Anomaly Agent

Anomaly Agent, a cyberpunk themed 2D action-adventure game developed by Enis Kirazoğlu, a prominent figure in the Turkish gaming community, and his team Phew Phew Games, was released on January 24th. Art design, atmosphere and musics of Anomaly Agent draw attention at the first sight.

Anomaly Agent was released on Steam and Xbox platforms as of January 24, 2024 (January 25 for Nintendo Switch). It appears that Phew Phew Games has listened the feedback provided by players following the release of the demo version on October 10th. While Anomaly Agent has gathered many compliments, it has some flaws that should be addressed. Let’s delve into the general features of Anomaly Agent and its potential to stand out in a competitive gaming landscape within its genre.

Anomalies’ nightmare, Agent 70

In Anomaly Agent, we manage a very charismatic character called Agent 70, who attracts attention with his white clothes. Agent 70 is a member of company which was established to destroy enemies named Anomalies. I will not delve into the story of the game in depth in order to avoid spoilers, yet it is worthy to mention it simply. Firstly, the humorous tone of the game in general was fun and amusing. Reading conversations with entertaining dialogues is really enjoyable.

I particularly enjoyed bickering with enemies and even breaking their heart with dialogue choices was a very entertaining element for me. The story, however, remains a little simplistic. The development team did not delve too deeply into the story, preferring a flat flow on paper. Of course, personal preferences vary, but I find myself drawn to narratives that offer a bit more depth.

Dialogues are not only a element of narrative but also they affect the gameplay. As an outcome of some dialogues we earn symbols of happiness and unhappiness. Happiness symbols can be used for health, and unhappiness symbols can be transferred into money. This feature makes dialogues more immersive.

graphics and Art Design of Anomaly Agent

Anomaly Agent definitely has visually characteristic boss designs, environmental designs and visual effects. This is where they can stand shoulder to shoulder with other top competitors in the genre, despite being an independent company. Each chapter introduces distinct themes and color palettes which creates a visual appeal and a sense of variety. Meanwhile, each boss appears with a unique visual design contributing the general atmosphere of boss fights. The game’s Cyberpunk world is definitely well represented with its colour palettes and character designs. The game’s visual effects, paired with its music (which we’ll touch upon later), successfully elicit a satisfying sensation with every strike we blow against enemies.

Gameplay of Anomaly Agent

Okay, though we have praised Anomaly Agent with its graphics and art design up to this point, I have to emphasize that there are a few shortcomings in the gameplay part. First of all, the enemy types never increase in quantity throughout the game. Only the weapons they wield or very minimal things change. Apart from that, the fact that standard enemies did not undergo any changes overwhelmed me from time to time.

Also, I could say the same for the abilities that enemies use, most of them enter a loop after a few moves. The same problem occurs in boss fights. Even though bosses are visually very beautifully designed, they do not better than 3 to 4 skill moves in terms of gameplay. Thus, impressiveness of boss fights diminishes quite a lot.

In spite of the cons I have mentioned above, Anomaly Agent has a simple but fun gameplay. Just like a beat’em up game, you don’t think too much about engaging in fights, you dive into the direct action which has definitely been a positive feature for the flow of the game. Extra weapons and abilities we get throughout the game set the stage for varying fight scenes, though enemy types are the same. The combos, various abilities and weapons that our character acquires make fighting scenes really fun to play.

Technical Side and Skills

I have not encountered any game-breaking bugs or FPS drops in Anomaly Agent. I haven’t seen any significant problems, except that our character occasionally stayed off the camera while beating enemies. However it is not considered as a bug, the control scheme of the game troubled me right up to the very end. I believe that control scheme was designed for Nintendo Switch, as the button prompts in the tutorial. However, using a Playstation controller was a huge challenge for me as I struggled to memorize the skills.

As for the abilities and improvements, there could have been some more exciting power-ups here. Usually the upgrades we received were just statistical boosts, such as 10% damage to the weapon, 5% less damage from bullets. Slightly different interesting power-ups could have pushed the player to grind more gold and create different builds in the game.

Synthwave musics

A genre of electronic music influenced by the soundtracks and games of the 1980’s, Synthwave really suits Anomaly Agent right on the spot. Due to the retro color palettes and graphic style of the game, nothing other than Synthwave genre could be considered. The atmospheric music playing in the back really fits the theme of the game. In the same way, during the action, sound effects are designed to make you feel like you are hitting the enemy. Anomaly Agent managed to get full score from the music selections, especially for someone like me who is into retro culture.

How long is Anomaly Agent?

Anomaly Agent, of course, does not keep you on the screen for 800 hours both because it is an indie game and because of the necessity of the genre of the game. I finished the game in about 6-7 hours, this time may decrease or increase by 1-2 hours for different players.

Conclusion

Although Anomaly Agent remains weak in gameplay, I think it can rival the top games of this genre, especially with its art design, atmosphere and musics. However, the shallowness and lack of variety in gameplay bring this game down to a more standard level. Deficiency of enemy diversity and repetition of abilities used by enemies bored me from time to time. I especially think that the characteristic designs of the bosses are wasted in the shallowness of the gameplay. Although our own character tries to increase the variety by getting power-ups throughout the game, I was disappointed that the enemies remained the same and the bossed could not go beyond 2-3 moves.

Though Anomaly Agent does not bring innovation to the genre, I can say that it has been a fun experience to play. I suggest you take a look at Anomaly Agent, a fun action-platform game in which I enjoyed the Synthwave music along with the general retrospective atmosphere.

Many thanks to Phew Phew Games team for helping us to review this game.

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Author: Ege Muslu

Translator: Arda Bahçekapılı

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