Welcome back to The Wheel of Ukraineous Video Games, a cavalcade of high quality (and sometimes not-high quality) interactive software entertainment mostly developed in the sovereign nation of Ukraine! If you'd like to donate to the Ukrainian Red Cross, I'll include the link here, as always.

ATOM RPG

Developer: ATOM Team

Release Date: December 19, 2018 (1.0 release date. It was in early access for something like a year prior)

Time Played: Around 90 minutes

Troubleshooting: None

Would I play more? Nah, nope. Underrail and Encased are right there.

One of the things I’ve tried to be fairly consistent about with my various wheehicular rampages is a loose policy of “no indies.” This was partially due to me wanting to avoid the layer of garbage that sits at the bottom of Steam; be they Unity asset flips or RPG Maker porn games (with or without the 18+ patch.) However, it’s also because I think it’s less fun to dunk on smaller games made by smaller teams with smaller budgets than their published retail counterparts. The idea that something like Dungeon Lords or Nosferatu: Wrath of Malachi was a boxed product on store shelves is more interesting to me than going after a $15 indie game made by like a dozen people. I might eventually budge on this a little more, but for now the likes of Inquisitor are safe from the Dubious RPG treatment.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is that ATOM RPG is the most immediate turn-off I’ve had for this feature and I feel bad because it was made by like nineteen people total, including art contractors. Black Isle’s Fallout duology is only slightly less relevant than Heroes of Might and Magic III in the annals of post-Soviet computer mythology. If you wanted evidence, take literally one look at ATOM RPG’s UI, which is less an “homage” and more of a “direct translation” of Fallout 1 and 2; a feeling that extends to the rest of the game. I guess a less charitable way of saying it would be: ATOM RPG feels like a video game designed by No Mutants Allowed trying to recreate the lost Van Buren version of Fallout 3 through the lens of a post-nuclear Soviet Union, rather than a United States, but slavjank. If that sentence appeals to you, you’re probably the audience for this game. Apparently I’m not that audience.

Now, to be clear, sometimes I’m down for some comfort food blatant homage. I wouldn’t be a fan of the King’s Bounty games otherwise. But ATOM RPG’s tone is immediately weird and mean-spirited, its translation immediately scuffed, and mechanics immediately weird and janky all in a way that I nope’d out of far faster than I was expecting. I’ve liked A Fallout in my time, I loved Wasteland 3, and I’ve liked the little I’ve played of other indie Eastern Bloc Fallout-likes such as Underrail. But when the gameplay feels like a lesser reflection of a game from 1997 and the writing an awkwardly translated mish-mash of quirk, grime, and just a sprinkle of casual bigotry I don’t think it’s my jam. I could see someone putting in more time than I did and coming out with a better impression, but this is one of those cases where I’d rather just replay Fallout 1, finish Fallout 2, or delve into a more immediately promising indie RPG. I mean, heck, they released a new campaign for Solasta! You know I’ve gotta get in on that action, see what all of my weird meat puppets wanna say.

Metro 2033 Redux

Developer: 4A Games

Release Date: August 25, 2014 (Redux) March 10, 2010 (Original)

Time Played: Around 2 hours

Troubleshooting: I'm honestly surprised it's taken this long for a game to start randomly crashing on me

Would I play more? Yes

It’s almost quaint to go back and read some of the things people were saying about the Metro games back in the early 2010s. “It’s a shooter where there are long periods of not-shooting things!” “There are attempts at creating atmosphere and building a world???” and “you have to wipe your mask sometimes?” Like, I know this was the peak of Call of Duty and Call of Duty-poisoned shooter design, but folks, it’s not hard to understand. 4A Games (which was founded by devs who worked on STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl) attempted to adapt the Russian sci-fi novel Metro 2033 into a video game. It’s weird, slow, and doesn’t always quite nail what it’s trying to do, but as a premium vibez delivery service and entry into the surprisingly large “Slavic dudes wearing gas masks trying to avoid giving into despair while opining about life and the universe” genre of video games I had a very good time.

Now, funnily enough, Metro 2033 is just as linear, scripted, and directed as most shooters from 2010, it’s just slow and weird and contemplative when shit isn’t hitting the fan, a tone enhanced if you switch the voice language to Russian instead of hearing like… Yuri Lowenthal doing a Russian accent. Atryom’s journey to defeat The Dark Ones is the exact level of grim I expect from a game like this, with just enough Eastern Bloc mysticism and oh god horrible spiders jesus christ why are the spiders so gross to keep me involved. As I mentioned, it's a game whose greatest strength is less about the shooty shoot or the looty loot and more about the peak vibez of hanging out in dark tunnels with a bunch of sad Russians (and sometimes murdering Nazis.)

The Redux variant (which is the one I played) just seems to look better and smooth out some of the edges, if you so desire. I don’t wanna be the asshole telling anyone how to play the video game, but this definitely seems like it benefits from playing in “Ranger” mode, which turns off the UI and gives you less ammo to mess with. I know this because I didn’t do that; I was drowning in AK bullets only two hours in, had fully upgraded my revolver into a mid-range carbine, and rarely had to use healing items. I like it when I’m forced to engage in the video game systems (unless those systems are bad tbh,) and in that sense I don’t think the “normal” difficulty really facilitates any of the scrounging, sneaking, or ammo preserving Metro is designed around.

I’m honestly half-tempted to restart the game that way, but between this, STALKER, and Chernobylite (which was made in Poland and thus doesn’t qualify for this wheel, but in spirit ABSOLUTELY qualifies for this wheel) I’ve already apparently hit the triple jackpot of weird atmospheric shooters heavily inspired by Roadside Picnic and Tarkovsky’s Stalker. Might need to mix it up a bit before STALKER 2 comes out at the end of this year. Anyway it’s cool. You might have it on the EGS if you got it during their giveaway. Give it a look.