PC Game Review: Amid Evil

GAME: Amid Evil
RELEASED: 06/20/2019
DEVELOPER: Indefatigable
PUBLISHER: New Blood Interactive
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Steam & GOG)

New Blood Interactive shouldn’t be a stranger to PC gamers by now. Their game Dusk has already garnered attention for its 90’s Quake throwback visual style and similarity to old school first person shooters such as Quake, Blood and Redneck Rampage. It didn’t take long for a similar project to follow. Amid Evil is the brainchild of developer Indefatigable who are based in New Zealand. And where Dusk is a love letter to aforementioned titles, Amid Evil’s inspiration comes from similar but still different sources. Amid Evil is a love letter to games such as Heretic and Hexen, and also Quake to a large extent. So while I’m on such a boomercore kick with my previous review of Hedon, today I’m going to be taking a look at Amid Evil and let’s find out if the game is a worthy tribute to the old legends.

Amid Evil’s weapon selection includes a wand that shoots spikes, allowing you to pin enemies to scenery.

STORY

Amid Evil, much like most 90’s shooters, is rather light on story content. Essentially some kind of evil has invaded several realms and it is up to a chosen warrior to cleanse these realms of evil, seek out its source and destroy it. It really is the most straightforward story you can think of, but the game doesn’t really need much more. There are no lengthy cutscenes in sight, no text crawls, and very little in terms of dialogue. It’s just you, your weapons, your enemies and the gameplay. So let’s discuss it, shall we?

Most of the lore in the game can be read on walls. Or hidden messages from Dave Oshry.

GAMEPLAY

Amid Evil, despite its fantasy inspirations plays very much like a fantasy version of Quake. No RPG mechanics in sight, just pure action with the occasional puzzle. Puzzles are typically solved by shoving your body into buttons until a sequence is complete, so don’t expect your brain to get any massive exercise. What Amid Evil mostly focuses on is pure combat. The main gameplay consists of traversing levels, going from room to room and cleaning out the badguys.

However what makes Amid Evil stand out is the weapon selection. Since you’re not using guns, the arsenal is rather unique to say the least. You start out with a badass axe but quickly acquire more exotic weapons. Such as a staff that shoots magic bubbles, a sword that shoots green energy, a trident that fires electricity, a claw that fires minituarized planets (yeah really), a wand that shoots spikes and a weird purple crystal thing called the Aeternum that is essentially the game’s BFG-9000 and fires orbs that kill everything in vicinity.

Amid Evil features some of the coolest level design I’ve ever seen that evokes nostalgia in a way you don’t see much nowadays, often resembling 90’s fantasy media with checkerboard patterns abound.

And that’s not all. Enemies upon being killed will drop souls. The size of the soul depends on the power of the enemies you kill, ranging from small souls to large souls and even legendary souls (although the legendary ones never drop from enemies and instead show up as normal pickups, of which I am grateful). These souls fill up your soul meter and when it fills up, you can unleash what’s called a Soul Mode.

In this mode your weapons function very differently and often more powerfully than they would normally. Essentially it functions as a limited time alt fire. Your axe turns into a boat propeller, the bubble wand shoots out even more lethal bubbles, the sword shoots out even more powerful projectiles, the trident fires a continous stream of electricity, the planet claw’s planets create huge nova-like explosions, the spike wand shoots spikes much faster and the Aeternum now creates small black holes that sucks in everything nearby (even you if you’re not careful).

All of these weapons also use different types of mana. Blue mana is used for the bubble wand and trident, green mana for the sword and spike wand, orange mana is used exclusively for the planet claw, and purple mana is used exclusively for the Aeternum. It would also seem these different types of mana represent different elements though I’m not sure about it. Basically they just function as different ammo sources and making sure you usually have a fallback weapon if you run out of mana for any of them. Another cool mechanic is that you can overkill enemies. And overkilling enemies with some weapons can cause chain reactions that take out nearby enemies, such as with the electric trident.

The game’s cheat codes include different retro colour palettes. You can even play through the game in an 80’s style CGA palette if you so please.

The game’s true strength lies in its level design. Each realm you visit has its own distinct theme and style that runs through everything in it. Both in terms of its level design, visual style and enemy selection. The fact each episode feels so unique makes the game insanely fun to play through, given you’re never sure what to expect around the corner.

And some of the later episodes really threw me for a loop with some seriously awesome level designs that evoked dream-like imagery such as floating islands in a void, ethereal places and just realms where things are completely abstract. It evoked a similar feeling I got when playing Quake where things didn’t make sense in any realistic way, but felt realistic for the realm you were in. In an era where games strive for realism, it is refreshing to play a game that more tries to make something you either haven’t seen before or don’t see too often.

Amid Evil definitely features some remarkable levels, often involving castles and dungeons similar to Quake.

The game’s difficulty overall feels really fair and not only rewards skill but also at times demands it. Especially in the final episode where health pickups are extremely rare or hidden and you have to rely on your skills to survive. But it is forgiveable to increase the difficulty near the end of the game where the player should and most likely will be very familiar with the game mechanics. I like that none of the enemies use hitscan weapons, so pretty much every projectile coming towards you can be dodged which feels more rewarding for skilled players.

The enemies seem a little on the simple side. Some of them force the player to think differently but for the most part it’s just a matter of shooting them until they die. But the designs are pretty cool at least, with each episode having their own enemies to fight with unique designs and themes.

Picking a favourite realm is really difficult with Amid Evil as all of them are so distinct and pay homage to different sources. This industrial realm in particular gives me some delicious Quake vibes.

GRAPHICS & SOUND

The game’s graphics is definitely the strongest point of Amid Evil. With such diverse episodes there is a huge array of influences at display. The game is downright beautiful at times with dark and colourful lighting. It manages to look both retro in its use of baked shadows and simple colored lighting but also somehow more beautiful than a lot of photorealistic games released today. Its retro style evokes very dream-like and abstract imagery at times that most modern games don’t bother with. It’s a very strange kind of nostalgia where it reminds you of something you’ve never seen before.

The soundtrack and sound design is done by Andrew Hulshult who I feel once again has outdone himself. Rather than sticking to his (somewhat boring) rock and metal style he’s gone for a more synth heavy ambient soundtrack that is stunningly beautiful at times. It definitely fits the otherworldly and magical levels of the game in the same way Nine Inch Nails’ soundtrack for Quake fit that game perfectly. I was really impressed by the work done on the sound here and would easily recommend picking up the game soundtrack alone.

The game’s final realm provides some of the most alien and beautifully assymetrical level design I’ve seen, relying heavily on geometrical shapes and shapes that make you feel really uncomfortable and unsafe.

SUMMARY

In a market of shooters that focus so heavily on story and realism, it is extremely refreshing to play a shooter that harkens back to when games were games and movies were movies. If I were to say anything negative about Amid Evil I don’t know what it would be other than I wish it had a multiplayer mode and that there was more of it. Which in my opinion aren’t really bad things and don’t really detract from the fun of it.

What Amid Evil lacks in story and depth, it more than makes up for with its stunningly diverse level designs, extremely fun combat and immersive atmosphere. This is the kind of game you can get lost in for hours upon hours before you realize how much time you’ve spent playing it. If you’re a fan of old school shooters, heck shooters in general you should definitely pick this up. You can get it on Steam and GOG.

SCORE

STORY: 8/10
GAMEPLAY: 9/10
GRAPHICS: 10/10
SOUND: 10/10

FINAL SCORE: 9/10

PC Game Review: Hedon

GAME: Hedon
RELEASED: 05/16/2019
DEVELOPER: Zan
PUBLISHER: Zan
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Steam)

The term “boomercore” is being thrown around a lot lately to describe this new trend of making new games that either mimic 90’s shooters or straight up use 90’s shooter game engines. With games like Dusk, Amid Evil, Overload and the upcoming Ion Fury to just mention a few, it’s clear that we’re in a pretty good period right now if you’re into old school shooters. And one of the less talked about ones is Hedon, a shooter that’s made entirely in the most classic of game engines; The Doom engine. Having played through the campaign in its entirety, I do still feel it deserves a review. So let’s talk about Hedon.

Hedon starts off rather slow exploring a large cave.

STORY

In Hedon you play as Zan, a female Orc warrior who wakes up in a cave system. After exploring a bit, you find out that an invasion has taken place and your entire village has been wiped out. It’s the classic Doom story though Hedon takes more of a fantasy take on it. Unlike Doom however, Hedon focuses a lot more on its story with several levels dedicated almost entirely to the story.

One thing I love is how the story is always told in first person, much like games like Half-Life. And also similarly to Unreal and System Shock, most of the story is told through in-game journals and diaries you come across. I can’t really discuss the story in too much detail without spoiling much. All I can say is that it’s really well done.

The universe and characters in the game feel unusually developed and deep compared to most Doom mods I’ve played, which really helps make the game stand on its own. There is a ton of lore in this game in the various journals you come across. And you really feel there is a lot more than you see going on, and that you’re often too late to witness what’s really going on. The game feeds you information at a perfect pace and often leaves you open to put the pieces together yourself.

Zan could be described as… thicc.

GAMEPLAY

Hedon is technically a mod for Doom. Specifically for GZDoom, a popular source port. But considering it uses no assets at all from the original game and even adds a lot of new content, I would consider it more being its own game using the Doom engine, in a similar vein to games like Heretic, Hexen and Strife.

Like in Doom you have a health meter indicated by Zan’s face getting progressively bloodier as you take damage. You also have armor that functions identically to the one in Doom. Though in Hedon they’re called armor crystals (probably to justify the fact that everyone’s clothing is rather skimpy).
That’s where most of the similarities end however. The weapon selection is probably the most interesting part of the game. For melee you have your fists which is essentially your desperation weapon and you pretty much never use them since you get an axe shortly into the game. You then pick up the Spike Gun, which functions as your basic assault rifle. It feels similar to the nail gun from Quake in that it fires spikes at your enemies. Its alt fire allows you to aim down the sights and fire short bursts at your enemies.

The Fragfire Gun is a combination shotgun and flamethrower that fires piping hot shells at your enemies or with the alt fire shoots out flames of death at them that can ignite an entire group in seconds. It’s a very powerful weapon and ammo for it is thankfully not in short supply.
The fourth weapon is the Crushbow, which fires explosive arrows at your enemies, similar to the dynamite launching crossbow from Redneck Rampage. The alt fire fires weaker but faster bolts that have a smaller explosion radius. It’s very useful against groups of enemies and larges ones as well as the damage is pretty substantial.

The fifth weapon, the Potion Launcher is also the most utility based one. Its first ammo type are Toxic Grenades which create clouds of toxic gas upon impact. These can also be ignited though to create massive explosions. So combining them with the Crushbow or using them against fire based enemies can prove to be quite effective. The second ammo type are Acid Grenades that cover their target in corrosive acid upon detonation. Extremely useful against hordes of enemies and even some tougher armored enemies. The alt fire makes your grenades bounce around, which can be tactically useful in some situations but I never used it.

The aftermath of battles tend to look pretty spectacular with the game’s gore effects.

The final weapon is the Crylance, which uses the power crystals you find scattered around in the game as its ammo source. It is easily the most powerful weapon in the game and can deal massive damage to most enemies. Its alt fire fires off a large projectile that explodes upon impact and sends out numerous smaller ones.

There are also some additional weapons that are only available on the Bearzerk difficulty, a special difficulty mode that removes access to the game’s usual weaponry and instead gives you a unique set of weapons to play with.

The Hatchet and Shield gives you a less powerful version of the Axe, but it does give you some defensive option with the shield, which can soak up damage for you. The Fire Hammer creates explosions when used against enemies and can also be thrown to be used as a makeshift grenade. The Force Pike can be used as a powerful spear and can also be used to pull enemies towards the player. The final weapon is the Great Axe which deals massive melee damage to enemies. Its alt fire allows you to spin around in a 360 degree circle with it, dealing damage to everything around you.

Using the Crushbow against a group of Cultists.

In addition to the weapons you also have some helpful items at your disposal. Unlike the original Doom where items would be used upon pickup, Hedon is more similar to games like Duke Nukem 3D in that your items are stored in your inventory and can be used at any point. All of the items are temporary buffs and none of them are reusable.

The Vial of Healing restores your health by 10 HP up to a maximum of 100. It’s very useful during combat when access to health potions are limited. The Fixer Goggles functions as the game’s aid in low light conditions and not only illuminates the area around you in a neat “night vision” mode but also highlights enemies. They are particularly useful against some of the late game enemies which are pure black and blend in very well with the darkness around them. My only criticism with these is that they have a limited supply. And given how much of the game is covered in darkness, I often found myself running out of juice when exploring or getting stuck in a level, which lead me to having to fumble through a lot of the darkness.

The Time Shard is an artifact that allows you to freeze time around you. It’s useful for escaping out of bad situations but I found it most of the time to be pretty useless. It doesn’t really offer that much tactical advantage I found, but some players might find it more useful. The Potion of Stoneskin is probably the one I found the most useful. It gives the player massively increased damage resistance and also removes the pain flashes from the screen when taking damage.

The Elemental Ring provides you with massively increased protection against elemental and magic damage. It’s very useful in combination with the Potion of Stoneskin for providing damage protection. The Potion of Might increases your Axe and Fists damage 4 times (basically a melee equivalent of Quad Damage) but ranged damage is reduced by 50%. This makes the Potion very useful for when you want to do insane melee damage. Combined with the protection potions, it turns you into an Orc sized grinder.

The Amulet of Shadows is your invisibility power. Although it doesn’t technically turn you invisible, only makes you much harder to see. It also makes you much faster, making it handy for crossing large gaps. The Potion of Haste, unlike what its name suggests, doesn’t actually make you run faster. But it does increase your firing rate as well as your reload speed temporarily, making it very useful during combat. In combination with weapons like the Crylance it’s a really useful buff.

The Choker of the Beast are items that not only makes your enemies run away in fear (unless they are immune to the fear effect) but also reflects any damage they dish out. The Sentry Gun are helpful allies that you can carry around and place anywhere in the world where they will dutifully attack any hostile in their near vicinity. They do unfortunately have a limited range however.

The Scroll of Wizard’s eye is a useful item which functions like the automap in Doom, filling out the entire map for you, including secret areas. Easter egg areas are however not filled out by this item. The item also charts monsters, items and projectiles. There’s also the Bag of Holding which is only obtainable in a single level and gives the player a permanent inventory upgrade, similar to the backpack from Doom. I never picked this up in my game and I did fine but it is a useful item still.

The level designs are easily some of the best I’ve seen in a Doom engine game.

Most of the gameplay feels similar to Doom where you’ll mostly be searching for keys to unlock locked doors and progress through the game. Although Hedon will sometimes mix things up by tasking you with finding certain spells or completing puzzles in order to progress through the game. All items in your inventory can be examined by pressing the Enter key with the item selected. This can give important clues for Quest items which can only be used in specific circumstances, such as in the first level where you need a pickaxe to get through a crack in a wall.

Combat is a lot more tactical than Doom however with a bigger reliance on elemental damage as well as various weapons and items working together. Finding the right weapons and items to use in the right situations can be key to survival. I also found the general difficulty to be really high as enemies can deal a lot of damage to you. Particularly some of the stronger ones.

But with the items and weapons at your disposal there is also a lot of possibility for yourself to not only deal a lot of damage but also become almost invincible so the game feels very fair and rewards skill and quick tactical thinking over mindless shooting. It is very easy to play Hedon like you’d play Doom but it isn’t as fun or rewarding. It’s easier to approach it like a FPS hack’n’slash rather and use the buffs at your disposal as the game really is built around them.

What I like the most about the game is the varying pace. Some levels are more focused on exploration and building atmosphere. And I found the pacing to be perfect in that regard. In one level you’re going from battle to battle while in the next you’re simply exploring an ominous facility and avoiding organic trip mines. The use of black slime and tentacles really gives the game a very Lovecraftian vibe, even more so than Quake. And you truly feel like you’re up against a realm that’s beyond understanding.

The game features a rich universe with multiple characters and feels unusually deep for a Doom engine game.

GRAPHICS & SOUND

Graphically, Hedon looks amazing for a Doom engine game. It looks unmistakably retro, but with some very nice lighting effects and the sprite artwork is undeniably well done. Of course it feels a little male oriented with the amount of scantily clad women in the game. In particular the boss feels like she’s straight up wearing dominatrix gear. But it never really bothered me that much. I mean it is a fantasy game and if I had a body like Zan’s and a crystal that gave me armor without needing any physical armor, you’d bet I would show some skin.

The sound is really good though, with a lot of satisfying crunch to the sound effects and with some excellent music. A lot of it is composed by Alexander Brandon who might sound familiar to those who grew up with games like Jazz Jackrabbit, Unreal and Deus Ex. He really brings his own sound to a lot of the music in the game and it’s really good stuff. The soundtrack is also really diverse, ranging from creepy ambience to melodic breakbeat tunes and even some heavy metal. I really hope a soundtrack album is or will be available at some point. Cause it’s one of the best soundtracks I’ve heard in a while.

The levels really give a sense of this underground fantasy world in Hedon, where crystals are used as light sources.

SUMMARY

All in all, Hedon is an amazing retro FPS that I highly recommend if you’re a fan of old school shooters. Its difficulty might turn some people off and its confusing level design can sometimes be a bit of a chore to get through, but this is a really rich experience that feels highly rewarding to those who are willing to get good at it. You can grab it now on Steam for about $10.

SCORE

STORY: 8/10
GAMEPLAY: 7/10
GRAPHICS: 8/10
SOUND: 9/10

FINAL SCORE: 8/10

PC Game Reivew: Borderlands 2 - Commander Lilith & The Fight For Sanctuary

GAME: Borderlands 2 - Commander Lilith & The Fight For Sanctuary (DLC)
RELEASED: 06/09/2019
DEVELOPER: Gearbox Software
PUBLISHER: 2K
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Steam), PS3, PS4, XBOX 360, XBOX One

It's been quite a while since Borderlands 2 released. 7 years to be precise. But seeing as it is finally time for Borderlands 3 to be released (and it has to be said it's looking really good), in order to get their fans prepared for Borderlands 3 they have released a brand new and completely free DLC for Borderlands 2. Today we're going to take a look at Commander Lilith & The Fight For Sanctuary, a DLC which is set a while after the end of Borderlands 2. I will do my best to avoid any spoilers for both the DLC and the main game, but I will definitely touch on some things that are story related to if you want to go into the DLC completely blind, I suggest not reading this review. Because I can probably say right away that if you're a fan of the series and especially if you're hyped for Borderlands 3, you should definitely play this DLC. But let's get into the details of why you should.

Fight For Sanctuary has quite a different theme to it, with a heavy focus on plants. Good thing I'm playing a fire-speced Maya.

 STORY

Set after the events of Borderlands 2, Fight For Sanctuary is about how the vault hunters must help Lilith, who have now become the leader of the Crimson Raiders, fight an invasion of Sanctuary at the hands of Hector. How does he plan to invade Sanctuary you may ask? Why by releasing spores into the air that turns everyone into mutated plant zombies of course. Seeing as the gas soon affects not only the inhabitants of Sanctuary but also the Crimson Raiders themselves when Mordecai becomes infected by it, the stakes are definitely put pretty high from the get-go. Along the way you meet Vaughn who has his first and only appearance in Borderlands 2, and you of course also meet all the familiar faces from the core game, including Ellie, Scooter, Moxxi, Tiny Tina, Mordecai, Brick and the whole story almost feels like a family get-together where all of these characters we have spent 7 years playing with are coming together to fight a final threat before the next big adventure.

In all honesty, something I did not expect was just how much the story would tug at my heart strings. It not only gives characters like Tiny Tina much needed character development and depth, but some of the writing is extremely well done in both terms of humor and emotional depth. Something I can definitely say is that you can tell this was not written by Anthony Burch, so people who didn't really enjoy his style of humor in the main game may definitely enjoy the writing in this DLC more. It still has a lot of references here and there but they're not as common and it feels more like the writing focuses on the characters themselves and gives them more room to shine. Especially Vaughn I feel was extremely well done here and his voice delivery combined with his writing just made me laugh so many times.

It just wouldn't be Borderlands 2 without some... "adult" magazines would it? If titles like "Racks & Rakks" interest you anyway.

GAMEPLAY

In terms of gameplay nothing is radically different here. It's still the good old looter shooter gameplay you'd come to expect from this game. The DLC does add some notable updates to the game however. The level cap is raised even more from 72 to 80 so now you can actually have even more skills at max level, a much welcome update in my opinion. It also gave an excuse to brush some dust off my old max level character I've had since 2012 or so.

The DLC also makes it possible to start a game at level 30 instead of level 1, putting you at the end of the main story with gear befitting the class you pick. This is a perfect addition for people who have played the game a lot and want to start a new character without having to do the entirety of playthrough 1.

Another notable addition is the new weapons tier, the Effervescent tier. We didn't find much of these in our playthrough but what we did find was pretty cool. One of the items was a grenade mod called the Electric Chair which proved extremely useful against some of the shielded enemies in the DLC. We also found a fire SMG that didn't seem to do anything that unique but it had a pretty high elemental damage so it was definitely useful. Some of the Effervescent tier gear also seems to have abilities that gel well with each other so collecting all of it seems to possibly give some "set" bonuses.

There is kind of a gameplay mechanic about how the toxic gas from the plants makes your damage output higher the more you have in your system but taking too much of it causes you to take damage over time. It would've been neat if this had been developed further and perhaps given you some random debuffs or even buffs depending on which class you played, so it's a little bit disappointing they didn't go further with it.

The good thing about plants is that they burn well.

GRAPHICS AND SOUND

Graphically I really love some of the level designs in the DLC and the design of the enemies. Granted some of the models do look a little bit weird in the cinematics and it still doesn't look amazing, even with the HD textures added, but it definitely doesn't look awful for sure. Everything in the DLC suits the style and the atmosphere is generally really well done.

The voice acting is really good I would say, especially Vaughn who absolutely has some killer delivery in this DLC. There isn't really much new to comment on in this DLC in terms of sound and music though. The music sounds good but doesn't really stand out and the lack of a proper end credits song is disappointing. It would've been nice to hear something like a remix of "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked" or something similar to give the game a proper sendoff before Borderlands 3, and it feels like a missed opportunity for some fanservice.

You know, this is pretty much how I feel during pollen season...

SUMMARY 

All in all, this DLC is really good and considering it's free, it's definitely worth downloading and playing. I think it's really nice of Gearbox to give this little gift to the fans and give us a story bridge between Borderlands 2 and 3. It ties up a lot of loose ends from Borderlands 2 in terms of story as well and some events that happened in other spinoff games, Tales From The Borderlands in particular. And if you haven't played Borderlands 2 yet then you should definitely give it a go as you now have even more to explore.

SCORE

STORY: 8/10
GAMEPLAY: 8/10
GRAPHICS: 6/10
SOUND: 6/10

FINAL SCORE: 7/10

PC Game Review: Borderlands - Game Of The Year Edition

Originally published at https://www.vgr.com/borderlands-goty-edition-pc-game-review/

GAME: Borderlands Game Of The Year Edition
RELEASED: 04/03/2019
DEVELOPER: Gearbox Software
PUBLISHER: 2K
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Steam), XBOX One, PS4

The Original Looter Shooter

Gearbox is a developer that most gamers probably have a bit of a love/hate relationship with. When they aren’t busy pissing off the collective Alien and Duke Nukem fandoms, there is one franchise that they seem to put more effort into. And that is of course their very own IP, Borderlands.

If you’ve never heard of Borderlands, you have probably heard of the term looter shooter. It’s a term that gets thrown around quite a bit nowadays, but Borderlands was in many ways the first of its kind. It’s best described as someone at Gearbox having the lovely idea of getting Diablo and Call Of Duty together in a bedroom with some sexy music and letting nature do its thing. What we ended up with was a pretty addictive game that combined FPS combat with hack’n’slash mechanics.

When your co-op partner gets a perfect headshot on the person you’re about to attack. 😛

The original Borderlands was in that regard a very original shooter when it came out in 2009. Being a co-op shooter, it gave you four heroes to choose from. The so-called “vault hunters” who each had a distinct personality and skill sets.

You had Mordecai, the brooding hunter type with his pet bird of prey Bloodwing, with skills that makes him an excellent gunslinger and sniper. You had Brick, a towering mountain of a man capable of wielding rocket launchers with ease and punching enemies into submission. There was Roland, the soldier type more focused on support with his trusty turret. And finally there was Lilith, a siren. Sirens in Borderlands are legendary females with blue tattoos who are gifted with immense powers. Lilith has the power to literally enter another dimension, an ability called phasewalk. She is also more centered around elemental damage than the other hunters and has skills more focused on SMG’s and automatic weapons, as well as crowd control.

The plot in Borderlands is pretty simple. You learn that Patricia Tannis, an archeologist on a planet called Pandora is studying something called Vaults, which she isn’t entirely sure on what is but she seems to have found one on Pandora and intends to find a way to open it. As the four vault hunters, your main task in the game becomes to assist Tannis in her journey towards opening the Vault and finding out what’s on the other side. This of course would be an easy task if Pandora wasn’t also an incredibly harsh environment with not only local wildlife to deal with but also humans that have either turned insane or are there to seize the Vault for themselves.

The Game of the Year Edition of Borderlands adds “heads” which are essentially just accessories to your character.

What Makes It Different?

Being the game’s 10th anniversary, it’s therefore a perfect time to release a remaster of the game. Because while it is a great game, it still suffers from being the first in the series, with a lot of the quality-of-life improvements from Borderlands 2 having always felt absent from it. And therefore I would argue it is the game that has benefited from a remaster the most compared to the games in the Handsome Collection which were essentially just glorified texture packs. The Game of the Year Edition of Borderlands is a far more substantial update of the core game that adds those improvements back into the first game and also updates the visuals by an incredible amount.

The SHiFT system is now in full swing in Borderlands 1, meaning you have access to a golden chest in the game’s many main locations which can be used to get really good loot at your current level.

You now have a minimap in addition to the compass from the first game. An issue in the original game was always navigation since the compass would only give you a vague idea of where something was. With the minimap and the game’s added objective markers, you’re now never stuck being unsure of where something is during one of the game’s many fetch quests. And it also shows enemy locations which helps a lot during combat.

Another issue in the first game was that you had to manually pick up everything, which included stuff like money and ammunition. This is now fixed so that like in Borderlands 2 you automatically suck up consumables, which probably is one of the most welcome fixes to the game.

Inventory has been massively overhauled, with items now being markable as junk or locked so that you can’t accidentally lose them. You can also sell all items marked as junk in any store with a single key press

What Makes It Unique?

Despite the changes that makes Borderlands 1 play more like Borderlands 2, it is still a very different game at its core. The gameplay in general is far slower and more tactical, with more focus on shooting from cover and advantageous locations than running around blasting enemies. The difficulty is generally higher which means that running and gunning is more likely to get you killed faster, even if you have a decent shield. Compared to the sequels which had gameplay that felt much faster paced and twitchy, it definitely makes the game feel unique to play.

There is of course also the lack of the trademark humor from Borderlands 2, since Borderlands 1 in general had a more laid back tone to it. So if you were never a fan of the writing in Borderlands 2, you may still enjoy Borderlands 1. That’s not to say Borderlands 1 isn’t funny at times either, it definitely has some funny references and quirks, but it never reaches the same points that the sequels made.

Boom.

The combat also feels distinctly gorier, with heads actually exploding when you get a perfect headshot, something that was missing in the sequels. And with Borderlands 1 being the only game where you could get snipers and SMG’s with explosive elements, it also has a more diverse feel with the weapons, since the explosive element isn’t exclusive to a single manufacturer like it was in the sequels.

And of course it has to be mentioned that cars are just the most powerful weapon in the game, capable of running over pretty much any enemy and making them explode instantly. Granted this does damage your car a fair bit when running over heavily armored enemies or corrosive element enemies, but it still feels amazingly overpowered. Compared to the sequels where your car dealt more realistic damage to enemies, it feels almost comical in comparison but not lacking in fun factor for sure.

And that’s of course not counting the fact that Borderlands 1 offers unique locations and enemies you likely won’t see in the sequels, such as the Scythids which always felt absent from the sequels. The flying space slugs are probably some of the most annoying enemies in the game though so that may be a reason they decided not to include them in future games.

Well this guy had a nasty surprise.

A Mixed Bag

Visually the Game of the Year edition features some noticable enhancements. Textures are at a much higher resolution, making it actually possible to see fine details on them, as well as a higher shadow resolution. And the game on PC now has an FOV slider, meaning you’re no longer forced to deal with the low fixed FOV of the original game. It does not feature any massive visual enhancements though, the colours still look a bit muted and the lighting still feels very basic and reliant on bloom like most pre-2010 games tended to do. So in a way it does look like a 2009 game still, albeit with higher resolution textures.

That’s sadly not to say the new edition is without its flaws. And most of them come in the audio department. The audio mix is kind of all over the place with gunfire constantly cutting out during heavy combat which makes the game feel oddly quiet despite there being a lot of sound going on. Noises made by enemies and cars feel like they have no distance factor to them, being incredibly loud no matter how far away you are from them which makes combat incredibly disorienting, and other players can be on the other side of the map and still sound like they’re right next to you. And music changes so abruptly you’re almost given sonic whiplash. This is the area where the remaster suffers the most and it’s hard to understand how the audio could get this badly messed up.

It doesn’t stop there either, the audio settings in the menus doesn’t do anything. Changing volume sliders doesn’t actually change any volumes and everything still feels like it’s mixed completely bonkers, with it almost being impossible to hear Echo logs when you pick them up due to them being drowned out by other noise. And that’s not to mention that whenever you start the game, your voice settings are reset to always broadcasting, which means you have to enter the audio settings every time you start the game to toggle them. It gets incredibly frustrating.

Mothrakk is looking pretty awesome.

In Conclusion

Despite the audio issues, I would still recommend getting the GOTY Edition of Borderlands 1. It’s a substantial and welcome overhaul of the game that makes it a lot more fun to play, to the point that I find it very hard to go back to the original. Heck, if you already own Borderlands on Steam, you also own the new version since you get it for free! So hopefully these issues will be addressed in a future patch and we will have the absolute definitive edition of Borderlands 1 to play.

SCORE

STORY: 7/10
GAMEPLAY: 8/10
GRAPHICS: 8/10
SOUND: 5/10

FINAL SCORE: 7/10

PC Game Review: Rage 2

Originally published at https://www.vgr.com/rage-2-pc-game-review/ 

GAME: Rage 2
RELEASED: 14/05/2019
DEVELOPER: id Software, Avalanche Studios
PUBLISHER: Bethesda Softworks
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Steam), PS4, XBOX One

Rage was not a particularly memorable id Software title but it certainly had a lot going for it. Being mostly a showcase for id’s new idTech engine, it showcased a lot of impressive graphical detail for its time and certainly was unique in its approach to things like texture streaming. It gathered mostly average reviews, aside from myself who personally loved the game aside from the lackluster ending. So personally I was actually pretty excited when they revealed that Rage 2 was being made, and even better by the team who made the Mad Max game. So how is Rage 2 compared to the first game, or even other id Software titles? Let’s find out when we take a close look at Rage 2.

STORY

As a whole the tone of the game is very 90’s, and not in the good way. It just feels like the game is trying too hard to be “extreme” in every way possible and gross you out as much as possible. The entire time I was playing this game I just felt like it was trying to be this gritty hardcore wasteland game, but it just ended up making the game feel remarkably difficult to get into.

One fascinating aspect is how Rage 2 simultaneously has a better story yet somehow worse story than Rage 1. The story itself has more of an actual arc to it. The focus is on avenging your adopted mother’s death at the hands of an Authority general known as Cross. Taking down the general proves difficult however, since he has the ability to clone himself. So you have to work with three head figures of the wasteland to take him down. Loosum Hagar from the first game in the town of Wellspring, John Marshall in the town of Gunbarrel, and finally Doctor Kvasir (also from the first game) in his laboratory. Sounds all fine and dandy right?

Well, Rage 2 has some serious issues with its story in all honesty. The most glaring issue is how none of these elements are properly introduced. Instead you’re just kinda thrown into it without given much opportunity to get to know any of the characters you’re supposed to care for. Your mother for instance gets killed in the very first mission you play. Rage 2 completely misses the point of a game, where the story is interactive, to allow the PLAYER to actually feel attached to characters before sacrificing them to the plot gods. It doesn’t help if this is a good driving factor for the main character if we as players have no real attachment. Heck, even if Rage 2 was a movie, having a character die so soon that is integral to the plot would just feel cheap. And that’s how it feels here.

The game also has a serious lack of any likeable characters. Most of them feel like caricatures or one-dimensional gimmicks, lacking any sort of actual personality or likeability. It leads to a situation where you have plenty of characters to talk to and accept quests from. But due to how the game makes no effort to get you to know these characters before helping them, you’re left feeling kind of distanced from everything going on. Not that the main character Walker lacks any eagerness to do all of this but we as players certainly do not share that enthusiasm.

Walker is the main character of the game. Unlike Rage 1 where you played a nameless Ark survivor (Rage Guy if you will), in Rage 2 the main character has a voice and a name. And a gender that is up to the player. Personally I decided to go with female Walker simply because that’s the gender I always pick when I have the option. But it doesn’t seem to matter which Walker you pick since, well, both are equally boring and bland. Walker doesn’t have any discernable personality traits beyond being your basic hero and thus ends up feeling kinda boring for most of the game. You’re not even allowed to make any choices that could affect the story itself. So really you’re just kinda going through the motions as the game strings you along from location to location.

He had a bad hair day.

GAMEPLAY

Which brings us on to the topic of gameplay. Rage 1 was really a very linear game that had the illusion of being open world. But Rage 2 on the other hand is completely an open world game. In fact it’s extremely similar to Mad Max, the game Avalanche Studios were probably most known for prior to Rage 2. The main issue with Rage 2’s gameplay is its repetitive nature. Sure you have a massive world to explore but several locations you visit feel quite literally copied and pasted around with some feeling identical and some quests having you visit old locations again, giving a very intense sensation of deja vu throughout the entire thing.

Aside from the story missions, you have a number of different mission types in Rage 2. Bandit Dens are essentially outposts where the goal is to clear them out. Crusher Nests are dungeons with a boss at the end. Road Chokers are more basic road blocks where the goal is to raise the roadblock and clear out enemies. Authority Sentries are massive turrets that deal a shitload of damage to you, but are worth a fair bit of XP to take out. Mutie Nests are nests of… you guessed it, muties, where the goal is to take out all of their eggs. Pit Stops are places where the goal is to blow up all the gas tanks. Repowering Stations are places where you have to overload some energy Pylons until they overload from waves of enemies.

The main issue with all of these locations is that all of them feel the same. You mostly kill enemies, gather loot and rinse and repeat. And that brings me to my biggest gripe with Rage 2. The loot and how it ties in with your character upgrades. All of your character upgrades are locked behind resources of some kind. And instead of these upgrades being out in the world for you to find, each location only gives you seemingly random resources to spend on these upgrades in the menu. There’s really no rhyme or reason to it and it feels extremely boring to essentially grind resources from location to location, rather than perhaps more locations being built around getting certain upgrades or ability upgrades.

The only locations that offer anything worthwhile are the Arks which offer either a new Nanotrite ability, or weapon. I kind of wish more locations would feel like these ark locations and offer more unique loot rather than just spewing resources at you.

Yay. An Ark chest. Another one.

That being said, what the game does well and what makes the game somewhat fun is the combat. Given all the nanotrite abilites you can find and the various weapons you pick up, it becomes sort of a combat playground where you’re free to approach combat however you want. Your nanotrite abilities allow you to several cool things, including shattering enemies with a kinetic push, slamming down into them, or even creating a vortex that sends them flying into the air.

You also get a fair amount of weapons to play with, including wingsticks from the previous game. All of the weapons are pretty fun to use and all have different tactical uses depending on the type of enemy you’re facing. Another cool addition is the overdrive mode which boosts all your weapons and your strength. Unfortunately even on Hard mode this ability becomes insanely overpowered once you’ve leveled up your abilities, and allows you to pretty much be in Overdrive continuously as long as you have enemies to kill.

The combat is not perfect however. One major issue is that the enemies just kinda blend together in the end. All of them just kinda act the same way in terms of AI with no real threat or challenge once your character is upgraded enough. I played the game on Hard difficulty and after a while it just felt like I was breezing through the game on Very Easy unless the game got cheap and faced me with obstacles that killed me in 2 hits or less. Sure, some enemies charge at you with shields but you can just shatter them or throw grenades at them. And then there’s the issue with the BFG 9000.

The BFG 9000 is a deluxe edition exclusive weapon that is pretty much the game’s kill button. It can take down most bosses in one or two shots and is devastating to the Authority Sentries you meet. Sure, the ammunition for it costs 1000 bucks per plasma cell, but even that is pretty cheap when you consider how easy it is to earn money in the game. It creates a situation where you have this weapon that is ridiculously overpowered, and very easy to get ammo for. The weapon ruins all the challenge in the game and feels like a cheap way for people to just get a pay-to-win weapon.

SPLAT!

The game also has a lot of driving in it, which feels exceptionally clunky and unresponsive. Which is a shame given you have to actually drive some races to progress the story in the game. Unlike the first game the only thing you get from driving are auto parts you can use to upgrade your vehicles. It’s nowhere near as involved as the first game, making racing almost feel like an afterthought in Rage 2. Though given how clunky the driving controls are, it may be a blessing in disguise.

One of the main issues with the car controls is how the turret will lock onto things. Why is this a bad thing? Cause it also locks onto things that aren’t a threat to you! I’m serious, the turret locks onto to empty cars and even loot! WHY ON EARTH WOULD YOU HAVE THE TURRET LOCK ONTO THINGS THAT POSE NO THREAT TO YOU?!!! Especially during car combat where you NEED to shoot things that have a higher priority this is infuriating beyond belief! I cannot stress how bad of a game design decision this is!

You also have the Mutant Bash TV arenas making a combat with the incredibly unlikeable Desdemonya as the new host. Her entire personality is that she’s old and gets off on murder. The arenas lack any sort of original gimmicks and feel like complete rehashes of the ones from the first game, making it feel entirely pointless and like the racing it feels like a complete afterthought.

Such a beauty.

And let’s get talking about the controls as a whole. For the most part, the game controls fine on PC and on console I can probably see no issue with it other than the fact you’re playing a FPS with a gamepad which to me just feels weird. But the PC version has some notable missing features, such as being able to bind the mousewheel. By default the mousewheel is bound to up being your next weapon and down being your previous weapon. This is actually the opposite way to how I prefer things. Which drove me absolutely insane at times where I meant to switch to the next weapon, but accidentally picked the previous one.

Oh and despite the game having a ton of pitch black areas, there’s no button for a flashlight. Go figure. I mean when Doom 3 had more features than you, you know you have issues.
And whoever thought it was a good idea to have messages that pop up and cover the screen for every time you complete objectives needs his ass kicked. Especially whoever thought requiring the player to press ENTER to get rid of them was a good idea. Because you may be aware that on a keyboard, Enter is on the right side. Which is very awkward when you have your hand on the left side and your right hand on the mouse, having to move either hand away from those positions to press Enter whenever any message is on the screen.

In all honesty, having popups that pause the gameplay in any game like this is a crime. It baffles me that they still have some instances where all you get is a simple message that shows up on the screen without pausing the gameplay. Why couldn’t the rest of them act this way?

Uhm... that looks kinda threatening.

SOUND AND GRAPHICS

For the most part the game sounds pretty good. You have some really good weapon sounds and crunchy headshot sounds. All good stuff. The voice acting unfortunately is often so boring to listen to that I praised the gods the game had an option to skip dialogue. I mean, it’s not easy to make the dialogue interesting when it’s written like it is to begin with, but the voice acting did not help. I also ran into a pretty annoying bug where voice clips would randomly not play or were playing at such a low volume they were inaudible. This wasn’t even just voice clips from NPC’s, it was all kinds of things. Sounds just not playing for various reasons. And the music is okay. It suits the mood. Nothing memorable, nothing bad. It’s there.

Graphically the game looks as you’d expect. For the most part. They decided to put a very saturated color filter on it that enhanced pink and blue colours, giving the game a very intense neon look that makes it hard to look at at times. Especially during the overdrive mode where everything just looks like you took an overdose of LSD. It has a fair variety of areas to explore but never really looks all that interesting. I did like some of the Authority base interiors though, simply because they really reminded me of Doom 2016.

Oh and the game is extremely prone to crashing for some reason. Not sure how well it plays on consoles, but on my PC system it wasn’t unusual for the game to crash like 3 times in half an hour. Especially near the end of the game or when certain events happened. It was especially common when driving around. That coupled with the game having abysmal performance drops very frequently made it a chore to get through it. I was running the game on low to medium graphics settings and would still get frame dips into the 30’s and even 20’s occasionally. And I have a fairly decent system with a Ryzen 7 1800X CPU.

Character models tend to look… questionable.

SUMMARY
 

All in all, Rage 2 is an extremely underwhelming game. It does some things right but ultimately does a lot of things that just feel like it’s checking things off a checklist. The difficulty for the most part is way too easy once you’ve got some upgrades going. Or too difficult in places where you’re either in a vehicle or faced against a really cheap enemy. But even those fall victim to the BFG 9000 which ruins any challenge the game could pose you. It’s a bug-ridden mess at times too, prone to both crashing and just not working as you’d expect. At times it gets so close to being good. But whether it is the weapons just not feeling strong enough, or the locations not feeling interesting enough, or the story just being both predictable and completely incapable of engrossing the player, there’s always something that ruins the experience.

It also feels like it has no original cell in its code. Everything feels derivative, with the open world feeling literally copied from Mad Max, the suit you have and its abilities feel copied from Doom 2016, and a lot of the elements that were in Rage 1 are also here but feel completely soulless and copied over just to be there. It is a sequel that completely lacks the charm and likeable characters that made Rage 1 fun to play.

That being said if any of this looks like something you’d have fun with, you’ll probably enjoy the game. Because at times, it is enjoyable. But it’s not great. The game is currently available on Steam and from Bethesda. And if the game’s current story is not enough for you, there is more DLC coming in the near future.

Damnit, Willits. Stop putting your sausages in games.

SCORE

STORY: 2/10
GAMEPLAY: 5/10
GRAPHICS: 6/10
SOUND: 5/10
FINAL SCORE: 4/10

PC Game Review: Anthem

GAME: Anthem
RELEASED: 02/22/2019
DEVELOPER: BioWare
PUBLISHER: Electronic Arts
AVAILABLE ON: PC (Origin), XBOX One, PS4

BioWare's Anthem

It's been a while since I was really into a game. And I'm talking beyond just enjoying it. I mean like compulsively obsessed with it. For me, Anthem has been one of those instances where a game has occupied my headspace more than most games I've played. A game that I've not only thoroughly enjoyed, but a game that has really clicked with me. Ever since it released, I've played Anthem almost to a religious degree. Aside from going to work, sleeping, working out and all that important stuff, I've done nothing but play Anthem.

I already knew the game was going to be special when it was first announced at E3 2018. I was a bit shocked to hear about BioWare of all things releasing an online multiplayer shooter. It's not really the first thing that comes to mind when you think of BioWare. The company is probably more famous for their work on games such as Baldur's Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age and of course Mass Effect. Not only that but we haven't really seen a new IP from BioWare in quite a while. It would seem EA were more than content to delegate BioWare to making Mass Effect sequels.
Then again with Mass Effect Andromeda being rather badly received, it makes sense that EA wanted to give the old BW a chance at something new. And in a way, that does make Anthem a truly special game. A new IP in a new universe, with a whole new style to it.

Anthem lets you customize your Freelancer by choosing your gender and appearance.

In either case, Anthem spoke to me in a way few games have done before. I immediately felt almost drawn to the game, in a way similar to how people in the game itself feel drawn to the Anthem. As soon as I saw those early demos where you could see people in different Javelins flying together, I could already just feel how fun the game looked. And that's something I hadn't really seen from EA in a while. A game that simply looked fun.

Fast forward to late January and I was lucky enough to get invited to the VIP Demo (which you can read my first impressions of here). And while my experience was no doubt buggy, the experience did leave me hungry for more Anthem. After having played the open demo a week later, I knew this was a game I was going to love. And even before the game launched, I saw negative reviews. The game was being absolutely torn apart by critics. I became anxious, if the game I was so hyped for, felt so much attachment to would prove to be a disappointment.

Luckily, when I played the game on its launch day on February 22nd, I felt the entire opposite reaction. I was not only having fun, I absolutely loved it. Yet that makes it even more confusing to me why so many people hate this game. That being said the game is not without its flaws either. So without further ado, let me go into detail about what I love and what I dislike about BioWare's Anthem.

From beginning to end, the world of Anthem is a gorgeous place.

A Different Place, A Different Time

Anthem takes place on an unknown planet in an unknown time, giving it a bit of a Star Wars feeling where it could be the distant past or the distant future. The planet is covered in relics of advanced technology, all harnessing an immense source of power known as the Anthem of Creation. Unfortunately these relics can at times get unstable, doing all sorts of unpredictable stuff. Which includes terraforming, mutations and spawning in hostile creatures. The most unstable artifacts can envelop an entire area in storms, energies and creatures. Known as Cataclysms, you were once sent into one, known as the Heart of Rage. Unfortunately things didn't go as planned and most of your squad were killed, leaving you alone as one of a few survivors. And those who survived were both mentally and physically scarred.

As a Freelancer, whose gender and appearance is left up to the player, it is your job to keep the hostile monsters and factions brought on by the Anthem at bay. You're given a Javelin, a powerful exo suit with flight capabilities, as your main weapon. In addition to flight, the Javelins are also equipped with powerful abilities and weapons that can strike true fear into your enemies. Your main goal becomes to put a stop to the Dominion, a hostile group whose goal is to use the Anthem for their own purposes. In other words, you have to keep it from falling into the wrong hands. Which is easier said than done when you have no way of returning to the Heart of Rage where the Anthem is located. And such it is your job to find a way to return and keep the Dominion from obtaining the Anthem.

Customizing your Javelin with different weapons and abilities becomes necessary to survive.

Fort Tarsis - Where It All Begins

Outside of missions you'll be spending your time in Fort Tarsis, which serves as the game's hub. This is where you'll interact with NPC's who you can have a chat with or get missions from. As a bit of a nod to BioWare's earlier games, chatting with someone will bring up dialogue choices now and then. Unfortunately these are always simple binary choices of mostly a positive and negative response to the NPC. It almost feels superfluous to have choices at all if you're not given a more extensive dialogue tree. Though it is nice to see how your dialogue choices affect the NPC's decisions. I just wish the game allowed for a higher degree of roleplaying and more dialogue options.

That being said, generally the voice acting is great and the writing is really good. And not to mention funny, given how many times I laughed out loud during NPC interactions. And given how quirky and interesting the characters are I always found myself talking to them between missions for no other reason than just the joy of doing so. I just wish the conversations weren't always so binary. But for how engaging the writing is and how much I grew to love the characters, I can forgive it.

NPC's in Anthem definitely have some interesting fashion choices...

Your Javelin

Customization seems to be a huge aspect about Anthem. While I wish the character creation for your Freelancer was more indepth, given how little you actually see of their face it makes sense that you wouldn't need to spend a lot of time on it. The options you get are there to help immerse you into the role. The Freelancer is nameless and fairly bland in terms of personality, making them more of a shell for the player. So customization in that regard is adequate in my opinion. Heck, it's great to see some customization at all given the demo only had a choice between male and female voice for the Freelancer.

Customizing your Javelin becomes almost 50% of what you do in the game as well. Using The Forge you can customize your Javelin's gear and appearance. I was a bit afraid that cosmetic customization would be very restricted, but I am happy to say this isn't the case at all. For one, you can basically choose any colour you want, you can access any part of the Javelin's body you want to paint, and you're even given a bunch of Vinyls to add from the get-go.

And any kind of cosmetics you want to purchase can be purchased using in-game currency. I'm a huge fan of how this game approaches microtransactions since they are entirely optional. And you can easily save up some in-game currency for that item you really want. So far I haven't spent any real money on the game but it is nice knowing I have the option if I absolutely want to.

My absolutely BAMF Storm Javelin that I used for most of the game.

Strong Alone, Stronger Together

As you progress, you can unlock a new Javelin at levels 2, 8, 16 and 26. While you only have four to choose from, you can unlock any of them you want during these moments. The Ranger is the marksman and soldier type, focused on using grenades and artillery to blast enemies into submission. The Interceptor is a smaller and more agile Javelin, focused on melee and agility. The Storm has weak armor but packs the most punch, able to deliver elemental attacks that can set enemies up for combo attacks. And finally, the Colossus is the tank of the group. It's able to shield allies from enemy attacks and draw enemy fire. It also is the only Javelin capable of wielding heavy weapons, at the cost of not being compatible with pistols. You can read a more in-depth look at the Javelins and their capabilities here.

There really isn't any wrong Javelin to choose, each of them support wildly different playstyles. And there is no wrong way to play any of them either. Due to how versatile the Javelins are there are multiple ways to use them. Since all Javelins can use pretty much all weapon groups, with the only exception being the Colossus, you're really not that limited in terms of range either. The combo system allows you to prime enemies using certain attacks. A combo can then be detonated by a different attack. These combos are often related to elements, as using elemental attacks will prime enemies for combos. This allows multiple Javelins to work in sync and time combos, often to devastating results.

Yes, Anthem has warp pipes. Off to minus world!

Iron Man - The Game

The above statement really sums up the experience of playing Anthem. While there is a slight learning curve to the controls of your Javelin, once you get used to them, playing Anthem is almost an intoxicating experience. The moment you realize how quickly you can go from running on the ground to soaring in the air, you really feel like you're Iron Man. Exploring the world in Freeplay mode is really where you get a sense of absolute freedom, exploring the world at your own leisure and casually doing world events with other players. The game almost beckons you to explore every nook and cranny of it, to uncover collectables and bits of lore. A thing I enjoyed in particular was how seamless the transition between water and air was. Essentially when you're under water, you're still flying. So when you exit from a body of water you go straight into flight seamlessly.

As fun as this is though, the core of Anthem's gameplay is still that of doing quests. And similar to older BioWare titles you have "Critical Quests" that are essentially story missions, "Agent Quests" which serve as side missions, and "Contracts" which are basically just shorter "go here do this" missions that serve as more of a way to level up than serving any actual story purpose. And while you can do all this in public matchmaking, and are encouraged to do so in order to have a full squad, I would say I never really enjoyed the game much in this mode.

Nearly all cutscenes in the game are in first person. Luckily the face capture is excellent.

Especially on a first playthrough, playing in public mode pretty much ruins the experience. The issue is that when you're playing with strangers, you really have no idea how they are going to play with others. And sad to say a lot of the time you risk running into people completely ignoring you when you're down and need repairs. Or worse, rushing ahead. And thus forcing you to follow them since the game will automatically respawn you with the group if they advance too far ahead. Granted BioWare did address this issue by making the timer more lenient, but it's still an issue when you're not allowed to play at your own pace.

Thus I highly recommend playing the game in Private Mode on a first playthrough. Even if you're just playing with a single friend, it's totally worth it. This allows you both to enjoy the game at your own pace. As well as listen to the dialogue which in all honesty is far too good to be ignored. Anthem is truly a game that comes alive when you can play with a group of close friends, and all of you can communicate with each other while playing. That's not to say public play doesn't have its place though. During Strongholds and Freeplay, which are essentially public game modes, it's never really much of an issue. Since there isn't really much story to pay attention to and you're just there to earn some XP and loot.

Similar to vistas in Guild Wars 2, the game world is full of spots where you can stop and take in the view. It really lets you appreciate the amount of work that's gone into creating the world of Anthem.

Looter Shooter

Anthem gives loot to the player in mainly two different varieties; crafting materials and items. Crafting materials can be embers, plant material, mineral material or Javelin parts. All are necessary in order to craft your own weapons and gear. You can also craft sigils which are single-use items that grant you certain bonuses for a single mission. Whether you wanna focus on defense or offense, these sigils actually make a fairly significant difference in gameplay. And it's highly recommended to at least use one for each mission.

Items can be anything from weapons to gear for the Javelin you're using. Now here's where a little confusion comes into play. Items have a rarity and a Power level. The rarity doesn't really seem to mean anything as it seems to scale with your level. And since all item drops are client side, if an Epic item drops for you, it doesn't mean it will be available to other players. So the rarity doesn't seem to affect all that much, other than the fact the more rare your item is the better stats it will have.

The power level also doesn't really seem to indicate much, other than how powerful the weapon is. But since weapon stats are completely random, it's possible to have a weapon with a higher power level, but with WORSE stats than a similar weapon with a lower power level. The game also had a bit of an issue of assigning useless bonuses to several items. Though BioWare did thankfully address this in a recent patch. But it seems as a general rule the rarer the item and the higher its power level, the better it is. Just keep an eye on the bonuses and stats as well since it might not always be the case.

People who played the demo might remember the Cataclysm event at the end. A foreshadowing of things to come it would seem.

Not Always Well

Generally I would say Anthem has been an amazing experience for me but that's not to say I didn't run into some issues with it. The menu system is extremely confusing to navigate, with several menu options often being placed at the bottom of the screen in small text. I've had a hard time just finding where things are and I wouldn't exactly call the menus intuitive at all. It took me an entire day to realize where I could claim my pre-order rewards.

And it doesn't exactly help that a loading screen separates you from customizing your Javelin. And you have to wait for it to load every single time you want to customize, which is going to be a lot I promise. Luckily some of this is addressed by the fact you are given the choice of going directly to the Forge screen after a mission. There's even a public lobby option called the Launch Bay where you can access numerous options between missions.

Anthem is simply a fun game to play, no matter how you put it.

And of course, I would be remiss to not mention the numerous bugs that are still in the game. Often it can be very minor things like enemies glitching out, items and quests being wrongly marked as new, the wrong mission being played, or servers failing to connect. Or it can be major things like the game crashing or audio completely cutting out. I wouldn't say these bugs have been severe enough to ruin the game for me though. And they haven't been frequent enough for me to consider them a massive flaw. But it's definitely something to be aware of.

And yeah, the final mission did feel quite anticlimatic. I wouldn't exactly call it bad by any stretch, but it wasn't what I was hoping for either. Calling the puzzles in the game puzzles is also a stretch. I've seen more challenging puzzles in children's puzzle books. And then some missions suddenly throw really obtuse puzzles at you that takes you ages to solve. It's either too easy or going full "what the heck do I do". The game also feels a little barren on content as it is, but given BioWare's plan going forward, I am still looking forward to what's to come for Anthem. Because despite all these issues, I've had an amazing time with Anthem. So far it's been one of the most fun experiences I've had in 2019.

"Yes. It is true. People hate this game."

A Beautiful Anthem

In terms of visuals, Anthem is absolutely gorgeous. And running perfectly smooth on my Ryzen 7 1800X rig with an 8GB RX580. I haven't run into any kind of major performance issues, with the game generally running at a stable framerate, and very rarely dipping below 60 FPS despite pushing my hardware to its limits. Of course, the Frostbyte engine has always been beautiful and Anthem is no exception.

I especially love the animations and motion capture work. It truly feels like a lot of it is acted in front of you, and it helped me get really engaged in the story. I also loved just taking in the gorgeous landscape, and I love the fact the game has a seamless day/night cycle. There's also an incredible attention to detail, with your Javelin looking increasingly damaged as it takes more and more abuse. Stylistically it does look similar to games like Warframe and Destiny, but still stands on its own. It's really hard to compare it to anything in terms of setting, and the world feels like a mix between various cultures. It often clashes but in a beautiful way that almost symbolizes nature's and humanity's diversity.

Underwater segments of the game are particularly noteworthy, showing off some amazing lighting and designs.

I've of course already mentioned the voice acting which I think I have nothing bad to say about. Everyone gives a great performance here. Even the main character I enjoyed who has an almost dry wit to them. Sound effect work is also really good, I especially love the combo sound and the sound work on the attacks and weapons. The weapons just have a really satisfying punch to them, especially the shotguns.

And while I wasn't 100% into the music and I'm still not as orchestral music isn't my cup of tea, it has grown on me considerably and I found myself enjoying it a lot. Even if some of the instrument choices such as using a didgeridoo felt a little weird to me. It still isn't a soundtrack I've enjoyed as much as the original Mass Effect. But it serves its purpose for sure.

A shout out to my co-op buddy Kira who kicked serious ass during our campaign.

A Flawed Masterpiece

To sum it up, Anthem is not a perfect game. It's got its flaws for sure. But it remains one of the absolutely coolest games I've ever played. In some ways it feels like a spiritual successor to Mass Effect, with a similar focus on a mystical energy source, and the threat of the end of the world. And playing this game just makes you feel like the coolest badass that's ever existed. Your Javelin moves with such elegance and flair that you can't help but just grin when playing the game. It just has this indescribably coolness to it that you feel when playing it. And I simply haven't played any other game like this recently. What it lacks in polish, Anthem more than makes up for in charm and I am sad to see so many people just not seeing it.

Anthem does not deserve the hate it gets, nor does it deserve to be called a bad game. To anyone who doesn't like Anthem as much as I do, I completely understand your criticisms for the most part. But saying Anthem is one of the biggest disappointments of 2019 is being way too harsh.

The game does microtransactions perfectly, and since it's co-op there's no way to gain an unfair advantage. It has an amazing cast and story that still grabbed me and it's a game I've simple been unable to put down since it came out. And to me, that's the sign of a good game. So whatever you may think of Anthem, I absolutely love it and I think it deserves to at least be played. So if you find this game on a discount, don't hesitate to pick it up.

SCORE

STORY: 8/10
GAMEPLAY: 7/10
GRAPHICS: 10/10
SOUND: 8/10

FINAL SCORE: 8/10