The Secret World doesn’t launch until June but The Secret War has already begun to heat up the conflict. Funcom’s browser-based social game set to build up the tension between The Secret World’s three secret societies - Dragons, Templars and the Illuminati has already enlisted more than 200,000 participants. By participating in The Secret War, players can fight for their chosen secret society to gain influence and unlock items to be used in The Secret World.

The Secret World launches on June 19th, 2012. Check out the official press release after the break and visit The Secret War website to join the fight.

200,000 ILLUMINATI, DRAGON AND TEMPLAR INITIATES NOW FIGHTING THE SECRET WAR

– Over 50 MILLION agents deployed in ‘The Secret War’, a unique social experience that gives a glimpse of the conflict in ‘The Secret World’ MMO launching June 19 –

Durham, USA – May 3rd, 2012 – Funcom is excited to share that 200,000 participants are now engaged in battle through ‘The Secret War’, a unique browser-based social experience that draws upon the conflict between the three secret societies in Funcom’s upcoming massively multiplayer online game‘The Secret World’. Launching on June 19th, 2012, ‘The Secret World’ MMO pitches players against each other as they fight for the power to control the world for their secret society, and through ‘The Secret War’ social experience, participants can get a taste of the epic conflict that hits on June 19th.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY ‘THE SECRET WAR’

In this unique social experience participants recruit their friends to join the battle and use them as agents on a world map to spread influence for one of the three secret societies: the Illuminati, the Dragon or the Templar. While doing so they unlock items that can be used in ‘The Secret World’ MMO at launch, items such as clothing, weapons, elixirs and even in-game titles. Through this social experience, participants get to engage themselves deeper in the conflict that they will get to play in ‘The Secret World’ MMO. They can also win a trip to the Funcom studio and even the chance to have their name in the game world.

‘The Secret War’ has now been raging for two weeks. Here are some interesting stats so far:

• Over 200,000 gamers have registered and become participants in the war
• The experience has had over 1.2 million visits in total
• Each participant spends 20 minutes on average playing at each visit
• Over 50 million agents have been deployed by the 200,000 participants
  
  

Since launch on April 18th additional strategic layers have been added to the experience and participants must now work together toward a common goal every week. The secret society that performs best by the end of each week will see all their members be rewarded with unique items that can be used in‘The Secret World’ MMO. This week the factions battle for the Heart of Africa health-boosting talisman.

“The success of ‘The Secret War’ shows that the conflict between the world’s secret societies has universal appeal,” says Funcom SVP of Sales & Marketing Morten Larssen. “This conflict has always been a key driver for activity in our own community, and we are excited to see that more and more people are coming in to join the conflict from outside the community as well. The conflict between the three secret societies adds a whole new dimension to MMO gameplay and we are excited to be able to have gamers take part in that conflict even before the launch of ‘The Secret World’.”

‘The Secret World’ is consistently mentioned as one of the most anticipated online games in development, and Funcom reported in February that over 750,000 gamers had registered for the ongoing beta testing by then. ‘The Secret World’ breaks new grounds and genre conventions by introducing a modern-day setting, a story-focused MMO experience, and a freeform progression system using no classes and no levels.

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ABOUT FUNCOM - Funcom is an independent developer and publisher of online games for PC and consoles. Funcom has provided outstanding entertainment since 1993 and continues to expand its track-record of more than twenty released games. Recent titles include ‘Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures’, ‘The Longest Journey', 'Anarchy Online' and 'Dreamfall: The Longest Journey'. For corporate information please visit www.funcom.com. For information about Funcom games visit www.anarchy-online.com,www.dreamfall.com, www.thesecretworld.com or www.ageofconan.com. Funcom is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under the ticker FUNCOM.