When a game gets delayed often, you need to start wondering why. One of two things could be happening in these cases: the developers could be working hard to make the game even better than anyone hoped it would be, or it could be fraught with issues that simply won’t lie down. In the case of Anarchy Reigns, it seems to be a case of the latter.
Anarchy Reigns is a game that casts the player in the role of a brutal street fighter in a dystopian future, where violence and chaos are the orders of the day. The player will need to fend off waves of enemies in melee brawls to gain superiority.
These brawls come in two flavours: single player and multiplayer. The single player game is divided into two campaigns, each with a unique lead character. The action in these comes down to one thing: beat up tons of bad guys. Beat up enough of them, and a mission is unlocked – either a story mission or a side mission. And the goal of the mission. Beat up tons of bad guys. Rinse and repeat, over and over again.
The story line is flat and uninteresting, and the action becomes bland and extremely repetitive before long.
That leaves the multiplayer which, in all honesty, is the focus of the game. There are various modes, like Capture the Flag and a weird variation of American Football, but the meat of all of them is a 16 player free-for-all brawl. There are numerous characters available for play, and each has a unique set of styles and skills that players can practice and get used to (even if their controls don’t vary at all.) A player who takes the time to explore their chosen character can become a skilful combatant in what is essentially a crazy, intense and sometimes frustrating mass melee. It can be great fun, provided the players in the game are of a similar skill level.
So, the sensible thing is to just play the multiplayer, right? Wrong! The characters needed to fully enjoy the multiplayer game can only be unlocked by sitting through the achingly repetitive single player game. It takes an iron constitution to do so, and players will likely only be able to take on the action in short bursts. Suffice to say, you really have to love the multiplayer to undertake this task, and I am not sure if anyone will love Anarchy Reigns that much.
The various levels are also subject to random events, like runaway vehicles and carpet bombing. This could have added a lot to the sprawling environments, which are not quite the free-form spaces they’re meant to be. But the graphics let this side down to a degree, because the effects are a little nasty, and the overall looks of the game are not what they should be in this day and age. This is exacerbated by a camera that often lets the player down, particularly during the more intense combats.
Anarchy Reigns feels like a game that should have been available at the launch of the PS3, not several years down the line. It’s weak story and repetitive action do very little to get the player hooked, and it is likely to be more of a cult classic – with a small following – than a mainstream hit. And that’s sad, because the idea isn’t bad… a little more effort on the part of the developers would have benefitted it greatly.
