Developer BioWare has commented on Anthem regarding what the future should hold. The earlier plans to develop the online shooter in acts have been scrapped. The roadmap no longer exists. They want to focus on core issues. However, there is still no new information on long-term changes. This likely means: Anthem is playing it by ear.
This is the situation: The event “Cataclysm” was originally intended to be the first major content expansion for Anthem, which was supposed to start relatively soon after launch.
Cataclysm was originally planned for May.
However, that didn’t happen. Anthem had such severe problems with fundamental game systems (loot, player progression, motivation) at release that the start of Cataclysm was postponed.
During that time, a planned team change at BioWare probably also took place, with the game’s development shifting from the main studio in Edmonton, which created Anthem, to the live team in Austin, Texas.
Ultimately, Cataclysm came with significant delays at the beginning of August, it was expanded in the last few weeks, completed this week, and the question arose: What’s next for Anthem?
Core issues of Anthem in focus
This is what BioWare says in summary (via blog.bioware):
- BioWare is proud of Cataclysm
- They appreciate the many feedback provided by players regarding Cataclysm, which motivates the team – they have already implemented several changes
- BioWare will scrap future plans for the “story acts”, abandoning this structure
- They want to focus on the “core issues” of Anthem. This requires time and proper consideration, not a quick fix. A team is working on it and initial results are positive.
- Therefore, they are now focusing on “seasonal updates” and events that they believe players will enjoy
Not ready to reveal concrete news
What’s next for Anthem? They want to be as transparent as possible, hence they state: We know we still have a lot of work ahead of us to improve Anthem.
However, they cannot provide any news about long-term plans at the moment.
They want to convince through actions and offer players a great game.
Much mockery for “future update” without news
This is how players are reacting: The blog post has received considerable mockery for Anthem (via reddit):
- This is a blog post to tell us what’s next, without telling us anything – that’s more than transparent
- Particularly, they highlight a point where BioWare states they want to be transparent, only to shortly thereafter say they cannot yet disclose how things will continue with Anthem
- They wonder where BioWare plans to get the resources to continue developing Anthem
What will become of Anthem?
What’s behind this: The news comes from the “Head of Live Service”, which is already a concerning sign – normally, games like Anthem have a “Game Director” and significant expansions in the pipeline that the team, which developed the base game, is also working on.
However, such expansions were never planned for Anthem. And what was supposed to replace them, the acts, have now also been scrapped. Additionally, the original team is apparently now working on Dragon Age or has already left BioWare like producer Ben Irving.
The “Live Service” is essentially all that remains for Anthem. With the “Live Service”, one typically plays it by ear, trying to keep players entertained with events and smaller content updates.
The question beforehand was how Anthem could be a “10-year game” when it should come without expansions and DLCs. The
