Atomic Heart, the very existence of which some did not believe a couple of years ago, became one of the landmark events in the domestic gaming industry and six months after its release it acquired an undeniable cult status. But Desura does not stop there - even before the release we were promised several DLCs, and the first of them has finally seen the light.
Let's start with the main thing - you don't have to replay the game. The DLC is completely self-contained and can be launched separately from the new cool game menu. Moreover, if the main campaign is not completed, as in the press account provided to us for review, you will be warned about spoilers.
So, “Collective 2.0” has been launched, polymerization is in full swing, the unfortunate glitch caused by the traitor has been eliminated through the efforts of Major Nechaev (as the main story campaign of the cool game tells), many injured employees, and Nechaev himself among them, have been sent to the “Easy” hotel of the “Mendeleev” complex » for rehabilitation – how could anything else go wrong? As it turned out, it quite can.
The abbreviation of the name of the add-on “Annihilation Instinct” AI refers to the topic of artificial intelligence, as, by the way, does the English version AI (Annihilation Instinct) - my respect for preserving the pun in all versions. And this is not without reason - the antagonist of the player in the role of the same Major Nechaev will be the AI, who, or rather, who we all know from the main cool game under the name “ELEANORA”.
“ELEANORA,” in case anyone forgot, is not just a lustful refrigerator, but a real AI with weapons production functionality. The addition again exploits the rather hackneyed theme of the “rebellion of the machines” - “ELEANORA” went crazy, launched aggressive robots and killed the entire staff of the complex, but the special attitude towards Nechaev, for whom we again have to play, has not gone away - and only this will become a chance for her pacification.
Under the guidance of Professor Lebedev, we will need to download new command sequences and restore the original functionality of ELEANOR. True, after a previous unsuccessful attempt by Lebedev himself, the carriers of the sequences, the special BUS-A robots, found themselves scattered throughout the complex and its surroundings, and also entered an autonomous mode with resistance to any external influences - but when was it easy in Atomic Heart ?
I will not reveal other details of the plot in order to avoid very obvious spoilers. I will only note that here we learn why “ELEANORA” became so lustful and became so attached to our hero - as well as new details of his biography. Yes, and there is a place for Baba Zina. In general, in terms of plot development, the addition is pleasing.
HRAZ is no longer with us, so we have to go through the beginning of the cool game without the usual polymer abilities - what are the usual ones, without polymer abilities at all - and the only weapon will be a spear found almost in the trash from improvised means with the traditional Atomic Heart sonorous name “Klusha” ", one of the new DLC items.
Together with the chthonic atmosphere of an abandoned village in one of the first locations, the result is almost Silent Hill, which, however, does not last long, giving way to the more traditional gameplay for Atomic Heart.
The second new type of weapon was the Secateur, a cannon converted from scientific equipment with two fire modes. A standard attack resembles a machine gun with a huge consumption of ammunition of its own type, of which, however, there is always enough, a reinforced attack wastes the character’s energy and releases horizontally oriented clots of energy.
Each type of weapon has three elements that can be upgraded, and there are also three upgrade levels, not five, like guns in the base game. At first, the “Pruner” deals fairly weak damage, but with maximum pumping it becomes a formidable weapon, which, in principle, does not require anything else. Although the shotgun I loved from the original came to the rescue more than once thanks to its significant damage at close range.
Another innovation is the essentially cheating consumable “Alenka”, disguised as a chocolate bar of the same name in the alternative version of 1955. It causes a destructive whirlwind, effective against large concentrations of enemies, which also restores your health. However, for some reason you can only launch it directly from the inventory; quick access is not provided.
Of course, they will also give us a new glove. True, our benefactor Professor Lebedev is a civilian and does not have access to combat modules, therefore the abilities “Mass Telekinesis”, “Polymer Throw” and “Cold” are blocked. “Polymer Shield” and “Shock” are in place, as are modules for pumping up energy and physical abilities, but the main thing is the presence of the new “Technostasis” ability.
Essentially, this is a local implementation of the time dilation mechanic , well known in cool games since Max Payne. Here it appears as a “bubble” of slowed down time, accompanied by a visual effect in the form of bluish waves and highlighting the weak points of enemies. The duration of action, radius and other parameters of the “bubble” can be improved by pumping.
But you really need to pump it up, especially in the absence of the usual abilities - many battle scenes are openly tailored for it. The enemies come in a huge crowd and are quite unpleasant even on the “Peaceful Atom”, so the recipe is to slow down, deal maximum damage to weak points while the ability is active, avoid hits, repeat. Works flawlessly.
BUS-A, in the spirit of the setting, are called that for a reason - they really gather into beads, combining several small enemies into one large one, which is quite rare in games. True, structures of 2-3 pieces are not that much stronger than single ones, and really huge ones are assembled only a couple of times - these, as you guessed, will be bosses .
Another new enemy is a robot dummy (I don’t remember the name), conceived for various tests, but, like everything at the Enterprise, it has a dual purpose. In combat mode, he can attack in close combat, separate and throw his own limbs, and also reassemble after the first destruction. Quite annoying bastards, especially in large numbers.
Literally from the first seconds of “Extermination Instinct” you understand that you are in that same Atomic Heart - superbly drawn monumental and atmospheric locations, faithful to the setting to the smallest nuances, “Twitter” scattered here and there for better immersion in the atmosphere, a cool soundtrack and sweet voice acting Major Nechaev, who still loves pies, cheerful gameplay with the synergy of weapons and abilities (though this time there is only one combination, but a new one).
There are also puzzles in the add-on. There are not many of them (large ones - only three for the entire expansion, plus several castles ), but they are made traditionally with imagination.
The characteristic humor with a bunch of references has not gone away either. In HRAZ's absence, his advice on loading screens has been replaced by quotes from famous people and characters, from Dostoevsky and Shakespeare to Stalin and Marty McFly. “Pears” is full of references to Soviet cinema (this time we especially went through the “Formula of Love”), and the icing on the cake was an aggressive foul-mouthed goose walking around the complex, promising to “outplay and destroy” Nechaev. Well, you get the idea.
Overall, Extermination Instinct has the main thing that a good DLC should have - new content in an old, beloved atmosphere. But it’s a little sad that there is not as much of it as we would like - you can complete the addition in a couple of days. It’s also unclear why it abandoned many of the interesting finds from the base cool game.
I already talked about the old combat abilities of the glove, but their absence is at least due to the plot. But the rejection of such interesting mechanics as cassette players is quite difficult to explain by anything other than the arbitrary desire of the developers .
Most of the old weapons were also “taken away”, leaving only the PM, shotgun and Zvezdochka. The range of items for crafting has also been reduced . Of course, given the small size of the DLC, it is not particularly necessary, but, as they say, the aftertaste still remains.
There are no new interesting characters - with the possible exception of the best development of ELEANOR herself. She raises a rather interesting and current issue of control over artificial intelligence and whether it has a personality, but due to the peculiar reputation of a lustful bitch, the situation is perceived as a slight farce.
I would also like more variety of enemies. In fact, the entire DLC is built on two types of enemies (BUS-A and dummies) with small inclusions of old ones (“Vovchiki”, “Vatrushki” and several others). By the way, new enemies are not saved in the game encyclopedia, which is why I did not remember the name of one of them.
Bossfights are interesting, complex and vigorous, with the destruction of bosses in parts and in several stages. True, the bosses themselves are also not very diverse, to say the least - there are only two of them in the add-on (these are the same mega-structures made of “beads”), and they differ... Only in color. Quite a strange solution, especially since having such a modular system, it was possible to come up with a huge number of configurations.
Technically the cool game has remained at the same level, and this, unfortunately, also applies to bugs. Robots still get stuck in textures or simply in place, and a couple of times stuck enemies did not allow us to activate the trigger for further passage - we had to reboot. The ability keys sometimes get confused, and once the cool game crashed for me right on the final boss. Let's hope that these are all costs of the pre-release version, which will be quickly corrected with patches.
“Instinct of Extermination” is the essence of Atomic Heart itself. This is a cheerful and interesting, albeit short, adventure in the spirit of the setting and gameplay of the main game, which reveals the plot well and leaves the groundwork for new stories - after all, we are promised at least three more DLCs. It has everything that we love Atomic Heart so much for, but, unfortunately, there are still some shortcomings.
