One and a half years after release, BioWare is in the middle of the reboot of Anthem and is presenting new ideas on how “Anthem Next”, the major reboot, should be better. The concepts involve fundamental ideas for every loot game. The biggest improvement: There will be skill trees for the individual classes, the Javelins.
These are the new ideas for Anthem: In a blog post, BioWare introduces another step in the overhaul of their game Anthem: This is expected to shine anew as Anthem Next. This time, it’s about the development of the Javelins, which are the various combat suits in the game, essentially like classes.
The overarching theme is player progression, how to advance in the game, and how to become stronger.
Previously, Anthem primarily had the “Pilot Level”: This was the same for all Javelins and determined the quality of the loot as well as when additional item slots and Javelins were unlocked. BioWare now sees this as a mistake. It is said that they observed that the pilot level did not provide “satisfying progress.” Because it increased regardless of which class one played: Even if one was only playing with the Ranger, in the end, one got stronger with all four Javelins.
The team leader admits: A major criticism of Anthem was: “The game does not provide satisfying builds.”
This problem is what BioWare wants to address now:
- There will be 11 different item slots
- Weapons are clearly primary or secondary weapons
- Instead of components, there are now mods and artifacts. Mods alter the individual skills. Artifacts provide strong passive abilities.
- Skills can be unlocked and are no longer drops
- Each Javelin will receive one or more skill trees, where points can be invested to enhance skills, stats, and passive abilities.
- Additionally, there will be a powerful artifact that unlocks special abilities.
The essential points of the overhaul of the builds are:
- They want to clarify the item system. Players should reliably be able to create their own builds.
- Skill trees should define the builds and give players the freedom to play what they want without waiting for skills to drop.
- Each Javelin can level up independently and unlock skill points.
- Javelins have different specializations, each featuring “advanced skill trees.”
- The builds should emerge from the combination of skills, specialization, and equipment.
- Inscriptions (the values of items) play a role but are no longer the decisive factor.
- Artifacts should give the Javelins that “certain something” and provide a special super-boost.
New ideas have failed – Anthem copies established patterns
This is what’s behind it: To put it harshly:
- Anthem actually discards all “own” ideas that were proposed in 2019 regarding “character progression”
- And now returns to a well-established core concept that MMOs and loot games have been working with for a long time and continue to function
Actually, Anthem presents absolute basics for a game here. This further emphasizes how flawed the first version of Anthem was, as now “skill trees” and “each class has its own level” are presented as solutions for the progression problems.
The original Anthem had a concept with the “Pilot Level” that did not work: Items felt partly useless and partly unimportant. The focus on “the individual stats of an item” and less on the item itself has also not worked.
These new ideas that did not work will now be discarded and replaced with “normal ideas.”
Anthem does not introduce innovative ideas in the overhaul, but brings in the standard features that the game should have started with in 2019:
- They give people skill trees instead of having them randomly find skills in the open world.
- The items should be clearer and more meaningful.
- Each class gets its own level and several subclasses (specializations).
- Players should be able to determine exactly how they want to play on their own.
It’s easy to mock BioWare’s change. But maybe that’s precisely the right direction:
Many fans thought in 2019 that Anthem itself was good: The gameplay is fun. It’s cool to fly around with the Javelin, only the game systems are a nightmare. Now BioWare apparently relies on proven concepts for the game system.
The idea of flying and the game feeling probably count as innovation; there is no need to try out things in the game system that simply did not work.
The big question now is: What content does BioWare want us to let play in Anthem Next, now that items and skills are clarified.
Corona seems to hinder the redevelopment of Anthem. It’s been 3 months since the last major information on Anthem Next was released. Back then, BioWare told us how they want to change the loot:
Anthem understands how terrible loot currently is – This is how they want to improve it
