Anthem

[DisturbedSwan]

I don’t take any pleasure in any game failing (even ones with MTX and LBs) because you just know that the execs won’t pay for that failure and developers will.

 

I hope with digital and EA/Origin Access subscriptions it did at least a little better than the U.K. physical numbers - even then it might’ve done far better in the US but we won’t find out until the end of March.

 

The situation is salvageable with the GaaS nature of Anthem too. Put out one fantastic expansion and the positive world of mouth will begin.

 

I do think the story itself and some of the little character side stories are far superior to anything I’ve seen in any similar games. It’s just the missions themselves and gunplay just isn’t that scintillating and that’s an issue in a game like this, the flying is amazing - they’ve nailed that - but everything else on the gameplay side of things just feels lacking.

 

Moving away from Frostbite for anything apart from Battlefront/Battlefield is the right way to go. Interestingly I don’t think Respawn has ever used it? And use a modified Source engine for the Titanfall series and Apex. Not sure why other EA studios don’t have that autonomy to choose their engines too. 

 

I’ve no idea what engine SW Jedi Fallen Order will order, it’s Respawn so I’m guessing the modified source engine again.

[Sly Reflex]

As nice as the flying is it does feel like the bits in Destiny where you'd sparrow through from A to B. There's a few times where you're doing this A to B where it's a case of scraping the surface of water on the way to your destination as not to waste any time having to wait for the boosters to cool down. This wouldn't be a problem if the world was completely bustling with stuff to drop into and deal with, but it isn't.  There's a whole lot of fuck all between areas. Sometimes there might be a node to harvest or a 1 time collectable to pick up, but it's not enough.

 

I do think the game is very salvageable. Not only are we talking about lots of content and variable activities being added to the game, but also quality of life improvements that are going to file some of those rough edges off. The thing with the quality of life stuff is that the list is hysterically long. If you asked me to catalogue it I don't think I could, every session I play I encounter more and more issues that need addressing. It's like the game was never play tested, there's a mountain of problems ranging from nitpicking right up to colossal fuck ups that should have never happened.

 

Saying that, I think the concept is fun. The potential is there. That 30 second loop designers often talk about needs some serious polishing but it could be something special once it's done. The story telling and writing is also head and shoulders above it's main AAA competitors, Unless Division 2 manages to be some magnificent work of story telling art when it drops in a few weeks time I can't see it been beaten in that ball park.

 

As for where I am I just opened all the doors. I've been retreading ground for people that are behind but I am guessing I'm right near the end now as far as the mainline story goes. It's a bit weird that we've not seen any of the demo missions crop up yet.

 

I'm really fed up of fighting the Scars. There's 3 enemy factions in the game as well as animals which populate certain bits of the map. But it always seems to be Scars. I'm not sure why as from what I can gather from the story stuff it's actually the Dominion that's  the main enemy of the people in the fort. There's also Outlaws who are a thing too, but again we don't see these. It feels like a huge waste to have these factions and have us fight Scorpions and Scars over and over. I want more variation and I want bigger dudes to shoot at. They've created a world here and they're letting it fall through their hands by giving us the same old same old. The Anthem should give them the ability to get away with literally anything, it can created endless threats of varying magnitude, yet here we are fighting a big rock dude. Or a little rock dude. Whatever. Give us something amazing and distinct to fight. Get weird with it. Derail that train and run it into whatever you want, the way Bioware has built the lore should allow them that freedom. Sticking with norms isn't going to help the game. 

[Maf]

I haven’t played this, but am quietly disappointed no one is *ahem* singing it’s praises. I find the flying really appealing and as simple as it is I really like the idea of being in an Iron Man crew. 

 

But it it sounds like they didn’t even get that quite right, mind about everything else like content, variety, technical issues, etc

 

If they get this in to a good place I would really want to jump in and play it, but then I said the same about Sea of Thieves. Even though these games can get better over time, I think that window is quite small for online games. A) Because there’s always something else coming out and B ) The sense of well I’m already behind I’m not going to get in this late 

[Sly Reflex]

There's flashes of "This is what it should be all the time". I was playing with @smallofbooty, @Duck and another guy and we're just rolling through the fights. There was explosion chains going off, lightning hitting the bad guys, people being frozen, enemies being punched to fuck amongst a cacophony of gunfire. For 30 to 45 seconds you can have these moments of unbridled fury where the game does exactly what it promised. The problem is those moments are the punctuation for the rest of it. That's the problem, to get to those climax moments you;re sitting through 5, 10, 15 or even more minutes where next to dick all happens. The experience is stilted both in that the action has too many lulls in it and is punctuated by loading screens, bad mission design that encourages rushing and the RPG parts where you've to try to listen to people while the people you are playing with are talking over it.

 

The only comparison I can think of is Anthem is like that ride at Alton Towers where it's a straight vertical plummet into a hole. You queue for an hour to have that fleeting moment, but it feels like a shitty time investment for what you're getting back. The more I play it the worse I think it is. I'm still enjoying it mainly down to the fact that my online brethren are playing it and the social aspect is carrying it somewhat, but parts of it are truly shite. I honestly wouldn't even know where to begin there's so many bad aspects to it.

[smallofbooty]

I'm liking this. It's nowhere near the disaster that some reviewers have touted. There were clearly aspects at launch that are unforgivable after 6 years development and there is a need to flesh out the world, to add variety and increase activity.

 

The story is coherent and the characters well presented. I think Skill Up's review is unfair (and I've been following him since he was doing builds and spreadsheets from the early days of the Division). There's no way a squad looter shooter can have deep branching consequential decision making and story telling. You need space and quiet for that. It's just not possible when there are people like Joker Hysterical Face ( @Sly Reflex ) mithering down your headset when you're trying to concentrate on a cut scene or dialogue. 

 

The flying, and movement on the ground, I think is excellent. Scraping low to keep your jets cooled and not wiping out is great. Even those short bursts of flight become automatic to just travel small distances. Flying becomes second nature. And each suit is nicely different in feel and sound when on the deck.

 

Being in a squad when it's all going daft is good fun. Explosions, elementals and meleeing kicking off all around is wonderful. Guns feel a bit secondary but it'll be interesting to see how they develop when we unlock legendaries and master works.

 

The greatest need, as @Sly Reflex has said, is to get more happening, loads of extra content into the world. Bring it to life and with more random encounters. This does look like it's imminent however, with plans announced to increase the numbers of the big massive stompy fiery fuckers for example. In fact there's a bunch of gaming and free cosmetic stuff in the pipeline. Some of these things should be happening pretty much over the coming week or so.

 

All in all, a good engaging beginning that will stand or fall over the coming months depending on the size, frequency and quality of content drops. 

[Sly Reflex]

A heads up for those that don't like them. This is a long post.

 

Look at the road map they've set out.

 

The top line is a given, so sod talking about that. It's not important aside from the fixes, improvements and optimisations. Those are always welcomed.

 

First we get Outlaw Outrage. I am guessing it fills freeroam with Outlaws and gives us some dailies and what not to go with it.

 

There Be Giants will be the Ash Titans thing that run in the closing hours of the demo, I'd be surprised if it was anything else.

 

Shaper Surge will add more Shaper things to the freeroam where you can repair them and get a chest for doing so. I don't think it'll be that involving, but it'll be nice to farm if you're into it.

 

New cosmetics, which are sorely needed. New items which could be guns and loot to pad out the loot tables.

 

Legendary missions sounds like some end game content for those that can beat the hardest stuff no problem. I am guessing you'll be able to play these on various difficulties, but it'll offer the highest reward and challenges at whatever grandmaster mode is the highest.

 

Then they repeat the events we've seen already.

 

 

A mastery system. That could possibly let you reset stuff and prestige it. That's a complete stab in the dark but I'm not sure what else it could be. I'm guessing it's a grinding thing rather than actual content to work through. It could be like Age of Triumph, but that's not adding content, it's a shopping list for you to work through with the current content.

 

More new items, which is good because it fills out the barren loot pool.

 

A Shaper Surge between all those locked cortexes suggest to me that they have other special events to come but can't show them specifically because it's going to give story stuff away. Mainly I think these events will lead up to the new Stronghold.

 

The Stronghold is in my eyes the first bit of proper content. It's not adding loot or cosmetics, it's discernible content that can be played. It's not a tunable like the events, once it's in it's in and you can play it to your hearts content.

 

Leaderboards? Why? Seems a bit pointless, but OK. Guilds are nice as long as there's a reason for them existing, IE you can earn stuff by being in one.

 

May onward we have 2 events plan as of now and some new items. I'm not going to post the picture because it's pretty pointless.

 

So in three months time we get a Stronghold to go at, some items to earn and also some cosmetics stuff to buy (or purchase), as well as some extra difficulties on top of some recurring events.

 

In that time we have:

Trials Rising release date - February 26
Dirt Rally 2.0 release date - February 26
The Lego Movie 2 release date - February 26
Stellaris: Console Edition release date - February 26

Dead or Alive 6 release date - March 1
ToeJam & Earl: Back in the Groove release date - March 1
Left Alive release date - March 5
Devil May Cry 5 release date - March 8
The Division 2 release date - March 15
Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice release date - March 22
Tropico 6 release date - March 29

Earth Defense Force: Iron Rain release date - April 11
Mortal Kombat 11 release date - April 23
Days Gone release date - April 26
Super Meat Boy Forever release date - April TBD

A Plague Tale: Innocence release date - May 14
Rage 2 release date - May 14
Team Sonic Racing release date - May 21

 

Division 2 is going to crush Anthem. I actually think Division 2 is going to end up in a similar boat to how Destiny 2 was. They won't have learnt anything, they're going to end up falling down the same holes they supposedly climbed out of with the first game. That's besides the point. It's going to ride Anthem until people get fed up or Destiny 2 or Warframe pulls something out the hat unexpectedly. People are only going to do the same 3 activities in various parts of the game for so long before they're like "Fuck this!" and move on. No amount of making giants run around in free roam or having any other event is going to stop that bleed of players. Sure they might revisit for the Stronghold, but I can't see the retention being mega.

 

I think they've fucked this by trying to cram it into this years fiscal window. You look at the games that came out and got crucified by players. Diablo III. The Elder Scrolls Online. Battlefield 4. Destiny. The Master Chief Collection. Assassin's Creed Unity. Rainbow 6 Siege. The Division. No Mans Sky. For Honor. Destiny 2. Sea of Thieves. Fallout 76. Apart from the latter few those games managed to turn it around, I believe that Sea of Thieves and Fallout 76 can be turned around as well, one just needs more content and the other needs a lot of care and attention.

 

Anthem needs both of those. The issue is it has EA at the helm, a company that did the bare minimum it needed of Mass Effect Andromeda before fucking it off. You could always argue that they managed it with Battlefield 4 but that was more a case of passing it on to a studio that was going to make the next game and making them delve into the broken as fuck game and make it work to some degree was training them up to eventually make Hardline.

 

I think it's 50/50 that we're going to see Anthem get the nurturing it needs. I hope in future I stumble over this post and I've ended up being completely wrong and Anthem ends up being a vibrant thriving game, but I can see it getting thrown to one side. The optimist in me thinks that Anthem could be fucking amazing, but the pessimist in me knows that they're going to half arse it and cut their losses when they can't be bothered to carry on.

[DisturbedSwan]

I literally posted that roadmap on the previous page @Sly Reflex ?

[DisturbedSwan]

I didn’t read any of the post, just saw the pictures and thought ‘wait, I posted those just the other day’ ?

[AndyKurosaki]

I certainly won’t rejoice if BioWare shuts down. And I don’t think it will,yet. But I’m not paying for a game that I have zero interest in,just to support them. It looked generic and mediocre at E3. And that’s exactly how it still looks now. It’s yet another live service game,pushed out the door in a half-baked state,with the mentality that patches will fix it,and that content added down the line will “make it good”. Fuck off. It’ll be months before the road-map pays off,and by that time the playerbase has dramatically dwindled down. Because we’ve moved on to games that got their act together,and are genuinely good. Not ones that go “it’ll be a different game entirely in a few months time”, while expecting you to pay full price on Day one.

 

Live services is a trend I will happily see the end of,because they’ve always been exceptionally tedious. 

[Sly Reflex]

Brin's final mission where the trophy unlocks. I want the extension cord that attaches to that generator. ?

[Sly Reflex]

Luck was with me in my freeroam. 3 purples dropped. One I didn't even earn, it was basically gifted to me by someone that did a open world mission.

 

Finally found out where the Outlaws and Dominion reside. Try looking up the very west of the map, The more north you go you'll stray from Outlaws to Dominion. Go inside the ruins and caves to find more. It should make bounties a little easier now you have some idea of where to get them.

 

Speaking of bounties, the coin alliance thing has gone over. I'm not sure they've paid in for me, or maybe they will have next time I boot the game. Everything is back to zero now anyway. I don't think any of us will be earning a huge bounty from that feature to be honest. You're probably going to get more coin doing the weekly's. It's a nice idea but it's kind of disappointing that it wasn't more. It's only going to get less as people don't play as hard.

 

I also found another page in the game that shows you the featured store things. That's 4 different places you can access. it. Talk about overkill.

[Sly Reflex]

I wish the rest of the missions in this game were the quality of that first stronghold. I know it's just the same as the rest of the games mechanic but the execution is so much better than the rest of the stuff they task you with. An escalation that ends up with a big boss. That's what we should be looking at, go do the thing, see it step up in threat and then hit the players with a crescendo. Finish up with you picking up loot front the big idiot that dare rock up and think it can rock your socks off.

 

Speaking of which. Those caves. Why would we go into them at all, other than just to discover what's in them? There needs to be something in those caves. Just put a boss in and when you kill the boss and the adds a chest spawns. As it is now you go in, kill the stuff and then teleport back to the top. It's kind of pointless. There's needs to be a hard as fuck boss in the depths of those dungeons. They're worse than Destiny 2's Lost Sectors and they were kind of guff. If they don't do anything with them it'll be underutilised area that nobody will bother with outside of peeking in once. 

 

It's just another thing to throw onto the "To do" pile. God knows if they'll ever clear it.

[Sly Reflex]

8 minutes ago, Nag said:

There's no real tactics to the firefights or so it seems

 

I don't really agree with this. The combo-ing system is pretty good once your crew knows how to go about it. I've done a few missions with randoms and they're playing in a way where there's plenty of stuff being thrown around but combo's are accidental. When you have a ruck where it's all going down and everyone is timing those primers and detonations perfectly the flow feels exemplary. The power fantasy is real when that happens. The combat is exciting when you're smashing the fuck out of them in that manner.

 

Depending on what Javelin you're playing the roles feel pretty distinguished too. The balancing between them could be a little better but I think they did a good job having each one feels unique. Just the way they move about feels better than anything on the market. Or rather the differences feel like the best on the market, I still think Warframe has better movement. When you're stomping about and smashing into mobs with the shield as a Colossus you really feel that weight. Similarly when you're playing Storm floating  at the back and lobbing fireballs into the mass of bad guys it just feels unique.

[Sly Reflex]

That is brute forcing it. Doing it any other way can be a bit grindy.

[Sly Reflex]

There's a ginger Scouse in this game. 

[Sly Reflex]

Found yet another bug that's annoying as fuck. When you start a mission sometimes it looks like you have a full ultimate when in fact you have not. 

[regemond]

9 hours ago, Sly Reflex said:

There's a ginger Scouse in this game. 

 

I demand royalties.

[Whiskey_chaser]

There's going to be a loot update applied today or tomorrow:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AnthemTheGame/comments/avm9yn/anthem_loot_update/

[Sly Reflex]

They've sorted that a lot faster than they did in Division. Hopefully it sorts out stupid drops. I was less than pleased when I got sniper buffs on the Tesla thing for example, that should never happen.

[DisturbedSwan]

I got my first Masterwork drop whilst doing an Agent Mission last night, let out an audible ‘whoa’ when I saw it drop. Got back to the mission summary screen and the game hard crashed on me.

 

I restarted it to find I was now ‘Level 1’. After restarting a few more times it didn’t seem to fix the issue so I went to the forge, came back out and my Level was correct at least but I’d lost all my loot ?

 

Oh, Anthem.