Anthem

[Drake]

I played a shortish blast of the demo (mainly because it kept either disconnecting me from the servers or getting stuck in endless loading screens), and it all felt a little lack luster if I'm honest.

It feels strangely familiar to Mass effect Andromeda with a bit of flying, likely weirdly similar.

Hard to tell if it's just the demo but graphically and detail wise it seems like a significant downgrade on the E3 gameplay trailer, and there doesn't seem to be any sort of dynamic events / interactions with wildlife etc that they hinted at too. The world just feels a bit empty and dull since apart from some groups of enemies there doesn't seem to be much to see/do outside of the missions.

I'll wait for the reviews I think, I kinda hoped that Bio-ware would have upped their game after the disaster of Andromeda but it seems like that might be wishful thinking.

Plus we still get nonsense like this, which wont curry much favor:

Images

Sorry; dynamic content not loaded. Reload?

[barcode120x]

I'll be waiting as well. I haven't really read up on the game, but had only watched a few short clips of the game and played the alpha. Game is definitely fun and visuals are amazing, but I'm worried about "content" as some people are saying. For a PvE game, there will need to be a lot of content to keep us going and farming. I'm also curious on the gearing/item system. It seems your primary damage comes from your javelin that choose, but what about the variety in guns and stuff. Also, I hope there are or will be a large variety of javelins. I have a few friends interested but some are turned off since there is no real pvp in the game. Hope it doesn't get stale like Destiny 2 did but I have high hopes for this game.

[MeoTwister5]

Tried the demo.

Gameplay wise, it feels like Destiny's shooting with Mass Effect's skill and combo detonations that have an added verticality in terms of combat and traversal. I'm pretty sure it still uses a system similar to Destiny's open worlds that have specified instances when you enter them, just being much larger with more freedom of movement. It's definitely different from the typical shoot and loots, but not exactly "groundbreaking". Combat at least feels tight, but the weapons and skills lack a certain impact to them.

On the technical side... I have no idea why it seems only DICE knows how to use Frostbite properly with good optimization. The BF games run amazingly well, and it becomes quite glaringly obvious how other studios just can't seem to make the engine work the same way. I've seen character models and/or limbs simply disappear midcombat or not load at all, environmental clipping here and there, some noticeable popup, a good load of stuttering even with Vsync, and some rather janky physics. Most of what I've seen are the same issues Bioware has had with Dragon Age Inquisition and Andromeda, things they've never really been able to fix. The game also doesn't run as well as you'd expect despite the fact that Frostbite isn't even as graphically good as modern engines (3.0 is like... 5 years old I think). High Preset with an i7-7700k, RTX2070 and 16Gb RAM I'm getting just 50-60 FPS on 1440p, which is apparently par for the course for most people running the demo. Comparatively speaking, I can run games made in 2018 on Ultra at 80-90 FPS easy on 1440p.

Connection wise... since I live in Asia I expected some lag, but it seems pretty stable for the most part. The only REALLY annoying thing was when you get DC'd you'd get booted out of the match/instance back into the hub, and this game takes a LONG time to load even on an SSD.

So in summary the gameplay is fine but really feels like a technical mess in many places. I have no idea why Bioware even bothered with Frostbite again given the well known issues people had with its performance in Inquisition and especially Andromeda. As for me, good gameplay can't mask these issues, especially since the game already looks downgraded graphically from when it was announced. It feels even worse when you consider how they allegedly diverted resources from Andromeda to deliver this product.

So no, a no buy for me.

[Drake]

I had read improvements and fixes had been made to the demo since the closed VIP version, so I re-downloaded it to give it another shot. However despite it working before I couldn't even get the demo to launch, instead a black box would pop up for a second and then boot me back to origin.

I get the feeling this game is gonna be DOA, and a train wreck for bio-ware.

[blakstealth]

The flying is easily the most fun thing to do for me. It looks cool, feels fluid, and is very satisfying. I feel like Iron Man. The flying sensitivity for PC does need some work, though...especially when you go underwater. holy shit, it's so dark and claustrophobic underwater to the point where I don't know where I'm going.

[Kyero Fox]

Warframe players aren't gonna give this game a chance because it's not stupid flip actiony.

[Drake]

Why would they ? If you've got the choice of a game that's rich in content, stable on a technical level and free. Vs a $60+ game that recycles ideas from destiny and warframe, ropey on a technical level and likely to rammed with endless micro-transactions, season pass nonsense and gated content. It's not a hard choice to make...

[Kyero Fox]

You know you're right, why bother playing new games.

I'm gonna go replay Runescape instead of FFXIV Shadowbringers.

[barcode120x]

Originally Posted by Kyero Fox

I'm gonna go replay Runescape instead of FFXIV Shadowbringers.

Y'know, more and more people are getting back into RS. I was tempted to for a second, but the visuals...the oldness. The nostalgia is great an all, but I'll pass on a RS replay lol. I honestly think the whole 3D made the game worse. The original 2.5D made it look OK.

[Drake]

So having 3 days left on my EA access I decided to give the final release a blast, and boy am I glad I did not pre-order or actually buy this game. As sad as it is, it seems my gut instinct was right in this case.

To cut to the point don't buy this game, its an incredibly badly built slog that feels like nothing more than a hollow vehicle for over priced cosmetic DLC. The story behind why this game launched in the state it did will be far more interesting than anything in this game.

Utterly shocking.

Skill-up did a pretty comprehensive video that's worth a watch if you're still on the fence.

[barcode120x]

^
Thanks for the info. Glad I too didn't pre-order (I don't have EA access either; I already have too many monthly payments on my plate lol).

[MeoTwister5]

61 on Metacritic. Highest review there is only a 7/10.

Yep.

[Kyero Fox]

So anything lower than a 80 or 9/10 is garbage?

I don't even have the game and I feel sorry for it. If it didn't have EA on its name I bet people would be giving it a bigger chance.

It was clearly pushed out too early. Atleast it's not bombing as hard as 76

[Drake]

I don't think this is a case of people jumping on the EA hate train, the game genuinely deserves to be scorned for the state it shipped in. It's not just problems on a technical level, the game is deeply flawed in its core design.

The average review scores are in the low-mid 60%, some even in the 50's. It's being panned universally, rather than a few overly harsh reviews dragging it down. Maybe it'll improve in time, similarly to destiny, but it's hard to say how EA will react to the release reception.

It's legitimately sad since if you look hard Anthem has the potential to be good, I dig mecha and flying around like ironman is actually pretty cool. But if this is all that Bioware can do with 5 years of development time, then I'm genuinely worried for the studio.

Edit: The latest patch (lets be honest there's nothing day 1 about it) has improved / fixed some stuff, such as the stupidly long loading screens. However predictably it's broken lot's too, and I'm getting way more sound bug's / crashes / disconnects than before it dropped...

[dragon1412]

I haven't played it yet, but from my friend who has it, he said that the visual and the mech are pretty stunning, but the game itself feel repetitive and sometimes grindy, which he didn't like. The story is flat, but he said that the combat is actually pretty good. Help me a lot actually, i was planning to buy and now choose to hold it off and see

[Shinji103]

First off, sorry but the hate is anti-EA rage gone out of control. You have some legitimate criticism.......and then you have the horde of haters who actively scour YouTube for videos promoting the game or players making guide videos for other newcomers, just to troll the comment section with “Tip #1: don’t buy this game” lines repeated over and over between different trolls. When this is how these people spend their time, you know the hate is real. If they simply didn’t like the game they’d ignore it and move on. Haters on the other hand go trolling, calling the players “low IQs” and such, and try to ruin the experience for people who like the game, just as they’re doing with Anthem.

@Drake: (saving space) I’ve long since never paid attention to reviews about games, movies, or anything. If I had, I would’ve missed out on so many enjoyable games and movies. They’re not golden-standard rules of quality, and I find that they’re very much biased when they claim they’re not, whether they’re praising or criticizing.
Many if not all the game issues you listed are things that only some players are experiencing. Many players say they haven’t encountered any bugs or crashes at all in Anthem. I myself have never experienced a lot of technical issues others went through, across a variety of games.

Originally Posted by dragon1412

I haven't played it yet, but from my friend who has it, he said that the visual and the mech are pretty stunning, but the game itself feel repetitive and sometimes grindy, which he didn't like. The story is flat, but he said that the combat is actually pretty good. Help me a lot actually, i was planning to buy and now choose to hold it off and see

No problems here that other looter shooters haven’t been stuck with. Many of those are doing just fine.

[Drake]

Reviews are and will only ever be the subjective opinion of the person doing the reviewing. If you like it great, good for you. However when criticism is so universally shared then it might be a good indicator that maybe the "thing" being reviewed just might be exactly what everyone agree's it is ?

I for one like to reserve judgment on something, until I experience it first hand. Now that I've had a good 30 hour with Anthem, I can agree with the dozens of similar minded reviewers, and the opinions of the friends I've played with, that Anthem is a flawed and disappointing game.

Again it has the potential to improve over time (the division did it, destiny too to a certain degree) but I can't imagine many sticking with it that long, when its been so badly received. I can only imagine what the folks who paid £60+ up front are feeling about their purchase.

The idea that people think Anthem is getting bad press only because people love to hate on EA is in my view frankly naive.

[Shinji103]

Well I’m not going to say the bad press is only due to hate, though I haven’t seen many of the issues the bad press is talking about. But the hate is very real.

[ganbaru]

For all the comments or reviews I came accrost, I got more of a enphasis on Bioware than on EA; mention of how Anthem is so far from what were their strenght, dissapointement of expectation build on some of their past game and worry about the future of the studio. The biggest EA-related issue might be the microtransaction.

[dragon1412]

Originally Posted by ganbaru

For all the comments or reviews I came accrost, I got more of a enphasis on Bioware than on EA; mention of how Anthem is so far from what were their strenght, dissapointement of expectation build on some of their past game and worry about the future of the studio. The biggest EA-related issue might be the microtransaction.

yeah, all of the reviews i read comments most of bioware and more on andromeda team and the main team as well, Ea wasn't mentioned