After playing The Secret World beta this weekend there were plenty of secrets uncovered. However, one of the things that stood out the most to me about the game was how it created the mood and atmosphere of the world. Even being set in our time and our world, it does an amazing job of setting the mood for the players.

Once your character is created you are put into a short cut scene on how you got your the secret wolrd power leveling. You have not even mapped out your abilities yet, and right away your character is shown with an infinite amount of potential. I don’t want to spoil things for players but the game puts you in the mood to go and harness this new found power.

As an Illuminati player I was instantly transported to the streets of New York City. Since I grew up about twenty minutes outside of New York, it is quite easy to recognize my home turf. One of the great parts in the zone is that they don’t show you the glitz and glam New York, but the underbelly of society. The zone is a mix of seedy back alleys and quiet conversations in corners. Living here for many years, this is everywhere in New York, except maybe Time Square and Broadway now-a-days. Being transported into this world now makes me want to find the Illuminati and figure this place out.

Before I knew it I was listening to a crazy Laundry Mat owner about all kinds of conspiracy theories. He rants on and on about the government and its ties to the supernatural, even with a great joke about Disneyland. Once he puts you on your path you are sent to find the Illuminati headquarters, which is no easy task. I mean honestly it is low level, so it isn’t too hard, but just enough to give you the sense of how secret this organization is. That aspect of the game for the Illuminati is what makes the secret wolrd power leveling so cool. There are symbols within symbols within graffiti on the walls. Just the way something as conspiracy theory-bound as the Illuminati should be.

The Secret World does a few things with its mechanics which are very cool. First, they allow the player total freedom; I spent about thirty minutes trying out all the weapons before I chose one.  You know from the weirdness around you that you will be battling some pretty heavy stuff. It made me want to test my skills more in the game. After running the Tokyo Flashback instance I really wanted to think about how to spec out my character. It felt very different than any other MMO.

This alternate choice from my normal style characters made me think right away. Then I realized the game itself presents that alternate world to you. One thing The Secret World definitely gets right is story. Story has been focused on by AAA MMOs ever since Star Wars was in development and BioWare started pushing the story angle. However, in Star Wars it was rather cliché. You knew what you were getting into with the secret wolrd power leveling. The Secret World does an amazing job with story because you don’t know what you are getting into.

The setting of this game will latch onto players quickly as you will want to find out the secrets hidden for you. There are events and things going on that will bring players in and make them want to find the answers. This element to the game drives the story very well. The Secret World does an amazing job of setting up the atmosphere for the player. It is horror, mystery, and action all wrapped in one.

The legacy system is going to be a huge feature in SWTOR and it is probably the reason why patch 1.2 was named Legacy. The first feature introduced with the legacy system is family tree. This is more of a RP feature but it is nonetheless very cool to be able to sort all your characters in a family tree. Currently this legacy tree is only available for characters you own, there might be plans down the road to add other people's character as marriage partners etc. The key thing about this legacy tree is that it is cross-faction so it can contain both your Republic and Empire characters on the same server.

Another cool legacy feature is species & class unlocks. Once you play a species to swtor power leveling 50, you can unlock that species be any classes on both factions - this means that you can have a pureblood Jedi or a Chiss smuggler! If you are playing human, you will be given a presence stat on all your existing and upcoming legacy characters instead since the human species can be all classes. Cyborgs also have a neat feature. If you havn't noticed this before, each class for the cyborg race have their own unique cyborg attachments. You can now unlock all of them and become a super cyborg!

In terms of class unlocks - completing a character to the end of Chapter 2 for that character's class quest will grant you that class's class specific emotes and buffs for all your legacy characters. This means that you can have bounty hunter buffs on your sith warrior alt for example. Completing that character to the end of Chapter 3 will grant you heroic abilites from that class to all your legacy characters. These abilites are iconic class abilites (i.e. force choke from sith warriors or flamethrower from bounty hunters) that will require a companion to use (similar to the heroic moment abilites you have right now). The companion restriction will prevent you from using these heroic abilities in places such as a warzone or operation.

Companion completion: Bioware wants you to do those companion quests and there are now incentives to do all the quests for a specific companion. Once you "complete" a companion (do all the quests available for that companion), you will receive a) shorter cooldowns on heroic abilites, b) longer durations for your heroic moment and 3) unlock small stat boosts if that companion is the first companion you have "completed" for that companion type (i.e. ranged tank). If you complete a second companion of the same type, you will receive an additional presence buff.

Alignment/Social Rank/Valor unlocks: These unlocks are mainly non-combat based (fluff). Reaching Light V/Dark V will unlock active abilities for all legacy characters with swtor power leveling. Reach a certain valor rank will unlock the abiliites to have unarmed duels on all your legacy characters. Reach a certain social rank will allow you to dance with your companion and unlock RP emote packages.

Additional rewards: Sprint has being moved to level 1 with 1.2 so you no longer have to wait for your teens to get faster running speed. Gaining legacy levels will allow you to unlock a higher level version of spring called Jetpack for bounty hunters and rocket boots for all other classes. This is essentially a shorter duration spring with faster movement speed. Legacy levels will also allow you to purchase items for your ship such as training dummies, mailboxes, repair droids, neutral GTNs and even cores for your ship droid to improve specific crew skills. To prevent the fleet from becoming a ghost town, the devs have said that items like neutral GTNs are only available for players with very high legacy level and lots of credits. Mobs will also drop legacy tokens. These tokens are not class specific and are bound to your legacy. You can trade them to merchants in return for low level gears for your legacy characters.

Economy and Crew skills
Some hard statistical data were given during the summit. It was interesting to see the overall distribution of all the crew skills. Biochem was actually not the most popular crafting skill - that was artifice. Interestingly, bioanalysis was actually the least used gathering skill, which explains the inflation seen on the GTN right now with the bioanalysis mats.

The goal of crew skills in 1.2 is to to make every single crew skill viable for endgame. To that end, there is an overhaul to the current reverse engineering system - better reverse engineering rates and the ability to reverse engineer more items. There is also going to be a change to the augment system - synthweaving, armstech and armsmech will be able to make augments while slicing (the current source of augments) will be providing mats for these three professions for augment making. There is a huge emphasis on the crafting of orange armor with crit slots to both customize the look you want and also providing the best stats since the majority of endgame mods/armoring/enhancements can now be removed. Schematics for new orange gear will be released with 1.2 so if you don't like the look of the orange gear you can get right now from crafters there is hope down the road.

Roleplaying & Guild features
The meat of the roleplaying experience will be in the Legacy system introduced earlier - family trees, social unlocks, emote unlocks etc. Chat bubbles will be making a come back as Bioware has resolved the technical issues that prevented their usage at launch. You will also see a lot more ambient activity as well - creatures, NPCs etc to make the world feel more alive. Cosmetic/social armor will no longer be light armor exclusive and should be useable by all without taking a stat loss.

For guilds, there are two major improvements - guild banks and guild UI as well as swtor power leveling. Guild banks has finally arrived and now features 7 tabs you can unlock with increasing credit requirements. Guild leaders can restrict access to these tabs to only people of a certain rank - including the option to require authenticators to combat account hacking. Guild UI will feature some minor improvements with 1.2, with the promise of a complete revamp sometime after 1.2. In 1.2 you should be able to invite people to group from the guild window.

Guild capital ships and calenders are in the works but Bioware has no ETA on exactly when they will be released.

Early this morning, BioWare released a trailer for the Novare Coast Warzone coming in Patch 1.2. In the trailer, SWTOR game fans get a close look at a few of the combat mechanics and objectives at play in the new Warzone.

On the war-torn planet of Denova, opposing forces vie for control of Novare Coast, a strategically vital beachhead that leads to the open oceans of Denova. Whoever controls this coastline will have a decisive advantage in taking control of the planet. To secure the beach, sides battle for control of three mortar turrets which can be used to pound the enemy with artillery fire.

A more subtle announcement came via the trailers page that shows showed the release date for Patch 1.2 as April 10th.

Republic and Imperial forces battle for control of a Denova beachhead in this new Warzone coming to Game Update 1.2 on April 10th!It is said by Bioware. Also ,the SWTOR power leveling is always available.

Lead Interface Artist Michael Voigt hosts a tour of the new User Interface customization options coming in the SWTOR Game Update 1.2: Legacy. v1.2 is scheduled to launch later in April. Enjoy!

"The biggest change with Game Update 1.2 is the evolution of the Legacy system," said BioWare. "As we first highlighted back in January, players will be able to tie their different characters together in their Legacy family tree. Characters that are placed within a Legacy family tree will then be able to unlock special Legacy emotes and abilities. Players will also be able to unlock different species and Swtor powerleveling for any character class in their Legacy."

Update 1.2 also introduces a new Warzone, Operation, and Flashpoint. Other features in the patch include UI customization, PvP rankings, and guild banks. Expect a lot of bug fixes and other tweaks as well.

Game Update 1.2: New content:

1.Flashpoint: Lost Island continues the Kaon Under Siege Flashpoint from Game Update 1.1 - Rise of the Rakghouls. Players must survive a menacing island of mystery on Ord Mantell as they hunt for clues to the Rakghoul virus outbreak that ravaged the Tion Hegemony. But the answers to this riddle may prove fatal!

2.Operation: Explosive Conflict sends groups of eight or sixteen Imperial or Republic players to a new zone on the planet of Denova, where traitors and mercenaries are selling the rare explosive mineral baradium to the highest bidder. Players will battle through hordes of Droids, mercenaries and deadly creatures all fighting for control of the planet and its valuable resources.

3.Warzone: Novare Coast pits two teams in an epic battle to control multiple mortar locations and use Swtor power leveling to bombard vulnerable enemy bases. Like the Huttball Warzone, Novare Coast can be played Republic vs. Empire or with players of the same faction fighting each other in a thrilling contest of wills to determine each side's greatest champions.

The Star Wars: The Old Republic guild summit is kicking off in an hour, so there’s bound to be plenty more info on upcoming features arriving over the course of the next day or so. Also, Swtor power leveling is available all the hours.