Anthem is a title that Julius Caesar would have liked, because for better or for worse it was impossible not to tell her about the new title produced by Electronic Arts and developed by BioWare: “As long as we talk about it”, the Emperor of Rome said! We are now two days away from the fateful day one, which unfortunately will not allow us to still have a definitive picture of the game, but a good chunk. Let's go and tell you what there is so far that we have seen a lot of certainties!
An abandoned world
As we knew from the various information leaked over the course of Anthem's development, the story surrounding this planet is complex, but not as complex as you would say. There are myths and legends about this "unfinished world" which in turn are shaped like the world itself. The creators of this vast planet disappeared out of the blue, leaving the work incomplete: it is not clear how the human race got here, whether it has always been or not; what is known is that there is a source of power, a matrix capable of reshaping the planet and completing or undoing what the creators did. Our job is to stop a mighty Javelin pilot who has assembled a decent army for this spasmodic search for the matrix. A story that will keep you glued to the screen for a time more or less close to sixteen hours of play. Nothing striking but if we think that the title is thought of as a multiplayer game, where the End Game counts rather than the main plot, well things change and the focus of our life on Anthem must definitely be recalibrated.
One pilot, four Javelin
In terms of gameplay we are faced with a Third Person Shooter (TPS) in Role Playing Game (RPG) sauce ergo you will be called to play a role, be it defensive, aggressive support or a mix of the three. To address our experience on Anthem know that you can level up through the accumulation of experience points that will add up until you reach level 30 of the pilot; as the level increases, you will unlock more and more Javelins and complex missions so you can decide how to change "skin" to your liking. Each Javelin is unique and as you play as the Guardian, Colossus, Storm, or Interceptor it will be up to you to choose the different style of approach for each character, which although it maintains peculiar characteristics from time to time different (for example the colossus is the only one who can carry heavy weapons while the Interceptor is the only one to have different chain-linked melee attacks), you can somehow modify at will, having different versions of the same Javelin in your forge. And here in some missions your Guardian could become a support element for the group, while in others the same Javelin could represent the pure damage of the party, obviously based on the type of equipment you will wear. Then there is another value in terms of "absolute" which is the sum of the value of the pieces you will wear: each weapon or piece of equipment will have a value expressed in numbers that identifies its general power, this will allow you to understand if a javelin is generally ready to face this or that mission and at what level of difficulty recommended (like the level of Light in Destiny, for example).
difficulties: there are six of them and they will have a considerable weight! In Anthem you will face the same mission over and over again at different difficulty levels so that you can access, from time to time, a different type of equipment which is divided into:
- White - Common
- Green - Uncommon
- Blue - Rare
- Purple - Epic
- Unique - Orange
- Yellow - Legendary
The different difficulties are:
- Easy
- Normal
- Difficult
- Great teacher
- Grand Master 2
- Grand Master 3
As the difficulty progresses, the level of the items you will find will also increase, and here are the first Epic objects that have specific abilities, ready to completely change the way a character is played compared to just before. Obviously finding the right legendary with a specific skill will be the real focus of the game, and will keep you glued to the screen with different challenges: at launch we will have three Strongholds to explore, several secondary missions that will be given to us by three factions, Sentinels, Specialists e Arcanists, who will tell us stories about their "faction". As if they were mini-campaigns in the game, eventually these missions stop and turn into Contracts: these are totally random and once you reach level 30 some of them can be Legendary, which translates into longer and more complex contracts, but with much better rewards. It is also possible to go out in Free-Play to explore areas of the world of Anthem, being able to get better equipment here too, face Titans when they meet them, and so on. We know that already in March we will find several news such as the Cataclysm Events about which very little is known, but it will be good to be at level thirty in order to access better equipment in case of victory.
After the Cataclysm
We have therefore reached the halfway point for ours Anthem, a game that turned out to be as beautiful as it is controversial: on the one hand we have a solid gameplay related to shooting, shooting and hitting enemies is really satisfying as well as obviously doing it with friends makes everything longer and more fun; on the other hand we have a flattening of the curve of interactions as you progress through the game and arrive at the much desired endgame or post game. Once the story is over, you will be left with the daily missions, the legendary challenges that add that pinch of panache and recently a new stronghold with a final boss that's not bad and different from all the others. What is wrong with Anthem is not the game itself, but the lack of constant content: Diablo III survives thanks to the season mode, for example, which adds from time to time exclusive legendaries and new ways to take advantage of the different builds of the characters; in Anthem as well as a frustrating looting system that does not reward skill in the game (for example merits for the most spectacular action or the number of headshots or enemies killed would have been appreciated) nor luck, given that while equipping pieces of armor with that characteristic the loot will remain almost always random. At the time of purchase you will have an enjoyable game in single and spectacular in multiplayer, after three weeks, however, you might get bored given the repetition of the game. To you the choice!
