If you enjoy a complete game shipping day one sporting no bugs, Hymne is not the game you should seek out. An additive that makes Electronic Arts and Bioware’s looter-shooter, Hymne, look worse is content shown during E3 2017 that did not make it in the full game. However, Ben Irving — Anthem’s lead producer — claims the missing content is an act of transparency and not that of dishonesty.
Hymne has a lot of problems. I could go on about the game’s list of issues such as Larry Blackmon’s eyes tripping out, the game force closing or bricking systems und Javelins looking like Spoderman, but I won’t. Instead, Irving’s recent comment on cut content is worth examining.
Back on March 5th, 2019, Reddit user TheWalkingDerp posted up a Diskussionsthread titled “Whatever happened with these things? Just a few examples of what we’ve seen previously that’s absent from the game we got.” The title is followed by an image showing the following content:
Like clockwork, fellow Freelancers pounded the upvote button 11.2k times (and counting) like they were using a weak weapon against a bullet sponge enemy, which in turn got the attention of Mr. Irving.
Irving’s response to the post boasting a silver, gold, and platinum award reads as follows:
„Die kurze Antwort lautet: Der Preis für Transparenz besteht darin, dass sich die Dinge ändern. Wir haben unser Bestes getan, um auf dem Weg zur Inbetriebnahme transparent zu sein, wussten aber, dass die Dinge in manchen Situationen anders sein würden. Manchmal waren die Leute glücklich und manchmal waren sie verärgert.
Es sind die Kosten der Transparenz.
Bearbeiten: zur Erläuterung – die Spieleentwicklung ist voller Veränderungen. Es gibt eine Million Gründe, warum Sie mit einer Idee beginnen und diese sich im Laufe der Zeit weiterentwickelt. Das kommt in jedem Spiel vor. Wir teilten so viel wir konnten. Manche Dinge ändern sich. Der Preis der Transparenz besteht also darin, dass einige Dinge, die wir gesagt haben, nicht wahr werden, nicht weil jemand unehrlich war, sondern weil sich die Dinge im Laufe der Entwicklung geändert haben.“
After hearing the lame excuse that Irving typed out, user Karimouhbi replied:
“I get your point. I think people are more than willing to accept changes as the game development advances, but I’m afraid what the game has seen ultimately was pretty much exclusively downgrades: smaller world, worse graphics, worse inventory, less immersion, more simplistic narratives, etc.
I’m sure people would have been fine with losing some and gaining some, but I don’t think we can say that’s the case. And after being at the receiving end of this very similar thing for a few years now (Watch Dogs, Destiny, No Man’s Sky, The Division, Fallout76, etc.), you honestly kind of get tired of making excuses. It just so dangerously borderlines false advertising at this point.”
Being honest here, I knew this day would come given the E3 2017 video. Heck, even other people a year and two ago on different Anthem E3 2017 videos stressed the same thing as the people playing the glitchy game today:
With all of that said, I guess the lesson Irving taught everyone on March 5th is that dishonesty and showing “blockbuster” content that’s not in the final product isn’t false advertising. . . It’s just Transparenz.
If you don’t know and dare to play the new looter-shooter, Hymne ist jetzt auf PC, PS4 und Xbox One verfügbar.
