Tower defense games are usually quite similar. You set up towers in certain areas to destroy enemies that move along a predetermined path. One developer, 11 bit studios, wants to reverse that with Anomaly 2. Instead of a tower defense game, Anomaly 2 can be described as a tower offense game. While the concept is great, I had a hard time keeping interest in the game while playing.
The game is set in the distant future, and North America is buried with snow. Mechanical aliens have invaded Earth, and it is up to an elite squad to make it across the continent to retrieve a weapon that will send the alien threat away from the planet. It is a very basic story to get you from mission to mission, which is fine. You are not playing Anomaly 2 for a rich, narrative driven experience. You just want to blow crap up, and there is plenty of that in the game.
You begin each mission by selecting the units you will be using, and a path that they will be following while they take down enemies. Setting up the path that your units will take is pretty simple. At each intersection you click an arrow to rotate it around until you have your desired path. In the map view you see where enemies are located, so you can select a path that has fewer enemies. There are times when the enemy will use scramblers so you cannot see them on the map, or they will use just pop up out of the ground when you get close. It is a minor annoyance, but the surprise adds to the challenge.
While the units you are controlling follow a designated path, the character you control has free range to move around the map. If you get too close to enemies, they will fire at you. The ability to run freely around the map allows you to deploy different items that give you an advantage. These items range from repairing your units, to distracting the enemy and draw their fire to another place on the map, to shutting down enemies for a short amount of time. As more enemies get introduced to the game, these items will become necessary.
As the commander of the group, you have access to a variety of vehicles to use. The nice thing about your vehicles is they can morph into other vehicles to match the different situations you’ll find yourself in. For your attacking vehicles, one version of the vehicle is suited better for wide open combat, while the other is useful for close quarters. Having to morph your vehicles is a great way to keep you paying attention to the game. You cannot just set your vehicles on a path and walk away.
The types of enemies you’ll be fighting against evolves over the course of the game, which means you will constantly have to rethink your tactics. But this is one of the first problems I have with the game: it is hard. I could barely get through the game on normal settings. There is a specific mission that brought rage out of me that has not happened in a long time. While I’m not looking for a game to hold my hand, I did feel that Anomaly 2 was quite challenging. It seems that as the enemies grew in strength, the user side of things was not progressing at the same rate. There is the option to upgrade your units, but that does not carry over to other missions. Plus, since it is more valuable to spend your scarce resources on new units rather than upgrading them, it seems pointless.
Anomaly 2 has a distinct look to it. You view the game from a top-down view, much like you would other tower defense games. The aliens have a distinct orange glow that really stands out, and the animation when your units morph is well done. Since you traverse the entire world to take down the alien invasion, Anomaly 2 plops you down in some very unique looking maps. They range from the frozen tundra of North America, to a destroyed New York City, to tropical environments in South America. They all have a unique appearance and color palette, which gives the game a sharp look.
I can’t figure out if it was the incredibly challenging gameplay, or the repetitive nature of each mission that caused me to not love this game. It is a good game, just not something that I will want to play over and over again. Anomaly 2 is a game where you can play through a few missions, then set it down and pick it up again a few days later. There just wasn’t enough there to get me hooked.
Anomaly 2 features a multiplayer mode where one player sets up towers like a tower defense game, and the opposing player tries to make it through the map. While the premise sounds great, I could not connect to a single person to play. The tutorial showed off what the multiplayer was like, and it did seem like it could be fun. But with not being able to actually play the multiplayer, I can’t say where it is good or bad.
For those that liked the first two Anomaly games, you will like Anomaly 2. But for those not familiar with the series, I would try out the demo to see if it is a game you would like. You’ll figure it out in just a few missions whether or not to spend your money.
Score: 7.5/10
Anomaly 2 was developed and published by 11 bit studios for PC, Mac, and Linux on May 15th. A copy of the game was provided to us by 11 bit studios for reviewing purposes.
