Anachronox

The Good
This won't be a review about what kind of genre that game belongs to or why those people at Ion Storm decided to make a third person RPG with the Quake II engine or why the game was so hardly recognized by any serious and daring gamers out there...

I just want to celebrate the fact, that this game dares to be different from the way of storytelling, its humor, its game- and graphical design and so on.

There are two points I want to underline here. First: there are the graphics. Ok, let me say that I've played many games recently. The year is 2006 and I can only hardly remember the days when I was playing Quake II the first time with my old 3dfx-Accelerator. Back then it was a jawdropper experience to see a game in such a high resolution and a complete texture memory of 2 MB. A few weeks ago I played the first installment of the Unreal Tournament series again on my PC again and it was quite a shock for me to realize how fast and perfect graphics have evolved in the last few year (and how unbelievably bad those games from the past look nowadays). So then: I've installed Anachronox and I kept in mind that it was just built on a modified version of the Quake II engine. No extravaganza at all - just good old graphics from the old days. I also kept on telling to myself: no matter what you will see on the screen for the next few days - always remember how old that game is and that the main reason for playing is just one thing: the story. In the end it turned out that I was completely wrong. Believe it or not: the graphics in that game combined with very, very fine texture artwork make a really great and modern looking game. Of course you can't compare it to Doom 3 standards or any newer Unreal game but for a science fiction, comic-like game there are dozens of eye-opener-scenes in it. The camera angles, the cut-scenes, the low-polygon facial expressions. It's just great to see what Ion Storm made out of the old Quake II engine. It is and was really a surprise for me to see e.g. the intro to the game. I still can't remember any other game (even today) that had such a huge and creative opening and such creative in-game cut-scenes.

And the second point, the reason for me to write that review: Anachronox's humor and the way of Ion Storm's storytelling... I think you can imagine the game's humor best, when you put Monty Python, Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov and Bruce Willis into one room and let them write a nice and entertaining story for a computer game.

Just two examples of that absolutely crazy game-design: Both unorthodox and over-sympathetic party members that are not like the usual computer generated, untouchable, zombie-like members found in many standard RPGs. They all have their very, very, very own personalities, life and intentions that are drawn in the game very, very detailed. As the game goes on you'll see how great the mixture is, how deep the relationship between the members grows, how crazy some party members come into the game's story and what kind of surprises they've got for your opponents (ever had an old man with a beard as long as to his toes in your party whose special ability is to yammer at people to finally get what he wants? or a robot that finally realizes that he has a mind of his own - don't imagine how the puberty of such a robot could look like :));

Finally I also want to underline the plot of the game - the by far most important part of Anachronox. Unfortunately the story needs some time to get moving but then...it's also unbelievably creative and unique and leaves you back in a completely fascinated mood: no standard alien-human story, no simple "good-guy-bad-guy" story - it's really not possible to predict how the story continues. Just to add it: of course there are many, many plot twists and surprises there that will make you wonder even more why nobody has made a film out of that game yet. Did I already mention that I like games that surprise me in all matters? This one did.

So, enough said about my enthusiasm about that game...now the cons...

The Bad
There are still heavy and nasty bugs in the game that will once again force you to save your game often and wisely.

I've already stated that the game is truly an epic and just great, but what made it a bit difficult for me was the fact, that the story hasn't got a constant tempo. The beginning is very, very slow and doesn't really capture your curiosity, then suddenly the pieces come together, the humor and main story unfolds, the party-members are becoming more and more sympathetic to you and then - BANG! - you're forced to again to just wander from point A to point B, bring item C to person D that waits for you at point E and the whole story comes to quite a stop.

It lets me think that at such points the designers obviously wanted to lengthen the game by all means without realizing that it sometimes can become very, very boring (even more when the rest of the game is THAT great and entertaining!). Unfortunately the quest logbook is also very uncomfortable because only the main quests are stored. Even if this lets you overlook your tasks more easily it is kinda even more frustrating, when you have to write the remaining side quests down all by yourself. It's always extra disappointing when a generally seen great game has such unneeded, unnecessary flaws.

The Bottom Line
Want something fresh, absolutely new and quite unknown? Something that makes you really laugh and something that is really an epic, that raises your attention, interest and curiosity for many hours?

Try it out - it will surely surprise you in a absolutely positive and humorous way...

The Good
Anachronox is a peculiar experiment made with a rather strange design philosophy in mind: eschewing "serious" Western genres, it takes nostalgic, 16-bit-era Japanese RPG mechanics, and builds a constantly flowing, cinematic and humorous experience around it. Basically, it is a collection of varied, yet lightly treated gameplay elements peppered by excellent writing and well-directed cutscenes.

I won't talk here about the designers' unexpected choice of the main genre. In a way, Anachronox manages to be attractive in spite of that choice, thanks to all the other creative stuff it throws on top of it.

Conversations and quests have much more weight in Anachronox than in "real" Japanese-style RPGs. This is where the game takes the right cues from its Western brethren, resulting in a more flexible and refreshing experience than mostly heavily combat-oriented Japanese games. The quests are for the most part interesting, varied and amusing; they often require you to to think and use your special skills to solve them. For example, at one point you need to gain the trust of the High Council on one of the planets, so you'll have find out how they will vote on the elections. What's really good is that besides the main, story-advancing quests there are also optional assignments, collecting and other things that increase the game's life span.

Your companions are a great bunch of unusual and comically appealing characters. Ever had a planet in your party?.. More importantly (and this is where Anachronox beats its Japanese progenitors again): the various NPCs you meet while playing the game are not just item- or quest suppliers; each one has something to tell you, and the amount of different, original lines written for each NPC is really impressive. They will tell you about their religious or political views, complain about some silly stuff, or say a joke or two about your appearance. Although most NPCs are not important for advancing the story, talking to them and listening to what they have to say enriches the experience.

This is also where Anachronox displays its strongest trump card: the writing. It's a delight to read (and listen to) the dialogues in this game. What makes the humor great aren't even the jokes and hilarious situations (the scene where Sly talks "science language" almost made me roll on the floor), but the way they are incorporated into the narrative, contributing to the ironic attitude towards the characters and creating an unusual form of a "semi-parody", though not at all in the same way Japanese writers would do.

No review of Anachronox would be complete without mentioning its fantastic cutscenes, all made with in-game engine, with great camera work that would do an honor to a movie. The game is naturally cinematic, elegantly using cutscenes to advance the plot in a fashion that is often more spectacular than its Japanese "teachers".

The Bad
Some parts of the game may seem unpolished, underdeveloped. I've heard rumors about cut content, and judging from my experience with the game they ought to be true. Often interesting peripheral locations and well-written secondary characters seem superficial because they were probably supposed to be more important to the game.

There is some discrepancy in tone, mainly caused by clashes between the cheesy, "epic" Japanese-like story and the humor - which, when applied to supposedly emotional events, becomes condescending and unpleasant. Two scenes come to mind: the destruction of the planet where you meet Rho, and the end of the comic-book chapter. In both cases, the scenes of mass destruction and death should have been made in such a way that we would feel the tragedy, but instead they are treated with the irritatingly inappropriate ubiquitous sneer.

The main flaw of Anachronox, however, is the choice of genre. Now, I don't know whether there is a "politically correct" rule to consider all video genre games equally good - speaking strictly for myself, I feel that Japanese-style RPGs are most certainly inferior to Western ones. However, the problem is that Anachronox is not even a good Japanese RPG; in fact, it is good at everything else except that. In other words, it's a game that excels in every way - except at being a good game. Clearly, the choice of base game mechanics followed the careful creation of jokes, cutscenes, and minigames.

What kind of core gameplay do we have here? Battles are sporadic, primitive, and much too easy; the character growth system, while interesting on paper, becomes a pure luxury: no matter what you do, you will win. You'll gain stats and learn spells, but they won't make any difference. Why would you hunt for special magical abilities if you can win any battle with bare-bones moves anyway?

Worse is the game's aggravating linearity. The game's locations look impressive, but what you see are mostly decorations - you can't go anywhere unless you are "supposed" to go there, as dictated by the ultra-linear plot, and each individual location is, in fact, small and cramped. There is little sense of discovery, as your hand is being constantly held, with everything given to you just in the doses that the game's restrictive mechanics allow. The bulk of the game is spent running from one NPC to another, completing simple quests, and then proceeding through a tiny area with pre-set, primitively handled battles.

The Bottom Line
No amount of cinematic direction and witty dialogue can alter the fact that Anachronox is a watered-down Japanese-style RPG that feels very much like a talented fan tribute than a serious gaming experience. If you are looking for some laughs, check it out; but if role-playing is your poison, you should look elsewhere.

The Good
Anachronox is a brilliant game from ION Storm (Dallas), designed by none other than Tom Hall, the creator of Commander Keen. Unfortunately, lack of funding was a problem, so ION Storm has sadly gone defunct. It all starts above Rowdy's bar, the dingiest bar on the dingiest street on the dingiest section of Anachronox, an abandoned city planet floating inside Sender One (a large sphere with spikes, allowing intergalactic travel and commerce), the largest Sender known to exist. Our hero, Sylvester "Sly" Boots, is in his office.. getting the crap beaten out of him by a mob thug. After his face is pounded, he gets thrown out the window into the bar below. Boots is broke, he owns money to the mob, and his robot PAL 18 (stands for Personal Assistant Lackey) is out of batteries. It's up to you to get him off his feet. You'll travel through the barren world of Anachronox looking for a job, and soon you'll find one with the retired curator of the MysTech museum, Grumpos Matavastros. You're on your way to save the universe.

The first thing you'll notice about Anachronox is the music-- very well done, and definitely surpasses the milestone set by Deus Ex (the opening theme is incredibly well done, it really sets an idea in your brain of how vast Anachronox really is). The game is running on a very heavily modified version of the Quake II engine, but you won't notice-- there's so much amazing architecture around you that the Quake II engine is hardly imaginable to power a vast game like this.

But what exactly makes up the gameplay? If you've played a Final Fantasy game before, you'll know. Transitions from battles are seamless (no flashy entrances), as well as cutscenes (which, by the way, are brilliant. The game's cinematics were compiled into a movie and won Best in Show at the Machinima Awards in 2002.).

Basically, each one of three characters has a circular bar that elapses as time passes. When the bar is full, you can issue an order, such as attack, move, MysTech and Battle Skills. One of my favourite orders is the move action; you can move practically where ever you want in the battle field, adding another strategic aspect to battles. Also, if available, you can use items nearby (for example, in a certain boss battle, you can use a special crystal nearby to replenish your NRG [MysTech power]). ION Storm has managed to cram so many different aspects of gaming into this little round disc that it will make your head spin! You'll receive battle training at Whackmaster Jack's Temple of Beating. You'll vote on various issues to help get yourself off a planet. You'll frantically attempt to open security doors as certain doom awaits. All this and more.

Minigames are also a fun aspect of Anachronox. Each character has a world skill, that will come in handy when you need to pick locks (Boots), hack into computers (PAL), hit an unreachable switch with a loonie (Stiletto), analyze objects (Rho), and bust through walls (Paco). Grumpos' certainly is the funniest, as his is Yammer-- if somebody whose item you need, for example, Grumpos will ramble on about various issues until the person gives in. As well as world skills, other minigames are available. Ox is a simple table-top strategy game found in Rowdy's Bar. Zong, Pooper and Bugaboo are all arcade games you can play on Hephaestus.

The Bad
Patch it. Anachronox is quite buggy once you get it from the store. (But thanks to Joey Liaw, one of the original programmers on Anachronox, you can play using an updated patch with all new features-- Joey programmed it all by himself!)

The Bottom Line
This is my favourite game of all time, simply said. No other game has been such a joy to play and leave you up all night thinking "I wonder what's going to happen next". Get this game now.