That introduction though! "I cant remember the last time I played a game where the developer absolutely nailed the most crucial aspect, while managing to completely shit the bed everywhere else" Got me instantly hooked XD
When Apex was released, all praise went to Respawn. But with Anthem, all rage goes to EA. Glad you agree with me in that Bioware is so responsible for this game as Respawn is for Apex.
EA greenlighted, funded and released the game. I think that counts as involvement They trusted Respawn's own vision (with god reason) but you wouldn't have Apex if EA didn't approve the development in first place.
EA was actually the hero in this case. When they were presented with biowere's game, EA rejected that version hard and forced biowere to go back and create an actual video game for them. Which was that shit show we got on release, but it was a lot better than whatever the hell they had before.
The thing that infuriates me most is that Anthem and 76 prove Andromeda was a good game at least on the average scale of things. Because at least it had a story, it had characters, and it had a world you could interact with while seeing it evolve. Anthem had none of this and it was piss poor. Combat was the ONLY good thing that came of it and as the other user stated, it was ripped from Andromeda and subsequently Mass Effect 3 which started the whole combo system.
Don't forget Anthem uses Mass Effect's (3 to be exact) Prime and Detonate mechanic for majority of its combat. The combo stuff was cool but I'd have rather they just stuck with Andromeda to make it work than waste their time on this shitty game.
I feel like you should change the "stars" rating to just, recommended, or not recommended. I mean this is obviously a below average game, and 3 stars makes it sound like an above average game. I understand that you enjoyed certain parts a lot, but when there are so many problems it doesn't seem like the game lives up to that rating as a whole. Anyway its just a thought, I'm assuming most people only care if you think it's worth a playthrough or not. The actual rating, whether it's 3 or 4 stars seems trivial to the recommendation. Anyway really enjoy your videos keep it up!
I saw a clip from LegacyKilla showing a bit of dialogue from the hub, where one of the NPCs exclaims how crucial it is for your Javelin to look good and how much pride it will give you if you pimp it out. The enthusiasm with which those few lines of dialogue were written and delivered with in voice acting is so far above anything else I've heard in Anthem that it makes me wonder if the pitch for Anthem was "First off, microtransactions. OK, now how do we build the world and gameplay around microtransactions?" Given how many of Bioware's veterans left during Anthem's development, I feel this is a project few were truly passionate for, at least compared to something like Mass Effect or Dragon Age.
@Kouldor Bane you seem to miss that the skins available now are just epic, so when they put out legendary/masterwork sets they will cost more and not everyone has streamertime to grind the game 8-10 hours a day..
There is also dialogue with an npc about multiplayer. If you say you like doing this alone, the dialogue lasts for 7 more lines, fighting with you to accept their point of view, whereas if you agree to spend your time with more people being better than the dialogue ends abruptly. Lol they aren't even subtle anymore. Find ways to compare yourself to others and if they have something you don't and want, then buy it or farm for hours for it. Nah homes. I like playing games. Not making it my career.
yeah the matchmaking is horrendous, there was an instance where a lvl 3 player was matchmade by the quickplay option in to final story mission of the game, in to the middle of second to last boss fight despite the fact that this lvl 3 player had just started the game and was just out of the tutorial missions when this happened.. that is unacceptable and should not even be possible but , somehow, in this "Bob Dylan of video games" it certainly is possible..
Care to explain why you say that ? Andromeda's story was fundamentally broken and the writing was beyond horrendous but we can hardly pin that on Anthem. .
@@rramona88 yeah, it's entirely wrong to think that the new IP that was put on the creators of ME, keeping the creators from having anything of note to do with ME, while ME:A was handed over to some third string dev (because again, the creators were working on the IP that totally has nothing to do with them not working on ME) had anything to do with it.
@@rramona88 Cause the core bioware team ditched Mass Effect to make Anthem, as Anthem was their "dream" game to make. So a B team was put on Andromeda with all the shit that followed due to Bioware still meddling with the production and a lot of disagreements between the teams. They openly said that they were rather working on Anthem, well now we can see how much passion their dream game got. Not only did Mass Effect suffer from it, but their "dream" game is a broken pile of steaming shit. They didn't show much love at all if this is their passion project, if this is the kind of game they always dreamed of making. It could have been great, but somehow Bioware managed to fuck it all up on the most amateur level possible. Seriousely, the many loading zones are bullshit and not needed if you programmed your game properly, the competition can do it so why can't you? The match making that is faulty as fuck, again amateur programming skills. For a company that has the biggest RPG's on it's name, they fuckd up the stats..how? Only complete idiots who never worked on a RPG can fuck that up, yet a veteran studio dropped the ball there...again..how? It's either they were lazy or insanely stupid with the mistakes they made. And i don't wanna hate on the game, i do hope they manage to pull a Division here, where the game sucks now, but in a few months they fixed the major issues and make it into a great game. Cause i love the idea or running around in armored suits.
While blaming a game for problems prevalent in the industry is certainly not the way to go about it, games shouldn't get a pass just because all other games are doing it. If a game implements lootboxes, it doesn't matter if it's not the worst implementation of its kind, or if it wasn't the first one to do so. Lootboxes are lootboxes. The same extends to any and all criticisms of a game, regardless of how prevalent they are in the rest of the industry.
Sure, microtransactions are lame and undesirable, and Anthem has them, but they aren't implemented more maliciously or intrusively than any other game which would be comparable (Destiny 2, Fallout 76). Beyond that, what more should be said? Should the video have devolved into a tirade against the presumption that players ought to invest a greater sum of their money to get any additional content when games, more and more often, come out in an apparently unfinished or poorly optimized state? Because how is that then a review of Anthem and not the industry as a whole? And so it comes down, yeah, you're not wrong, but what's your point and why is Anthem our sacrificial lamb to this particular altar?
@@TheAdarkerglow Pointing out that a game continues a problem is a valid critique of that game. To exclude the criticism from a review is not only omitting parts of the game from the scope of the review, it is also unduly skewing the review in favor of the game. And Anthem isn't a sacrifical lamb. It's not being "singled out". At the beginning of the video, a claim is made that a game's flaws shouldn't be considered as part of the critique and evaluation if other games do it. That is nonsense. To my knowledge, this is the first time such a distinction has been made on this channel with a review. Therefore, I'll gladly post in the comments to point out the problem with this kind of reasoning.
I feel like Anthem is a perfect example of the value of a good combat system. So many games have you engage in combat 90% of the time yet have lacklustre combat, especially RPGs. A good combat system can make a bad game addicting whilst a bad combat system can make a great game unplayable.
Sadly, Bioware has had some egregious monetizing practices since way before the microtransaction craze kicked in, whether of their own or EA's volition. Remember Dragon Age: Origins? That dude who would just stand in your encampment for the sole purpose of reminding you there were quests in Origins you could only complete if you bought additional DLC? All of this despite the locations for those DLC being fully accessible on the world map, only for you to travel to them and get a pop-up message that you can't proceed further unless you buy the DLC? Mass Effect 3 was also one of the first instances of lootboxes I can think of, and it had that garbage day-1 DLC. Yeah, Bioware has had questionable monetizing practices for a long time.
PudyMaster Omar Montero Whoops, my bad, for some reason I thought EA didn't acquire Bioware until Dragon Age 2... I also don't remember seeing EA's logo when booting up DA: Origins... weird. I'll edit my post, thanks for the correction.
To the people blindly brushing aside all criticism with "don't listen to the haters" need to understand something. When people are dropping criticism on the game it's because we WANT to like the game, we were excited for the game just like anyone else, we WANT to play it, we WANT to be able to look at what the game offers and say to ourselves, "yup, i can easily put 100 hour into this". but there is a bevy of serious issue that need to be addressed before it gets to that point, bluntly dismissing all criticisms with "haters gonna hate" will hurt the future of this game more than your defense helps it. Hearing all of this criticism myself is heartbreaking, i was so excited for this game, and while i still love the moment to moment gameplay, it really needs an overhaul in certain places before i can sit down and dump a 100+ hours into it.
Can't remember who said it, but there's a saying, "We criticize something because we love it and want it to be better, (here should be the 2nd part of this quote, but I've forgotten it)".
I'm not dismissing this videos criticisam as 'haters going to hate'. I'm dismissing it as flat out bollocks. The video was published 3 hours ago, which means there has been more than ample chance for the OP to review both the day 1 patch notes AND the post release content road map. Not to mention the numerous dev QnA sessions detailing various reasonings for including/excluding certain mechanics etc. Never mind the game, this review has been rushed out in order to maximise its views based on a few dozen hours played on an early access version of an unreleased title. If people really were excited about this title, they would have been following its development close enough to have made a far more informed review than this. I'd be bloody embarrassed to upload something so near sighted as this.
So I was pretty spot on then? A few dozen hours played. Few = 3, dozen = 12. Quick maths: 12 x 3 = 36. So I actually gave him an extra hour played. But its still in the early access pre-release. And he still flat out ignored every update addressing almost every issue raised in this piss poor excuse for a review. Hence, this review is utter bollocks.
Anthem seems like a game made by people who know what a video game is but who don't actually play videogames. Like they professionally make videogames but then subsequently have no urge to play them on their own time.
It's a good video overall, but one bit of criticism I want to offer is that I don't think calling developers incompetent is helpful at all, or making the general assumption that many issues are there by choice. In Bioware's case, I'm sure the Frostbite engine itself is the source of many, many issues. It is notoriously hard to work with, and for Dragon Age Inquisition and Andromeda, they had to develop scores of assets and basic features. They had to implement the ability to just see your character in third person, and a way to allow manual saving. We also don't know how troubled the development was behind the scenes, but it's pretty clear Anthem needed more time, which is a recurring theme with every Bioware game since they were acquired by EA. I really do appreciate the way you break down and critique games, it's a valuable part of the discussion around games, especially in the context of taking them seriously as art, but I also find criticizing the developers themselves as being incompetent, or failing to learn from the mistakes of their peers is unfair. In all likelihood, it's probably a miracle Anthem even functions as well as it does, no doubt do to the tireless work of the people at Bioware. Even a game like Fallout 76 had to have had a lot of passionate people working to the bone on it, simply not having enough time to finish their game. Gaming developers have it pretty hard, so I think it matters to be considerate about that. I hope all of this makes sense, and thanks for taking the time to read this.
So tell me how a competent dev made all these glaring mistakes that many of which have already been made by other devs? I think the word is fairly used here.
@@Jajalaatmaar Imagine working on a game on Anthem's scale with unreasonable deadlines and an engine that actively fights against for the most basic things. Imagine working brutal hours where you literally don't go home, you pass out on your computer, wake up, and then keep working after pounding down an energy drink. Game development is anything but easy, and assuming the developers are incompetent is just not helpful in the slightest, and also just not true.
I don't think anyone doubts that there are tons of devs that are given impossible deadlines, have to work with bad tools etc. but none of that is the consumers fault or problem. I can't even imagine working somewhere like Bioware it's probably an absolute nightmare, but they made the choice to become EA and in turn they are responsible.
@@Henry_Chan Yeah, I appreciate the nuance, but part of the studio responsibility is making sure you don't end up under a publisher that forces you to use the wrong engine.
@GiRayne All the graphical fidelity in the world pales if the faces look worse than the ones we had 10 years ago. That's fundamental, and they cocked it up. Even after patching.
@@alaksandutheexorkizein7634 I stopped playing Destiny some time after Forsaken, it just kinda lost meaning and became a grind for the sake of the grind and I, and I bet many, many others wanted this to migrate over to until it became painfully clear that this is far worse than destiny ever was right out of the gate.. Bioware really fucked up royally..
elite reptilian I’ve seen people say this is the most fun game they’ve ever played. To each his own. My best friend likes it so I’m going to give it a chance
You don’t remember D2 because we all would like to erase everything except their gunplay from recent memory.. 😂 It’s hard to believe that they made an entire sequel out of mistakes and people are happily paying for them to fix it yet all of Anthem’s dlc will be free n everyone is trying to boil it down to glue instead of letting or God forbid, helping it heal.
You keep saying that the combat is fun and explaining why it is, but with all the particle effects clogging up the screen and twirly acrobating animations from characters it just looks like a mess to me.
As a huge fan of the art style and the (very, very) few javelin sets, I’ve been in a rut today, wondering whether I should spend $$$ on the new Storm set that looks sexy as hell. I started with just 40k coins and already spent all that I accrued on the two prior sets on the store. EA’s fucking around with these time-limited store items - almost a full week for the first store, now less than a day for the new stuff - and I genuinely have a hard time figuring out whether I want to invest not only money but more time into this game. Contrary to SkillUp’s thoughts, I love the combat loop (perhaps I’m a filthy casual who just likes pewpewing in GM1 and will take a few weeks to progress onto GM2 and up) but everything else about this game is disappointingly subpar. Spend $20 on shards to buy new cosmetics for this fresh new game off the block, or save that for Division 2? Time can only tell, and EA is (intelligently?) making the choice a difficult one.
I think Anthem is the best reason for why more people are about to start playing Warframe. Why don't developers for these games figure out that it's good to have a satisfying melee attack with your gun, just like in Borderlands....AND WARFRAME. I'm not even trying to shill or anything, Warframe is just my bare minimum expectations for one of these loot/armor shooting games. Yes it's not fair. I don't care.
@GiRayne yup. I'm struggling with it too still. But I don't mind it too much because at least I know I didn't pay $60 for the game and there's plenty of good content in the future if I get through some early game oddities. Stuck on Mars at the moment.
I know what you mean. During the beta i understood and followed very little of the story but i kept redoing them becuase i liked the gameplay. Also. Cant wait for the Mass effect 3 critique :)
I knew something was terribly wrong when Yarrow started narrating the Attack on Freemark, delivering his lines like a 5th grader at a a school play. Interest degraded quickly after that
This is by far the best review I have seen on this game. Honest, definitive, and without this copy & paste horrid hate that seems to have plagued it. I commend you for this... and hope all your reviews will hold the same standard. For this... you well earned my Sub.
Or maybe just don't give games Numbered Ratings because it's completely arbitrary and just share your thoughts on the game without any mention of a "score".
There are moments that you would have seen the face of your character. Especially at the end of the story. However, if you change your armor from the default one (which most people do, because you get a fancy armor set with Origin Access) you can't. The reason for this is that the default armor has a functionality to open the helmet during cutscenes where you see your character. The developers "forgot" to model this functionality for every other helmet in the game. Just like they "forgot" to model a character stats screen, to give the final bosses loot (during the """"early access"""" release period) and to model TEXT CHAT in a multiplayer coop-shooter. This review is the best one I've seen so far and basically rhymes with my own experience of the game.Not overly negative and making fun of EA and Bioware. Just genuinely sad and baffled that something like this can be released for 60 dollars, with one great core mechanic and the rest being crap.
Of all the Devs to have to make a Destiny / Division also-ran......Like a Medal of Honor Warfighter title, to go up against Battlefield 4 and Call of Duty This is testament to the generic-ifying soul of EA, leaning on Bioware until all the unique skills / assets / strengths that actually gave the company VALUE have been leeched away (just like ALL THE OTHER great developers before them) - EA really have shit myopic visionless management
Every single reviewer: It's a looter, why didn't they learn from other looters? Their own employees: It's like Destiny, we could learn something... C-suites of Bioware: This is not Destiny. This is Bob Dylan of video gaming.
Anthem is a fun game with an amazing concept. It’s just soooooo barebones though! I still feel like this should have been a single player game with a deep and rich story like Mass Effect or The Last of Us instead of being a shallow throwaway game to milk off of for 5 or so years 🙄😒.
why are you comparing a looter shooter to an top-down ARPG? destiny i get, but do you know that warframe is also a third person looter shooter too. None the less I guess you made your point in this video. Guess I'll put a hold on anthem, srry bioware you take another L for this one too .
Didn't Bioware have to put the game together after the E3 fake demo? I remember reading the devs didn't know how the game was going to turn up until then, they had to crunch the hell up in less than a year
This looks like somebody made a Warframe mod for Destiny 2 and then it got "developed" into a full blown game..but not a good one. As a designer myself I cant express enough how sad I am that this is just another approach at an artstyle that is 100% forgettable Sci-Fi again (just with more glowing eyes).
Diablo but a 3rd person shooter, wbout killing as many grunts as dast as possible: Gotta say friend you gotta try warframe, Its like this but stable, and has an amazing community and developers (Also its free)
I've tried warframe, and honestly, I just didn't like the way things looked. I'm not saying it was bad graphics, just the style of everything, and the nasty ass ear human things. I get that it's free and that's good. But it's not for me
Bioware is owned by EA, so yes, the blame can be entirely on them since it's ultimately EA that decides what will be in the game, not Bioware. Bioware merely says "ok" and does it.
Wait... so EA is involved in a project that's a disappointment!? That's shocking! :) Honestly, it hardly qualifies as "disappointment" to me anymore, they screw up every game they touch now, so I've learned to stop having expectations for them.
Poor old Bioware, I hope they're given the chance to make a NON IP SEQUEL game *about something they passionately want to make as a team* - that focuses on Biowares strengths, and maybe does NOT use Frostbite....This developer should be DEVELOPING NEW IPs for EA, not stuck as a sequel farm (that's a job for the B team Devs) - I really fear the worst for this superb Developer... O~O
The scaling is largely based on the rarity of gear and lvls are kinds little to no relevant. A lvl 9 in blues can deal more dmg to the mobs and the boss than a lvl 30 in greens. A lvl 9 in blues deals about the same dmg with a lvl 30 in blues (i think). But well when uve been lvl 30 for a while u end with masterworks and purples so if you get ppl bellow 20 you are for sure going to have to carry them. Also, cool review, have a sub.
A consideration for your scoring system: change it to x out of 4 or 6 (and stick with whole numbers only). By using an even number system, there is no middle point to ride. You have to fall on 3 out of 6 or 4 out of 6. This defeats the instinct of just doing like a 3 out of 5 when it's a mixed decision while giving everyone a clear signal of if it's below half or above half which in many ways is more important information than what the number itself is (at least the way you use scores).
I really enjoyed the game. However at the gamebugs eventually made the game unplayable in the literal sense. I could not progress because a quest info-box wouldn't proc. The game is really fun and I really want there to be more content in it. But I will have to wait for the bugfixes to proceed before I can complete the game and give it my score. Good video! Many great points! So far I agree at a ~6/10 but then again I haven't finished the main quest.
Buggy as hell. And load screens. My god load load load load loooooaaading . Solo a hard event collecting stuff and then beat 2 ursix? Nah once killed booted from game and recieve nothing.
Love all your videos Chris! Have you thought about doing an analysis or two on some of your favourite games? I really enjoy your long form videos. I’ll be waiting in anticipation for your next hour long video! With love from Canada 🇨🇦
I have played the alpha, both demos and origin basic 10 hour trial I find this game very fun to play but I have the EXACT same feeling of this game great review.I find myself wanting to play this game despite knowing how broken and lacking this game can be. I want to combo , fly around like Iron Man and grind for loot knowing damn well that the match making and loading screens are hell... I am really conflicted . I see a ton of bad reviews this makes me worry that EA will pull the plug very quickly on this game.
As a player of Destiny since the alpha in 2014, everything I'm hearing about Anthem is giving me serious deja vu. It's almost the same exact 'it's fun but there's fuck all to do', only with a whole lot more bugs and loading screens, and no promise of an interesting Raid experience.
Jesus Christ I saw a short review for this game and caught myself thinking "i wish one of my favourite long-form reviewers made a video on anthem" at the exact same moment as this popped up on my subscribed
I put in a solid 2 months into fallout 76 and the idea of playing another half baked game totally turns me OFF. In fact I am playing the Witcher 3 and have a new appreciation for a quality game. EA has been making the same fucking game forever... and it sucks. Collectathons, Arcadie gameplay, Mircro transactions, Loading, Crap story... I guess EA doesn't want my money.
That introduction though!
"I cant remember the last time I played a game where the developer absolutely nailed the most crucial aspect, while managing to completely shit the bed everywhere else"
Got me instantly hooked XD
When Apex was released, all praise went to Respawn. But with Anthem, all rage goes to EA. Glad you agree with me in that Bioware is so responsible for this game as Respawn is for Apex.
Dani3po difference is: Respawn already said that it worked out because EA wasn’t involved.
EA greenlighted, funded and released the game. I think that counts as involvement They trusted Respawn's own vision (with god reason) but you wouldn't have Apex if EA didn't approve the development in first place.
EA was actually the hero in this case. When they were presented with biowere's game, EA rejected that version hard and forced biowere to go back and create an actual video game for them. Which was that shit show we got on release, but it was a lot better than whatever the hell they had before.
Bioware makes a really disappointing and flawed game but absolutely nails the combat...sounds like another Andromeda lol
The game is a lazy cannibal of Andromeda assets.
The thing that infuriates me most is that Anthem and 76 prove Andromeda was a good game at least on the average scale of things. Because at least it had a story, it had characters, and it had a world you could interact with while seeing it evolve. Anthem had none of this and it was piss poor. Combat was the ONLY good thing that came of it and as the other user stated, it was ripped from Andromeda and subsequently Mass Effect 3 which started the whole combo system.
It still just looks like Destiny trying to be Warframe. And not knowing which to emulate when.
Don't forget Anthem uses Mass Effect's (3 to be exact) Prime and Detonate mechanic for majority of its combat. The combo stuff was cool but I'd have rather they just stuck with Andromeda to make it work than waste their time on this shitty game.
Would you like more motion blur?
I feel like you should change the "stars" rating to just, recommended, or not recommended. I mean this is obviously a below average game, and 3 stars makes it sound like an above average game. I understand that you enjoyed certain parts a lot, but when there are so many problems it doesn't seem like the game lives up to that rating as a whole. Anyway its just a thought, I'm assuming most people only care if you think it's worth a playthrough or not. The actual rating, whether it's 3 or 4 stars seems trivial to the recommendation. Anyway really enjoy your videos keep it up!
Agreed. Recommendation or no a la Redlettermedia is much better.
I saw a clip from LegacyKilla showing a bit of dialogue from the hub, where one of the NPCs exclaims how crucial it is for your Javelin to look good and how much pride it will give you if you pimp it out. The enthusiasm with which those few lines of dialogue were written and delivered with in voice acting is so far above anything else I've heard in Anthem that it makes me wonder if the pitch for Anthem was "First off, microtransactions. OK, now how do we build the world and gameplay around microtransactions?"
Given how many of Bioware's veterans left during Anthem's development, I feel this is a project few were truly passionate for, at least compared to something like Mass Effect or Dragon Age.
I hope this game doesn't conceive anything. At least not outside of the bog. And I hope it bastarding well remembers to flush afterward!
pride and accomplishment
@Kouldor Bane you seem to miss that the skins available now are just epic, so when they put out legendary/masterwork sets they will cost more and not everyone has streamertime to grind the game 8-10 hours a day..
There is also dialogue with an npc about multiplayer. If you say you like doing this alone, the dialogue lasts for 7 more lines, fighting with you to accept their point of view, whereas if you agree to spend your time with more people being better than the dialogue ends abruptly. Lol they aren't even subtle anymore. Find ways to compare yourself to others and if they have something you don't and want, then buy it or farm for hours for it. Nah homes. I like playing games. Not making it my career.
Warframe seems to fit the idea of a sci fi diablo which isn't something I thought about until you brought it up
Plus its stable and has great devs and community
All of these games are unintentionally promoting warframe.
yeah the matchmaking is horrendous, there was an instance where a lvl 3 player was matchmade by the quickplay option in to final story mission of the game, in to the middle of second to last boss fight despite the fact that this lvl 3 player had just started the game and was just out of the tutorial missions when this happened.. that is unacceptable and should not even be possible but , somehow, in this "Bob Dylan of video games" it certainly is possible..
Best review of the game I have seen so far and closest to my personal opinion. Thanks
by far the best review of anthem i have seen so far
The real shame is that Mass Effect died for this.
If this is a wake up call for the industry or even just EA then it's... actually no, it's not fine even then. But it would be something.
Care to explain why you say that ? Andromeda's story was fundamentally broken and the writing was beyond horrendous but we can hardly pin that on Anthem. .
@@rramona88 yeah, it's entirely wrong to think that the new IP that was put on the creators of ME, keeping the creators from having anything of note to do with ME, while ME:A was handed over to some third string dev (because again, the creators were working on the IP that totally has nothing to do with them not working on ME) had anything to do with it.
@@rramona88 Cause the core bioware team ditched Mass Effect to make Anthem, as Anthem was their "dream" game to make. So a B team was put on Andromeda with all the shit that followed due to Bioware still meddling with the production and a lot of disagreements between the teams.
They openly said that they were rather working on Anthem, well now we can see how much passion their dream game got. Not only did Mass Effect suffer from it, but their "dream" game is a broken pile of steaming shit. They didn't show much love at all if this is their passion project, if this is the kind of game they always dreamed of making. It could have been great, but somehow Bioware managed to fuck it all up on the most amateur level possible. Seriousely, the many loading zones are bullshit and not needed if you programmed your game properly, the competition can do it so why can't you?
The match making that is faulty as fuck, again amateur programming skills.
For a company that has the biggest RPG's on it's name, they fuckd up the stats..how? Only complete idiots who never worked on a RPG can fuck that up, yet a veteran studio dropped the ball there...again..how?
It's either they were lazy or insanely stupid with the mistakes they made. And i don't wanna hate on the game, i do hope they manage to pull a Division here, where the game sucks now, but in a few months they fixed the major issues and make it into a great game. Cause i love the idea or running around in armored suits.
That's an understatement. A screaming tragedy, more like.
While blaming a game for problems prevalent in the industry is certainly not the way to go about it, games shouldn't get a pass just because all other games are doing it.
If a game implements lootboxes, it doesn't matter if it's not the worst implementation of its kind, or if it wasn't the first one to do so. Lootboxes are lootboxes. The same extends to any and all criticisms of a game, regardless of how prevalent they are in the rest of the industry.
Sure, microtransactions are lame and undesirable, and Anthem has them, but they aren't implemented more maliciously or intrusively than any other game which would be comparable (Destiny 2, Fallout 76). Beyond that, what more should be said? Should the video have devolved into a tirade against the presumption that players ought to invest a greater sum of their money to get any additional content when games, more and more often, come out in an apparently unfinished or poorly optimized state? Because how is that then a review of Anthem and not the industry as a whole? And so it comes down, yeah, you're not wrong, but what's your point and why is Anthem our sacrificial lamb to this particular altar?
I agreee
@@TheAdarkerglow Pointing out that a game continues a problem is a valid critique of that game.
To exclude the criticism from a review is not only omitting parts of the game from the scope of the review, it is also unduly skewing the review in favor of the game.
And Anthem isn't a sacrifical lamb. It's not being "singled out".
At the beginning of the video, a claim is made that a game's flaws shouldn't be considered as part of the critique and evaluation if other games do it.
That is nonsense.
To my knowledge, this is the first time such a distinction has been made on this channel with a review.
Therefore, I'll gladly post in the comments to point out the problem with this kind of reasoning.
"Somehow have better things to do"...?! EXCUUUUSE ME!, but the the hairs on my Kiwi fruits aren't gonna cut them selves.
I love the gags that you've started to integrate into your scripts. Super dry and funny.
"Bob Dylan of videogames"
The Gay Tupac. Lol.
as in, repetitive verses with very little progression, separated by the occasional ear shattering harmonica solo?
Stefan Aguinaldo Soerensen I think he means as in being overrated famous and hilariously simple (mediocre)
I feel like Anthem is a perfect example of the value of a good combat system. So many games have you engage in combat 90% of the time yet have lacklustre combat, especially RPGs. A good combat system can make a bad game addicting whilst a bad combat system can make a great game unplayable.
Agreed. Fun combat is such an important aspect to any game. Story is important but the gameplay/combat is ultimately what hooks me on a game
>A Sexy Disappointment
The mad lad, he actually did it.
This looks like Lost Planet with jetpacks
The Nutman "why is this lost planet lagging so bad" was my beta thoughts
Sadly, Bioware has had some egregious monetizing practices since way before the microtransaction craze kicked in, whether of their own or EA's volition. Remember Dragon Age: Origins? That dude who would just stand in your encampment for the sole purpose of reminding you there were quests in Origins you could only complete if you bought additional DLC? All of this despite the locations for those DLC being fully accessible on the world map, only for you to travel to them and get a pop-up message that you can't proceed further unless you buy the DLC?
Mass Effect 3 was also one of the first instances of lootboxes I can think of, and it had that garbage day-1 DLC. Yeah, Bioware has had questionable monetizing practices for a long time.
Dude EA was the distributor of those you talk about, obviously EA is the one to blame.
Man, all of the those examples happened after EA acquired Bioware. C'mon man.
PudyMaster Omar Montero Whoops, my bad, for some reason I thought EA didn't acquire Bioware until Dragon Age 2... I also don't remember seeing EA's logo when booting up DA: Origins... weird. I'll edit my post, thanks for the correction.
@@LordofBroccoli It's all cool. Sorry for being so aggressive!
how about SWTOR´s clusterfuck of a transition to a fee to pay game..
Thanks for sharing your opinion on this game.
Please review The Outer Worlds and Cyber Punk 2077 when they are released.
To the people blindly brushing aside all criticism with "don't listen to the haters" need to understand something. When people are dropping criticism on the game it's because we WANT to like the game, we were excited for the game just like anyone else, we WANT to play it, we WANT to be able to look at what the game offers and say to ourselves, "yup, i can easily put 100 hour into this". but there is a bevy of serious issue that need to be addressed before it gets to that point, bluntly dismissing all criticisms with "haters gonna hate" will hurt the future of this game more than your defense helps it. Hearing all of this criticism myself is heartbreaking, i was so excited for this game, and while i still love the moment to moment gameplay, it really needs an overhaul in certain places before i can sit down and dump a 100+ hours into it.
Can't remember who said it, but there's a saying, "We criticize something because we love it and want it to be better, (here should be the 2nd part of this quote, but I've forgotten it)".
I'm not dismissing this videos criticisam as 'haters going to hate'. I'm dismissing it as flat out bollocks. The video was published 3 hours ago, which means there has been more than ample chance for the OP to review both the day 1 patch notes AND the post release content road map. Not to mention the numerous dev QnA sessions detailing various reasonings for including/excluding certain mechanics etc. Never mind the game, this review has been rushed out in order to maximise its views based on a few dozen hours played on an early access version of an unreleased title. If people really were excited about this title, they would have been following its development close enough to have made a far more informed review than this. I'd be bloody embarrassed to upload something so near sighted as this.
He played it for 35 hours.
So I was pretty spot on then? A few dozen hours played. Few = 3, dozen = 12. Quick maths: 12 x 3 = 36. So I actually gave him an extra hour played. But its still in the early access pre-release. And he still flat out ignored every update addressing almost every issue raised in this piss poor excuse for a review. Hence, this review is utter bollocks.
My condolences for your game. I'm sorry these criticisms upset you. Thoughts and prayers.
Anthem seems like a game made by people who know what a video game is but who don't actually play videogames. Like they professionally make videogames but then subsequently have no urge to play them on their own time.
That's how a lot of executive game decisions are made
It's a good video overall, but one bit of criticism I want to offer is that I don't think calling developers incompetent is helpful at all, or making the general assumption that many issues are there by choice. In Bioware's case, I'm sure the Frostbite engine itself is the source of many, many issues. It is notoriously hard to work with, and for Dragon Age Inquisition and Andromeda, they had to develop scores of assets and basic features. They had to implement the ability to just see your character in third person, and a way to allow manual saving. We also don't know how troubled the development was behind the scenes, but it's pretty clear Anthem needed more time, which is a recurring theme with every Bioware game since they were acquired by EA. I really do appreciate the way you break down and critique games, it's a valuable part of the discussion around games, especially in the context of taking them seriously as art, but I also find criticizing the developers themselves as being incompetent, or failing to learn from the mistakes of their peers is unfair. In all likelihood, it's probably a miracle Anthem even functions as well as it does, no doubt do to the tireless work of the people at Bioware. Even a game like Fallout 76 had to have had a lot of passionate people working to the bone on it, simply not having enough time to finish their game. Gaming developers have it pretty hard, so I think it matters to be considerate about that. I hope all of this makes sense, and thanks for taking the time to read this.
So tell me how a competent dev made all these glaring mistakes that many of which have already been made by other devs? I think the word is fairly used here.
@@Jajalaatmaar Imagine working on a game on Anthem's scale with unreasonable deadlines and an engine that actively fights against for the most basic things. Imagine working brutal hours where you literally don't go home, you pass out on your computer, wake up, and then keep working after pounding down an energy drink. Game development is anything but easy, and assuming the developers are incompetent is just not helpful in the slightest, and also just not true.
I don't think anyone doubts that there are tons of devs that are given impossible deadlines, have to work with bad tools etc. but none of that is the consumers fault or problem. I can't even imagine working somewhere like Bioware it's probably an absolute nightmare, but they made the choice to become EA and in turn they are responsible.
@@Henry_Chan Yeah, I appreciate the nuance, but part of the studio responsibility is making sure you don't end up under a publisher that forces you to use the wrong engine.
@GiRayne All the graphical fidelity in the world pales if the faces look worse than the ones we had 10 years ago. That's fundamental, and they cocked it up. Even after patching.
When are they going to realize we never wanted destiny
a lot of people wanted Destiny..
And those people already have Destiny. Why would they jump over to this copy-cat? And the rest of us who don't want Destiny don't want this either.
@@alaksandutheexorkizein7634 I stopped playing Destiny some time after Forsaken, it just kinda lost meaning and became a grind for the sake of the grind and I, and I bet many, many others wanted this to migrate over to until it became painfully clear that this is far worse than destiny ever was right out of the gate.. Bioware really fucked up royally..
elite reptilian I’ve seen people say this is the most fun game they’ve ever played. To each his own. My best friend likes it so I’m going to give it a chance
Then heed his advice and wait for it to patch up and a price drop. Personally this looks like total garbage and ain't gonna spend a minute with it.
You don’t remember D2 because we all would like to erase everything except their gunplay from recent memory.. 😂
It’s hard to believe that they made an entire sequel out of mistakes and people are happily paying for them to fix it yet all of Anthem’s dlc will be free n everyone is trying to boil it down to glue instead of letting or God forbid, helping it heal.
You keep saying that the combat is fun and explaining why it is, but with all the particle effects clogging up the screen and twirly acrobating animations from characters it just looks like a mess to me.
As a huge fan of the art style and the (very, very) few javelin sets, I’ve been in a rut today, wondering whether I should spend $$$ on the new Storm set that looks sexy as hell. I started with just 40k coins and already spent all that I accrued on the two prior sets on the store.
EA’s fucking around with these time-limited store items - almost a full week for the first store, now less than a day for the new stuff - and I genuinely have a hard time figuring out whether I want to invest not only money but more time into this game. Contrary to SkillUp’s thoughts, I love the combat loop (perhaps I’m a filthy casual who just likes pewpewing in GM1 and will take a few weeks to progress onto GM2 and up) but everything else about this game is disappointingly subpar.
Spend $20 on shards to buy new cosmetics for this fresh new game off the block, or save that for Division 2? Time can only tell, and EA is (intelligently?) making the choice a difficult one.
How this took 6 years I'll never know.
It was probably more like 2-3 years, and the rest of the time they were stuck in loading screens.
They probably had to rebuild the entire game after the BF2 loot box choas forced them to change the entire progression model.
@@JeremyComans 👉😎👉
@@JeremyComans
You sir win the internet today!
@@sagacity1071 they sort of did when a higher up said that flying looks fun and to add it half way through.
im just looking at Anthem thinking.... didn't WARFRAME already do this??? AND BETTER, AND FREE TO PLAY!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
I think Anthem is the best reason for why more people are about to start playing Warframe.
Why don't developers for these games figure out that it's good to have a satisfying melee attack with your gun, just like in Borderlands....AND WARFRAME.
I'm not even trying to shill or anything, Warframe is just my bare minimum expectations for one of these loot/armor shooting games. Yes it's not fair. I don't care.
@GiRayne yup. I'm struggling with it too still. But I don't mind it too much because at least I know I didn't pay $60 for the game and there's plenty of good content in the future if I get through some early game oddities.
Stuck on Mars at the moment.
Give it a year to straighten out. Until then? NO TOUCHY~!
Lol. Just a year huh?
@@johnathanera5863 Make it TEN, then.
I know what you mean. During the beta i understood and followed very little of the story but i kept redoing them becuase i liked the gameplay. Also. Cant wait for the Mass effect 3 critique :)
If only they had some sort of Beta or demo where they could test the game before releasing it to the public
TheCivildecay uhh wait lol
by the way its soooooo good now..... great review by the way... whery fair
I knew something was terribly wrong when Yarrow started narrating the Attack on Freemark, delivering his lines like a 5th grader at a a school play. Interest degraded quickly after that
6 year bio-ware not EA, bio-ware and only Bio-ware.
you earned a like for the thick of it quote hehe
This is by far the best review I have seen on this game. Honest, definitive, and without this copy & paste horrid hate that seems to have plagued it. I commend you for this... and hope all your reviews will hold the same standard. For this... you well earned my Sub.
Or maybe just don't give games Numbered Ratings because it's completely arbitrary and just share your thoughts on the game without any mention of a "score".
There are moments that you would have seen the face of your character. Especially at the end of the story. However, if you change your armor from the default one (which most people do, because you get a fancy armor set with Origin Access) you can't.
The reason for this is that the default armor has a functionality to open the helmet during cutscenes where you see your character. The developers "forgot" to model this functionality for every other helmet in the game.
Just like they "forgot" to model a character stats screen, to give the final bosses loot (during the """"early access"""" release period) and to model TEXT CHAT in a multiplayer coop-shooter.
This review is the best one I've seen so far and basically rhymes with my own experience of the game.Not overly negative and making fun of EA and Bioware. Just genuinely sad and baffled that something like this can be released for 60 dollars, with one great core mechanic and the rest being crap.
Of all the Devs to have to make a Destiny / Division also-ran......Like a Medal of Honor Warfighter title, to go up against Battlefield 4 and Call of Duty
This is testament to the generic-ifying soul of EA, leaning on Bioware until all the unique skills / assets / strengths that actually gave the company VALUE have been leeched away
(just like ALL THE OTHER great developers before them) - EA really have shit myopic visionless management
Love this channel, these reveiws are quality!
Just let it die.
Every single reviewer: It's a looter, why didn't they learn from other looters?
Their own employees: It's like Destiny, we could learn something...
C-suites of Bioware: This is not Destiny. This is Bob Dylan of video gaming.
Attack on Titanfall
Anthem is a fun game with an amazing concept. It’s just soooooo barebones though! I still feel like this should have been a single player game with a deep and rich story like Mass Effect or The Last of Us instead of being a shallow throwaway game to milk off of for 5 or so years 🙄😒.
why are you comparing a looter shooter to an top-down ARPG? destiny i get, but do you know that warframe is also a third person looter shooter too. None the less I guess you made your point in this video. Guess I'll put a hold on anthem, srry bioware you take another L for this one too .
Didn't Bioware have to put the game together after the E3 fake demo? I remember reading the devs didn't know how the game was going to turn up until then, they had to crunch the hell up in less than a year
"A Barry Bonds 3."
*[confused zoomer noises]*
This looks like somebody made a Warframe mod for Destiny 2 and then it got "developed" into a full blown game..but not a good one. As a designer myself I cant express enough how sad I am that this is just another approach at an artstyle that is 100% forgettable Sci-Fi again (just with more glowing eyes).
My eyes and brain hurts from seeing the gameplay, how do you even play this wtf
That would be the Bioware "Awesome Button™" in action
Comparing to Diablo is the best characterization but I don't use it cause most people don't play it and can't relate
A looter shooter that gives the player a ridiculous sense of power is Warframe. You should try it.
Very good vidéo, your possible parallel with Diablo is very interesting.
We get it, Warframe is free. Stop ramming it down our throats cheers
Love that late 80s Decepticon color scheme; turquoise and purple 💜
Honestly this game should go free to play. It's the only thing that could save it.
I'd rather play Mass Effect Andromeda than have had to have played this trash.
Diablo but a 3rd person shooter, wbout killing as many grunts as dast as possible:
Gotta say friend you gotta try warframe,
Its like this but stable, and has an amazing community and developers
(Also its free)
Like the developers actualy removed a mechanic that made them money because people were doing it to much, if this was EA well......
I've tried warframe, and honestly, I just didn't like the way things looked. I'm not saying it was bad graphics, just the style of everything, and the nasty ass ear human things.
I get that it's free and that's good. But it's not for me
The game looks cool and that's about it. I found it extremely disappointing from my beta experience.
looking to D3 for inspiration is the worst decision ever
see the current state of D3
I get motion sick just from watching this gameplay
It's criminal you don't have more views love your content.
Bioware is owned by EA, so yes, the blame can be entirely on them since it's ultimately EA that decides what will be in the game, not Bioware. Bioware merely says "ok" and does it.
Anyone else get really irritated that he never mentions Warframe?
Wait... so EA is involved in a project that's a disappointment!? That's shocking! :) Honestly, it hardly qualifies as "disappointment" to me anymore, they screw up every game they touch now, so I've learned to stop having expectations for them.
Poor old Bioware,
I hope they're given the chance to make a NON IP SEQUEL game *about something they passionately want to make as a team*
- that focuses on Biowares strengths, and maybe does NOT use Frostbite....This developer should be DEVELOPING NEW IPs for EA, not stuck as a sequel farm (that's a job for the B team Devs)
- I really fear the worst for this superb Developer... O~O
The scaling is largely based on the rarity of gear and lvls are kinds little to no relevant. A lvl 9 in blues can deal more dmg to the mobs and the boss than a lvl 30 in greens.
A lvl 9 in blues deals about the same dmg with a lvl 30 in blues (i think). But well when uve been lvl 30 for a while u end with masterworks and purples so if you get ppl bellow 20 you are for sure going to have to carry them.
Also, cool review, have a sub.
I love how you sign off on your videos
A consideration for your scoring system: change it to x out of 4 or 6 (and stick with whole numbers only). By using an even number system, there is no middle point to ride. You have to fall on 3 out of 6 or 4 out of 6. This defeats the instinct of just doing like a 3 out of 5 when it's a mixed decision while giving everyone a clear signal of if it's below half or above half which in many ways is more important information than what the number itself is (at least the way you use scores).
Sounds like the loads are as bad as Sonic 06.
Interceptor and Storm nerfs incoming.....
'In time this will be solved by wikis' idk boss
I've already bought the game, now I wish I watched your video before.
Bazinga. I don't buy EA games.
I'm telling you guys, German audio with English subtitles.
It turns everything into what sounds like getting surrounding outside of stalingrad...
I'm having a really hard time watching the gameplay in the background; it's like someone lighted fireworks inside the house
I really enjoyed the game. However at the gamebugs eventually made the game unplayable in the literal sense. I could not progress because a quest info-box wouldn't proc. The game is really fun and I really want there to be more content in it. But I will have to wait for the bugfixes to proceed before I can complete the game and give it my score.
Good video! Many great points! So far I agree at a ~6/10 but then again I haven't finished the main quest.
Buggy as hell. And load screens. My god load load load load loooooaaading .
Solo a hard event collecting stuff and then beat 2 ursix? Nah once killed booted from game and recieve nothing.
Love all your videos Chris!
Have you thought about doing an analysis or two on some of your favourite games? I really enjoy your long form videos. I’ll be waiting in anticipation for your next hour long video!
With love from Canada 🇨🇦
youre my fav yt video essayist
I have played the alpha, both demos and origin basic 10 hour trial I find this game very fun to play but I have the EXACT same feeling of this game great review.I find myself wanting to play this game despite knowing how broken and lacking this game can be. I want to combo , fly around like Iron Man and grind for loot knowing damn well that the match making and loading screens are hell... I am really conflicted . I see a ton of bad reviews this makes me worry that EA will pull the plug very quickly on this game.
I'm pretty sure there was an 'exasperate' where there should have been an 'exacerbate'. Sorry to nitpick. I did appreciate this video!
Im sory my face is just tiyerd!
Chris, I love how you slide through insults. So quick I almost dont catch them. Very well done.
Your comparisons with Diablo 3 are really astute after the Kotaku Anthem revelations. Great review
One question about the 3/5. Are you into BDSM as well? (Asking for a friend!)
Awesome video thanks dude
As a player of Destiny since the alpha in 2014, everything I'm hearing about Anthem is giving me serious deja vu. It's almost the same exact 'it's fun but there's fuck all to do', only with a whole lot more bugs and loading screens, and no promise of an interesting Raid experience.
Interesting.
Jesus Christ I saw a short review for this game and caught myself thinking "i wish one of my favourite long-form reviewers made a video on anthem" at the exact same moment as this popped up on my subscribed
Had quite a good laugh at 31:10. Great review, you nailed the glaring issues while acknowledging the positive aspects.
How is the Interceptor?
Love your reviews! I watch your Andromeda review monthly lol.
Great review.
Almost every point you mentioned be it good or bad was in line with my own experience i had with this game.
I put in a solid 2 months into fallout 76 and the idea of playing another half baked game totally turns me OFF. In fact I am playing the Witcher 3 and have a new appreciation for a quality game. EA has been making the same fucking game forever... and it sucks. Collectathons, Arcadie gameplay, Mircro transactions, Loading, Crap story... I guess EA doesn't want my money.
Excellent review
19:18 OMG, shocking.
Every youtube reviewer ive heard has mained the interceptor. Lol.
Was waiting on your review to make my decision, Thanks Chris.