Having put 30 hours into Anthem and appearing to have a pretty different view than the conventional wisdom, I thought I would put down my thoughts on why I like (and also don't like) the game.
For reference, I am playing the game on a GTX 1080 at 1440p and Ultra settings. In the 30 hours I've played so far, probably 28 have been spent either playing scripted missions or interacting with the characters (more on that in a moment). I've only done free-roam in the world for a short while for some materials and world event credits that are needed at one point in the story. I did a lot of side quest while working on the main story, but having finished it, I still have a bunch of side quests left and one new Stronghold (like Destiny's Strikes).
The big question is, of course, what happens once I run out of story quests. There is definitely a grindy set of endgame quests to do if you want. But if I spend 40 hours doing content I really enjoy, will I care? And I get if people want to play Anthem every day non-stop for the next few months, that could be a disappointment. Maybe this is biggest disconnect between me and the reviews, but that wasn't why I was coming to the game. So anyway...
The good:
Flying - once you get the hang of the controls, which doesn't take long, flying is great. Maneuvering is easy to do and I don't know another game that has done this so well. There is a heat limit feature that means you can't fly indefinitely, but you learn to skim lakes and streams, burst through waterfalls and dive to the ground to reduce heat. It works well, and I think it's there for a specific reason...
The World - the open world section is huge and beautiful and you should sometimes get on the ground and look around. There are ruins, caves, villages, and more and there are treasure chests, materials and lore collectibles to pick up. You can fly quite high as well as dive down into underwater areas.
The Javelins - there are 4 javelins, and they all have unique features. I started with the Ranger, which is fairly bland, but then I tried the Interceptor and Storm, which quickly won me over. The Interceptor is quick and agile, allowing you to dash around with chained dodges and make quick melee slashes. The Storm can float for extended periods in combat and send down devastating elemental attacks. I haven't unlocked the Colossus yet, but I've heard it's got it's own unique style I'm eager to try.
The characters and character interactions - note that this is not the overall story. Anthem takes place in Fort Tarsis, where a big cast of characters is trying to live their lives day to day. There is the socially awkward Sentinel (army officer essentially), the douchebag laundry guy, the goofy bartender, the mysterious bar owner, the shopkeeper who loves baby monsters, the mother who is looking for her dead daughter, the wife who wants to know why her husband is having trouble adjusting, and many more. You can optionally speak to these people in exchange for increasing faction points which will eventually get you rewards, but they are well worth talking to regardless. It's a mix of humorous, serious, sad, mysterious and otherwise engaging storytelling that is also written and acted incredibly well. Outside of the main villain, who is surprisingly shallow, all of the characters are nicely fleshed out and grow and change during the game. You also are usually looking directly at them when they talk, and there is some very subtle work done with hand, face and eye movements. Tying it all together is Sarah Elmeleh as the cocky female lancer, and she's amazing. I've actually heard her in some other things and was not impressed (her character in For Honor sounds really out of place), but she really nails this. I don't know about the male lancer, hopefully he's good too.
The graphics - the game is flat out beautiful and performs well. With tons of enemies on screen and elemental explosions raining down, the game runs 60 FPS on ultra without a hitch (unless there is lag, which there was last Sunday, and that made for a bad experience)
The ok:
The guns - the guns are...fine? There are 12 or so classes of guns, from assault rifles to machine pistols to shotguns to heavy machine guns to sniper rifles and everything in between. But they are just guns. They feel good to shoot and they usually have some stat bonus on them, but they leave something to be desired. Hopefully this will improve over time. In general I only have purple gear, so it will be interesting to see how things change as I get the orange or yellow gear and can try some of the harder difficulties.
The story - again, it's serviceable. The villain could be interesting if they spent some time developing him. It's a pretty generic messiah kind of story with some predictable twists and it ends pretty abruptly. However, the mystical sci-fi lore has promise, and we'll see. There are hints as to where it is going after you finish the game.
The bad:
Load times - no sugar coating this, it's not great. You can spend a lot of time between loads, but they are coming and they are annoying.
Warping to squad mates during story quests - this probably bothered me more than it bothered others. Basically, if you matchmake your story quests with randoms it will try to start everyone at the very beginning together, but in the interest of not making people wait, it will start a mission with 2 or 3 people and then drop in the rest. Which means you can get into a mission having to catch up to the others, which means you may have missed some story voiceover, and if you are too far behind you'll get warped ahead after a countdown, once again likely missing some story voiceover. The game does actually have a journal that summarizes every mission you've been on, which is fantastic, if you need a refresher.
So there it is. I'm not usually one to like "bad games", but people have been dumping on Anthem so hard I thought it might be interesting to explain why I have been enjoying it.
