2033 still loves hurling fistfuls of monsters at you in open areas, particularly in the final levels, where you'll get so badly mobbed that it starts to feel like some level designer went berserk with a rubber-stamp tool when placing them. Not all of the battles are as interesting as the stealth opportunities, though.
Also, Metro 2033 has been retrofitted with the same little touches that make guard-hunting especially fun (if not particularly challenging) in Last Light – like musical cues that tell you when guards are near, what their alert status is, and when you've scored a kill or are in danger of being spotted. That's a big improvement, but the biggest one is that the enemy AI feels more consistent, making it possible to sneak around or stealth-hunt packs of hostile guards without the risk of arbitrarily bringing all their friends crashing toward your exact location once they spot a body. Not only do its new character models and brighter lighting make it easier to spot enemies and see detail (at the expense of some of the original's moodiness), but its clunky menus and controls have been ditched in favor of Last Light's more intuitive equipment wheels and Call of Duty-esque handling. Watch our original Metro 2033 review.Then again, part of the reason this new Metro 2033 is easier is that it's no longer tripping over its own feet. In Survival, gasmask filters – which put a timer on your lifespan when you're exploring Moscow's toxic surface streets – were often in short supply, but I never had to use military-grade bullets (which double as currency and powerful last-resort ammunition) until the very end, I never ran out of medpacks, and devastating weapons – like silenced shotguns and Kalashnikovs – were usually within easy reach. This makes no difference gameplay-wise, but it's a nice touch.) Being able to pick your pace and style of gameplay is a cool feature, although it's worth noting that playing through Metro 2033 on Survival mode in Normal difficulty definitely feels more forgiving than the original, so players looking for a serious challenge should immediately kick it up to Hardcore. (If you forget which one you chose, just look at your watch – 2033's analog model shows up in Survival, while Spartan features Last Light's digital timepiece. It begins with the choice of whether to scuttle through the tunnels in Survival mode – which promises harsher, Metro 2033-esque threats and scarce resources – or storm them with plentiful ammo and faster pacing in the Last Light-inspired Spartan mode. (Also, get ready to hear lots from veteran anime-and-game actor Steve Blum, who lends his gravelly voice to roughly half of the characters.) That’s all unchanged from the original version on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC, but Redux improves on both the graphics and gameplay in significant ways - mostly for the better.
Here, bullets are currency, guns are ugly and homemade, gasmasks spell the difference between life and death, and everyone calls them "gosmosks" in hokey faux-Russian accents.
A civil war is stirring that could wipe humanity from the face of the earth forever.It’s a journey that takes you through creepy tunnels and ruins haunted by shaggy monsters and eerie phantoms, in which tense moments of stealth or exploration might suddenly give way to explosive, crowded firefights. Mutants stalk the catacombs beneath the desolate surface, and hunt amidst the poisoned skies above.īut rather than stand united, the station-cities of the Metro are locked in a struggle for the ultimate power, a doomsday device from the military vaults of D6. Beneath the ruins of post-apocalyptic Moscow, in the tunnels of the Metro, the remnants of mankind are besieged by deadly threats from outside – and within.