‘Anthem’ is Closer to Star Wars and Marvel Than Mass Effect

Samantha Loveridge
Games
Games

Not only did EA Games reveal BioWare’s brand new IP, Anthem, at E3 2017 but it chose to show off the first Anthem gameplay details in a lengthy trailer during the Xbox press conference.

Aside from a few story tidbits, the fact you play as a Freelancer and you wear an exo-suit called a Javelin, we’re a little in the dark as to what the game will be – apart from co-op MMO looking to rival Destiny 2, of course.

Well, we’ve now got a few more details on the vibe of the Anthem gameplay, straight from the source that is BioWare General Manager, Aaryn Flynn.

In an interview with Edmonton AM, a Canadian radio show in one of the studio’s home towns, Flynn explained that Anthem is very much in the reel of science fantasy, similar to Star Wars and Marvel.

“The story is that you are part of humanity and you’re a member of a group called the Freelancers, who are out there to protect and to save humanity on an alien planet far away,” explained Flynn. “It’s in a genre we call science fantasy, very much like Star Wars, very much like the Marvel Universe, where you see a lot of amazing things happening but we don’t worry too much about why they’re happening or how they’re happening – the science of it.

Mass Effect is more our real, hard-core science-fiction RPG. This one is much more [about] having fun in a game world that’s lush and exotic and really sucks you in.”

It seems that Anthem is going to be quite a different game to what we’ve seen so far from BioWare, but it seems the team are very much focused on this being a cooperative adventure.

“There are shooting mechanics in it; it’s an action game; it’s a role-playing game; it’s got a lot of those elements to it that let you become a character to participate in this. It’s co-operative, so it’s our first game in a long time that you’re going to play with your friends natively, all through the whole experience.”

Anthem BioWare

In terms of story, Anthem is still going to deal with some of the similar themes we’ve seen in other games from the team, including the original Mass Effect trilogy, despite the shift in tone.

“They come from our own personal lives really. They come from experiences we’ve had many times, we’ve had folks that have moved to Canada and are immigrants, so those stories find their way in. We have those folks that are from smaller communities, and those stories make their way in. We have LGBTQ members and those stories make their way into the games. It all just comes from personal experience: the writers, the designers, the artists, they all want to put into the game things that they’ve admired or experienced in their lives.”

Unfortunately, you’ve got a while to wait until you can get your mitts on Anthem, with the release date scheduled for Fall 2018 at the earliest, running into March 2019 at the end of that fiscal year.

Samantha Loveridge
Sam is the UK Gaming Editor at Fandom. She's been addicted to games since she first got her paws on a GameBoy and hasn't looked back.