Antihero is a turn-based strategy game that trades breadth in scope for depth of its underlying mechanics. As it’s free for Amazon Prime owners for the month of August, you should definitely pick the game up.
Antihero is set in Victorian-era London, where pauperism and crime are running rampant. You play as a “master thief,” gathering resources and allies to take over various parts of town. In the opening hour, the story provides very little depth, but provides a dark backdrop for the actual gameplay.
There’s plenty of depth within the gameplay itself, however. You must complete a certain number of tasks before your opponent, which include getting a bribery, blackmail, or assassination. Briberies require money, blackmail requires you to infiltrate a church, and assassinations involve killing a certain target.
Each new match involves starting a new skill tree from scratch, opening up options for how you want to obtain your objectives. “Skullduggery” advances what allies you can obtain, and advances their abilities, “sneakery” improves your mobility options, and “stabbery” gives you more combat options and improves your strength.
Lanterns and gold, your two resources, are earned either by defeating enemy allies, occupying certain spaces with allies, or receiving them from charity, which skips any other menu advancement. Lanterns progress through the aforementioned skill tree, while gold purchases different allies that can do a large variety of actions to either help you or hinder your opponent.
The story mode provides a variety of challenges on multiple difficulty settings. However, players looking for more can play online with others, or do randomized matches against AI. There’s enough depth here for some players to really get into this aspect, making the game potentially endless.
So How Do You Claim This Game?
In order to claim Antihero, you must have a subscription to Amazon Prime, although you can also sign up for the 30-day free trial and still keep the game, even if your subscription expires. Once you’ve subscribed, link your account to Twitch Prime at twitch.tv for no additional cost. On Twitch, there should now be a crown in the top-right corner. Click it, scroll down until you find Antihero, and voila! You have a free game!
Antihero is one of four free indie games Twitch Prime is giving away this month, with Death Squared, SteamWorld Dig, and Jotun: Valhalla Edition also being available for free at the time of writing. You can only claim these games throughout the month of August, so pick them up soon!
