Archives for January 2019

Why Anthem? Why not The Division 2?

January 29, 2019 by Naithin Leave a Comment

I’ve been asked this question in various forms over the last little while. Some just want to know what about Anthem excites me full stop, for others they’ve been legitimately curious why I would be more hyped for Anthem than I am for The Division 2.

And my knee-jerk reaction in my head was, ‘Well duh- just look at ’em!’–but then when it came to actually articulate these oh-so-clearly-self-evident reasons, I drew a blank.

I couldn’t really say why I had such a strong preference for Anthem.

Not to worry if your preferences lean the other way–there is little doubt that I’ll ultimately cover both. I’m not really going to be trying to change your mind with this either, rather just give some insight into why I lean this way.

Going back to the Announcements

But I want to see full on expansions with level cap increases, new areas, new stories and new shinies to chase. I would have joyously paid for this for The Division 1. No amount of logic has been able to completely remove the sting of lost opportunity that The Division 1 represents.

When the titles were announced, Anthem left me with a sense of ‘Eh. We’ll see.’ Mass Effect: Andromeda was still fresh in the mind, so my usual enthusiasm for all things BioWare was tempered. Nonetheless, it looked interesting and I made a mental note to check on it again when it was a bit further along.

The Division 2 announcement, however, actively irked me. It felt to me that The Division 1 had plenty of potential life left to it, but had been left to die. Two years after launch and the story had not been moved, cars crashed into place on Day 1 were still there on Day 601.

The Division 1 had been left to stagnate, stuck in stasis, opportunity wasted. And then along comes The Division 2, seeming to me as nothing more than a rather cynical cash grab.

I’ve since tempered my view a little – I recognise that there were some fundamental problems with the way stats and itemisation worked in The Division 1. And sure, they could have done a Loot 2.0 patch but not without risk of pissing off at least some of the remaining player base who liked things the way they were.

Second, like it or not–I also recognise that Ubisoft is a business. This doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be treating consumers well of course, but they are not a charity. They do not carry any obligation to continue delivering against The Division 1 if the business case doesn’t stack up.

But I want to see full on expansions with level cap increases, new areas, new stories and new shinies to chase. I would have joyously paid for this for The Division 1. No amount of logic has been able to completely remove the sting of lost opportunity that The Division 1 represents, especially in light of Anthem claiming a 10-year plan.

The Story

The story and mission structure of The Division 1 was some of the best leveling content I’ve ever had the pleasure to play through. There was a sense of mystery around the First Wave agents, how or who spread the virus and more.

The Division 2’s story trailer by contrast leaves me a bit cold. The reality may be that the story is just as good and builds on Division 1’s — but if that’s true they’ve done a terrible job of conveying it.

Granted with Anthem, BioWare has been very close to the chest with the story. But even from what little has been shown and spoken about, there is mystery, forces bigger than ourselves, a misguided bad-guy with a pinch of Thanos and pinch of Darth Vadar in the mix. Reality manipulation is a thing. Forces of creation can and will go wild. Perhaps a pinch of The Dark Tower in there too.

I expect it will closely follow the BioWare tried and true template (albeit with 100% less sexy-times this time around, which personally I’m good with) but it’s been… quite a while… since I’ve been through a BioWare story in full, so I’m ready!¹

But… But… EA!

Alright, let’s clear the air on this one a little.

And secondly, perhaps a bit more controversially — I think anyone holding the view that EA is evil but Ubisoft is good is being willfully ignorant or perhaps stuck in denial.

I’m well aware of the grievances against EA. They have certainly not been any kind of consumer advocate. 😉 The issues were covered in excruciating detail, after all. But the resolutions and post launch improvements? Hardly a boo spoken.

Nonetheless, I don’t have any illusions that they’ve somehow overnight come up with a customer-first policy. I’m well aware that they may end up stinging us with something unwanted in Anthem.

But two points on this:

I think EA has been sufficiently frightened off being too obnoxious for a time by the fallout over lootboxes and the intense backlash they’ve received; not only by their customers but by legislators and as a result their shareholders.

And secondly, perhaps a bit more controversially — I think anyone holding the view that EA is evil but Ubisoft is good is being willfully ignorant or perhaps stuck in denial.

Ubisoft has not been a saint either, through adding microtransactions to titles (even The Division 1, in fact) post the review cycle. Even when adding them in at the game’s launch — including somewhat scummy items such as an XP Booster for a SP game (AC: Odyssey, which full disclosure I loved the game in spite of this).

They’re also a firm believer in creating a half-dozen editions of a game, and for Division 2 this has crossed from simple cosmetics or short-lived starter gear to a permanent stash-space increase only available with the super-duper uber-rich-person edition.

And in conclusion…

Anthem lets you play as fricken Iron Man, man. Case closed. Booyah. 😉

I actually went for more of a War Machine look as opposed to Iron Man. (Pfft; everyone was doing that!) Legs should have been darker as well, but were tied to the face plate colour. Overall happy with the results the customiser allowed for!

More seriously; I’d be happiest of all if both games were successful. I don’t buy into an ‘us or them’ mentality over the two. If I had unlimited time, I’d cover both from the get-go.

But since I don’t have unlimited time, and must choose — it’s Anthem for me to start with.

When my team and I run through all available content and are hankering for more, I believe The Division 2 will be there for us in our time of need. Switching between the two, allowing for content to develop in one whilst we play the other is going to be excellent.

There is more I could talk to over the relative transparency of the Devs and their community interactions, but the more I dove into my own motivations and thought processes the more I realised the centre of it for me was mostly around Ubisoft’s lack of long-term support for Div 1.

I’m willing to forgive and forget, providing a chance to Div 2 to be better. But if in a couple of years from now we’re talking about the announcement for Div 3 — I think we’re done!

Anthem VIP Demo Impressions

January 28, 2019 by Naithin 3 Comments

Anthem Demo - Naithin's Ranger exosuit Javelin in the background, coloured red, blue and gold. In the foreground are various engineer types working on other machinery items.

Hmm. Well, we know from the expectation setting done before the demo launch that the demo build of Anthem is without the benefit of ~6 weeks of bug fixes.

Still — I can’t help but wonder the impact the demo experience (or lack of it, for some) will ultimately have on the critical early sales period.

Personally I’ve been relatively lucky — I experienced the initial issues with server capacity and Origin going down in general like everyone did, but I did not run into the bug preventing people from unlocking their second Javelin, nor have I had to struggle too hard to actually load into missions vs. the infinite loading screen bug.

Some of my friends though have — and it has without any doubt dampened their enthusiasm. The experience delivered next weekend is going to be critical in winning at least one of this group back.

So how was it being able to play?

The foundational elements of Anthem are strong, and will support the load of long term play from its player base if allowed to. If BioWare can deliver a meaningful endgame with a good pacing on content releases the future for Anthem is bright.

You know how sometimes when playing a game, it simply reminds you of another similar thing, and then you get the urge to go play that other thing instead?

Well, I think the best shorthand compliment I can give Anthem, is that when playing — this didn’t happen. I was invested in the moment to moment gameplay and just wanted more Anthem.

Nowhere more was this true than in the Stronghold. I saved this for a bit of a demo endgame experience for myself and my team. We did it at level 15, pretty well geared, and cranked it to hard.

Hoo boy. We had been impressed with the game (when it let us) already, but the step up in the quality of the content and the degree of teamwork required was impressive. We were truly challenged, but in a way that felt good- it felt exhilarating. Will it ten runs from now? Twenty? Possibly not, but there is at least some hope in trying again through the Grandmaster difficulty ranks. Working out builds both as a team and as individuals to make it work I can imagine being great.

And yet, I was just watching the video I captured of my first outing into the world of Anthem (embedded below), and was reminded all over again just how satisfying and powerful even those early, most basic of skills felt.

I played with Mouse + Keyboard and while there was certainly a learning curve, particularly around mastering the transitions between ground, flight and hover modes — I honestly think it already controls well and feels good.

The live game has tweaks coming to the control model to make things a little less ‘twitchy’ — but I’m personally, at least, really hoping the feel isn’t too significantly changed!

It currently works in a way that will be familiar to anyone who has played Freelancer, or the X-series of games — where in flight control mode the cursor becomes as if a joystick onscreen. The further off-centre you move the cursor, the sharper your shift in that direction.

Swooping through the air — be it deep in the caverns of the earth or through the open air feels spectacular. Each Javelin seems to control very differently as well, adding to their sense of uniqueness.

Second half of the first mission, and my first hands on with the game. I went on normal difficulty and solo. (No puzzle solution spoiler)

The Ranger’s movement has a strong sense of physicality to it. Short, powerful boosts from your suits rockets propelling you into the double-jump or dash. The Storm by contrast lacked a double-jump but had total mastery over itself in the air, capable of slow-falling and adjusting direction at whim.

Overall, the foundational elements of Anthem are strong, and will support the load of long term play from its player base if allowed to. If BioWare can deliver a meaningful endgame with a good pacing on content releases the future for Anthem is bright.

Mtashed revealed¹ that the embargo on the endgame content the ‘EA Game Changers’ saw and played through ends Feb 1st 2019. This will likely be the day then, when we start to get a more complete view of what not only Anthem will come with at launch, but what the post-launch support plans look like.

What are my main complaints or issues?

It’s not all roses though, and there are certainly some things I feel the game needs to add or adjust to improve upon the strong foundation the demo proves exists.

No Build / Stats Overview Screen — Itemisation may require data mining to effectively theorycraft.

Please BioWare, allow us an in-game way of viewing our overall build stats and effects. At least provide some transparency over what components are doing and the base values we’re working with.

More than anything else, this is my biggest gripe. There is no way to view your Javelin’s overall shield, health or armor. When you look at a component piece that provides a flat amount of health or armor, there is no way to gain context on what sort of change you’re looking at.

What is the base health of my Javelin? Is it 500 or 2500? Just how significant a buff is a flat 250 health increase?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

You can’t see what bonuses you’ve got applied, or how much damage mitigation you have, the final weapon or gear damage figures you have as a result of your gear inscriptions — nothing.

Missing this while always frustrating, might at least be able to be lived with if the itemisation on item drops was clearer. Shielding components — I’m looking at you.

The base lines on components always appears to be ‘Javelin Health’ and ‘Javelin Armor’ – how much of each depending on rarity, item level and type.

Components generally also have a white text description implying potential further increases beyond what is shown. Possibly. The Armor Upgrade components do tend to have higher armor values. But shielding components don’t show any flat numerical value.

So… What do they add?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Please BioWare, allow us an in-game way of viewing our overall build stats and effects. At least provide some transparency over what components are doing and the base values we’re working with.

Other Itemisation Issues

Two issues here, but one of them is likely to be entirely demo related and may not show in the live game. Possibly both, if we’re really lucky.

Impossible Stats

By which I mean — I saw multiple instances of inscriptions and item types having fundamental conflicts, rendering the inscription completely useless.

Still not with me? Here’s an example — a component specific for Interceptors, no other Javelin can equip it — that also provides a buff for the Ranger Javelin Assault Launcher gear slot.

This is one that may be a design intent rather than a bug. I hope not. But the philosophy might be one of keeping things entirely random making that ‘perfectly rolled’ drop that much more exciting.

This is a rather archaic view in my opinion, and while I don’t expect every drop to be useful or amazing — I would expect the combinations to at least make some degree of sense.

0% inscriptions

I expect this to be a demo-only issue in one form or another.

If it is a true 0% value, it is possible the itemisation generation was still not finalised in this build of the game, and the capping on lower end rolls was not set.
It may be a non-zero value with a rounding/display error

Menu / UI Interactions

Urgh. For the love of all things holy, please do two things for us PC users:

Remove all instances of ‘hold Esc to exit’.
Let us click into the sub-menu which is clearly displayed on screen already.

No-one is hitting the Esc key on accident. I get the concern for controller; but at least provide the option to turn this safeguard off for Mouse + KB players!

And while the menu’s actually look pretty good — the console design is written all over them. There are many instances of having a sub-menu clearly visible but utterly unable to be interacted with when clicked over.

You have to go back and click or otherwise confirm entry to that menu before you can do anything.

Makes total sense for a controller, far less sense with a mouse pointer. And it is actively horrible to work with.

If we can get these changes in – it would be a huge quality of life improvement!

Picking a Main in Anthem

January 25, 2019 by Naithin Leave a Comment

I don’t know about you–but I always struggle with picking a main. It can become quite an ordeal. We now have a little less than a day to wait before the VIP Demo let’s us in for a peek. We’ll get the see first hand the Ranger and one other Javelin of our choice.

This is really good! Unless… Like me, all of them sound exciting to you for one reason or another.

What can hopefully help put your mind at ease a little then is the knowledge that in Anthem it’s a fair bit more difficult to go wrong. In fact, the Javelin exosuits are less ‘class’ and more ‘build’.

Huh?

Your in-game persona is a human. A freelancer. A pilot. You level up as a pilot, picking talents as you go that buff things such as your flight time before overheating.

After the tutorial mission (played in the Ranger), you will be able to pick any of the 4 Javelin’s to unlock first.

Javelin’s unlock at:

Level 2 – This is your first pick immediately following the tutorial.
Level 8
Level 16
Level 24 / 26¹

So in essence? Don’t worry about it. Well, I mean… Worry a little bit. You should have an idea of what to try first! But just know there is no wrong decision that is going to lead to you rerolling if you find you don’t like a given class as much as you thought you would. 🙂

While playing with a given Javelin equipped, Anthem will use a ‘Smart Loot’ system which weights drops toward things useful for that Javelin. But you still will get the odd thing for the other Javelins from time to time — so should you ultimately decide, ‘Oh no… I’ve made a terrible mistake’ or heck, simply decide new day–new you one morning, you can get a running start at another pick.

OK! But… What do the Javelins actually do?

I’ve posted a series of profiles on each Javelin for you to look at if you’d like some help deciding. (Note: At the time of writing this, I’m pending a review on the Colossus and Storm to update them to the new format I put the Interceptor and Ranger into.)

These will be updated with more detailed information (such as which skills Prime or Detonate) after we get our hands on the game. 🙂

For now, here’s a quick overview of each!

The Ranger is being toted as the versatile, jack-of-all-trades Javelin. You have a medium amount of health and shields and a medium degree of mobility. The Ranger is also capable of dealing all elemental damage types — giving it a good range of options when it comes to dealing with heavily shielded (lightning, frost) or armored (acid, fire) enemies.

Consider the Ranger akin to a Soldier in playstyle, with grenades, rockets, and a good range of weaponry.

The Colossus is big, bulky and extremely tough despite the total lack of an energy shield like all other javelin’s enjoy. Also though? Slow. Slower at least. The concept of ‘dodging’ is utterly alien to the the Colossus. Making up for this lack the Colossus gains two things:

It packs an actual physical shield which they can use to deflect damage and more enjoyably shield charge and slam the puny enemies out of the way… even while flying.
It is the only Javelin at launch capable of wielding the heavy weapon class, including the likes of Grenade Launchers and Autocannons.

The Storm fulfills the ‘space mage’ role. Elemental fury–fire and ice with a side of lightning–is how the Storm likes to get things done. A real AoE and status building powerhouse. Lightly armored this is not a Javelin you want in the thick of things up close and personal if you can avoid it. To aid with that, the Storm forgoes a standard dash move and when dodging performs a short-range teleport (or ‘blink’).

You can also hover for longer than the other Javelins in the storm, gaining a bonus to your energy shield while you do. Just watch out–there’s no real cover up there.

Last but not least The Interceptor. This is your super agile, super nimble rogue or ninja type. With it, you can rapidly move about the play field cutting ribbons off your enemies with you dual-wielded, dual-bladed daggers. If you like zipping around with triple-jumps, regaining shield while you do, and all at top speed? Then getting up close and personal with the Interceptor could be for you.

Decided now?

Yeah… No… Me neither.

I mean, I’m becoming fairly certain I’ll start out with the Ranger, focus on becoming the single-target boss-killer powerhouse of the team. So that the demo is giving everyone the Ranger to start with doesn’t bother me terribly.

But what next? Even the Interceptor representing the rogue playstyle — not something I typically go for! — looks fresh and exciting.

The tanky Colossus would more closely align with my typical play style, as I nearly always go Healer or Tank.

But I’m quite hyped to try out the damage-dealing, status-spreading Storm, too. I think this will be the class I test out for our free choice during the demo.

So… What do I DO then?

If you really cannot decide–then nothing is going to beat first hand experience.

Even if you can’t make (or don’t want, for reasons of story spoilers, etc) to participate in the demos — know that in the live game, you’re going to have each of the 4 Javelin’s unlocked before the end game.

You’ll have had ample opportunity to test and learn and see what works best for you.

And if they’re all truly holding equal spot in your heart, then just blind pick one. If you’re disappointed with what you unlock at the time — at least you’ll have a clearer idea of what you really wanted. 😉

What to expect when you’re expecting… (an Anthem Demo)

January 23, 2019 by Naithin 5 Comments

There is a lot of information floating around about the upcoming Anthem demo–some of it not quite right. So I’m here to help distinguish between what we ‘know’–that is, we have it direct from an official source–vs. what has merely been speculated.

Little does this Grabbit know how soon, or how much, it’s peaceful existence is about to be disrupted by a horde of new Freelancers…

What we’ve been told:

BioWare’s Mark Darrah and Michael Gamble have been busy beavers on Twitter, providing information and answering questions on what we will get in the demos.¹

The playable level range will be 10-15.² You will be dropped into the thick of it at level 10, without the benefit of the tutorial, nor having had the ability to run through customisation of your pilot/human avatar like you will in the full game.

All demo players will start with the Ranger. At level 12 we will be able to select a second Javelin of our choice to test.³

The demo was branched from the final game code base ~6 weeks ago.⁴ This has a few distinct call-outs of its own. Namely, 6 weeks worth of bug fixes are missing from the demo build.

Tweaks to mouse and keyboard flight controls made since the branch for a more nuanced control experience are missing from the demo.

Some things have been renamed for additional clarity in the final build, that will still have their old names in the demo.

Balance in terms of the economy and the difficulty have not been updated to the final state either. Mark Darrah confirmed⁵ that in general, the demo build is easier than what we will experience in the final build.

This will be an important note if you, or your friends, are concerned about the seeming ease of the game. The demo is not going to be representative of the final game difficulty. More on this in the next section.

In a similar vein to the difficulty, the gear drop rates and overall economy of the game do not reflect final game state either.

~~Demo will be a 30gb download~~⁶ This proved to be incorrect! For PC at least–the Origin download for the Anthem Demo weighs in at 44GB.

Progress will carry over from VIP demo to the Open demo, but not live.⁷

So this is what we’ve been told–if I’m missing anything, please do let me know. Oh. Actually. There is one more thing. I guess. The preload is live right now. Also, VIP friend keys are available. Just a small detail. 😉 Take a look at the official EA Anthem demo page for information on starting the preload on your platform of choice, or take a look at this Reddit Post for advice on grabbing your friend VIP keys.

Demo gets a trailer

This short (30 second) trailer popped up this morning. Little bit of a new scene and dialog from Matthias.

This way lies speculation!

…And information which might well be official that I read previously and cannot now put my hands on the source.

Either way–take this section with a healthy dose of salt.

It seems the demo build we’ll be getting our hands on is more or less the same build that certain content creators in the ‘EA Game Changers’ programme were given access to late last year.

This build we believe was optimised for ‘shorter play sessions’, to which I take the mean that the XP gain and loot drop rates will be inflated over what BioWare would consider ‘normal’ for the final product.

We will level faster, see more items and potentially items of a higher grade than we will see at the same levels of pilot and difficulty in the launch product.

~~What is also somewhat murky is how many Javelin picks we will get to test during the demo sessions. From~~ ~~this twitter thread, we can confirm that all four Javelins (i.e.,~~ ~~Ranger~~, ~~Colossus~~, ~~Storm~~ ~~and~~ ~~Interceptor) will be available to choose from. But not how many we will have access to on a single account.~~

~~The level cap of 15 would suggest~~ ~~two~~~~, and two has been discussed in various twitter threads the devs are on without contradiction or correction. My advice here would be to~~ ~~expect~~ ~~only two, then if it ends up being four, bonus!~~

~~There has been some discussion that we might~~ ~~all~~ be given the Ranger to start and then get to choose only one other Javelin. My suspicion is that this is confusion over the base game and getting the loaner Ranger in the tutorial before making a choice on your actual starting J~~avelin~~.

~~I predict therefore that we will have~~ ~~open~~ ~~choice of two Javelins. Just two days now til we can confirm ourselves!~~

I was wrong with that prediction, and this has now been cleared up in full! BioCamden has posted on Reddit in the past hour that the Ranger will be the first unlock for everyone. At level 12 we will be able to pick another Javelin to try.

As a parting note: I am still likely to have another VIP friend key or two to giveaway–if you’re still needing one, let me know in the comments!

Anthem Javelin Profile: Interceptor

January 22, 2019 by Naithin Leave a Comment

This series of posts is aimed mostly at those dipping their feet into the waters of Anthem for the first time. If that’s you – welcome! If that’s not you… well, also welcome! But more in-depth content to come once we get our hands on the game. 🙂

Bioware's Anthem: Line up of the four classes, left-to-right, Ranger, Colossus, Storm and Interceptor. The Interceptor is in colour as the focus of the image, with the other three in greyscale.

Play Style: In Anthem, the Interceptor is your super agile, super nimble rogue or ninja type. With it, you can rapidly move about the play field cutting ribbons out of your enemies dual-wielding dual-bladed daggers. If you like zipping around at top speed and getting up close and personal, the Interceptor is for you.

Movement/Dodge: The Interceptor can triple jump/dash, controlling the direction of each movement independently.

Special: When your shield is damaged, using your triple jump/dash will recharge your shield faster.

Combo Effect: Upon detonating a primed enemy, the Interceptor gains an aura matching the status used to prime the enemy. For example, should you detonate a combo on a frozen enemy–you will gain an aura that spreads the frost effect to nearby enemies.

Weapons CAN Equip: Heavy Pistols, Shotguns, Assault Rifles, Marksman Rifles, Machine Pistols, Light Machine Guns, Sniper Rifles.

Weapons CANNOT Equip: Autocannons, Grenade Launchers

Armor: Light

Melee Attack: Spin to win with your dual-bladed daggers. Each attack chains into the next and you can continue the chain indefinitely. Unlike every other javelin, it won’t be uncommon to use your melee attack more than your guns.

The Skills:

Assault Systems

Seeker Glaive: Throw a seeking projectile that will hit the nearest target.
Cryo Glaive: Similar to the Seeker Glaive but also applies the Frost status.
Acid Bomb: Throw a short range projectile that splashes all enemies in the proximity of the landing point with acid.
Cluster Mine: Throws out a cluster of mines in a very tight area, explode after a short delay on contact with an enemy.
Spark Dash: Dash forward in the targeted direction, dealing damage on impact with an enemy and leaving behind a trail of electricity.

Strike Systems

Star Strike: Infuse an enemy with energy which explodes after a delay. Can deal increased damage if you kill the enemy before the delay is up.
Plasma Star: One of the Interceptors few longer-range abilities, allows the Interceptor to throw a plasma charged shuriken.
Wraith Strike¹: Shoot forth a projection of your Interceptor which attacks enemies it comes in contact with.
Tempest Strike: A single-target attack capable of applying a stun to lesser enemies.
Corrosive Spray: Shoot a jet of acid that damages every enemy hit.

Support Systems

Target Beacon: Mark an enemy, which then receives increased damage from all sources. If the marked target dies before the duration of Target Beacon expires, it will jump to another nearby enemy.
Rally Cry: Remove negative status effects from nearby allies.

Ultimate Ability: Assassin’s Blades

Put down your weapons and super-charge your dual-bladed daggers, becoming a whirling dervish of melee-flavoured death.

The interceptor cannot fly while under the affects of Assassin’s Blades, but can continue to use the triple-dash ability, plus the melee attacks themselves will provide a small rush movement when needed.

As with all ultimate abilities in Anthem–heal yourself to full upon activation and become invulnerable for the duration.