This review contains spoilers
Atomic Heart is not for everyone. The convoluted open world design alone an issue that hampers a good portion of the games pacing and the moment-to-moment fun. Add to that story issues that are difficult to assign to any one point of failure it is difficult to tell someone to just put up with it for twenty hours. Especially if the aesthetic doesn't do something for them.
Luckily, Atomic Heart does strike a few chords on my sensibilities. It wears its influences on its sleeve—at times to degrees of absurdity. (at one point the main character, P-3, outright calls an underwater hub area a “rapture,” absurd but still it’s mostly for the better.) Even so, it still has a distinct enough identity to stand out. The music especially evokes that Russian identity whether it be Tchaikovsky or Russian techno-metal or menu music that is a decent bop in and of itself. The game really does have style to spare. The aesthetics are great and frankly I am a sucker for these alternate histories. The distinct Cold War futurism is absorbing. Outside of its plain (although bright) open world the game has some incredibly stylish areas scattered throughout its runtime.
On the gameplay, the best word for it is simply uneven. Most of the guns feel good, others are worthless. The melee is mainly nice and heavy, or it can be rather clumsy. The testing ground puzzles can be rather interesting, or they can just be nuisances. The minigames can be interesting distractions, or repetitive tedium. The world can be incredibly engrossing, or it can be a slog. The open world especially seems to exist if only to say it has one. All you are doing here is ferrying between the puzzle box testing grounds and a handful of story missions fighting off infinitely regenerating waves of enemies. The game would have benefitted from designing more linear outdoor sections that serve the main narrative. As implemented the open world sections are a distraction from otherwise fine to great puzzle dungeons and story set pieces. It is a watered-down immersive sim. Which in principle is fine, but it does leave room for a consideration of what could have been.
On the narrative you can tell there are some things lost in localization, while others just weren’t there to start with. The core set up is great. An alt-history Soviet Union with a magic element that sets it to be more advanced than our world today is interesting in concept. The designers seem intrigued by this era of their history but lack the full capacity to tackle the complicated matters inherent within the setting. That said, the game does have many strengths in its setting. The game is strong in cementing its worldbuilding and the magic system they’ve whipped up. The various robots as deadly as they are do have plausible reasons for existing in a non-combat scenario. A marvel given how video gamey they are as enemies. Still, as for the narrative goes the game is again, uneven.
The game beats you over the head with the central idea that the collective should hold the power and be free and it is a subset of individuals with wealth or power who ruin it. While it is always nice for anything to tackle these kinds of ideas, here they are at times superficially imposed upon a messy world. What does that message mean in a world where there is an utter lack of care for human life? Bodies line the streets and hallways of this game. You speak to their corpses. Hell, nearly the entire cast of this game is dead by the credits and at no point does it feel like any of them mattered in the grand scheme. In the end it can be hard to be sure that the game really believes in that sentiment of power to the people or whether it is just nostalgia for a Soviet empire that never existed at all.
One final issue with the main plot is that when the game reveals to you that you have been manipulated the entire time by a powerful figure who is driven by selfish desires you’ve seen it coming since the first hour or so. But it still wants that surprise twist, so instead it was not the boss of the facility, Sechenov, but your AI companion, Chariton, who was manipulating you. It’s a decent twist on a base level, but it just doesn’t feel like it fits in with the broad theme. It all boils down to a central fact that to pull off the twist there are several conveniences of characters not doing the thing that would clear them from suspicion for twenty hours. Although, to be honest, it was nice to not have it be Sechenov if only because the main character would be the most oblivious man alive if it were. Chariton personifies the lack of care for human life declaring in a blatant sequel tease that fragile human lives have no value. Instead, they must evolve into immortal blobs of goo like him. It is very dumb.
It is strange though. Even for as messy as the writing is it never bothered me like it has some others. The world is cool, it looks cool, and the game systems work to support you feeling cool playing it. The magic system and world design support the writing even when it is weaker. Hell, for as brash and oddly written as P-3 is, he is oddly relatable. In an Ethan Winters kind of way, he is dropping poor one-liners and expressing self-doubt throughout the narrative. At one point he even expresses that all his bravado is just a cover for the fact that he is in over his head and keeps letting people down. P-3 feels human, even for as fucking odd as he is.
All told, yeah Atomic Heart is a 6 out of 10 masquerading as an 8 out of 10. At least it is for me. This game is not for everyone, but it is for some and that may be enough. The fact that an unknown studio popped out of the blue with a product as competent as this is, well, that’s just impressive. I am hopeful that Mundfish can learn from this game and focus on the things that work for its sequel. If nothing else, they should get the fuck out of Russia and take a stand for what’s right else it sinks them before they ever get out to sea.
Luckily, Atomic Heart does strike a few chords on my sensibilities. It wears its influences on its sleeve—at times to degrees of absurdity. (at one point the main character, P-3, outright calls an underwater hub area a “rapture,” absurd but still it’s mostly for the better.) Even so, it still has a distinct enough identity to stand out. The music especially evokes that Russian identity whether it be Tchaikovsky or Russian techno-metal or menu music that is a decent bop in and of itself. The game really does have style to spare. The aesthetics are great and frankly I am a sucker for these alternate histories. The distinct Cold War futurism is absorbing. Outside of its plain (although bright) open world the game has some incredibly stylish areas scattered throughout its runtime.
On the gameplay, the best word for it is simply uneven. Most of the guns feel good, others are worthless. The melee is mainly nice and heavy, or it can be rather clumsy. The testing ground puzzles can be rather interesting, or they can just be nuisances. The minigames can be interesting distractions, or repetitive tedium. The world can be incredibly engrossing, or it can be a slog. The open world especially seems to exist if only to say it has one. All you are doing here is ferrying between the puzzle box testing grounds and a handful of story missions fighting off infinitely regenerating waves of enemies. The game would have benefitted from designing more linear outdoor sections that serve the main narrative. As implemented the open world sections are a distraction from otherwise fine to great puzzle dungeons and story set pieces. It is a watered-down immersive sim. Which in principle is fine, but it does leave room for a consideration of what could have been.
On the narrative you can tell there are some things lost in localization, while others just weren’t there to start with. The core set up is great. An alt-history Soviet Union with a magic element that sets it to be more advanced than our world today is interesting in concept. The designers seem intrigued by this era of their history but lack the full capacity to tackle the complicated matters inherent within the setting. That said, the game does have many strengths in its setting. The game is strong in cementing its worldbuilding and the magic system they’ve whipped up. The various robots as deadly as they are do have plausible reasons for existing in a non-combat scenario. A marvel given how video gamey they are as enemies. Still, as for the narrative goes the game is again, uneven.
The game beats you over the head with the central idea that the collective should hold the power and be free and it is a subset of individuals with wealth or power who ruin it. While it is always nice for anything to tackle these kinds of ideas, here they are at times superficially imposed upon a messy world. What does that message mean in a world where there is an utter lack of care for human life? Bodies line the streets and hallways of this game. You speak to their corpses. Hell, nearly the entire cast of this game is dead by the credits and at no point does it feel like any of them mattered in the grand scheme. In the end it can be hard to be sure that the game really believes in that sentiment of power to the people or whether it is just nostalgia for a Soviet empire that never existed at all.
One final issue with the main plot is that when the game reveals to you that you have been manipulated the entire time by a powerful figure who is driven by selfish desires you’ve seen it coming since the first hour or so. But it still wants that surprise twist, so instead it was not the boss of the facility, Sechenov, but your AI companion, Chariton, who was manipulating you. It’s a decent twist on a base level, but it just doesn’t feel like it fits in with the broad theme. It all boils down to a central fact that to pull off the twist there are several conveniences of characters not doing the thing that would clear them from suspicion for twenty hours. Although, to be honest, it was nice to not have it be Sechenov if only because the main character would be the most oblivious man alive if it were. Chariton personifies the lack of care for human life declaring in a blatant sequel tease that fragile human lives have no value. Instead, they must evolve into immortal blobs of goo like him. It is very dumb.
It is strange though. Even for as messy as the writing is it never bothered me like it has some others. The world is cool, it looks cool, and the game systems work to support you feeling cool playing it. The magic system and world design support the writing even when it is weaker. Hell, for as brash and oddly written as P-3 is, he is oddly relatable. In an Ethan Winters kind of way, he is dropping poor one-liners and expressing self-doubt throughout the narrative. At one point he even expresses that all his bravado is just a cover for the fact that he is in over his head and keeps letting people down. P-3 feels human, even for as fucking odd as he is.
All told, yeah Atomic Heart is a 6 out of 10 masquerading as an 8 out of 10. At least it is for me. This game is not for everyone, but it is for some and that may be enough. The fact that an unknown studio popped out of the blue with a product as competent as this is, well, that’s just impressive. I am hopeful that Mundfish can learn from this game and focus on the things that work for its sequel. If nothing else, they should get the fuck out of Russia and take a stand for what’s right else it sinks them before they ever get out to sea.