Anthem Review Thread

unfashionable · Feb 20, 2019

TheUnsungHero26 said:
Good post.

I would love to read an in-depth story detailing Anthem's development, similar to what Jason Schreier has shared about Destiny. It's especially interesting considering the first look we got at the game that would turn out to be Anthem was way back in 2014 during E3.

Obviously this is very early in development, but from the few seconds of footage, we can already see what looks like a completely different environment. It even looks like they planned for the game to have changing seasons.

This has been a tough generation for BioWare. It sounds like being forced to use Frostbite has been incredibly detrimental to the studio.

Dragon Age Inquisition was their biggest success both commercially and critically, but the impression I get is that the public opinion turned on it quite quickly. It always struck me as a game trying to overcompensate for the faults of Dragon Age 2. I actually think Inquisition might be my least favourite of the series. The combat just did not click with me at all, the quests were not interesting, and it might have one of the worst UIs of any AAA game I have played.

In hindsight, Mass Effect Andromeda's troubled development should have also been obvious. The game was a no-show at E3 so many times. We either got pre-rendered trailers or development documentaries on it. In fact, I think the most gameplay we were shown of a Mass Effect game at E3 this generation was at Microsoft's E3 2015 conference... When they were showcasing Backwards Compatability with Mass Effect 1.

I can't help but wonder how these games would have turned out if they were able to use Unreal Engine 4 or any other engine.

Man hearing that music is so sad. We'll likely never see the like of a true Mass Effect RPG again. EA going to just be chasing the BR stuff after Apex.

Have to be content with The Outer Worlds (looks fantastic but its not of the scale of the ME trilogy)

Hailinel · Feb 20, 2019

I know that this is a dumb comparison, so bear with me, but my brain keeps kicking back to Xenoblade Chronicles X. An absolutely massive world with no significant loading times once the game world is loaded, with giant mechs you can pilot and fly all over the place, utilizing a combat system that promotes chaining skill combos between party members. There's a hub city full of NPCs to talk to, sidequests to engage in, and there's a whole cadre of potential party members to recruit. It's not a multiplayer game in the same sense, but it had online elements that weren't obtrusive.

Anthem is like if Bioware decided to make Xenoblade Chronicles X as a purely multiplayer game and fucked it up from top to bottom.

Admiral Woofington · Feb 20, 2019

Hailinel said:
I know that this is a dumb comparison, so bear with me, but my brain keeps kicking back to Xenoblade Chronicles X. An absolutely massive world with no significant loading times once the game world is loaded, with giant mechs you can pilot and fly all over the place, utilizing a combat system that promotes chaining skill combos between party members. There's a hub city full of NPCs to talk to, sidequests to engage in, and there's a whole cadre of potential party members to recruit. It's not a multiplayer game in the same sense, but it had online elements that weren't obtrusive.

Anthem is like if Bioware decided to make Xenoblade Chronicles X as a purely multiplayer game and fucked it up from top to bottom.

You know as much as I found boring the main story of x, the side content and just pure sense of exploration was unmatched until breath of the wild.

I know it's silly to hope for as it's unlikely to ever happen, but if we could get a port of the title on the switch I'd die.

plexxrock · Feb 20, 2019

Eorl said:
Heck WoW makes you raid for hours on end with the same repeated boss encounters and that's been trucking along fine.

People enjoying raiding in WoW because of the extreme variety between raid encounters in terms of boss mechanics and strategies required to tackle them. It's like group problem solving, and it's because of the challenge and variety that people keep coming back again and again.

Sure you have farm after progression is done, but that's just to prepare you for the next tier of content.

The point remains the same, Blizzard doesn't 'repeat' boss encounters in between tiers and the innovation they show to this day when creating boss encounters is comparable to the best of boss fights in any single player experience out there, and put alot of the other offerings avaliable to shame in comparasin.

Drey1082 · Feb 20, 2019

bsigg said:
Tetris is a novelty. There is no replay value in what they did with Tetris 99.

Anthem is worth it just for this post.

Just finished the bombcast. Jeff absolutely goes off on this game. I'm somewhat shocked at the reactions. I don't know why but I assumed more of the media would be lenient on this game because of the pedigree.

I haven't see anything that says this is a great game. All media opinions seem to range from it's okay to downright terrible. Their stream tomorrow is going to be very interesting.

Anton Sugar · Feb 20, 2019

Drey1082 said:
I haven't see anything that says this is a great game. All media opinions seem to range from it's okay to downright terrible. Their stream tomorrow is going to be very interesting.

Overall, yes, but plenty of outlets have praised its combat/gameplay. The rest of the game...

It's just a shame. The stream is gonna be so rough.

abady-25 · Feb 20, 2019

month of flops

Jarmel · Feb 20, 2019

Drey1082 said:
Anthem is worth it just for this post.

Just finished the bombcast. Jeff absolutely goes off on this game. I'm somewhat shocked at the reactions. I don't know why but I assumed more of the media would be lenient on this game because of the pedigree.

The luster of Bioware's name wore off awhile ago. The only good game they've arguably made since 2010(ME2) is Inquisition.

Roy · Feb 20, 2019

Not a fan of Bioware but I feel for these poor souls.

Static · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
The luster of Bioware's name wore off awhile ago. The only good game they've argually made since 2010(ME2) is Inquisition.

ME3 was a better game than Inquisition for its multiplayer alone, and despite its misteps, a better singleplayer action RPG than Inquisition. Bioware's games since ME2 can be very easily cast as steady decline in quality.

Jarmel · Feb 20, 2019

Static said:
ME3 was a better game than Inquisition for its multiplayer alone, and despite its misteps, a better singleplayer action RPG than Inquisition. Bioware's games since ME2 can be very easily cast as steady decline in quality.

Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

Whales · Feb 20, 2019

mass effect died for this :(

Static · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

It wasn't a trash fire, and it was better than Andromeda, it was just unremarkable. I don't remember much of anything about it.

Crayon · Feb 20, 2019

Eviscerated on giant bomb.

Antrax · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

It's pretty well-loved in the DA community. Particularly for its characters and narrative. I'll say it has one of the gutsiest narrative reveals since Kotor 2 in my opinion.

I'm disappointed in Anthem. The beta just wasn't great. The gameplay is top notch. Legit 10/10 imo. But there's just nothing around it to keep you playing it. The loot doesn't seem like it drastically changes how the game plays; making bigger numbers is pointless since the numbers are arbitrary.* Maybe they patch it up pretty well though.

*I still remember my roommate telling me his gun in Borderlands 2 did over 100K damage a round or something like that. But then I guess the enemies had scaled to a billion HP so the battles looked exactly like they did at level 10. Still think that style of loot game is bad.

TheClaw7667 · Feb 20, 2019

I love the gameplay. The combat can feel really good when you're playing the game fast. Flying, using combos, dodging into a melee attack then flying back into the air, it all feels, and sounds, great. But man, everything else is just awful. I hate the story, I hate Fort Tarsis, and I can't believe how long the load times can be.

Fort Tarsis feels like it belongs in a different game. It's completely out of place in a game like this. Everytime I am forced to go back to the Fort I lose so much motivation to continue playing. It just slows down the game so much.

I have a year of Premier so I'll stick with it but I don't think I'd buy this game in it's current form.

Anton Sugar · Feb 20, 2019

Antrax said:
I'm disappointed in Anthem. The beta just wasn't great. The gameplay is top notch. Legit 10/10 imo. But there's just nothing around it to keep you playing it. The loot doesn't seem like it drastically changes how the game plays; making bigger numbers is pointless since the numbers are arbitrary.* Maybe they patch it up pretty well though.

This is pretty crucial. The gameplay is solid, they just need to get the loop itself firing before they can keep an audience. A lot of people are worried about the loot, based on cosmetics available pre-2/22. They need to give players a reason to play.

Mington · Feb 20, 2019

Maximo said:
I expect Anthem to sell really well, however its engagement and expectations of a constant revenue stream will drop like a rock.

I think the lack of any meaningful single player will harm the game amongst Bioware fans and lack of PvP hurts the game amongst multiplayer fans

Nightengale · Feb 20, 2019

Crayon said:
Eviscerated on giant bomb.

Everything Jeff said literally echoes how I feel about the core gameplay.

Even the flying. Like I said, the game doesn't really fulfill the illusion of Iron Man. The fact that automatically go to 'hover mode' when for normal ( non-homing missile ) combat is not satisfying.

Avitus · Feb 20, 2019

Crayon said:
Eviscerated on giant bomb.

Jeff being sad that Anthem is bad enough to jeopardize Dragon Age (his wife's favorite franchise) and Bioware at large was pretty poignant. Like Brad, I think about ME2 and how things have changed since then.

Mington said:
Normally I would say Anthem will be fine and still sell millions but with Apex now out, im not sure

Problem will be that Apex, like FIFA, will print a lot of money for a lot less than was invested in Anthem. It looks bad on EA and Bioware. It further motivates them to chase after the flavor-of-the-day and microtransactions rather than investing in big, expensive, time-consuming AAA games that might outright bomb. Why would you invest huge resources into expansions for Anthem when the ROI is nowhere near as good as something with the playerbase of Apex?

LossAversion · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

Inquisition is fantastic if you're a fan of the Dragon Age universe. The characters and the story were great. Especially with the Trespasser DLC.

Josecitox · Feb 20, 2019

Good to hear Jeff saying exactly what i think about the combat and flying, not even that is well done in this game, it's the only thing that actually has potential to be better due the combo mechanic but the rest needs a lot of work.

Mechaplum · Feb 20, 2019

Yeah reading all these comments about flying being great I was like so confused.

Fiery Phoenix · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
The luster of Bioware's name wore off awhile ago. The only good game they've arguably made since 2010(ME2) is Inquisition.

I would say even Inquisition was lackluster compared to their earlier output.

Rush_Khan · Feb 20, 2019

I watched a two minute long ad for this game yesterday not knowing anything about it. There was zero in-game footage in those two minutes as far as I could tell (looked completely live-action). I thought that was really weird.

Kin5290 · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

Inquisition was well received on release. It just suffered from having The Witcher 3 come out after it and being completely overshadowed by it.

TheMango55 · Feb 20, 2019

I don't know why people are surprised that Giant Bomb hated it when it was clear they hated it from the first time they played it, also, I don't think I've ever seen Giant Bomb actually turn around on how they feel about a game, if anything they snowball into hyperbole whether positive or negative. "Yeah man I dunno, It's REAL BAD!. Shit SUCKS!"

I love the Giant Bomb content but they are the last people I'd trust for game recommendations.

I'm not even saying this to defend Anthem because while I've had a lot of fun with what I've played, the bugs and sparse content issues make it seem like a 7 is a pretty fair score.

Josecitox · Feb 20, 2019

TheMango55 said:
I don't know why people are surprised that Giant Bomb hated it when it was clear they hated it from the first time they played it, also, I don't think I've ever seen Giant Bomb actually turn around on how they feel about a game, if anything they snowball into hyperbole whether positive or negative. "Yeah man I dunno, It's REAL BAD!. Shit SUCKS!"

I love the Giant Bomb content but they are the last people I'd trust for game recommendations.

If there is a time to question their judgement, this is not it. They're 100% right with everything they're saying about the game.

Staf · Feb 20, 2019

I love Inquisition.

Nightengale · Feb 20, 2019

I mean, I'm not here to disparage those who think the game is fun. Far from it.

I'm just sharing my perspective that I feel personally, the problem with Anthem runs really really deep into its core gameplay and design, and for some people, the problem runs deeper than blaming the engine or thinking it can be fixed within 3 months with bug fixes.

And why even though aspects of the game that looks fun and feels fun at first glance doesn't really stick the landing.

Deleted member 42055 · Feb 20, 2019

TheMango55 said:
I don't know why people are surprised that Giant Bomb hated it when it was clear they hated it from the first time they played it, also, I don't think I've ever seen Giant Bomb actually turn around on how they feel about a game, if anything they snowball into hyperbole whether positive or negative. "Yeah man I dunno, It's REAL BAD!. Shit SUCKS!"

I love the Giant Bomb content but they are the last people I'd trust for game recommendations.

I'm not even saying this to defend Anthem because while I've had a lot of fun with what I've played, the bugs and sparse content issues make it seem like a 7 is a pretty fair score.

"They snowball into hyperbole.. they are the last people I'd trust for game recommendations."

This got a nice laugh out of me. I appreciate that they don't sugar coat things and never suck up to any Devs

Staf · Feb 20, 2019

Listen to the GB podcast on my way to work. Man did they not like it.

gutterboy44 · Feb 20, 2019

I am looking forward to playing the game, but I am well aware of all the flaws from what I experienced in the demos and what I see reported during this early access phase. I will probably have fun playing it co op, but this game deserves to be dragged. It feels like a game that launched before Destiny 1. The fact that it had all the lessons to learn from Destiny 1,2, Division 1 and a very long Diablo 3 case study... it is pretty staggering the mistakes they have made that have nothing to do with technical issues. I hope we get a TTK or RoS about face with this game in a year or so, but until then, I can't fault anyone for having some very passionate negative takes on it.

Fou-Lu · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

It's actually one of my favourite Bioware games despite its flaws. Art style and areas were beautiful, characters were great and some of the things it set up... Let's just say I was very excited for DA4. Now I am not sure if I will ever get it.

Speely · Feb 20, 2019

Fou-Lu said:
It's actually one of my favourite Bioware games despite its flaws. Art style and areas were beautiful, characters were great and some of the things it set up... Let's just say I was very excited for DA4. Now I am not sure if I will ever get it.

They will get it :)

dodo · Feb 20, 2019

Inquisition was wobbly (the quest distribution was poor, it was fully of technical issues, and I personally didn't like the story; although the latter is just a taste thing really) but it had the benefit of being a much better game than DA2, so it felt a bit like a course correction.

FlintSpace · Feb 20, 2019

From the UK sales thread, are people still thinking Anthem will do comfortably better in its first week sales compared to Andromeda, or only by a slight margin.

Ricelord · Feb 20, 2019

i'm not so sure if EA gonna get that 5-6 millions sales they wanted within a month.

Tagyhag · Feb 20, 2019

I still have to do the trial for Origin but at this point I'm just going to wait for that day 1 patch and see just how much it actually fixes.

Because it sounds like some things can easily be fixed by a patch, but others would require complete work from the ground up.

Kin5290 said:
Inquisition was well received on release. It just suffered from having The Witcher 3 come out after it and being completely overshadowed by it.

Yeah, Inquisition was good stuff, especially as someone who really enjoyed 1 but didn't care for 2.

But fuck, it just looked so RPG-Lite and dumb when compared to Witcher 3, and it's not its fault, almost all games do.

I still have hopes for DA4, I just hope that Bioware comes out ok from all this.

Xater · Feb 20, 2019

I still can not believe this game gets a fundamental thing like loot wrong. Like how do you do that in a game like this 8n which it is very important?

Horp · Feb 20, 2019

Meta said:
I'm so sick of hearing this.

Read this:

I sincerely doubt what landed on February 15th is anywhere close to what Bioware set off to make in 2012. Hell, how many longtime Bioware higher-ups left in that timeframe? This is just as stupid as saying that Final Fantasy XV was in full development for 10 years by a single, consistent team, when it was more like 3-4 at best.

Does you really believe that A-Team Bioware, in 2012, decided without a doubt in their minds to make a bog-standard Games as a Service loot shooter? I wouldn't be surprised if Anthem has been rebooted several times, and it was almost certainly rebooted once - when EA deemed it necessary to push out "a Destiny".

Additionally, Frostbite - an engine that had zilch support for RPG mechanics, open world design, and playing in 3rd person perspective - has been a huge problem for Anthem just as it has been for Bioware as a whole. Imagine having to build the tools needed to build your product while trying to build your product without the tools you need.

Seven years seems like barely enough time as it is for all of this bullshit to happen.

Agree on most of your points, but not on the frostbit bit.
Zilch support for RPG mechanics, what? BF games has classes, with unique abilities, unlocks and gear. It has quests (in SP and battlefront coop).
It has third person support in Battlefront, a game fully designed around third person.
What it does lack is a level streaming system, therefor there are these loading times.

Turin Turambar · Feb 20, 2019

Mechaplum said:
Yeah reading all these comments about flying being great I was like so confused.

What people says it's that flying feels great. And I agree with that.

But that's the surface-level analysis most people do. How things feel. Gameplay-wise, I think the flying system is a bit wasted, it isn't as tightly integrated into the gameplay like it could have been done. Say, having parts of combat where you also fight while flying (and not just hovering), maybe against enemy freelancers? Or have more enemies with energy based weapons that can be avoided (I mean, like a fireball from an Imp in Doom), and having enemies with more special attacks which can be avoided, making movement more important.

About the integration with Fort Tarsis... I think Bioware fell on the temptation of using up their expertide in npcs and storylines. Yes, they are known for that, but truly was that the best decision for an ONLINE COOP LOOTER SHOOTER game? Just imagine how more smoothly the game would play by being mostly on the game world, not having to go back and forth to Fort Tarsis, having an inventory loadout button to instantly change things, etc.

KushalaDaora · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

Not really. The story have several great moment (some even better than anything from Origins imo) and the companions are my favorite out of all DA/ME . I also find the dungeons to be really great with cool environmental storytelling.

Inquisition also reward you with several altered story moment if you import your choice from DAO/DA2 using the Keep.

Unfortunately all the great stuff only made up for like 20% or so of the game (The main story also only take you to like 3 out of 8 or so zones). The side stuff is dumpster fire with low quality side quests with terrible writing (remember the Chantry Board/Blackstone Irregular stuff from Dragon Age Origins ? That's the level of 99% of side quest in Inquisition lol).

Handicapped Duck · Feb 20, 2019

Crayon said:
Eviscerated on giant bomb.

Nightengale said:
Everything Jeff said literally echoes how I feel about the core gameplay.

Even the flying. Like I said, the game doesn't really fulfill the illusion of Iron Man. The fact that automatically go to 'hover mode' when for normal ( non-homing missile ) combat is not satisfying.

Just finished listening to the Anthem portion and I just couldn't believe it. I thought all throughout Anthem (didn't play the beta) that you would be able to fly around strafing while shooting your shoulder machine gun, locking on to twelve targets firing hellfire missles and none of that type of fly-by Iron Man stuff is in there. As the bombcast stated, and I'm paraphrasing, BioWare messed up what makes Iron Man fun. Coming off of Ace Combat 7 I was kind of excited to see a 3rd-person Iron Man game, but with Ace Combat-like air combat. Maybe my expectations were too unrealistic but it baffles me that such a concept isn't in the game from what I listened to and have seen in the Quicklook.

I hope BioWare comes out of this stronger and learning from past experience, but I'm not too sure about their fate if this game doesn't meet the probable high expectations that EA has for it.

SweetSark · Feb 20, 2019

Sad to hear the game doesn't leave the positivity we wanted...
But I have a different question to ask:
Does the enemy designs are cool and unique or very generic for a sci-fi theme game?
Saw some trailers and you fought some weird enemies like a Golem and a Space Spider Queen think.

Anton Sugar · Feb 20, 2019

Turin Turambar said:
What people says it's that flying feels great. And I agree with that.

But that's the surface-level analysis most people do. How things feel. Gameplay-wise, I think the flying system is a bit wasted, it isn't as tightly integrated into the gameplay like it could have been done. Say, having parts of combat where you also fight while flying (and not just hovering), maybe against enemy freelancers? Or have more enemies with energy based weapons that can be avoided (I mean, like a fireball from an Imp in Doom), and having enemies with more special attacks which can be avoided, making movement more important.

It feels great and is important in combat, at least prior to the end game. Flying around saved my ass numerous times, as well let me save my teammates. It's also super useful to fly up and scout the battlefield, as well as quickly get around to high priority targets.

The end game difficulties sound so heavy hitting, I wonder if anyone even risks flying. That would be a problem, of course.

I do mostly agree with you. I wish flying were more useful than just movement/evasion. Integrating it into combat seems like a no-brainer--hopefully they do that eventually. It's not living up to its potential but that doesn't mean it's not important.

Laughing Banana · Feb 20, 2019

Jarmel said:
Was Inquisition that bad? Christ.

Nah, it's a fantastic game. The characters, especially, are very strong, especially if you play through Trespasser, which is an absolute necessity to fully appreciate Inquisition.

Yog-Sothoth · Feb 20, 2019

Brock Reiher said:
With Crackdown, Anthem, and Lawbreakers all bombing while Apex and Tetris thrive, it's official:

battle royal has killed off open world loot based and hero shooters

It's more of a case of Anthem and Crackdown being straight up bad and Apex and Tetris being great. Nothing to do with their genres.

darkwing · Feb 20, 2019

Shubh_C63 said:
From the UK sales thread, are people still thinking Anthem will do comfortably better in its first week sales compared to Andromeda, or only by a slight margin.

easily, look at the marketing, it's slick plus it is a space marine in a robot suit looter shooter game

Hulohot · Feb 20, 2019

I'm not surprised by these reviews. I got the feeling that this game would be a little bit of a miss from the first time it was shown off. The demo only further confirmed that.

Hopefully in a year or so it will be a lot better.

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