Atomfall
Developer: Rebellion
Publisher: Rebellion
Platforms: Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC (Reviewed)
Release Date: 27 Mar 2025
Price: – $49.99 USD – Available Here $99.95 AUD – Available Here
Overview
Nuclear disaster is never a good thing. In real life, that is. In video games, it can lead to some fantastic things. It can give us the Fallout series and Metro games, and we can always relax by climbing the towers or hunting the collectibles in Far Cry New Dawn. The rush of shooting at enemies with only 4-5 bullets left in the clip, scavenging for food and water, finding shelter before the night comes – life in the post-apocalyptic games can be pretty amazing. And that’s exactly what Rebellion is trying to make us feel with Atomfall. These devs have honed their craft with the great Sniper Elite series, but will this expedition in the uncharted waters with a new genre (at least for them) pay off in the end? Let’s find out.
Story
The game is set in the aftermath of the disaster at the Windscale nuclear power station, and it is up to you to find out what exactly happened. Fun fact: This is based on the actual nuclear disaster that happened in 1957 in the UK, which you can read more about here. Anyway, to solve this mystery, you will need to navigate through military camps, ruined houses, and abandoned bunkers and deal with paramilitary, scavengers, and cultists. Solving the mystery is anything but straightforward – you will meet a lot of eccentric characters and a strange advisor that only helps by randomly placed red telephone booths all over the country. The story will sometimes go from weird to intriguing with a bit of abstract sprinkled from the pages of Monty Python.
Gameplay
The beginning is as standard as you might expect. You wake up with no recollection of who you are, where you are supposed to go, and you’re slowly picking up the pieces of the story (and our goals) as you search for food and supplies. Pretty soon, crafting in the game is introduced, along with some melee weapons and firearms. You’ll be mostly fighting enemies with cricket bats, hatchets, sicles, and so on since the ammo in the game is limited unless you decide to explore every nook and cranny. Also, every shot counts, and going for anything except for headshots is a waste of ammo. If you survive long enough in these barely inhabited lands, you’ll be able to upgrade the firearms, learn more crafting recipes, and unlock plenty of skills.
The enemies are not rich in variety, you’ll be going against humans, robots, blue glowing mutants, and occasional swarms of bees and birds. What I do have to praise is a simple and smart enemy AI, too often we see in games enemies with weapons that will switch to melee when you get close to them (thus that can be exploited every time) but in this game if they have firearms enemies will always keep their distance, go behind the cover and flank you. But that can also be countered as soon as you unlock the skill to throw melee weapons at them. Oh, my gun is empty? No worries, here is that empty revolver right into your face! There is also some big exploration factor once you find the metal detector and go nuts on finding the caches. Another thing that I liked is the flexibility in finishing the quests. There is an overarching task in the game of finding a couple of atomic batteries, and you can get your hands on them by exploring abandoned sites or trading, but what happens when you don’t have enough resources to barter with someone? It’s easy: just shoot them in their face and take everything (that is, if you can live with what you just did). With that said, I do like the trading mechanic and the lack of actual currency in the game. If anything, it makes everything far more authentic.
Visuals
This is the part of the game that didn’t impress me, and honestly, it dragged down the overall experience. While the game can look fairly decent when played on the highest graphical settings, the moment you lower them—even slightly—the visuals take a serious hit. The environments become muddy, textures look flat, and the entire aesthetic starts to feel outdated. I’ll give credit where it’s due: the level designs in the early stages, especially the bunkers and half-ruined cityscapes, are well-crafted and atmospheric. But beyond that, the environments begin to feel repetitive, almost as if they were built using a limited set of assets that were just copy-pasted across different areas. The character animations and facial models are also underwhelming, particularly for enemies. To make matters worse, the game features respawning enemies who all come back with those same bland, lifeless expressions—which kills immersion in a game that’s supposed to reward exploration.
Audio
Well……the voice actors really tried. I’ll give them that much credit. You can tell there was some genuine effort and emotion put into their performances. There’s a certain energy and commitment in how their lines are delivered, and you can tell they were doing their best with the material they were given. Unfortunately, none of the characters in the game stand out or feel compelling. They’re all bland archetypes, and their stories are either predictable or just not interesting. The dialogue often feels cliche and exhausting to sit through. As for the music, it behaves most weirdly—randomly popping in and out with no rhyme or reason. Sometimes, I’ll wander around for hours in complete silence, and then suddenly, a dramatic theme kicks in like it’s signaling a major boss fight, but nothing happens. The weapons are equally uninspired, sounding generic and recycled like they used stock sound effects for everything.
Overall
One thing I can say about this game with great praise is its stability. No crashing, no game-breaking bugs. Actually, there are no bugs at all in my playthroughs. It is fairly well optimized. No microtransactions either – what you see is what you get. Unfortunately, what we got is nothing exactly impressive. The game is too short for its price, and after one playthrough, every next one feels like a slog. I liked Atomfall to some extent because it tried to bring something new to the table, but at the end of the day, it is a game with an uninspiring gameplay loop, and I don’t see how they could make a sequel and improve on its shortcomings.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
