Anthem

BioWare’s Anthem is the current flavour of the season, and for good reason. It’s the first major title from BioWare since Mass Effect Andromeda in 2017, and the first from their flagship Edmonton studio since Dragon Age Inquisition in 2014, and serves as a major departure, with a focus on looter shooter gameplay. Fans of the genre have been mostly positive about the footage ahead of the VIP access demo, but concerns have cropped up regarding the enemy AI.

Some users, like Reddit user chowdahead, noted that Scars and Scar Elites tend to stand around and not attack players on Normal and Hard difficulties. Asking whether this would be the case during the tougher Grand Master difficulties, development manager Camden Eagar replied that this was a bug. “So this is something that we looked at very heavily awhile back,” said Eagar. “I imagine that this was showing up in a lot of the Alpha builds, and potentially even some of the game changer gameplay videos because the bug was occurring around that same time as those were being captured. We identified several things that were contributing to that and got fixes in.”

Eagar also noted, “If we see this crop up again, we’ll be sure to address it. There is no intended behavior where we would want that lack of engagement from the creatures. Good catch though and thanks for keeping us honest.”

Thus far, BioWare’s communication regarding Anthem has been on point. Lead producer Michael Gamble recently provided information about the cost of cosmetics during the demo’s duration, and also confirmed the existence of the Launch Bay. This is a shared space where up to 16 players can hang out, grab Contracts, use the Forge and maybe even team up for missions.

Anthem’s VIP access demo starts tomorrow, while the free demo is out on February 1st. The game itself launches on February 22nd for Xbox One, PS4, and PC.