Imagine if every myth, conspiracy theory and urban legend was true.

Imagine a world where you can become anything you want to be, without restrictions such as classes or levels. This is the premise for The Secret World, Funcom’s upcoming massively multiplayer online game set in the modern-day real world.

What works

• Installer (2 Disc DVD)
• Launcher (with d3dcompiler_43)
• Patcher (almost 4 gig update)
• Sound (no problems noted)
• Character creation
  
• Game (...see comments...)
• Cut scenes/Videos (but with horrible flicker)
  

What does not

• Whenever menus/cut scenes/videos were displayed, there was horrible flickering to the point where it was extremely difficult to navigate the menu, or watch a video.
• Poor performance
  
• Some effects weren't rendered properly.  For instance, characters were rendered with half of the body darker then the other half and other oddities in facial shading/shadows.

What was not tested

• Extended gameplay (only about an hour so far, and mostly messing with settings)
  
• Grouping/interacting with other players
• Graphic settings above low
• Non-emulated desktop

Additional Comments

Install
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1) Installed from disk (no problems)
2) winetricks d3dcompiler_43 (needed for launcher to start)
3) winetricks d3dx9 (needed for game to start, although I'm not sure which dll's were key in resolving the issue)
4) winecfg -> Libraries then set d3dx9_43 to builtin (needed to *not* get directx9 out of date error (thanks coomac).  In open beta I got this error and proceeded with installing directx9.  Afterwords, the game kept crashing on start so I gave up messing with it).
5) Received error about outdated drivers, I declined updates.

Performance (Nvidia GTX 480 overclocked/AMD Phenom II X4 965)
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By default, my video settings were set to low and performance was horribad.  To make the game bearable (16 FPS in populated area) I had to:
1) In game, hit esc -> Video Options -> Advanced -> set everything to 0.
2) Restart game