Atomfall PS5 Review. No time for cake, tea and Cornish pasties, we got a jolly ole English first-person survival game to hunker down with courtesy of the Sniper Elite crew, Rebellion. Atomfall is easily Rebellion’s largest and most-ambitious game to date, stuffed with choices, dangerous outlaws and crazy groups of neanderthals, as well as vast opportunities to explore its resplendent and idyllic English setting. Can Atomfall stand apart and stamp its own watermark on the survival genre, or will it be passed off as nothing more than a tally-ho Fallout wannabe bootleg?
Set in The Lake District five years after the Windscale Disaster of the late 1950s, Atomfall places in you in a what-if scenario, suggesting to players “what-if” the devastating aftermath of The Windscale Disaster caused extreme measures of quarantining both the country and the military. Of course, the answer would be total anarchy, triggering an outraged population into forming tribes, all-out bedlam would be raging up and down the country, and insecurity would on the menu for breakfast, lunch and dinner – so yes, welcome to the world of Atomfall.
Atomfall Review (PS5)- A British Survivalist Dream
Atomfall places you in the role of a nameless amnesiac, who awakens inside a bunker to find an ailing hazmat suit-wearing fellow bleeding from the abdomen who desperately requires your assistance. The poor sod talks about another bunker known as “The Interchange,” which promises to unlock answers pertaining to the mysteries of the quarantine, as well as assisting you with finding a way out of this rural hellscape you’re trapped inside of. From here, you can decide to either act like a backstabbing cretin by manipulating this bleeding scientist into giving you what you want, or agreeing to help him with what he needs in exchange for what you desire.
This intro acts as a great primer for what the world of Atomfall has in store for you, giving you a choice to help or hinder, and setting the adventure in motion without giving away too much context, or wrapping you up in a blanket of relentless and needless busywork. What you do when you walk out of the bunker and into The Lake District is in your hands.
On the subject of hands, your hand doesn’t need to be held, you can dive right in and investigate the world around you without feeling restricted, which is already one insatiable way Atomfall invites you to drink it all in. This level of autonomy you’re embellished with is definitely more freeing than the uncomfortable conditions of the quarantine would have you believe.
The only dinger with the premise is the whole amnesiac protagonist set-up, which has been done a bazillion times in the past (especially this year) and is an overworn cliche, but what unfolds in front of you is the focus, not so much what your character endures. Drama is at a premium in Atomfall, and when you find yourself investigating leads and solving problems, you’ll be thankful that the locations you visit occupy your time with characters and sights that will truly leave their mark, allowing you to forget you’re a nameless protagonist who doesn’t remember anything.
Accessible Survival For All
Rebellion wants your Atomfall experience to be about choice, which is expressed through the range of options you’re afforded. Five difficulty settings provide you with the dexterity to opt for the playstyle best suited to you.
If you want a hassle-free time so you can soak up the sun, collect and discover the game’s secrets at your own leisure, then the Sightseer difficulty is for you. Conversely, if you want a hardcore challenge, where resource management and tactical planning is paramount to survival, then you’ll want to brave the perilous and unpredictable roads that Veteran difficulty will lead you down.
In-between these options are the Investigator, Brawler and Survivor difficulties, which scale up certain aspects while toning down others. For example, Investigator will retain Sightseer’s combat easiness, but you’ll be subject to fewer resources, whereas Brawler amps up the combat challenge, but is balanced out by survival and exploration assists. The Survivor difficulty aptly gives you a stern survival challenge, but combat and exploration is made easier, and on top of this it’s recommended way to play according to Rebellion themselves.
The flexibility of Atomfall’s difficulty and its dogged determination to tailor your experience of it is simply superb. Rebellion clearly understands the importance of all the tenets that conjure up a survival game, but at the same time wholly respecting that not every player wants an uninviting and frustratingly chaotic time. What Rebellion have managed to forge then, is a balanced and rewarding survival experience that never stops pouring on the intrigue and the delightful sights and sounds, but always wants players to enjoy every morsel of it.
Open-World Confinement
No matter how you choose to play, Atomfall never fails to indulge your curiosities. As you embark down the winding roads, admire the greenery and the elegant rivers and waterfalls, Atomfall encourages you to stop and take it all in. Yes, this seems like a big distraction from the nitty gritty of resource foraging and wiping out hostile ninnies, but blimey it’s gorgeous to look at and to admire, isn’t it?
Atomfall won’t blame you for going off the beaten path either because it actively encourages this behaviour. Get used to playing without a map marker and you’ll find that the game truly comes alive due to the wide assortment of encounters and locations you’ll discover as you travel around.
Don’t be too alarmed by the myriad of patrols you’ll find smothered throughout the streets and districts of Atomfall. If you’re on your best behaviour, they’ll ignore you so that you can focus on exploring and discovering in as peaceful way as possible. However, if you decide to become a jerk and bat these tommies round the bonce, then you’ll start a war you may not win unless you’re armed to the gills. Don’t step into their restricted areas either, though they may politely ask you to step off and they’ll look the other way, but don’t go testing them unless you’ve upped your arsenal.
Let’s make no mistake, just because The Lake District is encased inside a quarantine zone, this does not mean you won’t find a bunch of weird and wonderful characters, alarming discoveries, or amazingly chill hangouts-the abundance of surprises waiting for you are truly splendid indeed. Better yet, character interactions can spit out more quests and investigations, and the notes, scripts and letters you find will spring up new locations for you to discover. This means you’ll find yourself with plenty to do to peel yourself away from the evil pursuit of smashing up innocent garden gnomes.
Strikingly, Atomfall’s beauty and exploration mirrors The Chinese Room’s Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture, given how Atomfall’s exploration qualities allow you to calmly stroll through soldier-ceased streets and into distinctly British bakeries and pubs. At times you’ll find yourself shuddering with a pang of fear every time the telephone inside the red telephone box rings off, the strange voice and its foreboding utterings reminding you that even though you’re surrounded by beauty, there are still maniacs and unsavoury figures lurking in the shadows ready to pounce.
Bat-Heavy Combat Countermeasures
When you do decide to get down to brass tax by getting your fists ready for a fracas, bats ready for beatdowns or firearms ready for filling fiends with lead, Atomfall’s got you covered. Weapons in Atomfall help you to withstand the glut of nefarious nimrods, as well as contend with all size and types of hostile from daunting seismic robots to a clan of puny nibbly rats and everything in-between. Spiked bats and cricket bats are all the rage to beat the brakes off the brutes you come across, but ranged options like revolvers, assault rifles, SMGs and shotguns pack a punch. Also, causing an all-English riot wouldn’t be complete without Molotov Cocktails, bringing an explosive flame-fueled barbecue anywhere they’re thrown inside these benevolently British confines.
Weapons aren’t too dissimilar from what you see in other games of Atomfall’s ilk, yet the ability to craft what you want to in the game’s inventory system, as well as the assortment of upgrades you’re accustomed to can turn around those feelings of being short-changed regarding combat options.
Stealth is always a pleasure when it’s incorporated properly, and in Atomfall it is a great option if you don’t want to cause a huge ruckus. You can break the necks of cultists, hide in the tall grasses to plot your next move, and approach loners silently with a welcoming cricket bat to the back of their heads. Admittedly, stealth is undercooked compared to other areas of Atomfall, but will serve you well when a gung-ho approach is too risky of an alternative to take.
As great as Atomfall can be, it isn’t without a few blemishes. In-game crashes and irksome frame rate drops are apparent, and sometimes character animations aren’t as natural nor are the lip movements of the characters. These issues will not obliterate your enjoyment of Atomfall, but they will sometimes take you out of the world and may frustrate you.
Authentic British Brilliance
Stunning is the best way to describe how Atomfall looks and sounds. The naturalistic and rural English aesthetics and decor is outstanding, even more so when you factor in the fact that it’s rare to see an authentic triple A quality representation of British culture in videogames. The scenery is constantly breath-taking, and should compel you to forego business so you can totally immerse yourself in your surroundings.
The voice acting and script are unsurprisingly very British as well. Simms sounds like John Cleese doesn’t he? Welsh and Scouse representation is abundant among the NPCs too, which really highlights the distinctly British flavour of Atomfall. American gamers shall surely rejoice in how different ye olde British values are compared with the familiar American values that western culture has been saturated by for decades.
Remarkable is one of the most appropriate ways to describe Atomfall. So many triple-A games these days are situated in American cities and smother you with their American cultural values, but Atomfall is as British as a Yorkshire Pudding, and thus it’s an absolute treat. The array of difficulty options, the elegant scenery, the incentive to discover and go off the beaten path, and all the pleasant sights and sounds of Atomfall make it an unforgettable and outstanding survival game that is irresistibly moreish and well-worth your time. You may feel like some elements could be fleshed out more like the combat, but when there’s so much intrigue to relish in, there’s no doubt that this is an all-encompassing survival game that gives all types of players an accommodating hand to experience this ultra and most-exquisite of survival action shooter games.
Atomfall is due out on the March 27 for PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series S/X and PC.