantly look up the answers and probably hate myself for a short time after. I'll get over it though.

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  • FromHellFromHell Member Posts: 1,311

    Why would I look up walkthroughs, to ruin my fun of solving the puzzles?

     

     

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  • OrtwigOrtwig Member UncommonPosts: 1,163
    Always best to solve it yourself -- it's a huge rush when you figure it out on your own.  If I'm really stuck, I'll try to look up a hint before actually going for the full out answer.  By the way, for new folks, there is a Mission Hints channel in chat you can use to ask for hints in game, and it's generally bad form to blurt out spoilers in General chat.  If you want to use the browser to search for clues without going to spoiler sites, type in -tsw in the search box.
  • WhitebeardsWhitebeards Member Posts: 778

    I can not vote for any of those options because i solve them on my own. Period. I was once stuck on an investigation mission for 5 days but i did solve it. I had to learn some egyptian words but other than that i did it on my own. So the only clues i ever looked was the translation of egyptian, hebrew, latin etc languages used in TSW puzzles.

    I consider myself to be of average intellect and general knowledge but uptil now i never had look for  a walkthrough for any investigation mission. i did them all on my ow even if it took me weeks.

  • erictlewiserictlewis Member UncommonPosts: 3,022

    I google and investigation mission. I found a website by unfair incorporated.  They have a huge website with every mission, I bookmarked the page, and used it when I was stumped. Whoever is behind that website put in a ton of work. 

     

  • tom_goretom_gore Member UncommonPosts: 2,001
    I had to look an answer to a side mission (that was actually a fully fledged investigation mission) that involved decoding a big crypted message. Could't break it on my own.
  • SendenSenden Member UncommonPosts: 602
    How big of a role in the game do investigation missions play? Downloaded the client but yet to start my free trial, will I likely get to have a dabble in them with moderate level of play in my three days trial? The feature sounds really good and I LOVE a good puzzle to solve.
  • WhitebeardsWhitebeards Member Posts: 778
    Originally posted by Senden
    How big of a role in the game do investigation missions play? Downloaded the client but yet to start my free trial, will I likely get to have a dabble in them with moderate level of play in my three days trial? The feature sounds really good and I LOVE a good puzzle to solve.

    Investigation missions are as important as any other mission since they tie up with your main story and the back story of secret world and lore etc.

    There are not a lot of investigation missions but the reason behind is that they are quite difficult and FC expects you to solve them on your own. And if you don't take any help from google..you can spend days solving it. So one Investigation missions with its various tiers equals to say 10 action missions (rough guess).

  • RimmersmanRimmersman Member Posts: 885
    Anyone who says they have not asked or looked up some mission is bs in my opinion, especially codes. 

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  • Po_ggPo_gg Member EpicPosts: 5,749

    The whole point of a Ragnar game is to enjoy the ride and use your brain, so using walkthroughs basically diminishing your gameplay experience a lot.

    Btw, if you use the ingame browser to Google up informations, it filters out the walkthrough / wiki sites... it's in the game for a reason :) so if you need some background information for a quest, you can use that and don't have to worry about spoilers.

  • dancingstardancingstar Member UncommonPosts: 362
    Originally posted by Po_gg

    Btw, if you use the ingame browser to Google up informations, it filters out the walkthrough / wiki sites... it's in the game for a reason :) so if you need some background information for a quest, you can use that and don't have to worry about spoilers.

    Sorry, this is misinformation. Ingame browser defaults to the regular Google search page. A brief trial with two key words from the "Angels and Demons" investigation mission (the director's name and his security clearance level) produced the unfair.co guide as the 4th entry.

    Someone once made a web site (tswsearch.com) with a search front end that *does* filter out such sites, unforutnately it appears to no longer exist. Adding

    -TSW -"Secret World"

    to your search terms will have the required effect.

    EDITED TO ADD: To the OP, I avoid spoiler sites *most* of the time, a lot of the investigations I made a point of attempting on Testlive before said guide sites even go up. I may end up caving in with "The Binding" as I've so far only found 2 of the 7 or however many it was artefact pieces.

     

  • evilastroevilastro Member Posts: 4,270
    Originally posted by Whitebeards

    I can not vote for any of those options because i solve them on my own. Period. I was once stuck on an investigation mission for 5 days but i did solve it. I had to learn some egyptian words but other than that i did it on my own. So the only clues i ever looked was the translation of egyptian, hebrew, latin etc languages used in TSW puzzles.

    I consider myself to be of average intellect and general knowledge but uptil now i never had look for  a walkthrough for any investigation mission. i did them all on my ow even if it took me weeks.

    That would be the third option, where you only look up clues rather than walkthroughs. Unless you are saying that you use no online resources whatsoever.

  • Four0SixFour0Six Member UncommonPosts: 1,175

    Claiming to not use Google to aid in mission completion is the "New L33tism".

    Sorry if I offended anyone, NO, Im not, since the one of the Kingsmouth investigation missions, not sure of the name, it's the onw with the SUV by the skatepark...REQUIRES you to use your ingame browser to go the a web page and search for a last name.......

     

  • evilastroevilastro Member Posts: 4,270
    Originally posted by PWN_FACE

    I go straight to google without even attempting to solve the puzzles. I don't have any fun at all doing puzzles. They feel like work to me, probably because my jobs have involved researching stuff for a quite a while now. I play TSW for the story and atmosphere. I like the pve and playing around with the ability wheel. My verdict is still out on pvp, but Darkfall is coming out so I'm good for now. I have Chivalry as well, if I want some bloody hilarious pvp. 

     

    So yeah, I'm glad they put the browser in game. I'm one of those people who uses it without a second thought.

    Yeah same. As a scientist I do enough research during the day, I don't play video games to do more research.

  • grimalgrimal Member UncommonPosts: 2,935

    I don't look up walkthroughs for this game.  Period.

    The game is supposed to make you think and by cheating you are basically missing out on the whole experience.

    Yet, if the puzzle just doesn't seem to make sense or seems broken, I will ask for hints in the hint channel.  But that's as far as it goes for me.

     

    Edit: Actually, there was  one mission I did look through the walkthrough after spending a couple days on and just getting frustrated.  I found it incredibly difficult.

  • WhitebeardsWhitebeards Member Posts: 778
    Originally posted by evilastro
    Originally posted by Whitebeards

    I can not vote for any of those options because i solve them on my own. Period. I was once stuck on an investigation mission for 5 days but i did solve it. I had to learn some egyptian words but other than that i did it on my own. So the only clues i ever looked was the translation of egyptian, hebrew, latin etc languages used in TSW puzzles.

    I consider myself to be of average intellect and general knowledge but uptil now i never had look for  a walkthrough for any investigation mission. i did them all on my ow even if it took me weeks.

    That would be the third option, where you only look up clues rather than walkthroughs. Unless you are saying that you use no online resources whatsoever.

    If i knew all the foriegn languages. I wouldn't. That is the only clue i looked for.

  • apocolusterapocoluster Member UncommonPosts: 1,326
    Originally posted by Senden
    How big of a role in the game do investigation missions play? Downloaded the client but yet to start my free trial, will I likely get to have a dabble in them with moderate level of play in my three days trial? The feature sounds really good and I LOVE a good puzzle to solve.

    They arent core story critical from what Ive seen (up to the beginnings of blue mtns) but offer the biggest xp rewards for solving them...the first time around.

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  • L0C0ManL0C0Man Member UncommonPosts: 1,065

    Personally I refuse to look for walktroughs, but other than that, I look for any other resource online and otherwise to help solving the puzzles. For example, in the Dead Air mission (to use an early one, so I don't spoil much) you have to descipher morse code from the sound you hear of the signal, I (of course) looked on wikipedia for morse code, then (after a few failet attempts to try to write it down), I used audacity to record the audio and then look at the waveform for the dots and dashes so I could decode the message. I've also used online cypher decoders once I found out what kind of cypher was being used and things like that.

    Of course, personal mileage may vary, but I don't see it as cheating as long as it's something you'd be able to do in real life with an internet enabled smartphone (of course, within the game lore, I avoid results that refer directly to the game), and remember that in the game they do provide you with a smartphone (much to Dame Julia's chagrin) once you're done choosing weapons, and that phone takes calls no matter whether you're in a small seatown in Maine, deep in the egyptian deserts or in the tansilvanian forests, so I guess they made it (either magically or technologically) able to receive internet anywhere as well, which is, I think, the rationale behind the in-game internet browser.

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  • Crazy_StickCrazy_Stick Member Posts: 1,059
    Originally posted by evilastro
    Originally posted by PWN_FACE

    I go straight to google without even attempting to solve the puzzles. I don't have any fun at all doing puzzles. They feel like work to me, probably because my jobs have involved researching stuff for a quite a while now. I play TSW for the story and atmosphere. I like the pve and playing around with the ability wheel. My verdict is still out on pvp, but Darkfall is coming out so I'm good for now. I have Chivalry as well, if I want some bloody hilarious pvp. 

     

    So yeah, I'm glad they put the browser in game. I'm one of those people who uses it without a second thought.

    Yeah same. As a scientist I do enough research during the day, I don't play video games to do more research.

     I find it interesting that those of us that admit to skipping straight to the walk through in posts have something in common. Real life job duties requiring research and problem solving. I wonder if that will be a common theme?

  • minttunatorminttunator Member UncommonPosts: 131
    Originally posted by Crazy_Stick

     I find it interesting that those of us that admit to skipping straight to the walk through in posts have something in common. Real life job duties requiring research and problem solving. I wonder if that will be a common theme?

    That's pretty interesting. Personally, I feel the opposite - I'm a software developer by day, so I spend most of my time solving problems, coming up with algorithms and such. I, however, love the investigation aspect of TSW and I only use walkthroughs when I'm absolutely stumped. Then again, I like puzzles in general - I like to do crosswords, play chess etc. 

    It's weird and, to be honest, even somewhat depressing to see people considering thinking to be unpleasant or a chore - I guess that's a part of the reason so many MMOs (and games in general) are so dumbed down nowadays. TSW is pretty much the only MMO where the players actually have to use their brain cells (other than, in a different sense, maybe EVE) and I really appreciate that. 

    EDIT: I realized my post sounds a bit harsh. I'm not saying anyone who doesn't like investigation missions is dumb or a bad person or anything like that, I'm just throwing a different opinion into the mix. :)

  • evilastroevilastro Member Posts: 4,270
    Originally posted by apocoluster
    Originally posted by Senden
    How big of a role in the game do investigation missions play? Downloaded the client but yet to start my free trial, will I likely get to have a dabble in them with moderate level of play in my three days trial? The feature sounds really good and I LOVE a good puzzle to solve.

    They arent core story critical from what Ive seen (up to the beginnings of blue mtns) but offer the biggest xp rewards for solving them...the first time around.

    They tend to tie up the loose ends of the storyline so it all makes sense. Like the one in Savage Coast where you find out that the themepark was built using a anima power generator.

  • RimmersmanRimmersman Member Posts: 885
    Originally posted by Four0Six

    Claiming to not use Google to aid in mission completion is the "New L33tism".

    Sorry if I offended anyone, NO, Im not, since the one of the Kingsmouth investigation missions, not sure of the name, it's the onw with the SUV by the skatepark...REQUIRES you to use your ingame browser to go the a web page and search for a last name.......

     

    Yup this is true and not forgetting the radio transmition frequency on the roof at the airport.

    I call BS on anyone who says they have not been online or asked someone else.

    image
  • RaysheRayshe Member UncommonPosts: 1,279

    I only really use them for Morse code and certian sound related ones. Being tone deaf, its nearly impossible to accomplish. For example the Egypt Crate password where you need to listen to the buttons being hit and figure out the pattern using that. Being tone deaf ment i wouldnt be able to get passed it.

     

     

    Also using the ingame browser and using something like Unfair.co are 2 completely different things. Funcom has MADE websites for the game.

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  • evilastroevilastro Member Posts: 4,270
    Originally posted by Crazy_Stick
    Originally posted by evilastro
    Originally posted by PWN_FACE

    I go straight to google without even attempting to solve the puzzles. I don't have any fun at all doing puzzles. They feel like work to me, probably because my jobs have involved researching stuff for a quite a while now. I play TSW for the story and atmosphere. I like the pve and playing around with the ability wheel. My verdict is still out on pvp, but Darkfall is coming out so I'm good for now. I have Chivalry as well, if I want some bloody hilarious pvp. 

     

    So yeah, I'm glad they put the browser in game. I'm one of those people who uses it without a second thought.

    Yeah same. As a scientist I do enough research during the day, I don't play video games to do more research.

     I find it interesting that those of us that admit to skipping straight to the walk through in posts have something in common. Real life job duties requiring research and problem solving. I wonder if that will be a common theme?

    Maybe. Honestly I play video games to turn off the thought processes that makes too much background noise otherwise. Get me out of work mode. So I tend to prefer action oriented games, rather than puzzle games.  My partner on the other hand has a pretty non-demanding job mentally, so likes to do puzzles, and then asks me for help hahaha.  

    Although I still tend to theorycraft when making builds and choosing gear, and pull out the old spreadsheets for optimisation. Old habits die hard I guess.

  • RimmersmanRimmersman Member Posts: 885
    Originally posted by grimal

    I don't look up walkthroughs for this game.  Period.

    So the above comment needs to be removed from this post because it's BS yourown admission.

    The game is supposed to make you think and by cheating you are basically missing out on the whole experience.

    Yet, if the puzzle just doesn't seem to make sense or seems broken, I will ask for hints in the hint channel.  But that's as far as it goes for me.

     

    Edit: Actually, there was  one mission I did look through the walkthrough after spending a couple days on and just getting frustrated.  I found it incredibly difficult.

    This is what i'm saying, anyone who claims they have not looked online is BS, plain and simple. Whether you have done it once or ten time does not matter, fact is you have done it.

    There is nothing wrong in serching for a tip if it really is holding up your game.

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