Anyone know anything about this game? The reviews I've googled were vague and unhelpful. What kind of mechanics does it use? Where is it on the crunchy/lite scale ( 1 being Risus, 10 being Phoenix Command)? Anyone recommend it/warn me against it? Besides the anime art, why aren't you/wouldn't you play this?

I've played it, but do not own the books. A friend loves the system.

It is a roll high percentile game with a critical/"light" exploding top end.

For crunchiness I'd say that chargen is about and 8 and play doesn't go down. Its complex, and that complexity doesn't make game play more interesting or better. It's just a thing.

It is humanocentric but has certain races who are descended from more supernatural creatures (stand ins for Elves for example, and Giantish race with horns.)

It has numerous "power" systems that all work differently (psychic, summoning, magic. chi powers. religious "boons") and it is very possible to munchkin out the system.

In general I played (and enjoyed) the game, being run by someone who knew the rules well enough, but the multiple and very different powers, the lengthy chargen, and so on make it just too much for me. Then again I like games around a 3-4 at most, with 6 being the highest I usually agree too. (That being Shadowrun 4E, specifically for my 6.)

I wouldn't recommend it. If you like the anime-esque style of art its a beautiful game (I didn't care one way or another in this case for the art, it was just a neutral thing.)

Don't own and haven't read in detail; have purused a friend's copy though. Pretty heavy ruleset, weirdly arbitrary rules (stats are rolled on d10, with a 10 representing incredibly rare once in a generation ability; it has bonus modifiers that only increase occasionally - lots of dead spots - in spite of being d100 +bonuses for rolls, I think. I'd peg it somewhere between Rifts and World of Synnibarr as far as raw game design elegance and system efficiency goes.

It's one of my favorite games.

Mechanics are somewhat based on Rolemaster (d100 roll high, open rolls, a combat table, although just one, success levels for skill checks, powerpoints et al). It's not particularly rules heavy, but it's not very well presented so initial learning curve is a lot steeper than it should be. Plays pretty fast when you're over it, though. I'd say somewhere between Rolemaster 2e and d20 on the crunch side of things.

It's a lot of fun if you want a fantasy game with a lot of character options that is still pretty much old school in the rules design but rooted in more modern aesthetics (including Oriental). The books are really pretty, the setting is detailed and supplements are all useful and a joy to read (if not exactly mandatory). People for whom Rolemaster 2e is too much work should probably stay away, though, or make sure their GM has a very good grip on the system to do the work for them.

A formed player of mine was a fan of Anima, so I've read part of the spanish core (which I didn't finish because I didn't like the setting nor the system).

The base of the system is heavily influenced by Rolemaster, then adding a lot of crunch on top of that for each power set. Just a small peak at the character sheet will let you see how crunchy the game can get.

The setting is Final Fantasy meets the Catholic Church, which may or may not be appealing to you.

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;673206Don't own and haven't read in detail; have purused a friend's copy though. Pretty heavy ruleset, weirdly arbitrary rules (stats are rolled on d10, with a 10 representing incredibly rare once in a generation ability; it has bonus modifiers that only increase occasionally - lots of dead spots - in spite of being d100 +bonuses for rolls, I think. I'd peg it somewhere between Rifts and World of Synnibarr as far as raw game design elegance and system efficiency goes.

10 is not a once in generation, merely a normal human maximum (you can go over that in character generation, putting you in superhuman territory at once, and they can increase up to 20 in play).

Stats have modifiers of +5 every 2 so I wouldn't call it particularly dead (no bonus for 5, +5 for 6-7, +10 for 8-9 and +15 for 10). Those add to d100 for appropriate things like in RM or d20.

edit in response to Maese

Character sheets are awful, though. Wow, I wouldn't blame you if you swear off the game after seeing one. If it helps, you only need to fill about half of it for any given character, depending on their type (it shouldn't).

I own it but have never played it. My daughter wanted to play it, but I found the rules inpenetrable. As I am someone who enjoys rules rich games like Spycraft 2.0 and fully tooled out Hero system, that should scare you.

I like Anima quite a bit (even wrote a demo scenario with rules hack for it) but what good ideas it has are buried under some appalling writing and structure. Most of the complexity is in PC creation but due to lots of exceptions and poor writing, that complexity feels like it continues in play.

If I would sum it up, it feels like BESM 3e written in the style of AD&D1e, with all the good and bad that entails.

Its sorta a ripped of form of Rolemaster system to some extent.

As I like to describe it, it's sort of like Rolemaster if ICE crew was into Final Fantasy at the time of developing it in instead of Tolkien.

The system is very "meh". Silverlion is right -- it's about an 8 on the complexity scale, but you don't actually get anything(other than maybe a headache) from that added complexity. And like many overly complex systems, there are ways to totally screw yourself over in character generation and advancement if you don't know exactly what you're doing(trap options, yay!), and there are ways to totally game the system if you do(I've heard Psionics is the most exploitable of the sub-systems, fwiw). It very much continues the great RPG game tradition of people who aren't as good at maths as they think they are making something a good bit more complex than they're capable of dealing with, yet not so much so that it becomes unplayable. Just . . . wonky, with trap options and exploits galore.

As far as the setting goes, there are some things to seriously love about this setting. Some of the organizations are neat, the various human sub-races(human bodies hosting the reincarnated spirits of the actual non-human races that don't live in Gaea anymore due to a magical world separation thing a long time ago), the fact that there are tons of potentially world-changing ancient things sitting around, from dormant superweapons to entire hidden cities full of strange creatures and wondrous machines and magical items and the such.

That said, there are things to hate. You know all those cool Psionic powers, magic spells, chi powers, summonings, etc. that your characters can have? In most of the setting, unless you're working for a special branch of the church, that stuff is . . . FUCKING ILLEGAL. I'm not even joking. There are some farthest corners of the world that are supposedly not under direct church authority, but by default the church is the main power structure in the entire setting, with authority in the vast majority of Gaea, and they expect us to play in a setting where normal use of one's powers will likely get you arrested or worse. Um, yaaaaaay.

It's not so much Catholic Church meets Final Fantasy, as Maese said. It's more Catholic Church vs. Final Fantasy. Like I said, it's got cool bits, but it's a disjointed mess of a setting that really needed to be ironed out before being released.

Quote from: Maese Mateo;673216The setting is Final Fantasy meets the Catholic Church, which may or may not be appealing to you.

LoliNuns?

Quote from: GeekEclectic;673408It's more Catholic Church vs. Final Fantasy.

Naughty Inquisitorial Nuns and Anime Witches?

Ok, seriously though.

How does this compare with Anima Tactics? Are the stats similar?  Is there come kind of conversion in case you wanted to move a character from one to the other?

Quote from: CRKrueger;673418How does this compare with Anima Tactics? Are the stats similar?  Is there come kind of conversion in case you wanted to move a character from one to the other?

It doesn't. There is some pretty rough conversion rules in the Anima Tactics rulebook IIRC