Atomfall review: Snitches get shortcuts

There came a time in Atomfall when I felt the game had gotten away from itself. I was sitting just outside the perimeter of a prison, staring at dozens of heavily armed soldiers, giant robots, guard towers, and automatic turrets. The entire compound was surrounded by a fence with an alarm that went off any time I got close. There I sat with my bolt action rifle and 12 rounds, bow, pistol, shiv, and a few Molotov cocktails. There was zero chance that I could win this fight without some elite gamer buffoonery, but I had no idea what other options existed and no more patience to wander aimlessly to figure it out. I did the only logical thing that anyone in my position would do; saved my game every time I made a foot of progress and got to work. It wasn’t until a full hour and more than 25 saves later when I was having a conversation with another character that I found my alternative. It was a snitching opportunity that could have presented itself 15 minutes into my Atomfall run had I not balked at the vague offer. I could have walked straight in the front gate. I was both impressed and mildly salty.

Who are you?

Atomfall begins with players waking up in a bunker. There’s a dude there freaking out and bleeding, asking you for a bandage and giving you a keycard to escape the bunker. He tells you to get to the Interchange so you can escape this terrible place. You have no idea who you are, why you’re in the bunker, what this place is, and no clue as to where to find this Interchange. How you proceed in this moment is entirely up to you. Help this bleeding fool by crafting a bandage, beat him to death just for fun, or take his keycard and leave him there to bleed out. It’s a lesson in how Atomfall works from start to finish. The choice of where to go, what to do, and how to do it is entirely up to you. Your only true goal is to find this Interchange and escape.

As you exit the bunker, you’ll be staring at rolling hills and picturesque rivers that almost hide the fact Atomfall takes place five years after the Windscale nuclear disaster in Northern England. Scattered across these beautiful landscapes are buildings that are abandoned and burned out, but every bit worth exploring as you look for secret passages and hidden cellars. Just be mindful of the folk that have taken over these lands. Some may tolerate your presence, and others will attack on sight.

The exception to all of this is the village of Wyndham, a community that, at first, almost feels normal except for the Protocol, a military organization that keeps the residents pinned under its boot. You’re mostly free to explore this town, talk to its people, and start to make sense of what’s happening here. It also acts as a hub that connects the major regions of Atomfall, although it never quite feels like home.

Good luck

You’ve escaped a bunker, possibly made your way to Wyndham, so now what? The answer is whatever you want. Atomfall lets players experience it with very little help from the game itself. Unless you turn them on, there are no quest markers. You figure out where to go and what to do by having conversations with characters and reading notes left behind. These notes get organized in a journal that you can review at any time and can be sorted by region for additional clarity. They are vague, though, and there will be plenty of times you aren’t sure what you’re supposed to do next or, at the very least, why. This can be both refreshing and a little frustrating. Being lost is great, but it wears thin when you’re out of ideas and wandering for hours on end. Credit to developer Rebellion for including options to alleviate this suffering, if that’s your preference.

Atomfall calls itself a survival-action game, and that’s mostly true. The survival mechanics are light. You don’t have to manage food or water, but you will need to eat to restore health or gain buffs. You can also apply bandages and first aid kits if you’re bleeding or badly wounded. A nifty feature of survival is your heart rate. Atomfall doesn’t have a stamina meter, but you do have to worry about your ticker climbing too high, preventing you from running and fighting effectively. It’s a cool interpretation that can make you feel uneasy when you’re approaching 180 beats per minute.

Part of surviving is finding recipes, training manuals, and training stimulants. The recipes will allow you to craft items like bandages, shivs, tonics, or even explosives, assuming you have the materials. The training manuals reveal parts of the skill tree, but you’ll need to find training stimulants, which are just skill points, if you want to unlock the skills. These skills can buff damage to unaware foes, help you manage your heart rate, or even improve your bartering skills. I was more excited when I found a recipe than a training manual, as crafting yields immediate results where the skill tree is hit or miss.

Bless these lands

While Atomfall isn’t a huge world, it’s expertly crafted, which is more important. There aren’t a lot of regions, and none of them take long if you just run from one side to the other, but the detail begs you to slow down and explore. Hidden rooms, secret passages, and notes that explain what the hell is going on are everywhere. Atomfall is for thoughtful players that want to take their time and figure things out for themselves. You can feel the Stalker and Fallout vibes with some of The Outer Worlds mixed in.

As for getting around, things can feel a bit tedious when you walk from one zone to another on the other side of the world, but the reality is there is almost always a shortcut. Now, that shortcut might be a dark tunnel or mine that you’d rather not pass through, but once you start to learn your way around there are savings to be found. It’s rewarding to feel as if you have a solid grasp on this once foreign world.

While you’re moving about, you’re always on the lookout for new weapons and more bullets. There aren’t many guns, and they are simple, but you can upgrade them through a crafting system. If shooting isn’t your thing, you can go the melee route, although that really isn’t an option if you’re staring down more than two enemies, where one of them almost certainly has a gun. Thankfully, your character is armed with a Spartan kick, so if you need some cheap entertainment you can always kick someone to death while they struggle to get back up.

When you’re not being shot at, your metal detector is a treat. Thankfully it works even when it’s stuffed in your pocket, alerting you when you’re near a cache. You can then equip it and find the exact location of the loot, then dig up your prize. The only downside here is that Atomfall has a more punishing inventory system than Stalker 2, so it’s not uncommon to leave valuable loot sitting in a box in the middle of nowhere. There is a limited storage system, but it’s inconvenient at best. Unfortunately, this makes trading goods a bit underwhelming, as you can’t carry the things you need to survive and the things valuable enough to trade, and traders tend to be near people who want to kill you. In lieu of more backpack space, I would have loved a room in Wyndham with a chest in it. Hopefully that already exists, and I just never found it, although I doubt it.

Just die already

Where Atomfall surprised me was in the combat, both for good and bad reasons. I felt vulnerable during almost every encounter against hostiles. Ammunition is scarce, weapons are mostly reflective of 1962, and your foes are decent shots. This works well and feels high stakes when you’re facing three or four evil doers but not when you’re staring at a large force. Sure, there’s probably an alternative to fighting, but I can see where players are going to consider turning on waypoints or reducing the recommended difficulty to overcome challenges that feel out of place. That’s not to say Atomfall is a difficult game because it isn’t. There are just a couple of instances where it lacks harmony with the rest of the experience. 

Take the prison camp for example. It’s not the enemy firepower but rather the bullet sponges. In many instances, headshots don’t get you the kill, even against human enemies without helmets. Sure, a rifle will give you that one-shot headshot, but the bow may not if you aren’t very close, and the same goes for a pistol. I’m not talking shots at 100 meters, I’ve landed bow headshots on folk without helmets at reasonably close range and all it did was irritate them and alert every enemy in the area. Instead of being rewarded for your patience and skill, you’re punished. It’s not a great feeling. For the most part, though, if your aim is true, you can quickly John Wick your way through most combat encounters.

While we’re talking combat, stealth feels a bit off. You can silently take down an enemy, or creep through tall grass, but it doesn’t feel like stealth received the same attention as other aspects of Atomfall. I’m someone who will spend an hour quietly clearing a base in an Assassin’s Creed game, but I almost always avoided stealth in Atomfall. The only semi-effective stealth option at range is a bow shot, and we just talked about the problems there. It sure feels like a lot of my gripes could be resolved if shooting someone in the head consistently dispatched them.

Okay, I’ll stay

Your goal in Atomfall is to escape, but the reality is this world is far too interesting to want to leave. I cared very little about finding this Interchange at first, and instead preferred to hunt for buried caches, find recipes, read notes, and uncover secrets. I killed characters just to see what was in their pockets, but not before I heard what interesting things they had to say. It wasn’t personal on my end, but those three bullets and the key to the secret room behind them was far more valuable to me than their life. If that seems harsh, no problem, because you’re free to play the complete opposite of me, and I promise it will be just as entertaining.

This review was based on a Steam code provided by Rebellion. Atomfall will be available March 27, 2025, for PC, PS5, and Xbox.

Bill Lavoy

Managing Editor

Bill, who is also known as Rumpo, is a lifelong gamer and Toronto Maple Leafs fan. He made his mark early in his career through guide writing and a deep understanding of editorial SEO. He enjoys putting in the work to create a great content, be it a wild feature or grinding out an in-depth collectible guide. Tweet him @RumpoPlays if you have a question or comment about one of his articles.