[Console Games] Atomic Heart Review - Crispy Critters

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Atomic Heart lacks follow-through on its most interesting narrative concepts and plays it safe with its first-person shooter gameplay.

doesn't hide its BioShock Infinite inspirations. The game begins in a city in the clouds, features reality-bending and elemental powers you can employ in your fight against advanced robots, sees you scrounging for resources in an idyllic city that's falling apart, and stars an amnesiac protagonist grappling with the nuances of free will. By the time you reach the climax of the story and you're asked to visit a lighthouse, you know what's up. Where Atomic Heart most differs from its inspiration is in the lens through which it focuses its narrative, exploring concepts of free will via Soviet Russian collectivism instead of the U.S.' individualism. However, its intriguing premise is let down by a deeply unlikable protagonist and a predictable storyline that doesn't do anything interesting with its cool ideas.

In the alternate history of Atomic Heart, a scientist named Dmitry Sechenov kickstarts a robotics boom in Russia in the 1930s. By the 1950s, the working class has been abolished in the Soviet Union and completely replaced by robots controlled through a hive-mind network called Kollectiv 1.0. The game begins a few years after that, just prior to the public unveiling of Kollectiv 2.0, which will allow all humans to have equal access to the hive-mind to control robots remotely through a Thought device wired straight to their brain, as well as connect and share information with each other across great distances. Basically, it's the Internet plugged into your brain and available 24/7.

adversaries that shoot at you from afar to bulky foes who heavily telegraph their attacks but can take a hit. The same goes for the weapons and powers you use to fight them. The pump-action shotgun hits like you'd expect a shotgun should, for instance, and the cold polymer power freezes enemies in their tracks just as you'd assume. There's nothing revolutionary to how combat plays out, but it all works as it should. It's familiar but still fun.

Looting is surprisingly the most enjoyable aspect of Atomic Heart, as, with just the click of a button, Charles can use telekinesis to pull loot into Sergei's pocket. In practice, this causes drawers to fly open, cabinet doors to almost swing off their hinges, and the bodies of enemies to erupt as the magnetic pull of Charles rips the resources of a room towards Sergei. It never got old to enter an unexplored room or clear out a group of enemies and then sit back to watch as everything around me exploded into a whirlwind of paper and scraps of metal, sucked into my coffers like a greedy tornado. Of course, you can then use these resources to craft new firearms, ammo, weapon attachments, and items, but the sheer delight of the act is almost enough of a reward in itself.

 just hop in a car and drive straight to the next story beat, as that's where the better gameplay is. It makes the open world feel superfluous, adding content at the expense of enjoyability.

Fortunately, some of the main levels have a distinct flavor and engaging themes to them, helping them to stand out against the largely forgettable open world. My favorite of these levels takes place in a theater known for being the first to feature a cast composed entirely of robots. The level sees Sergei chasing after a man who used to work there, who has twisted the theater into a macabre showcase of art--much like in BioShock. There's this breadcrumb trail of diary entries you can uncover that reveals an engineer coming to terms with the strange parasocial relationship he's developing with one of the robot dancers, a clever puzzle that incorporates ballet poses and blood splatters, and an incredible moment where you're fighting off waves of enemies during a ballet that gets a hip-hop remix

It's a great level, and I'm sad we didn't get more like it or at least have more examples of using music to transform a familiar combat scenario into something more memorable. Atomic Heart has a great soundtrack filled with thumping, high-energy music from Doom composer Mick Gordon that will get your head bobbing during even the most butt-clenching of battles. But these powerful rhythms are usually reserved for boss encounters, meaning a lot of the game's best music is fleeting and only pops up for one encounter before never being heard from again. That moment in the theater is cool, but it's the only time something like that happens in the game. Atomic Heart doesn't build on it to make more moments like it--in fact, there are quite a few instances where the powerful soundtrack feels wasted because the superb composition that's playing doesn't match the vibe of what you're currently doing. Why play hard rock during a stressful fight in the dimly lit space of a morgue? It just doesn't fit.

There are quite a few parts of Atomic Heart that just don't neatly fit together, and those disparities create an experience that often feels at odds with itself. That disparity is most evident in how the history of the world in Atomic Heart is interesting and sets up an intriguing conversation about the nature of free will and collectivism, but then the unlikable protagonist repeatedly prevents that topic from being explored. Atomic Heart is certainly going to appeal to some people, especially those looking to relive BioShock Infinite, but it's not an easy recommendation.

 

https://www.gamespot.com/reviews/atomic-heart-review-crispy-critters/1900-6418033/