Anthem has clearly been one of the most anticipated games of 2019, yet there has always been an undercurrent of negativity surrounding it. As Bioware’s first new IP in awhile, and marking a major shift from the traditional RPG developer, the loot shooter has represented a lot of things to a lot of people. As the game nears its final and global release, many players have gotten into the game early, resulting in reviews from both critics and users. Many of these have been rather poor, docking the game for its bad pacing and story, along with gameplay design choices that seem to hinder the experience overall. After a major patch fixed some of these issues though, the reviews have been called out by Xbox VP Mike Ybaraa, referring to them as “whining” and “embarrassing”. Linking to a PC Gamer article that breaks down how the latest update fixes one of the biggest complaints with Anthem, Ybarra says “This was actually very easy to do. Amazed at the whining. One reviewer, not the below (meaning not PC Gamer), reviewed the game yet in the review cited that he didn’t even know how to do a combo. Embarrassing to review with such a lack of knowledge.” Later on Ybarra is asked what his own review of Anthem is. His response has drawn criticism from fans as well as game journalists who have also called out his original tweet. He says “I don’t do “reviews” because everyone enjoys different things. I’d suggest “modern reviews” should be watching streamers play a game, doing the demo, listening to what your gaming friends think – and if it seems like something you will enjoy then great.” The criticism of Ybarra has come from many angles. Waypoint’s Patrick Klepek summed up his thoughts by saying “What’s specifically infuriating about this tweet is the chief criticism—not knowing how to do a combo in Anthem—isn’t explained by Anthem itself, unless you dive into a hidden tutorial menu. I learned about combos after wondering WTF an “aura combo” was in an item description.” Others, such as VG247’s Kirk McKeand took issue with Ybara’s claim that streamers offer a more objective view of games. “Yeah, you should watch those sponsored streams for your impartial look at upcoming games,” he tweeted. Giant Bomb’s Jeff Gerstmann felt that Ybarra’s original tweet showed poor judgement as well, saying “Nice to see Xbox getting into the “lul whiners get gud” market.” Anthem’s reviews have been far from the glowing praise heaped on previous Bioware titles. The issues cited have been quite varied, and while many can be fixed with patches, as some seem to have, that doesn’t change the fact that it was released to a wide audience with these issues in place. As games shift to a longer update schedule, with many anticipating a bare bones initial release that is filled with fixes and content later on, it’s tougher to get a full understanding of when to release a review, and how seriously issues should be called out. Ybarra seems to feel that longer should have been given to Anthem, but reviewers apparently disagree.<doc-sep>I’ve played about six hours of Anthem, a game where players fly around in mechanical suits blowing stuff up in search of ever more rare loot, and while I’m still getting my bearings I already feel a lot better about the game than I did back during its two demos. Advertisement The game launched earlier today on PC for Origin Premier subscribers and on Xbox One as part of a 10-hour trial through EA Access, with a full-launch for non-subscribers and PS4 players on February 22. Unlike the two demo sessions earlier this month and last, I haven’t gotten disconnected from the servers or experienced any bugs on the scale of the never-ending loading screen. Load times are still a nuisance and I wish developer BioWare had done something to make them less noticeable and boring than a bar slowly filling up above a still image, but at least they’re not broken. There have been occasional graphical glitches, but nothing that lasted for more than a second or in any way interrupted what I was doing. So far, Anthem works. It’s also a lot of fun. The core of Anthem is flying through ancient caves and jungles dotted with ruins, and that part of the game could not feel any better. Punching the left analog stick to turn on forward thrusters or the right one to gracefully hover in place is easy and responsive but full of complementary camera effects and richly layered sound effects that really convince you you’re controlling a sentient rocket. Even if Anthem were just a fantasy-infused flying sim, it would still be a ton of fun. But of course there’s a lot more to the game than just flying around. Anthem revolves around getting missions from the people in your hub, a city called Fort Tarsis, going out into the big, bad, dangerous world to complete them, and then returning and using the loot you collected to upgrade a mechanical suit, also known as a Javelin. You can play as part of a group of up to four players or alone, though some of the missions really are built for teamwork. Happily, Anthem offers automatic matchmaking for everything. One of the big questions facing the game prior to release was whether it would have any meaningful story beyond a few wacky sci-fi premises strung together to explain why you were flying around a strange world in robot armor. And while the narrative does take a back seat to everything else going on in the hours I’ve played, it does exist. Playing as a freelancer, a class of warriors tasked with protecting humanity from deadly forces of nature brought about by mysterious artifacts, you become entangled in a plot to stop a particularly ruthless faction called the Dominion from obtaining special artifacts that could be used to do any number of terrible things. Based on what I’ve seen of it so far, it doesn’t have anything as complex as the political conflicts and intrigue at work in any of the Mass Effect games. Instead, it’s more in line with the Destiny games’ clear-cut drama around good vs. evil, and it’s decent enough with a world that feels somewhat more lived-in than Bungie’s series. Where Destiny’s hub, the Tower, is located up in the clouds and feels somewhat like a dream, Anthem’s Fort Tarsis feels more like a giant, greasy car repair shop with a bar inside it. I have no idea what the people in Anthem smell like but I’m absolutely sure they smell like something. Advertisement The game’s otherwise straightforward plot is also helped out a lot by a cast of extremely well-voiced and well-acted characters. Motion-capture is the basis for a number of the performances and it shows, with small winks, bitten-lips, and idiosyncratic mannerisms helping to set each person apart. You can see this in characters like Owen, a side-kick who helps guide you over the radio during missions. He’s charming, scrappy, and way out of his depth. Advertisement So far Neeson Giles is my favorite, even though I only spoke with him once and the conversation didn’t go very well. A loser who just wants to hang with the cool kids, Giles told me Owen was weird and unstable before backtracking after realizing he’d clearly offended me to say he’d only heard other people say that Owen was weird and unstable. He then proceeded to say we should hang out again sometime, before eventually begging me to hang out again some time. I have no idea if Giles will play an important part in the main storyline or if he’s just there to add flavor. Maybe he’ll have an interesting set of missions for me at some point. I could have easily just walked past him and never met him at all. Did I mention he’s voiced by Brooklyn 99’s Joe Lo Truglio? Though I’m running the game on medium settings to keep the framerate up thanks to my under-powered GTX 970, it still looks crisp and detailed, especially considering all of the action. Despite all of the flying around and almost non-stop explosions, everything has run smoothly. The few times I’ve slowed down to push my settings to the max to take in how the light peers over a ridge or bounces off the ripples in a pond, I’ve been really impressed. Even when the environments start to run together and feel repetitive, their size, scope and detail are breathtaking. Advertisement Of course, the real challenge for a game like Anthem is whether it can still feel almost as exhilarating after 100 hours as it does after six. Even now I have concerns the breadth and diversity of enemy encounters and mission types. Almost to a one they’ve consisted of some version of a spherical arena space that requires slow, methodical circling. When I end up in a tight spot, I fly out of range and then begin a new sweep. The mission objectives have so far been simple, consisting of either holding down a point or collecting orbs to activate an artifact. Enemy AI doesn’t help either. On more than one occasion I’ve seen enemies standing completely still, or turning around and showing their backs, exposing their weak points to me, for no particular reason. Given all of the powers and mobility at the player’s disposal, Anthem seems to try and make up for these slip-ups by giving enemies a good chunk of health and throwing tons of them at you. In the end it can all feel a bit chaotic, more like a free-for-all than a tightly wound shootout than forces you to actually consider strategy and tactics. Advertisement I’ve only completed about a dozen missions so far including one stronghold—a longer dungeon that’s made for a party of four players and features a boss at the end. As I unlock more abilities and equipment, I’m hoping the game’s encounters will change things up as well, beyond just offering me higher difficulties to complete all the same old missions on. I haven’t yet found one I would love to run again just for the hell of it. For now, there’s plenty of other things to keep me coming back.<doc-sep>
Anthem: EA Games releases official trailer for Legion of Dawn Anthem game reviews are starting to come in ahead of the big PS4 and Xbox One release. Anthem game is out this Friday, with the latest title from Mass Effect makers BioWare out on PS4, Xbox One and PCs. Ahead of the big release date Anthem game reviews have started to trickle in, with a number of publications giving their verdict on EA’s next big title. At the moment Anthem has a 70 per cent Metacritic rating, but this is only based on four different reviews. Express.co.uk has rounded up some of the reviews and early impressions so far for Anthem… ANTHEM GAME REVIEW - ROUND-UP OF CRITICS’ VIEWS SO FAR Destructoid - 70: “I wish some things were different but I find myself wanting to play Anthem beyond the scope of this review. “It isn't changing the way the genre operates, not by a long shot, and if you've struggled with a few of them before and tossed them in the gutter, you'll probably do the same here. “BioWare will need to build quickly on top of its shimmering jet-fueled foundation to hold people's interest, but folks looking for a new neighborhood to move into might want to give Anthem a try -- either now or after fixes and updates.” Anthem game review - Early verdicts in for EA’s next big PS4 and Xbox One hit CGMagazine - 70: “Despite its abundance of bugs, narrative shortcomings, and an overall small pool of content, I still enjoyed the fun gameplay of Anthem and plan to revisit it after the game has developed a larger suite of content and events for me to experience. “In its current state though, the experience is one I would recommend waiting on for people on the fence because it doesn’t quite deliver yet on what Bioware envisioned for this game. “Anthem reminds me in many ways of Warframe’s launch on PlayStation 4, where nothing clicked with me completely initially and I dropped the game after only a few hours of play. “Once I made a third attempt to join into the fray with the release of “The Sacrifice” on PC, all of the pieces began to fit in place and I became addicted to both its fast gameplay and fleshed out lore. “I fully believe Anthem can reach the same heights of Destiny and Warframe if, given the time to grow properly, I just hope EA doesn’t pull the plug too soon.” Anthem: VIP demo trailer for new sci-fi third-person shooter ArsTehnica: “There are enough flashes of quality and brilliance in Anthem to make me believe that this game shouldn't be written off as stillborn—and that it's ultimately a surer step forward than Mass Effect: Andromeda was. “But if I had the power to do so, I'd beg EA to cancel whatever expansion plans they have in store and get back to work on the Anthem that already exists. “This game is freaking rad at its best, but it's just not done. It's not fun to have sessions with friends so constantly interrupted. It's not fun to keep quitting out of the main map just to check my loot and quest beats. It's not fun to fight these boring bad guys in these boring missions, again and again and again. “It's not fun to feel confused by a lack of information all over the place. “Anthem has flashes of being a really good game, but what's the point if it's not fun?” Anthem game review - Anthem is coming to PS4, Xbox One and PCs on Friday