I remember my first time ever seeing an Xbox 360 at my friend’s house in high school. It didn’t really impress me all that much, although I was intrigued by the achievements that popped up while playing games. After graduation I went over to his place and saw the seemingly Pikmin inspired Overlord, a game where you play as a warrior that commands a horde of minions. Admittedly, it was one of those games that watching someone else play made me think I’d hate it. Of course these are the types of games that usually end up being quite a bit of fun when given the chance.

Masters of Anima is a new entry into this sub-genre of RTS, with a newly graduated shaper that can use the world’s energy source (anima) to create different types of guardians to assist in battle. This resource is limited and Otto (you) can only carry so much at a time. Going through the levels you will be able to stray off the beaten path to solve little puzzles and use anima to gain pieces to enhance your storage space. It’s vital that you find as many of these as possible, as the game is far from kind once you get past the opening. It’s also important to choose the proper upgrades between levels, as these can seemingly make or break your progression.

Starting the game you are given control of protectors, which are essentially your tanks in battle. You’ll have large amounts of these shielded characters and will use them generously while battling golems. The game is pretty manageable at this point, as you will attack, spawn, and use your battle cry at the opportune moment to knock over golems for extra damage with no fear of taking any yourself. However, once you acquire the sentinels, your archers, things become a bit more complicated, and continue to do so after you unlock more characters. As these classes don’t have any sort of AI outside of following your commands, they’ll sit around and die if you don’t direct them to safety. You may be thinking you’ll just grab everyone at once and keep them out of the line of fire, but the game adds in an extra timed factor in the enemy rage bar. Once the bar is depleted, all hell is brought down upon you, making the battle more difficult than it already is. Eventually it becomes impossible to win. While Otto is fully capable of attacking himself, time is your biggest enemy once you run out of anima in a fight.

The gameplay loop is not what I expected, with wandering around the map and minor puzzle solving to what almost seems like a boss fight each time you face an encounter. None of the battles really allow for you to relax and button mash, and even more so when you get to the final portion of a level. This is hardly a bad thing, as I want to be engaged in the games I play, but at times I wondered if I was as bad as it seemed at the game, or the difficulty spiked much higher than I anticipated. It seems to be the latter, at least in regards to using a controller. I love using controllers for games, but certain genres lend themselves to a keyboard and mouse, and the RTS genre is one of them. The only recent RTS game that didn’t make me want to play on a keyboard and mouse was Tooth and Tail.

Story wise, the game is pretty straightforward. Opposed to Otto feeling the need to save the world, he is set on saving his fiancée from the clutches of evil. When told that everyone’s existence is at stake, he only replies in a nonchalant manner, stating if it’s a necessary part of saving his future betrothed, he’d consider it. Otherwise, he’s heading to a beach and waiting for the whole thing to blow over after he gets his lady back. The plot device is a bit weird in that the woman is portrayed as one of the best shapers to ever live, while Otto is a bit of a joke having not even passed the test during the opening of the game, but she’s sundered like she’s nothing and Otto is soon shown to have a special gift and must save her. It’s all pretty familiar, but it doesn’t seem to take itself too seriously which is nice.

Determining what makes something like Pikmin fun is hard to do for me. It’s a bit like finding why Smash Bros. is so much better than Brawlout. They’re very similar in gameplay, but one has a special factor that makes it soar above the other. If you choose to play it, I highly recommend doing so on PC or hooking up a mouse and keyboard to your platform of choice. Masters of Anima is a fun take on the genre, but ultimately falls short of what makes its inspiration memorable.

6 out of 10

Pros

• Deep Strategy
• Cast of Guardians
• Leveling Up…

Cons

• …Only Between Levels
• Difficulty Spikes
• Controls

Masters of Anima was developed by Passtech Games and published by Focus Home Interactive. The game launched on NS, PC, PS4, and X1 April 10th, 2018 for $19.99. The game was provided to us for review on PS4. If you’d like to see more of Masters of Anima, check out the official site.

 

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