Can Anipods be earned for free?

So a free account has two taps rather than one. Ordinary reward payouts come in at whatever pace you play, and events add on top of that. Nothing in the supply chain is held behind a purchase, which means the question for a free player is how often you play, not how much you spend.

That pattern holds across the rest of the economy too. Tumblers come free from the battle pass, quests, exploration, chests and training. Glimmer comes from quests, daily tasks, events, elite training, boss battles, chests, puzzles, branch activities, the battle pass and the Holo Battle Simulator, and of that list the daily tasks and events are the efficient ones to farm. Build the habit around dailies and whatever event is live and you are feeding several currencies at once.

Where money actually enters the game

The paid layer you will meet first is the Companion Handbook, also called the Companion Guide. It is Aniimo's seasonal battle pass and it runs on two tracks. The standard edition gives you the free top track. The Advanced edition costs $10 and unlocks both tracks for bonus rewards. Rewards on it unlock gradually as you earn battle pass experience, and they cover cosmetics, journey-assisting items and one unique Aniimo form.

The free track is not a token gesture either, since the battle pass is one of the listed sources for both Tumblers and Glimmer. On top of that, every player gets a rare Prismana Aniimo as a launch reward, no purchase attached.

Not settled: No rate is fixed anywhere: there is no set number of Anipods per event or per day, so how quickly a free account builds a stock depends on which events are running while you play.