EA Denies That It Demanded Takedown of Negative "Anthem" Review

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YouTuber Gggmanlives claims he was blacklisted from EA’s Game Changer Network (a community partnership program enabling collaborative feedback) after he posted a negative review of Anthem. EA allegedly paid him for the review but asked him to take it down and remove the company’s watermarks after they realized it wasn’t in the game’s favor.

“I basically wasn’t allowed to say anything negative about the game if I also had the watermark in because the watermark means EA endorses it and shares it through the Game Changers network or something,” Gggmanlives told VG247 via Twitter direct message. “I really don’t know what it all means. I was just told it was to be pulled down and was basically a breach of contract or something along those lines.”
 
He doesn't sound that certain to me. I hate to do it, but I am giving EA the benefit of the doubt.
 
I definitely wouldn't recommend someone pay full price for this game and the only reason I'm playing is because it's included with my Origin membership. BUT, my experiences are nowhere near as bad as what the video portrays. I've been playing for a week now and I can count the number of times I had a disconnect or crash on one hand. I'm actually surprised by how few technical issues I've had. I haven't had any FPS issues either but I'm running a 1080ti. The load times are my biggest issue and I'm running off SSD. I imagine lesser systems are really suffering.

The game is nothing special and could be called a "Destiny 3". For me it's just a time consumer until Division 2 comes out. At the moment I don't see much of a future for Anthem. I do feel the video review is excessive. I've experienced similar issues but I wouldn't call the game garbage. It's just another IP that didn't live up to the hype.
 
Anthem: Mass Effect Andromeda (fly around in an 'open' world so you can do the same thing over and over and over ...) only instead of being one of the Ryder's you get to be a futuristic Iron Man :LOL:
 
He didn't properly disclose that he was doing the video as part of a promotion with EA. While Gg himself does not live in the US, both EA and Youtube are US based companies and must comply with FTC regulations regarding sponsored content. Gg has been on Youtube long enough to know this. As much as I hate to give EA the benefit of the doubt, they're probably telling the truth in this situation.
 
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anthem is a good game before the release i had 1 siege quest and nothing else after i picked up 3 quests and spider out into more content. every game has a rough start. some things id like to see changes for like Loot and inventory, the ceiling cap in the zones, and make the fort a part of the main world with seamless transitions.
 
I didn’t watch the reviews or anything but for a few hours here and there the “guys” and I are having fun with it. There isn’t a lot of story content yet but the gameplay is just fun, intense enough in parts to keep us motivated but not so much we feel it’s a second/third job.
 
so, is EA going to kill bioware now that their last 2 games have been bad?
 
EA doesn't care about quality, they care about money. The game could score all 1s and as long as it makes a bunch of money EA won't care.
That's why this game needs to flop. It is a cool concept but game needed at least another year of development. It is barely a early access level game that want to charge full price for while promising to that it will be better in the future.
 
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That's why this game needs to flop. It is a cool concept but game needed at least another year of development. The t is barely a early access level game that want to charge full price for while promising to that it will be better in the future.

The entire "games as a service" idea needs to die. I can't think of a single "games as a service" game that launched in a "complete" state and didn't need months of extra work to get to an acceptable state. There is a lot of awesome stuff within Anthem, but even a few years ago not even EA would have allowed a game to release in the state it did.
 
The entire "games as a service" idea needs to die. I can't think of a single "games as a service" game that launched in a "complete" state and didn't need months of extra work to get to an acceptable state. There is a lot of awesome stuff within Anthem, but even a few years ago not even EA would have allowed a game to release in the state it did.
I honestly don't understand how they think releasing a game like this a good idea? Games live and die from first week impressions. Most people will not give it a 2nd look afterwards cause they moved on to something else.
 
I honestly don't understand how they think releasing a game like this a good idea? Games live and die from first week impressions. Most people will not give it a 2nd look afterwards cause they moved on to something else.

They had already delayed multiple times already. At this point EA probably just wanted it out the door in order to try and bolster their fiscal year-end earnings since BFV has been doing so poorly.
 
They had already delayed multiple times already. At this point EA probably just wanted it out the door in order to try and bolster their fiscal year-end earnings since BFV has been doing so poorly.
Yep. Short term gains over prolonged future games. Such a great businesses idea. You would think that these so called businesses man and stock holder would understand that concept.
 
My boyfriend and I have been enjoying the game since it released. We havn't run into all the bugs and server issues that the reviewers mentioned, and there have been two small patches so far. I wonder if the bugs and server issues could have been caused by the reviewers playing the game before it was actually released.... So far, the world is beautiful, the story is entertaining, and the gameplay is fun. I don't see it as any more repetitive than any other MMO, and i'm not really an MMO person.

I think a lot of the hate is simply because "reviewers" were playing the game prior to release, rushing through it, and "hate" videos get more clicks than "good" videos.
 
My boyfriend and I have been enjoying the game since it released. We havn't run into all the bugs and server issues that the reviewers mentioned, and there have been two small patches so far. I wonder if the bugs and server issues could have been caused by the reviewers playing the game before it was actually released.... So far, the world is beautiful, the story is entertaining, and the gameplay is fun. I don't see it as any more repetitive than any other MMO, and i'm not really an MMO person.

I think a lot of the hate is simply because "reviewers" were playing the game prior to release, rushing through it, and "hate" videos get more clicks than "good" videos.

Not sure how having a week to play it before it was officially released is rushing it. I mean the max level is what 30?....Not really a lot of content. Now I am not knocking the game, but there were a lot of reviewers who did give the game a try.....

Either way glad you are liking it :) My wife and I were very disappointed in it. I am glad we just spent $30 for Origin access, then blow $120 on it.
 
They had already delayed multiple times already. At this point EA probably just wanted it out the door in order to try and bolster their fiscal year-end earnings since BFV has been doing so poorly.

I'm confident they released Apex when they did to try to counter how poor Anthem is going to do.
 
I'm having fun in Anthem.
The server load times are terrible, but will be resolved fairly soon from what I've read.
I don't think I've hit any of the bugs yet..... Although I might have ended up in the final boss fight by accident just after it finished one time. That was strange
 
I played in both demos for a total of 49 hours and have 79 hours in the release version (I got Premier for early access and then the standard edition, so $70). Masterwork javelin for my primary and I think I'm going to pad out the other three for fun and variety. Still quite a bit of uniques required for my primary, though. I feel I've enjoyed the game and got my money's worth and look forward to upcoming content. Developers have been responsive but there's definitely a lot of issues - technical and quality of life - that need to be addressed quickly.

I was in the alpha and betas for The Division along with getting the gold edition and 100% the game through the first 3 months or so, and let me just say: that was every much the flustercuck. Cheat Engine in PVP, people glitching raids to get gear before it was closed off basically giving a subset of players a massive advantage, weak DLC rewards, balance issues galore, bullet sponge issues, and plenty of bugs. I guess people have amnesia when it comes to this? I will say The Division 2 beta was much cleaner (but not without its problems), but still, I think expectations are a little unrealistic at this point for this genre.

Anthem is fun while it lasts and that's what gaming is about for me. I'll get my hours out of it. Patches have been quick to come. The roadmap is fine as I know summer will be looming. The Division 2 will let me jump back-and-forth. I just don't see the need for doom and gloom.
 
Another game that looks like it was released half finished and unoptimized. Loading screen simulator from what numerous reviews are saying.
Fixed 2 patches ago thankfully. Loading screens are waaaaaaaay shorter now.
 
Fixed 2 patches ago thankfully. Loading screens are waaaaaaaay shorter now.

They are still far too often due to poor design choices of having you have to load into a new area to get new missions, and a separate area just to equip gear.

If they would at least get rid of the loading screen for the forge that would fix a lot.
 
They are still far too often due to poor design choices of having you have to load into a new area to get new missions, and a separate area just to equip gear.

If they would at least get rid of the loading screen for the forge that would fix a lot.

The loading screen I really hate is when the game teleports you to the location of other players.
 
so, is EA going to kill bioware now that their last 2 games have been bad?
doubtful. dragon age 4 is coming in not to distant future, not sure what else they are working on but. it's prety much confirmed a new mass effect also but that is years away, so who knows.
 
Not sure how having a week to play it before it was officially released is rushing it. I mean the max level is what 30?....Not really a lot of content. Now I am not knocking the game, but there were a lot of reviewers who did give the game a try.....

Either way glad you are liking it :) My wife and I were very disappointed in it. I am glad we just spent $30 for Origin access, then blow $120 on it.

There were some reviewers saying that they were disappointed with the 50hr campaign, on Monday. So they put 50+ hours into the game between Friday and Monday. Also, all these people that preordered and were able to play the game early are still playing a prerelease version of the game.
 
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