Ananta Gameplay

What kind of game is Ananta?

ANANTA is a free-to-play urban open-world action RPG. You play the newly appointed Captain of the A.C.D. — the Anti-Chaos Directorate — a task force dealing with supernatural incidents inside a modern, anime-styled city. Your job is to rebuild that team from almost nothing while the city keeps producing problems.

The official pitch is "Go Viral. Save the World." That is not flavour text: social reach is a progression system. You build a following through what you do in the city, and that following converts into resources, access and perks. It is the loop that separates ANANTA from a standard open-world checklist.

Structurally the closest comparisons are open-world city games, but with two differences that matter: every playable character is free (see the gacha guide), and the city is designed around daily life rather than only around crimes and combat.

How does combat work?

Combat is built on a deliberately small input set. The core is two buttons — attack and block/counter — with contextual finishers layered on top. Enemies carry both a health bar and a stamina bar; when you break their stamina, a finisher becomes available, and those finishers use whatever is nearby.

The defining feature is environmental combat. Producer Ash Qi has described the influence as Hong Kong action cinema and Jackie Chan: anything in the world can become a weapon. Trash cans, golf clubs, guitars, chairs, cleavers, chainsaws and cars are all usable, and you can disarm enemies and keep fighting with their weapons. A GTA-style weapon wheel covers conventional firearms — pistols, assault rifles, snipers, flamethrowers, grenade launchers and RPGs — so melee and guns coexist rather than one replacing the other.

The control scheme observed at Tokyo Game Show 2025 on PS5: R1 attacks, L1 blocks and counters, R1 + X vaults and functions as a parry, and a thumbstick click triggers a contextual finisher on a stunned enemy.

The open question the community keeps raising is depth over time: whether two core inputs sustain long-term variety, or whether environmental improvisation carries it. That cannot be answered from trailers alone.

How does movement work?

Movement is the most consistently praised part of the game in hands-on coverage. The design rule is "anywhere in sight" — if you can see it, you can get to it.

• Parkour and wall-climbing across a city built in three vertical layers: rooftops, mid-levels and ground floors.
• Grapple-swinging between buildings, in the Spider-Man idiom.
• No stamina bar capping sprint, climb or swim. Swimming is uncapped, which is unusual and removes a common open-world annoyance.
• Vehicles with physics: cars, motorcycles, and reportedly helicopters and yachts.
• Public transit — subway and bus — as an in-world travel option rather than a fast-travel menu.

The absence of a stamina bar is a real design statement. It says traversal is meant to be the fun part rather than a resource to manage.

What is there to do besides fighting?

This is the area ANANTA is betting most heavily on, and the area with the least public verification. Officially listed activities include cinemas, mahjong parlours, arcades, cat cafés, gyms, restaurants and clothing stores, plus basketball, claw machines, darts, photography and home decoration in a player residence. There is also an in-game social media app.

The claim from NetEase is that anything you can see should be something you can interact with, backed by a 24/7 NPC routine cycle and dynamic traffic. Whether these activities form a repeatable daily loop or are one-off set pieces is the single most important unanswered question about the game.

Identity system: living different lives

You are not locked into one role. The game frames progression through identities — an NCCA officer, a hacker, a delivery rider, a content creator — and each has its own progression path. Concretely: Richie levels by issuing tickets and making arrests; Taffy levels by completing deliveries. That is a day-job system, not a class system, and it is the mechanism that makes switching characters feel like switching gameplay rather than just switching a model.

Switching is seamless and happens mid-mission, not only at hubs. See the characters index for who is confirmed playable.

The two cities

Nova City is the primary setting — a dense metropolis drawing on Tokyo, Shanghai and Hangzhou. Chongxiao, and within it Lingyun City, is the second city, revealed in the story trailer that accompanied the August 2026 release-date announcement. Chongxiao is the more traditionally Chinese-styled of the two.

Having two substantial cities at launch rather than one starter map is a significant scope claim. It also raises the same question as everything else here: how much of it is densely interactive, and how much is space to move through.

FAQ

Is Ananta open world?

Yes. Two cities ship at launch, with free traversal across rooftops, mid-levels and streets, plus vehicles and public transit.

Is Ananta a fighting game or a shooter?

Neither. It is an action RPG with martial arts at its core, improvised environmental weapons, and a secondary weapon wheel for firearms.

How many characters can you play?

Four are confirmed playable at launch: the Captain, Taffy, Richie and Seymour. See the characters index.

Does Ananta have a stamina bar?

No. Sprinting, climbing and swimming are uncapped. Enemies have a stamina bar that governs finishers, but the player does not.

Is there a day-night cycle?

A 24/7 NPC routine cycle is confirmed. The full implications for mission availability are to be confirmed.