Anthem

19. February 2025 /
  • Information
  • Original Soundtrack
  • Original Soundtrack

Year: 2019

Type: Original Soundtrack (OST)

Composer(s): Sarah Schachner

Number of tracks: 23

Rating

★★★★★

Mournful anthem

There was a time in video game history when you could buy games from the Canadian development studio BioWare without hesitation. With Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age: Origins and, last but not least, Mass Effect the role-playing game veterans had proven that they could deliver quality until the early 2010s.

However, the flawless reputation began to crack: While good games such as Star Wars: The Old Republic and less good games (Mass Effect 3, Dragon Age II) were still successful, the decline became clear with Dragon Age: Inquistion and Mass Effect: Andromeda, at the latest. The game developer was heading in the wrong direction. Whether this was due to publisher Electronic Arts or the departure of creative minds from the team is difficult to say from the outside.

The final nail in the coffin was Anthem, released in 2019, which, with a Metascore of 59 and a user score of 4.0/10, represents the sad low point of the developer's list of releases. This deplorable picture is only undercut by the 3.9 user score for Dragon Age: The Veilguard, which at least came off comparatively well in the critics' eyes with a score of 82.

What went wrong? Well, what didn't? Poor marketing with false promises, the insistence on an unsuitable engine and a fixed release date meant that an unfinished game was thrown onto the market. As a result, Anthem was unable to deliver on its bold promises and was dropped a short time later despite its game-as-a-service model. Or to put it another way: Anthem did the Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, before it was cool.

This is more than deplorable, because in both cases there was a lot of potential in the premise. The flying in the Iron Man-style mech suit in particular looked stylish and fun, and the idea of playing the bad guys in Suicide Squad wasn't wrong either. In both cases, however, a superimposed game idea and payment model was to blame for an underdeveloped premise. Alright, I'll stop ranting about games I haven't played myself and talk about nicer things like the soundtrack.

I already knew Sarah Schachner, who is responsible for the 23 tracks of the OST, from her excellent work for Assassin’s Creed Unity (2014) and Assassin’s Creed Origins (2017) as well as the later Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (2020) and a few of the more recent entries in the Call of Duty series. Her style, which is particularly characterized by dominant strings and an implied vastness in her composition, can also be found in the quieter pieces of Anthem.

Unlike their other works, however, this score is somewhat more 'generic' ... but at a high level. The spherical chorales, which are almost expected for a sci-fi adventure, give tracks such as Legion of Dawn or The Chimera a certain Halo-flair. In contrast, action tracks such as The Freelancers, Strong Alone, Stronger Together and The Monitor are songs that mimic the drama of the Marvel-films, especially the Iron Man-score - how fitting. Into the Heart of Rage meanwhile exudes a subtle Dragon Age: Inquisition-charm.

Meanwhile, Schachner lets her mysterious, cello-centered side shine through in pieces like Ancient Mysteries or The Fall of Freemark which bring back pleasant memories of her fantastic work for Assassin’s Creed Origins . The faster, more dramatic combat pieces (The Titan, Outlaw Ambush, In the Shadow of the Gods), however, seem a little more off the peg and hint at a relationship to the Call of Duty-series. This is not a bad thing in that well-placed in-your-face music can work thanks to its simplicity, and in the case of Anthem's soundtrack, it interrupts quieter passages such as The Freelancers or Haluk’s Wisdom.

My highlight - which all readers of this review have of course been waiting for - is Valor a representative of the action tracks. Here, Schachner combines the synth influences that gave Origins its mystical strangeness with fanfares. From this overture, the track marches proudly into a heroic epic of the Overwatch-brand. But Valor remains wild, unconquered by the didgeridoo, before the horns once again call for heroic action.

And that says almost everything about the score. Even though Anthem was originally supposed to be supplied with content (and therefore also music) for a long time, nothing more came of it. In fact, according to the Anthem–fan wiki there is still music that does not appear in the OST. However, these are five tracks by Ted Reedy (called “Dylan” here), which he composed in 2017 for the first official gameplay. Nobody knows why Schachner and not him was later recruited for the score, despite her building on his motif.

I couldn't find the tracks in question, but during my research I came across this behind-the-scenes video showing the process of creating the game's sound effects. It has nothing to do with the music, but it's still cool. So: thumbs up for the score, thumbs down for the game and a big middle finger for this timeline in which great studios like BioWare are forced to produce garbage and not what once made them great.

  • Original Soundtrack
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