ANVIL Review Summary

Good co-op experience: The game provides a solid co-op experience with enjoyable gameplay and team dynamics. Players find the co-op mode fun and engaging.

Diverse character and build options: The game offers a broad roster of unlockable characters, each with unique abilities and diverse build options. Players appreciate the variety in character design and weapon selection.

Impressive graphics and visuals: The game features stunning graphics and visual design, with smooth framerates and appealing effects. Players consistently praise the visual quality, noting it surpasses similar games.

Unique and innovative gameplay mechanics: The game features unique crafting, skill tree, and weapon systems, along with innovative gameplay elements. Players enjoy the variety and depth of the gameplay mechanics.

Rewarding roguelite gameplay: The game offers a rewarding roguelite experience with meta-progression and high difficulty. Players find the gameplay engaging and the progress satisfying.

Repetitive and tedious gameplay: The game is criticized for its repetitive nature and excessive grind, which can make the experience tedious. Players feel that the time investment does not necessarily lead to a sense of achievement.

Poor game balance and difficulty: The game's difficulty is poorly balanced, with some bosses and mobs being nearly unbeatable. The difficulty curve is seen as atrocious, making the game feel unfair rather than challenging.

Unbalanced and frustrating boss fights: Boss fights are described as overly difficult, unbalanced, and tedious. Players find that bosses have excessive health and that defensive stats and healing are ineffective, making these fights frustrating.

Game plagued by various bugs: Players report numerous bugs affecting gameplay, including issues with countdown timers, resetting achievements, and game crashes. These bugs significantly impact the player experience and need urgent attention.

Lack of game support and updates: Players feel the game is abandoned due to the lack of new content, updates, and bug fixes. The removal of language support and minimal player choice contribute to this sentiment.

Diverse Crafting and Progression: The game features a robust crafting system, skill tree, and various progression mechanics including unlockable characters and a seasonal mode. Players can choose unique characters with different skills and weapons, enhancing build variety and gameplay depth.

Challenging Boss Fights: Boss fights are a significant part of the game, featuring high difficulty and specific mechanics such as life-draining and enrage mechanics. Some bosses are extremely difficult and require strategic planning and learning attack patterns.

Seasonal and Co-op Gameplay: The game includes seasonal challenges and a co-op experience that allows players to team up with friends or random people. Seasonal resets and progression systems add a layer of challenge and strategy.

Roguelike and Looter Shooter Elements: The game incorporates roguelike elements with looter shooter mechanics, featuring randomized relic shops and weapon drops. This adds a layer of unpredictability and replayability.

Repetitive and Tedious Gameplay: Some players find the gameplay repetitive and tedious, with a need for more monsters and better hit feedback. The combat alone is not enough to sustain interest for all players.

Numerous bugs affecting gameplay: Players report various bugs that significantly impact gameplay, including issues with countdown timers, boss fights, and ability performance. These bugs are frequent and annoying, detracting from the overall experience.

Black screen issues: A common issue reported by players is the occurrence of black screens, which can happen infinitely or during launch. This problem severely affects the game's playability.

Poorly designed battle pass system: The game's battle pass system is criticized for its poor design. Additionally, there are issues with shared perk pools, leading to competition among players.

Lack of ultrawide/widescreen support: Players have noted the absence of support for ultrawide and widescreen monitors, which limits the gaming experience for those with such setups.

Solid performance on Steam Deck: The game runs fairly well on the Steam Deck, with solid graphics and framerates. This indicates good optimization for the handheld device.

Worth it on sale: The game is recommended for fans of challenging games, twin-stick shooters, and roguelike genres, especially when purchased at a discounted price. It is not ideal for casual players due to its high difficulty.

Needs balance improvements: The game shows potential but requires significant improvements in character balance, multiplayer participation, and system interactions. The third galaxy is notably criticized for its unreasonable difficulty.

Great for co-op fun: The game is suitable for players who enjoy cooperative gameplay and challenging high-end content, making it a good choice for hop-in hop-out fun with friends.

Wait for full release: Players are advised to wait until the game is out of Early Access to fully enjoy the experience, indicating that the game has potential but may not be fully polished yet.

Reconsider season pass: There are concerns about the value of the paid season pass, indicating that players should carefully consider whether it is worth the investment.

Steam Deck: The Steam Deck experience is marred by significant issues such as black screen problems, controller support issues, visual clarity problems, and game stability issues. These problems collectively degrade the user experience and require attention from the developers to improve the overall functionality and enjoyment of the device.

Monetization: The game has introduced a battle pass and season pass system that is perceived as highly predatory. Players feel coerced into spending real money to maintain progression and access essential content. The season pass is not just for cosmetics but provides significant gameplay advantages, creating a pay-to-win scenario. The progression system resets every season, forcing players to grind repeatedly, which is seen as a way to encourage spending. Overall, the monetization strategy is viewed as greedy and exploitative, severely impacting the user experience.

Black screen issue resolved: A solution has been provided for the black screen issue that some players were experiencing.

Patch notes available: The patch notes have been mentioned, indicating updates or changes made to the game.