I have two things to say

Wonderful game. Maybe because i coudlnt bring myself to enjoy last light or 2033 but my expectations were super low, and it was on gamepass. Loved it almost immediately. It feels more like a spiritual sucessor to STALKER: Clear Sky than a metro game, wonderful gameplay and engaging story. It got taken off of game pass though and i missed it daily. Until i saw it for sale on PS4

which leads to my seccond point

THIS GAME RUNS LIKE SHIT ON PS4

Attempt 2 after my first one was stopped by a run ending glitch.

Metro 2033 and Metro: Last Light were some pretty special games in spite of their gameplay shortcomings. They served incredible atmosphere and exploration mixed with some solid level design, typically offering open but not oversized areas to play in. It would be a shame if the sequel gave us bland, empty open world hubs while not doing anything about the gameplay jank or performance... Oh wait. :(

I don't know. I had a bad feeling going into this with it being the series making a big move towards being more open and I guess I should've went with my gut.

The appeal in the series had always been in the claustrophobic/constrained settings with the occasional breath of fresh air in the larger, sometimes outdoor settings. Here we have this flipped completely with the focus on large outdoor settings with the smaller bits being the (not common enough) breath of fresh air. I'm not completely against open world design but seeing as everything down to general navigation in these maps is a chore riddled with potential glitches, it had an uphill battle.

Stealth and combat are on average, about the same as the previous games. If you liked or tolerated them before you should be fine. If not, good luck? Enemy AI can be really finnicky in terms of detection and the addition of vehicles and larger maps to navigate did them no favors. There's this portion where you're rowing in a boat underneath some enemies that is borderline just RNG to get through unnoticed. It fucking sucked.

Beyond all of this, there was a piece of me that enjoyed myself somewhere. I do like something about the very core of the Metro gameplay and the emotional follow through across the series was a bit satisfying. I just can't see myself reaching for a replay like I would 2033 or even Last Light when it's such a drag to play on a moment to moment basis.

Hopefully the DLC stacks up a bit better being self contained expansions?

I don't remember my experience with the prior titles in this series, but I can tell you that they were a lot more enjoyable than this drivel. Because my pea brain cannot fathom dropping a game without completing it I dragged my feet all the way to the end and god my brain gave up on its goal. Metro prides itself on pacing and combat that's sluggish in order to draw you into the world. That's fine in a linear setting, but for a game touting its semi-open world landscapes, it dragged a shit ton. Not only would you have to trek your way across decently sized areas with the slowest movement possible, but many times the game gated progression behind waiting for NPCs to take their sweet fucking time to get going. Towards the end, it got so bad that it felt like a self-parody. On the other hand, the game threw you into many scenarios where tens of enemies would swarm you. The hilarious part is that since gunplay is slow the enemy AI was dumbed down as a compromise making each firefight effortless. Now I don't have evidence of that, but I don't care; my point still stands. To summarize my frustrations here I would describe 'Metro Exodus' as a game that maintains the stilted gameplay of its predecessors but expands far out where it can't keep up with itself. I guess that's what happens when you follow trends that huh.

I aboslutely loved the last games, and was exited for this one. i bought it at release but never got around to playing trough it until now. And man am i disappointed. It still has the very unique feeling and environments which i love, but thats about it. The gameplay is so clunky and feels very unfinished. There are so many bugs and my game froze almost everytime i used a workbench. The story starts of nice but that ending is.. i dont even know, it makes no sense and feels to abrupt. The sound design is horrible. The dialogue is so low that i cant hear what anyone is saying more than half of the time, and at the same time she shooting is way to loud. They do the directional audio many games do, but here it is so extreme that unless you are right in front of the character facing them you basically have to read the lyrics to get anything. This was advertised a lot as any other AAA title but man it does not feel like one. Overall it feels rushed and unfinished and unless you are a big fan of the series and want the rest of the story i do not recommend it.

Moments where the game wrestles control away from you to try and fulfill AAA ambitions are distinct low points here, but I’m always keen to have a STALKER/FarCry 2 understudy.

While it doesn’t go to those games’ extremes of player hostility, there’s a hardscrabble roughness to everything from the no-shortcuts traversal to the pitched guerrilla firefights with fragile-feeling weapons, that sells the particulars of its well-worn post-apocalypse infinitely more than its setting is able to. At its heights, which are decently frequent, damn tense.

red dead redemption 2: russian DLC

this may be more of a semi open world immersive sim with heavy stealth elements. but it's telling a lot of the same story as RDR2 and in very similiar ways.

both feature trains, coughing fits, and some fine natural day/night lighting. both are very slow, heavy, tactile games (in very different ways, RDR2 is more realistic but metro exodus is the game with an in-game map and a first-person camera that shows off some of gaming's most extremely textured gloves).

both are about desperate people suffering a bleak existence and attempting to survive harsh environments while clinging to dreams of a brighter future.

both take serious time out and go out of their way to explore their side characters in more depth than most games typically offer their main characters.

the best moments in both games are the quiet ones. like just the pleasure of exploring the world and taking in the atmosphere. or just listening to conversations, that either include you or don't. i think in that way both games aren't just about companionship but the importance of empathy.

both are about the consequences of your actions too. although in red dead 2 those actions are scripted. the game is third-person. you play a scripted character with a preset fate. metro exodus on the other hand, while featuring a scripted character, is in first person and has how play as someone who only ever speaks during loading screens when they're writing in their diary (another connection to rdr2 re: the diary). it ultimately tests your character's morality through your actions as a player. maybe those actions too subtle. maybe they're too dense to grasp. all i know this game left me in the same space as red dead 2 but i had to face that the bitter taste in my mouth was not the author's doing but my own, and when i realised i had to reap what i sowed, all i could say was "damn, you got me".

cool game. glad i played it. and even on a launch ps4 this thing sparkled. will play the DLC eventually.

sorta respect them having the ability to invest a bit more in the game and retaining all the jank from the previous two. i don't really have any major complaints with the game play as i knew what to expect and the expansion of the levels to semi open world was a good choice particularly when the levels were gorgeous to look at.

the story is a bit of a disappointment. threatened to have larger stakes than it ended up having which would be fine if the voice acting wasn't as poor as it was and the enemy groups were generally a bit lacklustre and predictable for a post-apocalypse.

I felt totally astounded when I set foot outside the metro tunnels to board a train and travel through Russia in search for a new home. The series made a complete 180 and gave more freedom to the player by creating an open world experience WHILE retaining most of the horror elements the series is known for.

I noted the character development and how you interact more with them in comparison with previous titles, it give more depth to the characters and makes the story even more interesting. Also, this is the pretties Metro game -visually speaking- and the camera feature makes wonders.

Man, I love the Metro games.

As a fan of the franchise another addition was quite welcome, despite some issues i had during my experience.

The open world formula doesn't settle so comfortably with the experience, some levels felt like a drag while others - usually the more on-rail ones - felt like continuations of the classic Metro feel.

Story wise it's a solid sequel, not last light story good but still. The ending(s) feel satisfying.

Great looking environments with locations that give a good feel for the world, people, and creatures. Well written likable cast of characters that you get to know from seeing them bond at your base, with some possible events altering the moods of characters. World feels alive in way other games apocalyptic games don't with a mix of hope and despair (much less bleak than the previous Metro games). Some nice customization options for weapons and difficulty and some good accessibility options for subtitles and QTEs when grabbed by enemies. I liked that you can get certain enemy groups to surrender if you have knocked out enough of them or that some of the mutants and animals might back off from attacking you if you kill some of their pack or if they are wounded. Some enemies will make use of hiding spots or try to blend in with corpses to surprise you.

Terrible save system, you get one save slot and a checkpoint system with a continue option that only loads the latest before giving you an option to load the other, so if anything goes wrong with a save or the game crashes while saving you're probably out of luck (it does offer a chapter select option on the main menu if you wanted to replay things though). Metro's systems aren't at their best in the more open environments, you will be sneaking by people, animals, and mutated creatures looking right at you in the day and most of the open area is really just a few more important places and some areas to just pick up some extra gear or supplies. Though really only two of the areas are more open, with the starting area, a later area, and the two ending areas being closer to the previous games. The moral system Metro has always used makes this game much easier to get the good ending but it really limits your options to almost never fighting to kill or shooting guns at people, which can make the weapon upgrades and scavenging for crafting materials not that important. A few bugs with the animations not working right, getting stuck on things, or bullets/knives going through enemies when they are doing certain animations.

Loses a bit of what made Metro stand out with you being away from the Metro, the factions of the Metro, and a lot of the more mystical or horror focused elements until the very last section but also shows an apocalyptic world with moments and characters the feel more hopeful than the usual poorly written video game fare.

Screenshots: https://twitter.com/Legolas_Katarn/status/1096997419298873347

What is maybe most surprising about Exodus is how much I warmed to its characters. I like this series well enough for being a densely atmospheric horror/shooter, channeling a mix of Far Cry 2 and STALKER, though the writing has always felt off. It’s gesturing at Big Ideas is undercut by the shallow characters, the annoyingly centrist depictions of warring factions, and your typical video game-y misogyny to top it off.

Some of that is still definitely present in Exodus (in its pastiche of post-apocalyptic tropes & villains) but by bringing the focus onto a smaller cast of characters, I found myself genuinely caring for the story it was telling. There's a lot of heart in this found family of survivors in search of a home. For that reason, the train sequences when you’re interacting with those characters were some of my favourite, though the whole silent protagonist thing didn’t work for me in those moments. I wish they’d either give Arytom some lines (he has plenty to say during his monologuing between chapters) or commit to him being mute; the latter is what I ended up using as my head canon. Even still, I can recall plenty of scenes on the train that felt more genuine than a lot of the writing I’m used to in bigger games. Having a smoke with the new guy we picked up as he regales me with stories of his old car, overhearing the little girl guilt the group technician into teaching her how to sow, watching the cold demeanor of the commander father-in-law thaw as the crew gathers around to listen to a newly wed sing & play the guitar. All of these interactions are effectively optional but Exodus does a superb job of rewarding you if you take the time to be a part of this family.