Published on:

April 13th, 2025

Atomfall Review

Atomfall-ing in Love

- Written by Dallas @ Quest Break

It’s still early into 2025 to be locking down anything concrete, but Atomfall may just be in contention for sleeper hit of the year. From Rebellion, the developers of the widely known Sniper Elite series, have stepped out of their comfort zone to create a very unique game that ends up being a mishmash of genres that somehow works, some aspects more than others but we’ll get into that later!

For now, let’s begin:

What a quaint little village! Surely everything is fine, right?

Our story takes place in the 1960’s, an alternate history version, where the Windscale Nuclear Disaster went awry and this section of Northern England had to be quarantined off. Our protagonist is trapped in said quarantine zone, and the only thought in our brain is “HOW DO I GET OUT OF HERE?!”

After some minor exposition laid out in a period piece laden slideshow. You’re immediately thrust into the world of Atomfall, a Scientist barges in warning you of the danger set before you, gives you your first “lead” and off you go!

Leads, act as your quest system, more or less. By exploring the world, talking to NPC’s, finding items, notes, etc. will give you information tied to other leads, jumpstart a new lead or just give you further lore tied to the world at large. Some NPC’s will have requests from time that could seem more like a “quest” but it’s completely up to you on whether you’d like to follow that lead or disregard it completely.

Choices matter here in the world of Atomfall. Though with some smart selections and utilizing your save feature often, you’re able to complete nearly every lead. Except for the final act, which will have you committing to certain choices to see the ending through. I was able to set up my playthrough in a way that I had all 6 endings unlocked and just had to decide which I wanted to go with when the time came.

The entire game leads you to this moment. But were the choices you made correct? Well that’s up to you decide, and the game doesn’t shy away from letting you know that. Are these people you’re helping trustworthy? Or are they merely lying to get you to their dirty work?!

And all credit due to the voice actors who lent their talent, because while you can tell some are in fact deceiving you, there are others I didn’t see coming! And you’ll only ever find out by certain dialogue options unlocking from the discoveries you make while out exploring. And this is exactly why I fell in love, I’ve never been big on the open world fps genre, it just never personally clicked with me. But turn that open world into a huge mystery which is solely driven by me, exploring to my hearts content and being rewarded for it?! Oh boy, that is my shit.

You can customize the difficulty to whatever you like, incase you do only want the story/investigation gameplay. I left it on the default difficulty as I wanted to see the vision the developers intended, with the survival/combat mixed in, though I think I’d be more inclined to turn that off if I were to ever do a second run.

What you get out of Atomfall, the interactions you experience and ultimately the ending you receive is solely based on how much you sought out information in the world.

Just one moment, you’ll be dead in a sec… just gotta reload.

So far you’ve probably realized I’ve only been talking about choices, dialogue and exploration, that’s because in my honest opinion that is the heart of Atomfall’s gameplay. There is combat, though most can be completely avoided with only some encounters requiring full on VIOLENCE! This is due to your choices and what you’ve discovered, that certain factions will let you be at peace unless you decide to attack first. You as the player get to determine how much action you want, which is such a refreshing way to play a FPS RPG like this. You don’t get experience or level up in a traditional way, your entire upgrade system is once again completely reliant on exploration, by having to find both the upgrade path as well as the skill point needed to unlock them.

If you’re going into this with a blast everything in sight type of gameplay play-style, while you can do that, I fully believe it’ll have an overall negative impact on your experience. And unfortunately ends up being my biggest critique of Atomfall, the combat just isn’t that great… So what do I mean by that? Well you start your journey scavenging whatever you can, meaning using the means around you as weapons to fend for yourself out in these hostile lands. Cool premise right? Well yes and no, you’ll find weapons such as knives, hatchets and cricket bats! Yes. Cricket bats! But you’ll quickly learn that the melee system just isn’t very fun or effective for that matter, especially once an enemy with a gun starts attacking you.

Oh the guns… where to even begin. They are a core pillar of Atomfall’s combat and unlocks easy mode, in my opinion. You’ll actually discover guns pretty early on, and from that point you’ll have no need for any melee weapon whatsoever. The game, even on its second hardest difficulty, says to be weary of using guns due to the scarcity of ammo but I found this to be wildly untrue. While not an abundance like other first person shooters, it’s enough to carry you through your combat encounters, with the ability to refill afterwards by looting the aftermath or any nearby areas. This is mainly due to every weapon having the ability of one-shotting an enemy with a nicely placed headshot, and while I can appreciate that level of realism, it removes any sort of anxiety to survive, because with your gun it’s a breeze to get through.

This is only further enhanced with Atomfall’s crafting system, allowing you to upgrade your guns to a “pristine” condition which in turns makes it so you can obliterate anything or anyone in your path! (Power fantasy lovers will enjoy this). Apart from that, you’re also able to craft healing items, consumables with timed benefits and throwables. But be warned, these do NOT stack, and your backpack’s inventory is very limited. You’ll be spending plenty of time managing your backpack and resources, so be prepared to save your favorites and drop the duds.

But hold on… shouldn’t I sell my unwanted items? Nope! There’s no buying/selling here, instead a Barter System takes its place, you’ll be able to trade your goods for items you’d want. I genuinely liked this idea but it’s not exactly fine tuned, the value of your items depends on who you’re trading with, but ends up being more of a guessing game to get what you want with a fair value. Plus add in the low inventory space, requiring you to travel back and forth between your storage and the trader to make a deal. This isn’t so much an issue but more so a hassle and time waster because the storage areas end up being few and far between. I really hope we see Rebellion expand upon and improve this aspect in a sequel or even a successor that shares the same DNA because it currently has the inklings of something great.

Woah this is breathtaking!

…and I’m being attacked.

If you’re able to crank up the settings. Holy moly. Atomfall is a looker. Characters and their facial animations can be a little dodgy (think Fallout) but the world and zones you explore can be beautiful. If only I didn’t have a baddie trying to end my life, I’d have stopped to smell the roses a bit more.

Performance was actually spectacular. Ultra settings with WQHD ran at a locked 60FPS, while barely making a dent in noise and thermals. While Very High settings at 4K 60FPS range the same in terms of performance. I’ve actually only played Sniper Elite V2 but I believe Rebellion is using the same in house engine that they use for that series, at least the most recent ones. Which makes me quite interested in checking those games out just from a technical standpoint. Bravo Rebellion.

(Running on a mid-range build with a 4070 Super)

You may be saying to yourself “You love this game? The last half was mostly negatives!” While true, it’s only because I love it so much that I want to see the aspects I found faults in to be improved. There’s so much to love here if you’re a detective exploration puzzle fiend like myself because Atomfall succeeds tenfold in this regard! It’s only for those who are seeking something more well rounded that they may want to look elsewhere.