Anachronox is an RPG, although we think diehard RPG players would consider it a “lite” RPG. Your main player has stats and level up, and finds bigger and more evil weapons along the way. You must complete levels or missions. You must manage the group after people join you on your quest. Anachronox has a typical universe saving story. You start out as an unfortunate private detective named Sylvester Buccelli, aka Sly Boot. In the opening cutscene, you are defeated by a thug and end up face planting the bar your office is above. You learn early on that you need to scrape together some money to pay off Detta, the loan shark mobster. Below we have write some of the details on our Anachronox review.
Unfortunately, you are broke and drunk, and that’s why you decided to make some money. As is often the case, your simple “will work for food” quest snowballs into an epic intergalactic tale where you alone act as a barrier between the ultimate forces of order and chaos in their purest forms. Anachronox is a game design masterpiece. Even the basic interface is woven into the story. All of your menus are stored in a device called the Cursor of Life, which also stores the digitised identity of your late secretary Fatima. Fatima is actually the main character in the game.
She provides advice and commentary at strategic points throughout the game, and sometimes reveals herself as a holographic image outside of the Lifecursor. It keeps track of your inventory and your party members, all with the click of a button. By the end of the game, you will have a group of seven people. Usually you choose three of them for each mission. Sometimes the choice is yours; other times your choice is driven by game design. Sometimes you are on a mission as a single character and in one part of the game you use all seven characters in three separate groups and they all have to cooperate and coordinate from different places in the game.
About
Developer: Ion Storm
Publisher: Eidos Interactive
Release date: 27 June 2001
Price: $18.99
System Requirements
Platform: Windows XP or Windows Vista
Processor: 1.8 GHz Processor
Memory: 512 MB RAM
Graphics: 3D graphics card compatible with DirectX 7 (compatible with DirectX 9 recommended)
DirectX: Version 7.0
Storage: 2 GB available space
Anachronox review: Gameplay
The gameplay of Anachronox is very similar to that of Japanese RPGs such as the Final Fantasy series. You control part of three different characters who explore a 3D environment made up of space age metropolises and futuristic open environments. Squad members can be replaced by different characters, each with unique skills that will come in handy at some point in the game. Enemies are visible on the map, and when players encounter them, combat mode is activated.
Combat is turn-based and has a system similar to Final Fantasy’s Active Time Battle. Characters have an attack meter that fills up over time, they can only attack once the meter is full. When a character or an enemy is reduced to zero hit points, they are defeated. Various items such as MysTech healing stones can be used to gain the upper hand in combat. Like most RPGs, Anachronox features a level-up system that allows players to upgrade and upgrade their characters’ abilities.
Defeating enemies earns experience points that can be used to increase various stats and attributes of playable characters. MysTech plays a big role in this cyberpunk game. After a certain part of the story, the Mysterium Tech system allows the use of these in-game objects, which consist of eight different item colors. MysTech can provide huge advantages in combat by dealing devastating damage to enemies, healing party members, or removing status effects.
Anachronox review: Graphics
Anachronox runs on a very heavily modified version of the already ancient Quake 2 engine. This results in uneven presentation in terms of graphics. The animation is pretty good and the level design is great. Textures, on the other hand, are usually pixelated and blurry. The characters are also quite blocky. However, none of this harms the game. In a way, this gives the game a rather unique style. Once you play you will understand what I mean. The game wouldn’t have the same feel if it had a level of visual sophistication similar to Morrowind. In general, the graphics are not impressive, but charming.
Anachronox review: Sound
The music in Anachronox is generally well done. It never seems out of place, and some of the songs are so good that I hum them later in the day, which is rare for me. One funky track in particular that plays during your stay in the red light district made me nod my head as we played. The sound effects are also quite good. Ambient noise and combat effects are always appropriate, and they never seem corny or fake. However, the real gem of Anachronox’s audio department is the voice acting.
Simply put, it contains the best voice acting we’ve ever heard in a game. Every main character has a voice, and none of them is less amazing. Even in melodramatic moments, when the voice acting of most games becomes banal, it remains at a high level of quality. our personal favorite was the voice of PAL-18, your robotic assistant, who was actually voiced by the game’s creator, Tom Hall. The robot sounds like a nasty shrill robot.
A tiny robot calling a depressed party member a “cold bitch” wouldn’t be so funny if he didn’t sound like a hyperactive crack-using five-year-old. Not that I’ve ever talked to a hyperactive five year old on crack, but you can imagine. Even if the music and sound effects in this game are awfully lame, which they really aren’t, we’ll still give this game a high score in the sound category because of the amazing voice acting.
Final Words
Anachronox is worth your time and money. Whether you want to play a good console-style RPG on your PC, or you’re just in the mood for a game with a great story, this game is a great choice. Although, as it says on the box, “the minimum system requirements include a Pentium II 266, 64 MB of RAM and a sense of humor.” If you have all these things, I personally guarantee that you will have a great 20 hours.
