ANANTA previews: what the press said after playing the TGS 2025 and Gamescom 2026 demos

Mostly impressed, with reservations. Journalists who played ANANTA at Tokyo Game Show 2025 and Gamescom 2026 liked its film-like story missions and busy city, and most noticed how much it borrows from Spider-Man, Uncharted and GTA. The harshest verdict came from GamesRadar+, whose writer decided after an hour that the mix of ideas barely holds together.

Tokyo Game Show 2025: the first public demo

The first playable build appeared at NetEase’s booth in Makuhari in September 2025 (fact in the registry). It ran on PC in two parts: a story mission in Nova City, where the Captain fights a gang and then joins a car chase, and free roam in the city, where you can switch to other characters.

• GamesRadar+ (Alessandro Fillari, September 29, 2025) compared the combat to Batman: Arkham Asylum and the chase’s quick-time finale to Uncharted 4. His favorite part was a delivery in which Taffy hauls a coffin with a vampire inside. The inspirations were so visible that he found them distracting, yet he came away more optimistic.
• AUTOMATON (Akihiro Sakurai, October 4, 2025) found the fights forgiving, with a wide counter window and strong aim assist. In free roam he swung through the air as the Captain, then switched to Taffy, whose trip to the cinema started an actual animated film, and to Richie, who questions passersby. His verdict: few new systems, but a huge amount of content, all pleasant to play.
• Famitsu (September 25, 2025) got about 30 minutes, five of them in the open city. The writer liked how much each character can do and the Tokyo-like streets, found blocking and dodging lenient, and ended wanting more time.

Gamescom 2026: a new demo in Chongxiao

A year later in Cologne NetEase brought a new section set in Chongxiao, the second map. In the story part you play Wei Yinglong, a young woman escaping masked men; in the exploration part you wander Longqi Village, a tea village with festival stalls. The Captain doesn’t appear in it. Some outlets also replayed the Tokyo mission, so not everyone played the same build.

• Denfaminicogamer (August 27) enjoyed a tea-roasting mini-game and passersby crowding into a selfie, but found swinging, parkour and kung fu far more limited than in the Tokyo demo; the build felt like a tour of the new map.
• AUTOMATON WEST (Takayuki Sawahata, August 28) compared the story section to Uncharted and praised how cutscenes flow into play. Villagers, robots and farmers all go about their day. His one worry is whether that quality can last through updates every few months. “At this stage, it’s truly an impressive game,” he wrote.
• GAME Watch (August 28) played about 30 minutes on PC with a gamepad. The writer climbed into strangers’ cars, read the messages on a passerby’s dropped phone and turned the clock to sunset from the heroine’s phone. A ring toss with no aiming guide proved hard; the doubts concern the PS5 and phone versions.
• Famitsu (August 29) called the stealth simple but tense, with quick retries, and listed a ring toss, a shooting gallery, hand-roasted tea and a three-wheeled truck to drive.
• IGN China (August 30) had about 40 minutes: 15 of them in the Tokyo mission, plus a Chongxiao section it couldn’t describe. The fights reminded the writer of Like a Dragon and Marvel’s Spider-Man, the difficulty felt low, and 40 minutes revealed neither the core loop nor the map structure.
• AXYO (September 4) also played about 40 minutes on PC: the Captain’s fight and a chase with arcade drifting (ANANTA vehicles), two minutes of swinging, at first less intuitive than in Spider-Man, then Yinglong’s escape. He regretted seeing so little open world.
• GamesRadar+ (Ali Jones, September 6) played for about an hour: the Captain’s fight and chase, free roam as a police officer who breathalyzes and detains passersby, then the stealth escape and a countryside fair. He found the driving and shooting solid but the two halves unconnected, and wrote that Ananta “barely holds together anything resembling its own identity.” He doubts players will stay.
• Game8 (September 8) played two excerpts at a press demo in August without a single fight and found the story gripping anyway; the festival mini-games were easy to learn and hard to put down.
• MMORPG.com (Luis Gutierrez, September 9) played Yinglong’s story, surreal enough to remind him of Remedy’s games, and an open-world sandbox like GTA Online, meant for friends but played alone (NetEase says multiplayer is still in development: ANANTA multiplayer). Taffy’s kit bored him; arresting people as Richie was the best part. His summary: “Ananta is very anime. But that’s a big part of its charm.”

What previews agree on

Our assessment, based on the twelve previews above:

• The story missions are staged like a film. Uncharted comes up at GamesRadar+, AUTOMATON WEST and IGN China, and Game8 and AUTOMATON describe cutscenes that turn into play without a break.
• The mechanics are familiar. Swinging is compared to Spider-Man, the fights to Arkham and Like a Dragon, character switching to GTA 5 and the sandbox to GTA Online. Nobody claims ANANTA invented them.
• Combat is easy, say AUTOMATON, Famitsu and IGN China, though a show-floor demo may be tuned down.
• The demos were too short. Missions, progression and the open world could barely be tried, and none of the previews we read shows the fame system at work, though it drives progression.

What they disagree on

• Whether the borrowing matters. AUTOMATON found few new systems but enjoyed how well the familiar ones are made; Alessandro Fillari of GamesRadar+ found the influences distracting, and his colleague Ali Jones sees little identity left.
• Whether the parts fit. GamesRadar+ saw no connection between the city and the countryside halves, while AXYO and MMORPG.com liked the swings from comedy to menace.
• Which characters work. Taffy’s delivery was the best moment of the Tokyo demo for GamesRadar+, while MMORPG.com found her dull. Police work as Richie worried GamesRadar+ in 2025 and was the most fun for MMORPG.com in 2026.
• What to worry about. GAME Watch, AXYO and IGN China ask how the game will hold up on phones (ANANTA on iOS and Android), AUTOMATON WEST asks whether the quality can last through updates, and GamesRadar+ asks whether players will stay.

Our assessment: the split comes down to expectations. If you want a free game that does known things well, the previews are encouraging; if you want something new, the harshest one is the more useful read. How ANANTA compares with its closest rivals is in ANANTA vs GTA 6 and ANANTA vs Neverness to Everness; the activities glimpsed in the demos are in what to do in ANANTA.

What the previews couldn’t test

Every preview that names a platform was played on PC, so nobody has reported on the PS5 or phone versions. NetEase hasn’t announced a public beta before launch (fact in the registry), and the full game hasn’t been reviewed: ANANTA launches on January 15, 2027 on PC, PS5, iOS and Android (fact in the registry).