Atomfall Preview

As a big fan of survival games, I’m ashamed to admit that Atomfall caught me by surprise. It wasn’t until a few months ago that I became aware of the upcoming survival action shooter set after the Windscale nuclear disaster in Cumbria, northern England. Eyes widened, and I sought to seek out more information on it, so imagine my delight when Gamer Guides was invited to an exclusive hands-on session with the game.

Northern England is full of so many beautiful locales, so to see developer Rebellion set a post-apocalyptic game in this area already sets it apart from its competitors. What followed was a treat of engaging gameplay, a beautiful trek through the Casterfell Woods, and mysteries abound as I avoided the gaze of Druids and looked to keep the peace with the local patrols.

With a cup of tea in hand, flatcap firmly on heads, we sat down to take Atomfall through its paces.

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Atomfall beautifully recreates 1960s Northern England.

Northern England in the 60s

The picturesque countryside of Cumbria, in the far reaches of northern England is the setting for Atomfall, and as soon as I got control in the Casterfell Woods region, I set off to explore the lush countryside teeming with danger. Atomfall by nature is player-led: you won’t get any big objective markers pointing you to the next part of the story, instead, you’re tasked with finding leads that will hint at where you might find more information or a place of interest worth checking out.

At this point, you can bring up your map and try to discern where this place or person may be and what the best route to it may be. Some leads may mark that place of interest on your map, like The Old Mine marker that was on our map after reading a note from “Mother Jago”, found pinned to a tree in the forest. At that point, it’s up to the player to work out how to get there, or even if they should meet with this person. After all, the area has been under quarantine for the last five years; with nobody in or out, who can you really trust?

Despite only getting access to the Casterfell Woods region, we already found a typical northern English village, complete with traditional stone cottages, the ruins of a derelict castle now inhabited by Druids, and an old interchange system that houses secrets about what may have caused the nuclear disaster, the setting for Atomfall. I was not guided along at any point through this; I explored, found some notes left around, and this gave me the leads to further investigate.

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(1 of 2) The Casterfell Woods region leaves it up to you in how you explore it without covering the map with markers.

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The Casterfell Woods region leaves it up to you in how you explore it without covering the map with markers. (left), There are multiple factions that you can interact with. (right)

Tackling Leads

The Leads system in Atomfall essentially replaces traditional quests that you may usually expect in these types of games and further promotes that design of a player-led experience. You can get leads from all manner of discoveries, as we found by exploring the Casterfell Woods region, such as a crashed helicopter site that pointed us in the direction of a Dr. Garow who appears to have made her way to a nearby village. At this point, I decided to ignore the other lead I was on and instead have a look around the area to try and find this nearby village, stumbling upon a few more leads for other people in the process.

It’s this level of discovery that immediately captivated me during my session with Atomfall; it’s a refreshing change to not have the map littered with markers while going around ticking them off like a checklist. I was free to go wild with whom to trust, help, or kill, allowing me to take out a poor defenseless woman when pressed for a key to a locked door on her estate, instead getting the key by looting it from her body. Despite sounding a bit barbaric (hey, it’s all about survival after all!), this freedom in my actions is what’s got my mind running with all of the potential possibilities in the final release.

Atomfall wants you to discover its mysteries in your own way that will trickle down to an ending based on your experiences. It does, however, mean that how you tackle leads may make it easier or harder to complete other ones. One such example is a lead that led me to an interchange system, I soon found myself prevented from exploring further due to not having an antidote against an infection, something I later learned I could have found a recipe for by following Mother Jago’s lead I had to begin with. Still, the early signs I saw of the lead system were enough to sell me on the idea of exploring at my own discretion, in the manner that I want.

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The Leads system allow you to choose which way you play through the campaign.

Surviving the Countryside

In the quarantine zone of Northern England, supplies and resources are naturally low, and as such, money holds no value. Instead, you’ll need to barter with the various merchants you meet with a good old-fashioned trade for goods. To add more to the survival elements, you’ll only have a limited inventory of which to store not only your weapons, but also your recovery items and any other loot that may have value for trades down the line. Fortunately, you can find Pneumatic Dispatch Tubes that work as an item box to stash items away for retrieval later. Still, the limited inventory space necessitates that you consider what you really need before you set off.

You’ll find all manner of scrap, string, alcohol, and other basic materials throughout the region, and these can be put to use to craft items from your recipes such as Bandages, Molotov Cocktails, and Antidotes to name a few. These materials don’t take up space in your inventory, but they do have a limit of how many you can hold at once, so making use of them as they cap is always in the player’s interest. The skill system in Atomfall also relies on you taking the time to scavenge around the countryside, as you’ll come across Training Stimulants that function as skill points.

As a general rule, there are four categories for your skills: Ranged Combat, Melee Combat, Survival, and Conditioning, with nine skills to purchase in each. Initially, you’ll only have the first three available; you’ll then need to seek out Training Manuals that are hidden around the region to add more skills to the tree. The skills are relatively interesting, offering staples such as disarming traps or having Takedowns create less noise, while there are some interesting ones such as Charisma that increase the value of your items when bartering.

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(1 of 2) You can find basic materials to craft items to help survive the countryside.

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You can find basic materials to craft items to help survive the countryside. (left), You can add more skills to learn by finding Training Manuals. (right)

Taking Matters Into Your Own Hands

There are two major forms of combat in Atomfall: melee and ranged combat, and how you spend your time scavenging will impact how much you can make use of the former. As you might expect, firearms weren’t the most common piece of equipment for civilians in Northern England, so ammo for the rusty weapons that you find isn’t exactly common unless you really take the time to scavenge every nook and cranny. This, too, goes for your enemies, who more often than not during the slice of the game I played, focused on using melee attacks.

Fortunately, melee feels satisfying here, packing a wallop every time you hit an enemy and there are multiple types of melee weapons you can get your hands on. A Cricket Bat, for example, will deal heavy damage at a slower attack speed, but a Hatchet will have fast attack speed, average damage, but come with the bonus of adding Bleed. There’s a good balance to the weapons and enough of a difference for you to experiment with what’s on offer.

Enemies vary from hostile factions, such as the Druids, to swarms of rats, and even Feral creatures that have been warped from the nuclear disaster. Despite having a large world to explore, it constantly feels hostile and finding someone to talk to, at least in these early stages of Atomfall, felt like a welcome reprieve, even if I didn’t know I could fully trust them.

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Melee combat plays a large role in Atomfall. It’s also very…English by design!

Fine Fettle?

We’ve only barely scratched the surface of what Atomfall could potentially bring to the table for the Survival Action genre, and there’s lots there that I hope continues to build upon the discovery and player-led freedom the title seems to be aiming for. Promising multiple regions that you can explore with hidden mysteries and allowing the player to traverse between them at will, Atomfall aims to urge players to keep playing the game long after they’ve finished to see how they might change things up.

This short taster of exploring Northern England was a treat, featuring a beautiful but deadly landscape filled with secrets to be discovered. If this is just one small slice of what’s to come, I eagerly await Atomfall’s final release on March 27th.