What’s the Big Deal with Anthem?
A closer look at Electronic Arts’ answer to Activision’s Destiny
Anthem made its debut at the end of Microsoft’s 2017 E3 conference. Developed by Bioware, the game has long been rumored as Electronic Arts’ answer to Activision’s massively successful Destiny (with a sequel slated to release this year).
The ambitious game will hope to stand out among other notable “shoot and loot” games like The Division, Borderlands, and the aforementioned Destiny where the goal is to kill a variety of enemies, and loot through their corpses for equipment and treasure.
Each have their own distinct flavor (a requirement in this increasingly crowded arena). The Division puts you in the shoes of an elite task force assigned to restore peace after a viral outbreak plummets New York into chaos. Borderlands focused on fun — crazy, looney, fun. The game boasted an arsenal of over 17 million guns that you could find in its futuristic world. And Destiny combined MMORPG elements with first person shooter gameplay.
Now, let’s see how Anthem tries to set itself apart.
Armor Up
The voice over introduces us to the concept of Javelins — customizable suits of armor that the player can choose to take into combat. They range from the versatile Ranger chassis to the durable (and presumably, heavy-hitting) Colossus.
Giving players options with armor is a great design choice. Not only will players get to play how they want — whether it’s being a jack of all trades, or a powerhouse that sacrifices speed, it also offers them a way to visually stand out in the world. The advent of cosmetic microtransactions in other games have shown just how much real money a player is willing to spend to make their in-game avatar unique.
These power suits are not a new concept. But, there’s still room for Anthem to stand out in how it’s implemented. From the customization options of how they look and function, to how they feel while traversing the environment, the game can still excel in this department.
Flight
Immediately after the video shows us the Javelins, we find out they’re capable of flight. This is an exciting feature as the other games mentioned above only let you run around in their great big worlds. The opportunity to fly through one with your friends would be a welcome addition, and adds new layers to exploration and combat.
The animation and sound effects are amazing. When the rockets on the back flare up and propels the Javelin forward, you definitely get a sense of how powerful they are.
Shooting and Looting
So what do you do when you’ve finished decking out your awesome armor and flying around in a shooting and looting game?
Anthem has an advantage for being late to the party: lessons learned from its competitors.
Lesson 1: Players don’t like to stand in one place and shoot at something for ten minutes before it dies. Players like dynamic fights that involve strategy, movement, and other elements of skill.
Lesson 2: Players don’t like it when games are too stingy, or too generous, with their loot system. The former makes it frustrating to get a meaningful reward. The latter makes the reward meaningless.
Take note, Anthem.
Drop in and Play
It’s still unclear whether you can seamlessly drop into a friend’s play session like they’ve showcased in the video. That’s one feature that’s sorely missing in this type of game. Most attempts at joining your friends require a sequence of inviting, accepting, and loading into the game.
Nothing like a load screen to break the sense of immersion.
To be fair, systems do exist that allow some form of “drop in and play,” but none of them are seamless, and some are just downright painful.
If Anthem can nail the, “I’m in a persistent world where I’m flying around, shooting monsters, and my friends can join me at ANY time!” feeling, that’ll be a great leap forward for the genre.
Dynamic World Events
It doesn’t matter how cool the armor looks, how good it feels to fly around, how balanced the reward system is, or how easy it is to play with your friends, if the world you’re doing those things in is boring.
We only got a glimpse of one of those locales in the video so we’ll have to see what else is offered in terms of variety. So far, the lush jungle environment provided plenty of eye candy as the player ran and flew around in it.
The developers chose to end the video with a “dynamic world event” called a Shaper Storm. We see the party of four standing at the precipice, overlooking a massive energy storm. These random events could require players work together in a variety of ways. Will a huge monster come out of it? Is it threatening innocent civilians? Does it offer some kind of unique reward once it’s contained?
Hopefully all of that and more.
Anthem is currently in development with no set release date.
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Calvin Fung has been playing video games his whole life, and recently started writing about them! He also co-hosts the Overwatch Hero Show podcast. Follow him on Twitter @thecalvineffect.
