ANNO Mutationem - Proper Chinese Cyberpunk?

The Chinese gamedev already has a persistent stereotype "Either, or. We will talk about the second, negative "Either. In this "or" Chinese developers from project to project build Napoleon's plans, do their work talented, but every time they can not put everything into a single, coherent picture. The disappointing trend can be seen in the colorful but mechanically poor Rogue-lite Loopmancer, and the equally colorful but no less empty metroid F.I.S.T.: Forged In Shadow Torch. It is these two games that come to mind first, because ANNO Mutationem suffers from the same ailment...

Abnormal creative success?

ANNO Mutationem is ThinkingStars' first big project. Before ANNO Mutationem, the Chinese developers worked on games where the player took control of a spaceship, wandered the star vacuum and fought the same Star Rangers as himself. Everything was in the sauce of the MOBA genre. And ThinkingStars' previous experience in the space setting was reflected in ANNO Mutationem's distinct handwriting.

And everything about the game's world, style, and overall compelling overall picture in ANNO Mutationem is clearly not done at the level of an indie game: the local "Knight City" in the semi-open world is full of extras and their life stories. Although each of them serves only for one or two scenes, the overall final picture of the game universe is pleasantly surprising. For example, going into the laundry room in one of the starting locations you can notice the TV, switch the channel, which broadcasts not 2-3 looped pictures, and a couple of full, coherent news...

It is striking to see the crowded streets and the traffic. ThinkingStars has managed to create the illusion of a living world. So, for example, each NPC has his own troubles, image, and sometimes even character. At first, ANNO Mutationem seems like a budget Cyberpunk 2077 with spritely, two-dimensional characters, but three-dimensional world. It's almost impossible not to fall in love with the style of ANNO Mutationem at first sight, similar feelings were aroused by Cult of The Lump with its sweet music and drawing borrowed from the animated series Powerpuff Girls.

ANNO Mutationem is rated "Outstanding" for its immersion and atmosphere. It is the only cyberpunk game of recent years with a recognizable face and not a bunch of stereotypes pasted together. One can only wonder how ThinkingStars was able to get so spot-on creatively with only multiplayer experience under their belt. Let's say even more, even the crumpled, incoherent exposition failed to spoil the impression. However, the first impression is deceptive...

...Oh, no, it's not.

But as soon as the first euphoria wears off, we begin to notice some strange things. First of all, it is difficult to get rid of the thought that the development as if engaged in two completely different teams. At one end of the scale is a semi-open world, divided into locations scrupulously filled not inferior to The Witcher III...

...On the other side of the scale, the controls are completely unintuitive on anything but an Xbox gamepad. If you are a proud owner of PC, but you don't have a gamepad for it, when playing ANNO Mutationem you risk breaking your fingers, accidentally put a terrible gypsy curse or accidentally form a hand stamp and smash the screen with rasengan.

Controls have become such a weighty stumbling block that many people won't even get into the game, let alone enjoy the experience. It is useless to change the layout of the keys, because there are a lot of active buttons, and it is impossible to set weak and strong strokes on the mouse button. Recall: ANNO Mutationem is primarily a slasher. A cheerful combat system, combos, and finishing should be placed on 4 buttons, and the techniques should be performed by a combination of keys... according to the logic.

In practice, we have one button for a weak punch, one button for a strong one, one for long-range combat, one for throwing grenades, one more for a somersault, one more for hitting the ground in a jump, one more for jumping... well, a block wouldn't hurt, one more button... And what about the activation button in dialogs - strictly a separate button for this as well. Yes, there are so many active buttons that the physical buttons on the gamepad may not be enough. You don't accept stick presses? Get used to it. You can argue, "Don't whine. Change the layout and play," but there's a catch. At the time of writing the review there was a bug - the layout was reset to default when you exit the game.

And all of the above are problems that cannot be looked at through our fingers. You can look through your fingers at a strange plot, where events do not flow into each other, but simply happen. Cause-and-effect connections are clearly not ANNO Mutationem's strong suit. So initially we are introduced to the main character Anne Florence. But the only way to get acquainted is through...getting acquainted with the emails on Ann's computer. No voice-over, presentation or reasoning of the protagonist, just a mysterious, rambling intro. The rest is as it goes. For the storyline can follow only if you really want to.

But what is not once rubbed in the player's face - it is the forms of Ann Florence. She's freaking everywhere: on the shortcut, on the loading screen, in the frame, and even in someone's fantasy. It's noticeable that a lot of work has been done on Ann by the voiceover artists and actresses, but clearly not the work of the screenwriter. The heroine's main motivator is to find a cure for a disease that occasionally drives her crazy and leads to gratuitous aggression. We learn about this somehow from the dialogues, from the notes, well somehow we find out, I guess.

Only the blind can fail to notice the sexual innuendo in the game. And okay, if it were in moderation, this content could be consumed at will - no! From the first minutes the player decides to show the scene where the main character washes in the shower and ... washes her panties. But this is just the beginning, so to speak, to ignite the interest of the male audience.

You can relate to such things in different ways, but not when the game has fundamental problems. History has seen more provocative female characters, but that game itself was and still is a good slasher with a twisted plot. ANNO Mutationem has neither of these things. You can not blame the game for the meager content - they have a lot. Here you have a branch of development with passive and active skills...

...and relatively sane RPG elements, and a very cheerful combat system. But still the impression remains that the mechanics have not been tested, not to mention the polishing of the balance. The same observation applies to the content of the game: at one point the game goes into a protracted narrative, then throws in plenty of fights. Skillful storytelling during action? No, ThinkingStars hasn't heard of such a thing.

Then again, if you're lucky enough to experience the game with a gamepad in hand, this observation wouldn't be critical if it weren't for the game's price. At the beginning ThinkingStars charged as much as $25 for their masterpiece - an adequate price tag for a B-game from a developer with experience, but not for a debut...

Soon ThinkingStars came to their senses and reduced the price twice, but was not ashamed to release empty DLC with makeup, three useless playable items and the soundtrack, the songs from which you can only hear in the game, not even download. Apparently, the pernicious stereotype of the Eastern GameDev has not yet outlived itself...

Is it worth it?

ANNO Mutationem is a very strange game. It mystically combines artistic talent and programmers' mediocrity, script impotence and harmonious soundtrack, original game world and vulgarity. The game can only be recommended to indie game programmers, who pick out successful elements from different games for themselves.