Atomfall Brings Fun Detective Work & Intriguing Narrative To Xbox Game Pass

There’s something about Rebellion’s output that always sucks me right in for the long haul. Games that can be rough around the edges at times, for sure, but also experiences that revel in their wonderful gaminess, maximising the fun of sniping someone in the nuts in Sniper Elite 5, for example, by hamming the entire operation up with slo-mo-swooshiness and camera angles that style it out in X-ray to capture exploding nutsacks in all their glory.

You see, no matter how real you make your world, or any of the gameplay mechanics therein, no matter how fancy, or not-rough-around-the-edges you make it, these OTT gameplay mechanics – that most often come at the expense of other mechanics in the game, TBF – are worth the price of entry alone. Because they are fun. That’s what I came for.

So jumping into Atomfall, I’m excited. I’m excited to the point of being fully prepared for massive disappointment. Because Atomfall marries one of my all-time favourite devs, with a setting and scenario I was born to love. Apocalypse UK, baby, we are going down. Burn it all. Seriously though.

In Atomfall you play the role of a survivor in an alternate reality United Kingdom – or more specifically Cumbria – that has succumbed to nuclear disaster based on the real world Windscale accident of 1957. Survival is the name of the game here, then, and it’s deftly handled in what I’ve played thus far – around about five or six hours. And here’s where the Rebellion factor strikes, in my humble opinion. The survival mechanics are good so far, they do what they need to and they incorporate everything you’ll know from the Sniper Elite series into their stealth aspects. If you’ve played those games you already know exactly how this feels and looks to play. Very responsive, full of options, but definitely nothing that you haven’t seen before. Solid. Yes, let’s say solid.

The key thing that elevates it all, though, and again I haven’t nearly finished it so these things may fall apart in the end, but so far it’s this completely unexpected layer of detective work that the player is given to puzzle over, in order to piece together the whys of what’s befallen them. Who did this? Why are you waking up trapped in a quarantine zone? There’s immediately a push into this investigative territory that has me mesmerised entirely.

And Rebellion uses this setup to give its missions a sort of updated version of Assassin’s Creed’s explore mode of playing – but, like, much better. A janky comparison, yes, but I am a janky man. Rather than just beeline to a big yellow marker, you pull on threads, work out where you need to go gently through exploration, investigation of notes, vague descriptions, landmarks and through conversations that you will either have or not, depending on how much effort you put in. I was not expecting any of this. And you can turn some of it off of you want – I should make that clear for those who might prefer a guided hand, it’s there.

It feels a bit like Fallout at times, with its choices and post-apocalyptic factions, and freedom to be good or bad. It’s all seriously impressive, especially given it’s reportedly only 20 hours long, that they’ve created so many fun little story diversions and mysteries to play around with in its five distinct and interconnected open world maps. It’s also massively atmospheric in how it’s captured a really fun slice of madcap Britain, a hammed up slice, fair enough, with its “P**S OFF” and other such Viz-styled graffiti messages daubed around. The accents are wonderful, the oddball humour and poetic cursing are wonderful, the outbursts of violence are wonderful. How absolutely wonderful.

I wish more games would go all in on leaving you to explore, trusting that you’ll find a place just by a visual description or following landmarks. I’ve been thoroughly enjoying everything about Atomfall as a result of how these freedoms intermingle with the detective work, an intriguing narrative and solid stealth/survival aspects that work well, even if they are lifted wholesale. Also, listen, the bit I’m at right now, I’ve just spotted something very familiar from a folksy horror movie, you know the one, and I think things are going to get a bit mad, a bit British horror-tinged. It couldn’t be further up my street.

The combat, I guess I should mention it, right. It’s great fun in how rough the weapons are, with baseball bats and rusted old war rifles, there’s a gritty sort of no-nonsense horribleness to the things you can pick up, to use in stealth kills as you murder around some enemy encampment. With Sniper Elite’s mechanics as a base, you can’t really go wrong here, and all of these aspects, even at their most clunky, are fine, bordering on very good.

So, no score from me unfortunately then, as I’ve yet to finish, but what I will say is that I am 100% committed to finishing it, which is always the best of signs, innit. I will finish it on my own personal time, if needs be, there’s my review.