It is actually pretty fun, I have a few niggles with it but overall it's actually a pretty fun game. It's like a weird crossbreed between bioshock and prey, the English translations are interesting and there's a lot of pro-communist content but it's worth a play.
Combat wise, it's fun. You have a bunch of melee weapons, guns and bioshock-esque abilities like Shok and telekinesis. I found myself playing for a few hours and was getting a bit put off by the tutorial "bunker" it goes on for a bit too long imo. But once you're out of that the game opens up and throws you in the deep end. By the deep end, you'll get to a boss fight in an arena a bunch of hours in- before that you'd be fighting just a couple of low-tiers and maybe one or two mid-tier bad guys in a go. After the arena fight, expect to be fighting massive groups, the combat refreshingly amps up and gets difficult at times- it's great, it keeps you on your toes and makes you think twice about running into a room guns blazing.
Gameplay & performance, it looks stunning. On my 3080 at 4k60 easily the prettiest game I've played for a long while. I haven't experienced and performance issues or game breaking bugs, or even crashes when I come to think of it. There's all sorts you can do in it also, you can upgrade your glove, your suit, your weapons to tailor your playthrough. It also has parkour and some driving elements.
Story, I don't think I'm in far enough to judge the entire story, so far it's pretty solid and has much better ideas and thoughts put into it than a bunch of other RPG/story related games I've played over the last few years.
Translations and Voice acting, so I tried playing it in russian with subs but the combat is fast paced and you miss a bunch. So I went back to English dub, the VA's aren't bad. The main character just sounds like a dick to start with but now he's actually growing on me, he kinda breaks the fourth wall with comments like "oh let me guess, the shit I need is spread all over the place"
Music and audio, the music is great. Theres some points where some badass music just starts belting out whilst you try to beat a boss or waves and waves of enemies. It's not quite doom tier but it's not far off. As for the SFX and weapons, they all sound pretty good- no complaints here.
As for my complaints, this game has puzzles... Lots and lots of puzzles. Not just the usual fallout lockpick or computer hacking puzzles, but literally dozens of different types- from matching sequences, playing around with moving walls and platforms by hitting switches and magnets, to hacking locks off doors even more sequence puzzles. Oh, they even built snake into it. Now normally I don't mind about the odd puzzle, but I just finished a bit where I need to rebuilt a robot which is missing 4 or so limbs. Each limb has a different puzzle. Because of this, it really messes with the pacing of the story and the combat.
Second complaint is audio queues, whenever the main character is talking to his glove AI about something important like the MC's past. You need to stop and listen, I've had it too many times where I think I've skipped some crucial backstory because some other audio cuts it off.
Even though I'm about 10or so hours in other than a couple of things I don't feel like I've accomplished anything story wise, but I have a sneaking feeling that'll change soon.
Tldr; Overall, I'd give it a play. Ignoring any politics and bullshit people are trying to project onto it because it's Russian made. It's actually an exceptional game. It's a breath of fresh air in this imagination barren, saturated market of sequels and copy and pasted games.
It's on steam and gamepass. I've been playing it via gamepass with no issues.
It's kind of nice to see a game with creative puzzles though, and not just one single puzzle repeated over and over.
I agree, but I still think there's a time and place. I find these are a bit excessive and properly slow down areas.
Feels like they're artificially padding the game out sometimes
crispy critters
The story is terrible and all over the place, and the devs admitted the English localization is fucked up and they had no control over that. You are absolutely right about the audio queues - sound and music direction is one of it's biggest flaws I'd say. Just really undercooked and broken everywhere. Gameplay seems alright though, especially once you get the OP upgraded melee weapon. The whole "stealth" mechanic and alert system and "robot ecosystem" is half-baked and confusing. It's an interesting concept, but it feels like they threw a lot of interesting concepts at the wall and none of them really stuck.
The "pro-communist content" is a believable portrayal of upper-class soviet citizens and a soviet soldier in the USSR in 1955. It's not that the narrative is putting a positive spin on communism.
I heard the game is broken as fuck for balance, with some skill and weapon progression that completely breaks the game, and on top of that it is outrageously short, 30 hours if you really push, definitely no fallout 100+ hour experience. I still plan on getting this, but not until it's under 30$.
Short isn't really a bad thing honestly. There need to be games that aren't months long odysseys.
Agreed, the only time short is a major problem is when most of the game is padding or when its "one or two sittings" short.
Balance is indeed shit, but I really like that they made it so you can refund the resources and change your skills whenever you want at the fridge.
I remember being really bummed out playing Doom 2016 and not even being able to test the weapon mods before picking them.
It's definitely not a 100 hour experience from what I've heard, but then for me neither were some of the fallouts . I only have so many hours in it because of mod support.
I can't imagine the modding community for this being that significant though, it's probably a single playthrough every few years kinda game.
Need a Silent Protagonist mod. That would be a game-changer. Even cutting the Russian Soldier and His Kollectivist Glove dialogue down to 20% would be an improvement.
Other than how much i hate fighting plyutsches.
The number of times I've been glitched into a corner unable to move during combat is higher than any other game I have ever played. Even more unbelievably, I've been able to wiggle my way back out of them back to normal just about every time
The worst glitch was when I unpaused and my controls completely reversed. Like I discovered a left handed mode command. But my movement was glued to that shitty mouse cursor they shove into all console games now for some goddamn reason even though it's the worst thing since covid lockdowns. Had to reload and fortunately it fixed it
It took me a LONG time to get across that bridge let me tell you
During 4 hours playtime last night I must've been locked against a wall or obstacle unable to move or fight half a dozen times. Twice I wasn't even in combat and was stuck hovering an inch from the ground and had to reload, costing 20 minutes and some hard battles both times. It's a shame because the game has some satisfying aspects but goofy jank shits all over the good stuff. (I'm on Xbox series x)