Now, it’s fair to say that Anthem didn’t quite set the gaming world alight on launch. One of the biggest releases of early 2019, the troubled title arrived with a wave of issues, but the game just has so much going for it, so much potential.

Fans are, quite rightly, expressing their concerns as only the internet knows how. At the same time, though, as long as the developers are committed to standing by Anthem and improving on it, so should the players.

There’s so much more to this action RPG than the shallow, flashy action you might be expecting. If you haven’t given it a fair shake, why not take a look at this mini-guide to the in-depth combo system, complexities of gear mechanics and other features you may not have known about.

10 10. Incredible Combos (If You Master The Combat Mechanics)

Combat in Anthem may look a little simplistic. It’s flashy and futuristic, with dazzling light effects going off all over the darn place. Enemies and allies dart around the screen like a swarm of confused wasps, and it’s tough to make out what’s what, who’s who or what day it is.

That’s an unfair assessment, though. Combat is certainly busy around here, but there’s method to the madness. It’s all surprisingly strategic for an action game, as you’ll discover if you persevere and get to know how the mechanics work. Battles are based around performing stylish and intricate combos, governed by the use of Primers and Detonators. Let’s take a look at how this system works.

9 9. Strategically Combine Primers And Detonators To Devastating Effect

Let’s dive into the nitty-gritty of performing combos. As with a lot of the best mechanics in games, the system is simple enough to understand, but deep enough to lend a fair degree of strategy to the game.

Primers are the first type of ability you’ll need to use on opponents to perform combos. A circle icon by the ability’s name on the menu denotes a Primer, and they’re used to ‘apply’ elemental effects to enemies. As PC Gamer reports, you’ll see a tell-tale effect around opponents that have been ‘primed’ successfully (an icy aura, for instance), which is your cue to really ruin their day with a Detonator.

A star-shaped icon indicates that an ability is a Detonator, and when you hit a Primed opponent with one, it’s devastating. That’s a successful combo in action, friends. Keep Primers and Detonators in mind as you build your loadouts.

8 8. You Can Find BioWare’s Famed Storytelling… If You Know Where To Look

As we all know, the FPS genre has become a bigger and bigger deal in gaming of late. Titles like Call of Duty have lead many to believe that flashy action over storytelling is the way forward these days.

This is another thing that Anthem players have found objectionable. For a BioWare title, there’s a notable lack of excessive talk and endless dialogue options. Dragon Age and Mass Effect fans are not going to take kindly to that.

In among all the flashy action, however, there is a huge amount of worldbuilding and lore to be found. It’s just hidden away in the menus. All you have to do is open up your codex/in-game emails and you’ll find a great glut of materials for the lore-curious. Many Anthem players have made it through tens of hours of the game without even knowing these documents existed.

7 7. Get The Very Best From Your Loadout

Or, rather, learn to read some obscure little symbols that the game doesn’t trouble to explain to you. This is a major shortcoming of Anthem all around, as we saw with the combo system: it’s just all so inscrutable. A more in-depth tutorial would not have gone amiss.

Anyway, there’s another pair of little symbols in the gear menus that players are going to need to understand. Next to the listed bonus for each piece, you’ll see either an icon that looks like a person or an icon that looks like a gear.

The former means that said bonus is a general one that applies to your character, while a gear symbol means that the bonus applies only to that specific piece (for instance, your main weapon may get the listed damage increase, but your secondary weapon will not).

6 6. Play Your Own Way

As we reported over on Screen Rant, the Javelins of Anthem serve as the game’s class system. You’d probably expect these to work in the usual way: a heavily-armored but super slow Javelin, one that’s super fast and agile but will crumple if an enemy so much as looks at it funny, one that’s more of an all-rounder… to an extent, that may be the case, but things aren’t as restrictive as all that.

The hulking Colossus may be the go-to for many Anthem players who enjoy taking the tank route, but other Javelins can be just as effective there. The nimble and vulnerable Interceptor has an ultimate that allows it to briefly negate damage taken, which can be a huge boon to you and your team.

Against all conventional gaming logic, they can be fantastic tanks too.

5 5. Make The Flight Feel As Satisfying As It Looks

On to item #13,304 on players’ list of Anthem gripes: the whole flight thing just seems much more restrictive than it should be. Those exosuits overheat frighteningly fast, don’t they? Not to mention the fact that an invisible ceiling prevents you from really getting any major altitude.

As it turns out, though, these systems are the way they are by design, and you can circumvent them to a certain extent. The key to the overheating issue is ‘skimming’ across the surface of water, which will keep that darn bar nice and low while you zip around. It’s another advanced technique that Anthem doesn’t bother to mention, and it’s a real lifesaver.

4 4. Forge Deep Relationships

As we’ve already established, Anthem is a title that’s fundamentally quite different to BioWare’s other offerings. For the most part, it’s all about high-octane, flashy action; a world apart from slower-paced story-driven franchises like Dragon Age.

No, there aren’t any romance options just now, but you can still develop meaningful relationships with the various NPCs of Anthem. The many denizens of Fort Tarsis have worries, wants, and needs, which you can gradually delve into and help them get to the bottom of. It’s quite reminiscent of Persona or The Caligula Effect in that sense.

You can also forge close friendships with those you meet out in the field. This isn’t just an action game, friends.

3 3. Learn More About The Anthem World Through Agent Contracts

So, yes. If you’re one of those players who likes to delve into the lore of their games, soaking up every last morsel of the world that the developers lovingly created, you’ve probably wasted no time at all reading all of those in-game emails and other documents.

There’s a whole wealth of information available there, for sure. It’s not the only place you’ll find some sweet, sweet story hiding out, though. You may have dismissed the Agent Contracts as simple side mission filler, but they’re quite cleverly integrated with the story too.

Later in the game, in particular, you’ll want to be sure you’re paying attention to these.

2 2. Charge Your Ultimate Super Quickly

If you’ve ever played… just about anything online, you’ll have noticed that good co-operation and team play is a difficult thing to find. A squad of friends is one thing, but random online matchmaking will often end in disaster.

Everyone tends to be out for themselves. In Anthem, however, co-operative play is key, especially if you want quick access to your Javelin’s super-powerful ultimates. While they recharge quite quickly as you simply defeat enemies, reviving your allies and helping them take down their slavering foes gives you a much bigger boost. There are also rare pieces of equipment that can reduce the cooldown speed of your ultimate.

1 1. Exploit Elemental Weaknesses Of Enemies

Here’s another interesting facet of Anthem’s combat. We’ve already seen how the two-step Primer and Detonator process works. Essentially, you simply hit an opponent with an elemental effect and then activate that element to deal huge damage. how does the player know which elemental effects to choose for which enemy, though?

As SVG reports, there’s a surprising amount of depth there too. Fire attacks, for instance, deal damage over time, and are excellent against standard enemies (look out for the red health bar). Fire won’t be much help against opponents with energy shields (blue health bar), however, which is where electric attacks shine.

Acid attacks, predictably, eat through standard shields, making them perfect to employ against those pesky enemies with yellow health bars. It’s all about adapting on the fly and ensuring that you and your team can handle everything being thrown at them.