Seems like the patch broke many things about what you mentioned. At least they dropped it on a tuesday, so a fix may come this week.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
Anthem |OT| GaaS Effect
- Thread starter iFirez
- Start date
update from bioware on state of anthem.
I give up. they have been saying this since day 1. its been two months and they still wont increase the legendary drop rates. i will never understand this. shocking behavior this.
The patch broke a ton of stuff and reintroduced a lot of old bugs. Things are pretty wonky so expect weird stuff like that.
legendary drop rates is not the problem with loot at all. it's more fundamental and requires lots of work not just fiddling with a few numbers. If it were that simple they'd have done it weeks ago. in fact it'd be more harmful than anything.
Yup, that's disappointing. I didn't really expect much more.
Played the new Stronghold--it's fine. Playing for the first time in a few weeks reminded me of how fun the gameplay is. I'm a little burnt out on cover shooting in The Division 2.
The new boss is a big Fury. It has some fun voice acting and doesn't really seem to have many moves other than shooting the energy at you and spawning minions.
I will say, the new Stronghold is gorgeous. This game really shines in its dungeons. It looks a little "soft" and fake sometimes in open map, but the interiors look amazing. It's a shame 99% of the time we'll be flying right by it.
The delays are just icing! So basically everything is delayed.
Played the new Stronghold--it's fine. Playing for the first time in a few weeks reminded me of how fun the gameplay is. I'm a little burnt out on cover shooting in The Division 2.
The new boss is a big Fury. It has some fun voice acting and doesn't really seem to have many moves other than shooting the energy at you and spawning minions.
I will say, the new Stronghold is gorgeous. This game really shines in its dungeons. It looks a little "soft" and fake sometimes in open map, but the interiors look amazing. It's a shame 99% of the time we'll be flying right by it.
The delays are just icing! So basically everything is delayed.
Absolutely nothing new besides the stronghold was added. With no loot changes, people will not play this game for much more.
They also delayed everything on the roadmap to the "future" with not even a date.
I am telling you people. Game is already on life support.
New stronghold is pretty cool. Really nice environment, looks amazing, couple of neat puzzles. No new enemies or enemy mechanics except for a couple of the boss attacks - ash brutes already existed in contracts/freeplay events. There's more to the boss than just "upscaled fury" because of the new attacks but yeah, it's longer than HoR so probably not going to win the hearts of people speed running for legendaries.
Disappointing roadmap update there. Lots of things delayed, no estimate on how extensive the delay will be. We talking a couple weeks? Months for everything? They think they're being honest and upfront about it judging from the stream, but without any details on timescale it's not nearly honest and upfront enough.
I'm not sure what all this crying about loot is about. As panda-zebra says, the problem with loot is not the drop rate, but how the entire system works. That's going to need a big re-think, and showering people with legendaries like the babies on Anthem reddit are demanding isn't going to do jackshit. If that's what you're waiting for, stop playing and come back in 6 months because right now they're primarily bug fixing and improving quality of life with the odd content drop like legendary missions and this stronghold, shit that should have been in at launch.
Disappointing roadmap update there. Lots of things delayed, no estimate on how extensive the delay will be. We talking a couple weeks? Months for everything? They think they're being honest and upfront about it judging from the stream, but without any details on timescale it's not nearly honest and upfront enough.
I'm not sure what all this crying about loot is about. As panda-zebra says, the problem with loot is not the drop rate, but how the entire system works. That's going to need a big re-think, and showering people with legendaries like the babies on Anthem reddit are demanding isn't going to do jackshit. If that's what you're waiting for, stop playing and come back in 6 months because right now they're primarily bug fixing and improving quality of life with the odd content drop like legendary missions and this stronghold, shit that should have been in at launch.
Yeah i think they already said this. I expect a complete loot overhaul but it will take months
Probably not for a long while.
And also, fucking lol at they saying "While we delivered many of Act one features on time". They delayed almost ALL of them with no release dates on sight.
I just did a GM2 run on the new stronghold. Holy HELL I don't know if it's just me but it's by the far the longest I've taken with a team to beat a stronghold boss. I run a 732 Colossus and with a competent team always overcome GM2 bosses without much fuss, but I literally got downed by that damn fury like 30 times from its attacks. It was maddening. Might be the inability of the Colossus to dodge but that was the most annoying boss so far. And I thought the Monitor was frustrating.
Just noticed they released an update today! Apparently it has a new stronghold... Looks like a good reason for me to jump back in for half n hour 😂
The weapon/gear buffs are funny, in context. Bumping something from 60% to 300% doesn't mean much if we don't know how that multiplier is being applied.
New stronghold was cool. Completed on gm1 and gm2, even got a leg. I'll be back when Cataclysm drops to check it out.
I agree. There has to be an overhaul coming. But they KNOW their game is a mess right now and the systems in place don't support a happy playerbase until it's ready. Why wouldn't they just loosen the valve and let legendaries drop like crazy? It costs them nothing and will make the poor die hards who stuck through this mess happy to replay the same stronghold for literally the 300th time. Sure the loot will likely be 90% trash, but the illusion of it all would help tremendously with Goodwill. Instead they copy pasted their response from a month ago and pretended like them squashing bugs and major QoL changes the game should have never shipped without are them delivering on their content roadmap.
If they ran wild with legendaries, what would keep people come back once they had eveything they wanted?
For me personally, I feel about Anthem now, the same way I felt about The Division 1 after completing the story; I felt burnt out because there was no new content, and nothing captivating about the existing content. D1 didn't have as many issues though.
It may be that for me personally, if they manage to sort out all the shit, that I'll give Anthem another chance in July/August (if they manage to make any meaningful changes by then), but there aren't any games I'm looking forwards to until Fallen Order. Unfortunately, I think that most other people will have other games on their minds, and Anthem's expected/desired changes will be out of sight, out of mind.
They are in crisis mode right now. They shouldn't be caring about whether or not people come back after they get what they want, the should be scared shitless that they have already left never to come back at all after not getting anything they wanted from dozens of hours of play.
If they start doing 180's now, simply to keep some people, they'll be taking part in a dangerous game. The whole point is that because there's currently no endgame as such, once people get all the legendaries they want, they'll get bored quickly and leave anyway.
They should focus on getting out as much decent content as possible, as fast as possible, if they want to keep people, or get new/returning players back. That should be their priority.
Obviously this is all just my personal opinion.
There is no point in new content because everything offers the same rewards. Unless they are cinematic stories that offer lore and character interactions, there's no point in content if there is no loot or no progression of ANY kind. The guild systems, mastery ranks, and all that stuff could have alleviated Anthems problem because it would give people reason to keep playing while chasing different stuff, but that has been delayed to somewhere in the future they dont even know when. There isnt even a date for the next stream or new content drop, just "somewhere around may". Right now the game has like, a dozen weapons, no armors, half a dozen abilities for each class, and that's about it.
That's why I said ages ago, that I thought that the best course of action would be to take the game offline for 6-12 months and overhaul pretty much everything if they want even a chance to make Anthem successful, and then relaunch it.
There's 2-3 variants on the dialogue for each stronghold, I assume to make it mildly less repetitive.
I remember reading that a while back but last night was literally the first time it changed for me.
Think I've just replayed Tyrant Mine hundreds of times that I had the NPC chatter practically saved to memory lol. It was immediately noticeable.
I need to pay more attention.
Any impressions of the new Stronghold yet?
Played through it a couple times. It's fun through most of it. Lots of verticality, some cool level design moments that feel a little fresh. I personally found the end boss a bit frustrating, at least as a Colossus. It's a huge fury with some different attacks (similar to a titan). Can't dodge as a Colossus and it melts shields so I found myself getting hit by its attacks and getting downed about 20+ times lol.
Much better time as a ranger. Overall I think it's a fun stronghold.
Deleted the game. Didnt even try out the new stronghold. I saw that they literally copied and pasted their response on the loot from a similar update a couple of months ago. So they have made zero progress on it in two months. This after going radio silent for weeks. I cant sanction this buffoonery.
I think the devs over at Bioware are immensely talented. Its why i have defended this game many times on this board and recommended it to people elsewhere. The combat, flying and graphics are absolutely incredible. But their community manager, their studio heads, the execs in charge of communication and decision making are absolutely clueless about how to run a games as a service game. they think they are still making RPGs where they control all the decisions, and lack the ability to accept criticsm on game design. especially from the plebs.
The livestream yesterday was shocking. The chat kept asking them about the loot and they told them to go read the blog post which had the copy paste response from months ago. They actually had the guts to complain about how no one was asking them any other questions. As if they loot hasnt the been the ONE main complaint since day 1. Then there was this hilarious moment when they reach a stronghold chest and no one wanted to open it. the CM said to open it and run away because no one wanted to pick up purples they would have to scrap at the end of the round. and of course, the chest only dropped purples. there was a good 4 second silence. just incredible.
What sucks is that their loot system is fine. They have random rolls so getting duplicates isnt a big deal and its actually kinda exciting. all they have to do is increase the drop rate. They have four classes. And every class can have multiple builds. The issue is NOT lack of diversity in loot, its lack of loot drops. They are following the example set by games like Destiny where drops are rare, but what they dont understand is that Destiny gave us many avenues to acquire end game gear. All raid encounters had a very decent chance to drop the best legendary guns in the game. There were many bounties you could do to earn exotic weapons. Xur came every week with exotics. Anthem has no guaranteed way to obtain anything.
Which again is weird because they had the good sense to drop guaranteed masterworks at the end of legendary contracts and GM strongholds. Every tier of strongholds gave you an additional masterwork for up to 3 masterworks for GM3. Instead of just doing the same for legendaries, they made them completely random. and refuse to fix it. i just dont understand this stubborness.
I feel bad for the devs working for this company.
I think the devs over at Bioware are immensely talented. Its why i have defended this game many times on this board and recommended it to people elsewhere. The combat, flying and graphics are absolutely incredible. But their community manager, their studio heads, the execs in charge of communication and decision making are absolutely clueless about how to run a games as a service game. they think they are still making RPGs where they control all the decisions, and lack the ability to accept criticsm on game design. especially from the plebs.
The livestream yesterday was shocking. The chat kept asking them about the loot and they told them to go read the blog post which had the copy paste response from months ago. They actually had the guts to complain about how no one was asking them any other questions. As if they loot hasnt the been the ONE main complaint since day 1. Then there was this hilarious moment when they reach a stronghold chest and no one wanted to open it. the CM said to open it and run away because no one wanted to pick up purples they would have to scrap at the end of the round. and of course, the chest only dropped purples. there was a good 4 second silence. just incredible.
What sucks is that their loot system is fine. They have random rolls so getting duplicates isnt a big deal and its actually kinda exciting. all they have to do is increase the drop rate. They have four classes. And every class can have multiple builds. The issue is NOT lack of diversity in loot, its lack of loot drops. They are following the example set by games like Destiny where drops are rare, but what they dont understand is that Destiny gave us many avenues to acquire end game gear. All raid encounters had a very decent chance to drop the best legendary guns in the game. There were many bounties you could do to earn exotic weapons. Xur came every week with exotics. Anthem has no guaranteed way to obtain anything.
Which again is weird because they had the good sense to drop guaranteed masterworks at the end of legendary contracts and GM strongholds. Every tier of strongholds gave you an additional masterwork for up to 3 masterworks for GM3. Instead of just doing the same for legendaries, they made them completely random. and refuse to fix it. i just dont understand this stubborness.
I feel bad for the devs working for this company.
i bought the game for $19 last week on Newegg and played it for about an hour. I played through a chunk of the beginning on the EA subscription thing on xbox at launch and hadn't touched it since I booted it up on Playstation on sunday. After about an hour I remembered why I never bothered to keep going with it. It has to be one of the most boring "loot" shooters I ever played and I had no desire to replay any of that.
I'm not sure there is any saving this game. Given the circumstances EA should have delayed it right from the start if they had any faith it. Which they probably didn't.
The news that everything was delayed really sucks. I was really looking forward to jumping in for the new content. Now, I'm not sure what I want to do. It may be time to trade it in.
But a good question is whether or not this game is worth it for BW to keep working on. Wouldn't be the first time that delayed content eventually becomes canceled content. Would be interesting to know how many people are playing and of those people are using real money.
Out of curiosity, why do people hold out for a game? It could be months if not longer before new content comes. What makes you stay waiting? Personally there's to many other things on the go that what I have played is enough and doesn't warrant me waiting 6 months. I imagine people being stuck with a digital copy keeps some invested.
Yeah, I'm happy for the new Stronghold, but the problem with this game is all of the loot is RNG focused.
So there is no reason to run anything other than the most efficient stronghold for loot drops.
I think taking some time and coming back with really awesome loot that
1) Looks cool
2) Behaves differently
3) Is tied to specific enemies
Is the only thing that can get players to come back.
It's pretty clear right now the content doesn't exist. The Cataclysm was probably just going to be some of the new enemies at the end of the campaign spawning in missions and free play, and they probably figured that wasn't gonna cut it for the fans.
So there is no reason to run anything other than the most efficient stronghold for loot drops.
I think taking some time and coming back with really awesome loot that
1) Looks cool
2) Behaves differently
3) Is tied to specific enemies
Is the only thing that can get players to come back.
It's pretty clear right now the content doesn't exist. The Cataclysm was probably just going to be some of the new enemies at the end of the campaign spawning in missions and free play, and they probably figured that wasn't gonna cut it for the fans.
true, i guess that either speaks volumes of me or the game. After playing the alpha, both betas, the EA access thing and now the ps4 version i haven't been able to make it further than 5 hours into the game, constantly replaying the first beginning section.
edit: for the record I didn't have that problem with other loot shooters i have replayed the beginnings of
Just wait for the year one update that will inevitably fix the game when they actually give in and make loot good and fun and abundant like every loot game ever.
We all just hoped they would have learned from EVERYONE else's mistakes. But no. They doing exact same thing. When they drop to a hundred players in the fall 6 months after release someone will finally realize how looters work and change it.
(Diablo3, FF14, Destiny1&2, etc etc)
We all just hoped they would have learned from EVERYONE else's mistakes. But no. They doing exact same thing. When they drop to a hundred players in the fall 6 months after release someone will finally realize how looters work and change it.
(Diablo3, FF14, Destiny1&2, etc etc)
I seriously doubt that is going to happen. They delayed all their updates and the roadmap to "TBD". I think they will quietly and slowly pull the plug on the game.
I think there's legitimate reason to be afraid of this, but changing the roadmap is not evidence. D2 had to change several plans after the poor response to Curse of Osiris, they still managed to really turn things around.
I know I can come off as really negative, but I don't think the situations are comparable at all. People reacted to Osiris because it was a BAD DLC, with a tiny area and the story was crap. But there was a LOT to do for months, it was just that the rewards felt grindy (Tons of weapons in the Verse Prophecies but you could only get a few at the time.) and the infinite forest was not really that good.
Anthem not only is broken at its core, it now has no content and no date to when it will be avaliable.
All of the examples you mention were flagship IP's with multiple games and an established userbase. Anthem has none of that. Think about it. EA has to SPEND millions of dollars on this game so it gets to an acceptable state. Do you really think they will do this just so the game gets a little bit of good press? The only thing that comes close to Anthem disaster is Fallout 76 and that is a game that was made in a fraction of the time and cost, and its an IP thats decades old with multiple million dollar sellers.
Pretty much this, if the Kotaku report is accurate the game was built in about a year. This is the inevitable result.
Like I said, there's lots of reasons to fear an eventual shutdown. But no content, broken at its core, no date for a fix - these were all complaints levied at D2 vanilla before Curse, and after, when Curse proved it wouldn't fix the core issues plagueing D2
Yeah I don't see this ever being a thing. Even if it's not abandoned within a year regardless of what they do I bet it will be dead.
I've not played in a long while and every patch I check to see if there is anything to make me want to play again and not even the new dungeon makes me want to boot it up.
Such a bummer it had potential but so many fuckups have squandered any chance.
I've not played in a long while and every patch I check to see if there is anything to make me want to play again and not even the new dungeon makes me want to boot it up.
Such a bummer it had potential but so many fuckups have squandered any chance.
What stops EA pulling a stunt like this again in future? I mean it's not like a majority of people will stop buying EA games, and EA doesn't give a shit about anyone after they have your money.
It's not like something similar didn't happen with NMS and yet BW and EA still tried to get away with it, and it's not like DA4 won't sell by the boat load, even after this debacle.
It's not like something similar didn't happen with NMS and yet BW and EA still tried to get away with it, and it's not like DA4 won't sell by the boat load, even after this debacle.
Asking this sincerely, because I am hopeful someone will be able to answer. I am trying to find the right way to phrase this question.
Why is there such a fascination with content for "GaaS" games, and not other genres? Prior to release, many people reading the tea leaves saw that Anthem appeared to be light on content, and anticipated its players would eat it up within the first week or so and then be hungry for more. Why are games like Anthem played in that mannerr, opposed to games in other genres? If Anthem takes 40 hours to complete, and any other game (let's say Days Gone) takes 40 hours to complete, why is it that Anthem players will clamor for more content? How many hours must someone spend on a game before they deem it worth the investment? If someone finishes the content currently available, why don't they just play another game until the new content is released?
I think I just fundamentally don't understand this genre, and I mean no ill-will to those of you who do play games like Anthem or Destiny for hundreds of hours. I'm just trying to understand why these games seem to be treated differently from games like Tomb Raider or Assassin's Creed.
EDIT: Asking this question as someone who genuinely enjoys Anthem as-is, and barely has time to play games during the week.
Why is there such a fascination with content for "GaaS" games, and not other genres? Prior to release, many people reading the tea leaves saw that Anthem appeared to be light on content, and anticipated its players would eat it up within the first week or so and then be hungry for more. Why are games like Anthem played in that mannerr, opposed to games in other genres? If Anthem takes 40 hours to complete, and any other game (let's say Days Gone) takes 40 hours to complete, why is it that Anthem players will clamor for more content? How many hours must someone spend on a game before they deem it worth the investment? If someone finishes the content currently available, why don't they just play another game until the new content is released?
I think I just fundamentally don't understand this genre, and I mean no ill-will to those of you who do play games like Anthem or Destiny for hundreds of hours. I'm just trying to understand why these games seem to be treated differently from games like Tomb Raider or Assassin's Creed.
EDIT: Asking this question as someone who genuinely enjoys Anthem as-is, and barely has time to play games during the week.
Last edited:
D1 or D2 Vanilla were never "broken" at their core. I played both, I played Anthem, this is an absurd comparison. I never played a game more bugged than this, and that's saying somehting, whereas both Destiny games were technicaly flawless.
I agree with you, just sharing what I recall about the outrage. The "brokenness" people were upset about was less about technical issues and more about fundamental gameplay features.