Join me on a violent journey via the English countryside, AKA: 90 minutes with Atomfall, the brand new survival-action game from Sniper Elite developer, Rebellion. I not too long ago visited a pub in North London to have a pint and some hands-on playtime, and got here away intrigued by Atomfall’s open-ended method to mission design and eerie tone. I additionally could have misplaced my thoughts and determined to assault everybody I noticed, together with an outdated woman who probably didn’t deserve it, with a cricket bat. Let me clarify why.
Every NPC in Atomfall may be killed, from the lowliest grunt to probably the most important quest-giver. As I sit down to start out the demo, I resolve that my mission is to check that design. I’ll admit that my method is inelegant; barely two minutes into my exploration of this digital Cumbria, I clumsily activate a tripwire alarm that outcomes in me having to finish the lives of three alerted guards. I accomplish that with the blunt face of a cricket bat, a hefty chunk of wooden that’s Christened as my homicide companion with a liberal splash of claret.
I later loot a bow and arrow, and being the glutton for archery in video games that I am, I shortly equip it. Now I’m set for long and short-range encounters, and so can let Mr. Cricket Bat take a well-earned relaxation. Nearby, I spot a hulking wicker man, towering over me and ready to be set alight. I'm not going close to that. I've seen how that story ends. Sights like this nod to the people horror undertones that function the bedrock for this area of Atomfall's segmented world, which is made up of a number of “open zones”. It generates a convincingly uneasy environment that solely feeds into the bigger thriller I’m making an attempt to crack: what precisely occurred right here in this sleepy, now irradiated nook of England?
My ideas about such a thriller are interrupted by a rabble of druids, who presumably have one thing to do with that wicker man. They show the right vary finders for my newly-acquired bow. One. Two. Three. They all fall down. "I'M ROBIN BLOODY HOOD", my mind shouts to itself, earlier than I snap out of it and back into my London pub environment. I haven’t had a drink but, I promise. It’s solely 10am.
The bow feels good to fireplace. But I’m more in Atomfall’s good method to stamina. A standard depleting and regenerating bar is nowhere to be discovered, as an alternative changed by a coronary heart fee monitor that will increase the more you carry out bodily taxing actions. Sprinting for an prolonged period will push you nicely over 140 bpm, for instance, making it more durable so that you can purpose steadily and precisely when you abruptly must stop and fight. Later, I discover a Bow Mastery ability guide that unlocks a perk that negates the impression a heightened heartbeat has on drawing the bowstring back. It’s not precisely probably the most thrilling perk, and a flick thru the menus suggests Atomfall doesn’t boast probably the most advanced ability tree suite. However, it does appear malleable enough to tailor your character’s abilities to a gameplay fashion of your selecting if, for instance, you’d choose to specialise in stealth over gunplay.
With my solely achievement thus far being a bunch of useless druids, you could rightfully be questioning what my general goal is right here. And, to an extent, so was I. Aimless exploration of the Casterfall Woods area had but to unearth something important, so I comply with my solely quest lead: a be aware pointing me in the route of a herbalist, Mother Jago, who lives close to an outdated mine. Along the best way I spot allusions to the larger story at play, as a shimmering, oily swirl of blues and purples hovers over a energy plant – the obvious trigger of Britain's descent into the post-apocalypse. Nearby, a cellphone field rings and a creepy voice warns me to remain out of the woods. It’s too late for that, however thanks for the call anyway.
The path is plagued by related small environmental story touches, reminiscent of an outdated boathouse rigged with an unsettling alarm system, the phrases “get lost” painted throughout it – a warning the close by mound of skulls and bones seemingly didn’t heed. There’s an enjoyably uneasy vibe round each nook of Atomfall, with sleepy, leafy forests giving approach to creepy zones of terror. Plenty of Fallout comparisons have been made ever since its reveal, however I assume Stalker and its latest sequel is a far more apt touchstone, each in phrases of tone and game design.
Following one other druid bloodbath in which I butcher them and loot their backyard middle home for herbs (a quick-thyme occasion, if you’ll) I meet Mother Jago at her quaint allotment retreat. Dressed in a plum-coloured coat and animal cranium and rose-laden hat, she resembles Angela Lansbury if she’d bought large into black magic aromatherapy as an alternative of crime fixing. But my hopes that she may make Atomfall’s opaque thriller any clearer are instantly dashed – she provides solely obscure solutions to my questions, regardless of exhausting each dialogue option as I dig for clues as to the place to go subsequent. This jogs my memory of traditional point-and-click adventures in the best way you’re inspired to discover each nook of dialog in search of a trace. Eventually, a door is opened: Jago provides what she guarantees to be precious info in exchange for the secure return of her herbalism guide. A guide that’s, of course, not in a library, however held hostage on the druids’ fortified fort. So, with a new lead in my pocket book, I traipse back throughout the map in search of recipes and the druid blood defending it.
Atomfall’s freeform design means I’m capable of method from any angle, and so I resolve to assault the fort from the facet. As I make my means there I encounter a druid patrol close to an deserted petrol station. The certainly soon-to-be-considered historic Battle of the Forecourt kicks off as I lob my solely grenade into the center of them. The enemy AI isn’t probably the most reactive, not often darting for canopy or actually partaking in any evasive maneuvers, however the satisfying eruption of blood and bits of bone does alert a couple of archers from additional down the highway. I put a halt to their advance with a nail bomb and then proceed to slalom their arrows, shortly closing the gap in order that I can snap one’s neck earlier than getting my trusty bat out for one more spherical of head-smashing. There’s undoubtedly enjoyable available taking part in round with these enemies, however from the small pattern I’ve had thus far, I wouldn’t go into Atomfall in search of top-tier fight. Instead, it appears clever to deal with enemy encounters more like a enjoyable sideshow to the primary occasion of discovering the world’s secrets and techniques.
After sniping a couple of axe-wielding brutes I make it inside the fort’s outer partitions. There I stumble throughout a locked hut. A be aware printed with a set of map coordinates pinned to its door means that the keys are distant to the southeast. Atomfall doesn’t consider in goal markers, as an alternative leaving it up to you to review your map and place down markers on factors of curiosity your self. Could this locked hut be the place the guide is hidden? Do I need to go on a quest for this key? My hunch tells me no, and I as an alternative stroll up to the central maintain’s large entrance doorways.
Once inside, I discover a few more druids to membership, however no signal of the guide. I hunt round its dank hallways, discovering nothing however material and alcohol to craft therapeutic bandages with. I spend a good ten minutes looking out each nook, however no luck. It’s a additional instance of Atomfall’s obtuse method to mission design. You gained’t have your handheld right here, and the guide gained’t glow gold with a large “pick me up” signal connected. While it could actually result in moments of frustration, I discover myself in the end inspired by Rebellion’s method to make one thing that challenges the participant and sticks stubbornly to its explorative, nearly detective-like imaginative and prescient.
So, with the guide nowhere in sight, I resolve to comply with the paper path and head to these map coordinates in search of the keys I beforehand examine. Perhaps this is able to unlock my path ahead? The coordinates lead me into the den of a poison plant monster… factor that appears to boil my mind if I spend too long close to it. Rifle bullets make minimal impression, and there’s little I can do to forestall my fast demise. I reload my save and use my Skyrim bunny-hopping muscle memory to bypass the beast, leaping down a rock face to gather the keys from one of the creature’s earlier victims. I head back to the hut, the place I discover a shiny new perk level and a smattering of ammo. As you’ll no doubt bear in mind, none of this stuff resemble the herbalism guide that I’m looking for.
Forlorn and barely misplaced, I enterprise underneath the fort and deep into its bowels, the place the druids concoct their rituals and chemical-fuelled practices. I kill the High Priestess and about a dozen of her lackeys, discover an SMG, a recipe for crafting poison bombs, and an atomic battery which seemingly opens up a entire new questline that I merely don’t have time to look into earlier than my demo time runs out. Again, the observant amongst you’ll discover that none of this stuff are the guide I’m in search of.
After my play session ends, I’m advised the guide was in the fort, simply mendacity on a desk I will need to have walked previous a number of occasions. Before that revelation, although, I begin to consider the guide merely doesn’t exist. That it’s a ruse. A lie. I resolve to go back to the herbalist and see if she has something to say for herself. She doesn't, of course, as a result of the guide is actual and the hunt to amass it’s reliable. But my own confusion manifests as absolutely shopping for into my character’s descent into violence, and so I kill her. She turns into one along with her vegetation in the soil. Searching her physique for some sort of hidden “truth”, I discover a recipe for one thing that would seem to help fight the poison swamp monster I encountered earlier. It’s too late for that, however I assume that is the precious info she was going to exchange her guide for. We may have saved a lot of time right here, it appears.
Not you could shave a big quantity of time off Atomfall’s runtime. I’m advised by the builders at Rebellion that you simply’d wrestle to complete the story in “less than four or five hours”, and that the majority gamers will take round 25 hours. Quite what’s going to occur inside these 25 hours may very well be fairly different, although. I spoke to another person on the demo session who went on an fully totally different journey to mine during their time taking part in, one which began with a crashed helicopter I by no means encountered and led to a entire new area stuffed with killer robots and mutants. It seems that even by simply skimming the floor of Atomfall, there are a lot of depths, secrets and techniques, and mysteries to be discovered.
I do marvel if some of the goals could also be too obtuse for some, although. The lack of route may definitely be offputting, however Atomfall seems like a game that rewards you the more you indulge in its obfuscated quest design. The blurred traces between the facet and major goals add a actual peril to each action, with its malleable plot design encouraging every participant to inform their own story and discover their own ending and clarification for what has occurred right here in the irradiated English countryside. I’ll nonetheless see the top of the story, regardless of killing off poor outdated Mother Jago, it could simply be wildly totally different from yours.
But, that’s all that I have time to see at the moment. For now, my fingers bloodied from the undeserved demise of a herbalist and the warpath I’ve left behind, I resolve to interact in full-British mode: take my cricket bat, head to the pub, and look forward to this all to blow over.
Simon Cardy is a Senior Editorial Producer who can primarily be discovered skulking round open world video games, indulging in Korean cinema, or despairing on the state of Tottenham Hotspur and the New York Jets. Follow him on Bluesky at @cardy.bsky.social.