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[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Game Information

Game Title: ANONYMOUS;CODE

Platforms:

• PC (Sep 8, 2023)
• PS4 (Sep 8, 2023)
• Switch (Sep 8, 2023)

Trailer:

• ANONYMOUS;CODE System Trailer | Nintendo Switch, PS4 and Steam

Developer: MAGES. Inc

Publisher: Spike Chunsoft Co., Ltd

Review Aggregator:

OpenCritic - 84 average - 92% recommended
Metacritic - 88 based on 6 reviews

Critic Reviews


8Bit/Digi - Stan Rezaee - 9 / 10

ANONYMOUS;CODE tosses players into a thrilling story set in a post-disaster cyberpunk world that is on the verge of doom.

NookGaming - Wes Playfair - 8 / 10

ANONYMOUS;CODE lacks the depth and maturity of earlier Science Adventure games but makes up for it with thrilling action and top-notch presentation. While it may not hit the highest of highs, I expect this is one most visual novel fans will enjoy.

Push Square - Jenny Jones - 7 / 10

Even if you’ve not played the other games from the series, Anonymous;Code is a great place to start due to its standalone story. While there are a handful of references to past events, these are well-explained in the moment. If you’re looking for an exciting new visual novel, this one is well worth your time.

Siliconera - Stephanie Liu - 9 / 10

2037. Nakano, Tokyo.
Pollon Takaoka is caught up in a tangle of plots as a result of his encounter with the mysterious girl Momo and faces major events that shake the world. Live the experience with Pollon, help him hack the myriad branches of reality and "load" the ending that saves the world!
An exciting and suspenseful visual novel that maintains its momentum from beginning to end. It's a story that relies on its medium for a complete experience.

WayTooManyGames - Oliver Shellding - 9.5 / 10

In the end, the fantastic story gives the perfect gift to players: curiosity about the world we live in and questions about what it means to be alive. If a visual novel can cause you to question existence, it’s doing something right.

Noisy Pixel - 9/10

Anonymous;Code takes some understanding of the Science Adventure series to wholly appreciate, but its world-building is what I would regard as some of the series’ best. It acts as a culmination of ideas seen throughout numerous titles, creating an unconventional experience that is extremely rewarding. Despite a few stumbles found in the cast and the ending needing a bit more time to be fully realized, what’s here is an immaculate story with brilliant pacing that makes every scene and interaction meaningful and necessary. The fantastic English dub and presentation only serve to help matters. I have no idea where the Science Adventure series will go from here, but after seeing the sheer love and ambition poured into Anonymous;Code, I’m more confident in this series than I’ve ever been.

 

[Arsic]

I’ve still yet to complete a single visual novel game but I still plan to support this. The art is incredible.

 

[SlimeGooGoo]

Looks kinda gimmicky with is reload idea

The 3D portraits are also a little distracting

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Metacritic score is now at 88 based on 6 critic reviews!

And Opencritic has finally updated the review page. I've edited the OP.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Adding the RPGFan review to the thread.

Anonymous;Code Review | RPGFan

Mages appears to be listening to criticisms, and they've improved on some of the recent tripe, but Anonymous;Code still doesn't come close to the series' highs.

www.rpgfan.com

 

[graywolf323]

Adding the RPGFan review to the thread.

Anonymous;Code Review | RPGFan

Mages appears to be listening to criticisms, and they've improved on some of the recent tripe, but Anonymous;Code still doesn't come close to the series' highs.

www.rpgfan.com

the same reviewer gave Robotics;Notes DaSH a 62/100 and complained about ‘offensive humor’

You know a review is unserious if it suggests No Daru is a positive.

There can never be enough Daru.

Zach really really seems to dislike Daru, Daru was listed as a con for the aforementioned review

Robotics;Notes DaSH Review | RPGFan

Robotics;Notes DaSH starts after the ending of Robotics;Notes ELITE where Kaito, returning from college, and Daru from Steins;Gate arrive for a local festival.

www.rpgfan.com

 

[Herr Edgy]

Adding the RPGFan review to the thread.

Anonymous;Code Review | RPGFan

Mages appears to be listening to criticisms, and they've improved on some of the recent tripe, but Anonymous;Code still doesn't come close to the series' highs.

www.rpgfan.com

You know a review is unserious if it suggests No Daru is a positive.

There can never be enough Daru.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

My Switch preorder copy which comes with a Steelbook has arrived one day early before the actual release of the game! Can't wait to play it!

 

[Mr Reasonable]

My Switch preorder copy which comes with a Steelbook has arrived one day early before the actual release of the game! Can't wait to play it!

Go on then.

Edit: sorry, couldn't resist replying to "can't wait to play it!" When technically you could have been playing instead of posting a picture caught me as funny, but I recognise that many won't feel the same. And yes I recognise that you might be at work, or otherwise disposed.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Go on then.

Edit: sorry, couldn't resist replying to "can't wait to play it!" When technically you could have been playing instead of posting a picture caught me as funny, but I recognise that many won't feel the same. And yes I recognise that you might be at work, or otherwise disposed.

All good lol! And yeah, currently working from home so I can't play right this minute.

 

[kurisu_1974]

Got my PS4 launch edition this weekend! A bit weird to see a new PS4 game, it is a very nice steelbook. I hope to find some time to start this soon.

 

[STARSBarry]

the same reviewer gave Robotics;Notes DaSH a 62/100 and complained about ‘offensive humor’

I have to admit the humor in
robotics notes DaSH was just cringe. It just made me feel physically uncomfortable when it was supposed to be funny.

But onto this game, I finished this over the weekend, one major complaint is that the protagonist gets in your way with the save load mechanic, so there's no real freedom on when you can use it or what save you pick to go back to, as he shouts and at you and force closes the menu.

This means this is essentially a linear novel where you need to push a button on the correct sentence for things to happen. What becomes infuriating are points where the protagonist will stop you loading even though they are about to die, because you didn't load on some exact sentence 5 screens ago, despite having access to the exact same information and not being dead yet.

Overall the concept of the title could have been fantastic but in action is incredibly limited. As reviews have stated there is very little time to breathe or get to know characters, this could be seen as a bonus for more casual VN players but it makes the overall experience come across as barebones.

I still really enjoyed my playthrough, but now that I can sit down after it's all over and think about it, its probably one of the weaker novels in the series, above DaSH but I could never bring myself to finish that so... This title could have been so much more with the save/load mechanic, but they decided to railroad the player so they didn't have to write 300+ bad ends, but that's what the game really needed.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

CTRL+ F “starfield”: 0 results.
This should tell you how many people will click on this thread

The game sounds interesting, but how many people are expected to buy it at full price? I surely am not.

 

[RuneFactoryFanboy]

Unfortunately I bought all the Danganronpa games during the recent sale, so I've been playing through them and won't have time to get A;C right away.

However I will definitely be picking this up at some point. The writer stated that he wanted A;C to wrap up a lot of the loose ends of the SciAdv series which excites me. I do hope that it actually touches on the storylines of Chaos & Robotics or Committee 300 stuff, and isn't just constant Stiens references. Sometimes I feel like Mages leans way too hard on the success of Stiens.

I'll also echo that I some of the humor in DaSH was cringy as crap. I don't mean Daru's general pervy speaking mannerisms, because I enjoy that about him, but just some of that games scenarios were so over the top that it was hard to take seriously. Goofy to the point that my immersion was broken and it felt more like non-canon spinoff at times. I did enjoy the continued character development arcs though, and the second half of DaSH was great.

 

[a multicultural team of v]

Got my copy today and played 4-5 hours or so. Seems ok so far, the save mechanic is kind of interesting but hampered by the fact that it is very scripted which kills any of the organic nature of it. Why even make me use a trigger if I can only do it on one very specific line of text which is not obvious, at that point just make it automatic and part of the story.

Other thing that irks me is that there are so many themes and plot points taken practically straight from Steins;Gate that it almost feels like I'm playing a remix. I have a lot to go in the game so it's probably too early to complain about this, but so many things so far have a very similar parallel to S;G - and I'm not talking references or anything like that, I mean actual story elements and mechanics.

 

[Yoda]

I heard it has issues running on steam deck, can anyone confirm?

 

[cireza]

Finally got the time to start the game, and I have to say that I am enjoying it a lot !

After Robotic:Notes, which I simply gave up with (the game didn't catch my attention), Anonymous:Code is starting super strong and everything his hitting the spot. Visuals are excellent and backgrounds have good detail. Combined with the music, it sets an excellent mood for the game. Presentation is really good, with cell-shaded characters and the occasional artworks are gorgeous.

The tone is rather serious, with themes tied to greater dangers for the world (this might not be everyone's preference though) but I find that it works quite well for now. And you have the more lighthearted events popping in every so often. The premise is extremely promising, with excellent potential installed in the few first hours (not spoiling anything !). The novel feels a bit more action oriented, and gives the sense of an interactive anime (especially as it is not 100% seen through the eyes of the main character), which can be opposed to Steins:Gate and how you had the feeling of taking part in the daily life of a small group of people.

The steelbook is also very nice and was added to the shelf ! For now, this is recommended !

 

[cireza]

Other people playing the game ? I made some progress and wanted to shared my thoughts.

Spoiler

I am not totally sold on the game. Even if it is enjoyable for now, there are some things that prevent me from fully enjoying the game :
- visuals : the characters are cell-shaded 3D, but the animation process is really poor. It is like "deforming", and sometimes it looks really weird.
- visuals : the backgrounds are nice enough, but sometimes I would have liked to them to be more detailed
- visuals : I find that everything is a bit blurry/has very large outlines overall, not a fan of it
- consistency : there were already a few instances where I found myself thinking "Wow that was fast" lol. The VN is really action oriented, but they take some shortcuts in character development, and it stands out a bit too much. There is a guy (Oz) that explains he had a terrible experience in space and it arrives in the middle of a discussion, only to be dealt with in a few windows of text. And the animation of the character at that moment was the worst yet.
- consistency : they put a lot of effort in their visuals and animations, but they couldn't bother putting people in the backgrounds of places that are supposed to be crowded. This kills the immersion quite a bit !
- scenario : you are basically there to save the world ! no sense of progression
- mechanics : having to reload is an interesting idea, but I already encountered a couple instances where I was basically spamming the reload button because finding the exact right moment to reload wasn't super obvious. The window was too narrow and the discussion didn't feel like it made much more sense to reload at that specific moment rather than slightly before, for example
- forced references : I feel that all the ties to Steins Gate are super forced. Like they don't add a lot and could have been skipped, at least for now. With the exception of how timelines works, this I am okay with, but everything else was totally useless
- characters : they feel too much like stereotypes for now. I really dislike the lady scientist from the US. Her voice is awful, and she has as much personality as a wall. She is only there to explain things and it feels terribly forced.

A positive though : the main character is really likable. Also the comics screens are really nice.

The game is not bad, but is a far cry from Steins Gate for now. Steins Gate was a masterpiece anyway, and each VN is its own thing, so that's understandable. But with what it tries, it really doesn't compared favorably for me. I will make it to the end of course, so let's wait and see.