The Secret World Will Have Subscription, Micro-transactions

Most MMO's on the market are either subscription-based or free-to-play but supported by micro-transactions. Funcom revealed on Friday that The Secret World find some middle ground between those two business models.

"At the [quarterly financial] presentation we revealed that The Secret World will feature a traditional paid subscription model combined with micro-transactions through an in-game store," said Funcom in a post on the official game forums. "This information was provided as part of Funcom's financial forecast going forward, and no further details were given due to the fact that we are still working on finalizing the model."

Any time a company announces that their game will have micro-transactions, they usually follow that up with a reassurance that their game isn't pay-to-win. Funcom does just that.

"We will be revealing more information about the store at a later date, but what we can say for now is that it will focus mostly on convenience item and character customization items such as clothing - of which The Secret World will offer a ton of variety! As developers we are being very careful in making sure that items purchased through the store does not give players any unfair advantage against those who do not use the in-game store."

Funcom adds that they have "considerable experience" with micro-transactions - for example, in Age of Conan - and they've been able to implement them without disrupting game balance in the past.

Additional details on the in-game store will be released as we get closer to the game's April 2012 launch.