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The year is 2018. Two alien spaceships, mistaken for meteors, collide with Earth - hitting Baghdad and Tokyo, causing massive casualties and creating powerful, almost impenetrable, energy fields around these cities. The armed forces, namely “Platoon 14”, are commissioned to take action against the invaders.
So begins Anomaly: Warzone Earth by 11 Bit Studios. You are a squad leader, guiding a convoy of armored vehicles through ruined, war-torn streets while battling visitors from outer space. We’re talking about a “tower defence in reverse” game, primarily targeted for mobile gamers on the Android platform. This aside, the most compelling feature is the natural balance between strategic planning and ruthless fighting, compounded by the possibility of avoiding meaningless fights altogether. There is no obligation to follow a given route as a means to an end, since you create your own instead.
Gameplay & Features
Acting as something like a co-ordinator, you can distract the enemy with smoke, divert their firing using dummy targets, and heal your units. You don’t directly fire at enemy turrets: members of your convoy (APCs, missile launchers, force-field generators and so on) can take care of them. Once you have enough resources, these war machines can be upgraded, multiple times if necessary, to increase their firepower and durability.
Convoy units must be taken care of, and the same weight should be given to route planning. Some turrets, such as “Behemoths”, can be difficult to beat if you confront them head-on, but present only a minor threat if you attack them from the side. Some distractions work better than others against certain types of turrets: you just have to try them to figure it out! There is also the order of your vehicles, which greatly determines how swiftly you can inflict critical damage. The downside for putting all firepower up front is that these vehicles don’t hold very good defensive capabilities, and are possibly wiped out in a matter of seconds.
I’m a big fan of computer usability and especially keyboarding. I was intrigued when I discovered that Anomaly is fully playable using only simple controls on the keyboard. In addition, the game requires no training to get started. This is something the majority of today’s games don’t have; here it is well thought out.
How to get it
Anomaly: Warzone Earth was originally released in February 2011, and re-released as a part of the Humble Bundle for Android on February 1st, 2012. As usual, the bundle included Linux, Mac, and Windows ports, as well as three other games. As of February 2nd, the list price in the Android market (for the Android version only) is 3 euros. The game is also available on Steam for Mac and Windows for 10 euros, but, unfortunately, I saw no mention of Linux there.
I tested Anomaly on Ubuntu 11.10 (32-bit; 2.7 GHz core i7, 8GB DDR 3, Radeon 6470 1 GB, 128 GB SSD). With medium specs and the highest resolution, there were no problems at all. Installation was trivial with the Debian dpkg command:
sudo dpkg -i package_name.deb
Conclusions
Anomaly is one of the best out there in its genre. Graphics are very good, gameplay is solid, and the music fits the theme. However, there could be more enemy types, and perhaps scenarios with a little more freedom than just simple routes. I know this is a lot to ask, especially because the price was a bargain when put in comparison with the quality.