When it came to light last week that the holiday season decorations for Anthem were still in place, many took it as evidence that BioWare had abandoned the bombastic multiplayer shooter altogether. In fact, it was intentional: the studio announced in January that it was extending the holiday event through February and adding two new Icetide armor sets; while it is not normal to carry over a 2019 seasonal event until February 2020, BioWare backed away from the project This was not a signal that some would take as a sign that.

BioWare revisited Anthem's future in an update posted today, in which general manager Casey Hudson confirmed that a major overhaul, first rumored for November 2019, is indeed underway. But that is still some way off.

"Over the past year, the team has worked hard to improve stability, performance, and general quality of life while delivering three seasons of new content and new features. We have also received feedback that "Anthem" needs a more satisfying loot experience, longer lasting progression, and a more fulfilling end game. As such, we recognize that fundamental work still needs to be done to maximize the potential of this experience, and that it will require more substantive reforms than updates and expansions," Hudson wrote.

"In the coming months, we will focus on a long-term redesign of the experience, specifically reinventing the core gameplay loop with clear goals, motivating challenges, and progression with meaningful rewards, while maintaining the fun of flying and fighting in a vast science fantasy setting. We will work to do this. And to do it right, we will do what we wanted to do more of in the beginning: give focused teams time to test and iterate and focus on gameplay first.

In the meantime, Anthem in its current state will continue to operate with events, store updates, and "past seasonal and cataclysmic content." However, the Seasonal Updates, which replaced the "act" structure last fall, will apparently be discontinued.

What I find particularly interesting is Hudson's suggestion that the development team has not had the opportunity to test "Anthem" as much as they would have liked; BioWare said in early 2019, ahead of Anthem's launch, that the public demo "exceeded our expectations," which were focused essentially on technical behavior - stability and performance - rather than gameplay. A closed test a month before that demo did not go so well, and Tim said (very prophetically, as it turned out), "I've always been concerned that BioWare is not a combat specialist.

While it is unclear how long the Anthem overhaul will take, with only a vague "next few months," it is clear that it will be a long-term project, and it would not be surprising if this is the last we hear of it for a while as BioWare gets down to business. According to Hudson, the current in-game update for Anthem will take place later this month to celebrate the first anniversary of its release.