ATOM RPG: Post-apocalyptic indie game

I'm gonna be honest this is exactly the type of wooden video game I'd think would be right up my alley but the writing is so atrocious I just can't push myself through it.

Some combat sections are rough, essentially RNG spawning you in front of decked out firing squads, but it's a solid game that's a lot of fun once you get past the jank

I've put around 28 hours in and really tried to like this game but it feels so slow and drags on and on. I got up until the part where you can either go to the Dead City or Mountain Pass of Woes but couldn't force myself to keep playing.

The major problem apart from the slow pacing of the game is the combat system. You have a turn based system with melee and ranged weapons, and throwables but there is no cover system. This is a major flaw and makes combat more about soaking up damage and hitting first with high damage weapons. If you get ambushed early on it is much harder so you're forced to take speechcraft to avoid a lot of these situations.

After awhile it just became a race to finish the dialog to complete the boring quests as you made progress from place to place at a snails pace with such repetitive interactions. This is why I've chosen not to complete the game and to shelf it.

Excellent story lines, multiple NPC interactions, in depth surrounding and graphics that capture and involve the player. Numerous random events, multiple choices that have short and long term impacts on the story line.

Loving a game is perfectly alright. Wanting to make a game inspired by it is also perfectly alright. Making your game almost completely the same as the one you love, is not alright. I don't mean that entirely from an intellectual property point of view, or a copyright point of view, or anything like that. There are so many games these days that are copies of copies, derivatives of derivatives, what ever.

No, what I mean when I say making this game almost an exact copy of another game, is that ATOM RPG is quite clearly and unabashedly inspired by Fallout 1 and 2, to the point of basically copying all of the bad game designs and mistakes that they had. Don't get me wrong, Fallout 1 and 2 are right up there on my list of favourite games; back from the early 2000s when I picked them up, and they were made back in 1997 and 1998 respectively. Game designers have had nearly thirty years to improve on these games and their formula. They were a product of their time, this game is not.

For some reason the creators of ATOM RPG didn't innovate on the original Fallout formula, they didn't change things that were annoying or that were a problem. They didn't fix the mistakes that were unintentional, or caused by game engine limitations. I don't know why this is. Do they love the original Fallout games so much (so much that they even took the 'a post apocalyptic roleplaying game' for their title) that they didn't want to change anything at all other than the setting, characters, weapons, etc? Did they not have the ability or intellectual capacity to make a unique game (which I find extremely hard to believe as this game is great in it's own way in certain areas)? I don't know what is going on here.

You cannot freely move your camera around like you can in most RPG games now. This can severely limit your ability to see items on the ground, on shelves, and things further away. The latter issue is also compounded by a lack of zooming out. You are often times just way too close to your character, and cannot get a good look at the map and specific angles of it. One of the interesting things about Fallout was being able to recruit companions. This game does the same, however they have barely changed the interface for anything. The most annoying casualty of this is your inventory, where only a small number of items actually show up in the two bars (increased from one in the Fallout games). But for companions, this is awful, as navigating through them and using them is extremely annoying and difficult.

Everything must be done to your companion through dialogue, as you cannot control them in any way. In combat, they will choose what it is they want to do, unless you use the lengthy menu process to change what they do. Melee companions will run right in front of you and take a bullet to the back and die. Or stand there shooting when they should be running, and die; and when they die, they aren't coming back. This is just like the original Fallout games, to the point where many people, myself included, just didn't bother with Charisma and recruiting companions. Yes, they were interesting and could at times be useful, but they were very often a huge liability.

It is the same, if not worse in this game. Now you can spend time and effort gearing them up, leveling up their skills, picking out abilities for them on the ability tree, only for them to throw a molotov cocktail at their feet when fighting a rodent and die instantly. Just, why? Why would you copy all of the flaws and mistakes of the original games? They at least have the excuse of being old and charming. This game has no excuse, other than I guess they wanted to make a Russian inspired clone? I hate to break it to you, but the Eastern European Fallout modding community has been making those for decades now, and they are free.

One of your companions dying can actually softlock the main quest. I would understand is this was say, Morrowind, and it informed you that: "With this character's death, the thread of prophecy is severed. Restore a saved game to restore the weave of fate, or persist in the doomed world you have created." But unfortunately, you get no warning about this. I love games that allow you to kill NPCs and block you from doing their side quests, or quests with them involved in it. Fallout New Vegas was great for this. You could kill everyone and everything. That freedom of choice is great; but at least more modern games tell you that such a quest has been failed. Even Morrowind did it with side quests, and that was released in 2002.

The tutorial is great and very well done in teaching you how to play the game, and use the outdated controls, but after that information from the game is extremely sparse. What is a useful crafting item, what is sellable junk, and what is a rare and unique item required for something way down to line? Who knows, but you only have a very limited amount of carry weight, so you better decide wisely! Does giving your companions certain perks and abilities stack with your own? Do they even work at all? No information or answers. Is there a place I can go to look at my character and see what statuses and effects they are currently under? No. The uninformative, unintuitive user interface and game design is just carried right over, and unlike the original Fallout games, this game is not popular enough to get a properly filled out wiki or guides.

If you are a massive, massive Fallout 1 and 2 fan and constantly replay those games and don't mind how obstinate they are, how aged they are, their flaws and mistakes; then I would recommend this game, because it basically changes nothing. If you are not a hard core fan of those games, and are looking for a fun post apocalyptic RPG to play, might I recommend to you Wasteland 2 or 3? Especially if you love things that are directly Fallout inspired. But there are just so many other, more advanced and improved RPG games out there. While I do really like the setting, characters, and writing in this game, I just can't recommend it on nearly anything else. I wanted to keep playing to see new people and places and things, but I just couldn't force myself to keep going.

Story: 10/10
Graphics: 10/10
Guns: 10/10
Difficulty: 10/10
I recommend, This game is mix of fallout, stalker, baldur gate, and many more. simply love this game.

Love the environments and most of the characters - however there are a few things that bothered me about this.
- The camera. I hate that you're unable to adjust the downward view to anything other than maybe 45 degrees. If I'm looking for a specific building in an area and forgot which way it was for instance, I want to be able to look in the direction my character is looking at. Not down at the ground at a 45 degree angle.
- Hand and melee combat is essentially useless against armed enemies. Really any sort of insinuation of stealth combat should be removed because you're going to have a bad time if you level up those skills instead of putting points into guns.
- Dialog choices are poor in some spots.

I could see myself enjoying this much, much more if those were fixed, however after almost 2.5 hours I just kept getting bothered by them and had to uninstall.

It has a food mechanic. Gamekiller for me, just adding something annoying that doesn't need to be there.

Very difficult yet enjoyable RPG in the post-apocalyptic Soviet Union, which is strongly based on Fallout 1 and 2. I played the original Fallout games that this strives to imitate and after waiting for the full release, avoiding EA I think they have done a good job. The combat is actually smoother than Fallout 1 and 2, although don't expect fights to be easy even on easy mode. Also if you are trying to recruit and keep followers alive expect much frustration. Still ATOM RPG does a great job of modernizing the early Fallout experience, but, like with Fallout 1, you're either going to get into it and enjoy it for a while or the game will go out of it's way to screw you over and you'll want to put it down before too long. Still, If you like fallout interplay days, then look no further. Do not miss out on this gem of a game. Outstanding work by the team. The game has been updated so much unlike during it's 1st few years.

Modern turn based isometric games like this need to a cover system like the one in X-COM games. Without it, your game feels lacking in tactics and ultimately kills the fun. Aside from that, the pickpocket skill is OP. Why bother gathering resources to sell when I can just pickpocket vendors for all they have? This kills the game outside of combat. You need to eat food in the game to survive but no hydration or sleep system is a bit odd. All this could have been forgiven if the combat was fun and tactics was an actual factor. NO COVER SYSTEM = NO FUN.

If you love a amazing crpg but really hard as shit then play this one it might have its bugs and the game might be impossible at some points but its still a blast and don.t worry companions in the game

This was an unexpected surprise and a very welcome one. I hope every other chapters in the series and any future games will hold the same care as this game has. I rarely replay a game with choices, as my choice have been made, unless it really intrigues, even rarer is a game where I wish to unlock everything. This is one such a game that ticks both points for me.

This is a pre-play review :
This isn't fit for ultra-wide (1440x3440) resolution. Some part of the main screen are hidden out of screen. Some game from 1995 are still playable without problem in ultrawide.
I find this is a lack of insight.
Other than that, this game is promising.
This review will be updated.

The camera is a deal-breaker. I don't see where I am going, what I am doing nor where I should be looking. Funny enough I have the same issue with BG3 but it is even worse here.

Одна из лучших в своем жанре, и единственная игра в которой сохранение переносится во вторую игру с событиями первой.....(взаимосвязанные части, да ну на...) Единственный минус этой игры - ее мало)

Good aesthetic. Interesting characters and setting, not masterpiece level, but it's very good if you like post-nuclear wastelands. If you're new to this kind of game (like Fallout 1 and 2) it can be a little esoteric how you're supposed to navigate combat and allocate your skill points, or even if there is a clear route of progression. Sometimes I felt like I went earlier into situations which I wasn't prepared for at all, and probably also because how of the game is structured (Roaring Forest). I haven't played Trudograd. This is one of the better crpg games I've played. Although, I feel like either the progression system could have been better or else there could have been some kind of guide to surviving the wastes implemented. Even if it was an in game book the character gets which is part of lore, written by the army or by some past traveler or sage.

most of the negative reviews I've read talk about the difficulty to get into the game and their own gripes about the grind. this is an "old school" RPG. if you want a game with easy cheats and not so clunky mechanics go play fallout. if you want more of that retro RPG feel with the difficulties that come along with it. buy Atom RPG. as long as you're not starting this game with the mindset "it should blow AAA titles out of the water" you'll have plenty of fun!

for the love of me I could not get past the first level, extremely slow to get going with no instant grip to keep you engaged

The developers of this game are racists

ATOM RPG is one of the best post-nuclear-apocalypse series I have played. The sequel is called: Trudograd

Game play and atmosphere is similar to Fallout 1 (i.e turn-based combat w/action points)

Choices that you make during the game matter; especially during the primary quest-line which affects how the final quest plays out.

The game has minor survival elements (hunger and radiation/toxicity)

Hint: Crafting is actually useful in this game: there are 20 ranged weapons, 12 melee, 8 armor, 7 ammo types, 6 explosives, and 15 consumables that can be crafted; you don't need to obtain recipes, you just need the required skill level and materials; I recommend a minimum of 10 points in the skill so that you can make some armor (Piece of Tire x2 + Scarf/Bandana + Wire + Scrap Metal), otherwise you'll want to avoid combat for the first third of the game; max 90

I also recommend the following Steam workshop mods: "Atom: Arsenal" (adds more weapons), "FallAtom" (adds 7 weapons from the Fallout series; note: requires console commands to spawn in-game), "More clothes and armor for the cadet" (adds a merchant that sells more armor)

A hidden jewel. It's like playing a game at the same-time reading a really good book!
The game has been updated so much unlike during it's 1st few years.

if you liked fallout 1&2 and similar old school RPG's, you will probably like ATOM RPG, at least for a while. IMO ATOM RPG's biggest issue is it's obsession with tedium; for example, putting 20 lootable locked containers in one room, where if your lockpicking skill is sub-par but good enough to open all of them, you will easily spend five minutes just lockpicking containers, or even worse, commanding a companion to lockpick them all open, which is another input every time you try to lockpick something, plus wrangling your companions.
if you want to walk from one side of a map to the other, it will probably take five minutes of watching your character walk. the game automatically pauses when you alt-tab. when there are random events (which are at least very rewarding), they are generally the exact same encounters every time and get pretty stale - literally wolves, insects, dudes with guns, pirate larpers with guns, and tin-foil hat dudes with guns, just all the same shit.
if you want to off-load all your loot, you will be cycling between waiting for 12 hours, eating and then trading, and waiting 12 hours again to reset traders and trader caravans.
eye-shot criticals bypass armor and are often enough to one shot you or a companion, obviously making you reload a save
some quests will have you go to a location on the other side of the world map to talk to someone, go back to the questgiver, and then back to the other person
there's probably a lot else i'm forgetting

fuck it whatever
i still had a lot of fun with this game, almost every NPC has unique dialogue and interactions, including companions, almost every area is worth exploring, and it's very clear the developers put A LOT of effort into the game. it's a charming ass game, it just seems to make every effort to waste your time. i realize now that i think 90% of the fun for me was in the dialogue.
Trudograd is much much better, most of the issues I had with ATOM RPG are gone or less exaggerated in Trudograd. I got completely sucked into and was actually able to complete Trudograd, in like a week, for one, but after owning this game for some like 6 years and restarting with new characters several times during that, I have not been able to beat this game once

A little rough around the edges, but an absolute hidden gem.
If you love classic Fallout games, this one is right up your alley!
The characters are well-written, the world is vast, and there are plenty of secrets to uncover.
The RPG mechanics are deep, allowing you to tackle quests in a way that suits your build.

the game is great but theres just one big problem companions die realy easy and thats a problem becose if Fidel dies and you fail one qest your softlocked



i had a level 8 charecter and now i need to start new game :(
oh and i checked theres no cheat code you can use to save you if that hapens (etleast thats what google sead)

ATOM RPG does a great job of modernizing the early Fallout experience, but, like with Fallout 1, you're either going to get into it and enjoy it for a while or the game will go out of it's way to screw you over and you'll want to put it down before too long. I think I'm in the latter camp right now. (I remember having very similar experiences with Fallout 1 and the only time I've actually been able to get anywhere in that was when I played it for the very first time.)

The combat in this is profoundly unsatisfying and the game has a tendency to force you into "no-win" situations far to frequently. I have to fight my way through a cave of wolves that are way above my ability, so instead I give up and head to the bunker. I run into a fight where I was jumped by three guys with automatic weapons. I can give up all my stuff or basically get gunned down. Mkay cool, so no matter what I do I either die and quit or lose all my stuff and start from scratch. This after putting up with the game's crap up till this point and struggling to get some amount of gear, because at this point the best I have is a pipe rifle and some rusty Makarovs that constantly jam and a knife or two. I haven't come across a single other proper weapon to buy or loot yet and I've been to what feels like the entirety of the known wastes. Anyway... I save scum a bit and discover that I can hide some of my stuff beforehand and I manage to keep at least the pipe rifle, some food and meds and my clothes, but have to give up most of my other stuff in order to progress or I just die. To be fair, this isn't the only time the game pulled this kinda crap as the exact same thing happens at the very beginning of the game.

Companions are also fscking useless in fights. I handed Fidel, one of the companions early on, a gun an he shot me dead in the back of my head no less than 3 times causing me to lose a lot of progress. The only solution I've found is to revoke his ranged weapon ability by taking my rusty Makarov back. Oh did I mention that when shooting the enemy he doesn't get nearly as many crits as he seemingly gets on me when shooting me in the head.

Anyway... so I think the systems in the game are pretty cool, the writing is good, the setting is quite interesting, and I have enjoyed the game thus far but I think if you want the player to become invested you either have to give them more opportunity to get stocked up or... maybe lower the challenge a bit early on so that they don't just get gunned down by overpowered automatic guns at every corner. Fundamentally I like the idea of working my way up from nothing, but if you're just gonna pull crap like that later on in the game what's the point? Also I'm not the type of player that just rushes headlong into the next objective, I really have been to many places around the wastes and have found... all of exactly nothing as a reward for my efforts. Which, to be fair, maybe I'm just profoundly unlucky... but still.

I'd recommend it if you liked the early Fallout games, but... don't expect a smooth jouney.

Atom RPG was an amazing experience from start to finish! The story and atmosphere kept me hooked the whole time. It’s easily one of the best games I've played in this genre. The attention to detail and world-building are incredible. Definitely a must-play for fans of post-apocalyptic RPGs!

Very well thought out game, has some elements that remind me of a Fallout 2, post apocalyptic type game, but has it's own original atmosphere and story line. Also purchased the Trudograd follow-up game and it is more polished, but I really enjoyed both games. After a year of waiting for time to pass, it's like playing the game new again, as I have forgotten some of the story, as this is my 2nd time playing through. A few little bugs, but the games are well done. Hats off to the creators of this game. Great job! There are very few of these types of games that are this well done, hopefully we will see a Trudograd 2 or follow-on game some day!

lil clunky, sick story, 8.5/10

Nice soviet style fallout. Still a lot of easter eggs and jokes requires some familiarity with soviet mass culture.

GG

If you like fallout interplay days, then look no further. Do not miss out on this gem of a game. Outstanding work by the team.

Great game. Buy it if you liked Fallout 1 & 2.

Yes, this is Fallout, but it's OUR Fallout Comrade.

Was looking something in the line of the two first Fallout games, but this definitely isn't it. The writing is very poor, with dialogues going on forever without them being interesting, fun or advancing the plot or game mechanics in any way. Perhaps the combat system gets fun at some point, but wasn't really tempted to keep going after slowly and clunkily fist-fighting some wasps. The character sheet was perhaps the only thing that interested me, but it got overwhelming way to soon (with lots and lots of perks/traits/whatever to choose from at level one).

Anyway, I din't make it past the first town. Too much to explore would seem like a good thing--if only any of it felt thought-out or meaningful.

Неплохая штучка. Звезд с неба не хватает, но примерно после трети игры начинает потихоньку затягивать. Большую часть диалогов, признаюсь, скипала, читая вполглаза, по причине их бессодержательности, пресности и отсутствия художественной адаптации. Сложилось впечатление, что писали их люди... ммм... скажем так, весьма далёкие от искусства изящной словесности. Было бы неплохо привлечь к написанию диалогов профессионального писателя. И я не имею в виду авторов приключенек с попаданцами или бояръ-аниме на АТ, прости-господи. Про напарников сказать особенно нечего, кроме того, что они есть и могут таскать шмот. А ещё иногда они помогают тебе в бою и даже не каждый раз шмаляют тебе в спину. Пока топ рейтинга держит Собака.

Большинство неписей, включая напарников, незапоминающиеся, болтают много, но не по делу, не вызывают никакой симпатии. Если создание атмосферы типичного Саратова с его провинциальными серыми обитателями было задумкой разработчиков, у них вышло на отлично. В существование этих людей веришь всем сердцем. Но вступать с ними в какое-то взаимодействие нет никакого желания. Я провела в игре больше 100 часов, и уже не помню никого, кроме, пожалуй, фриков из Цирка. Эти ребята знают толк в развлечениях.

Баланс раскачки хромает на обе ноги, как по мне. Зачем существует ветка ближнего боя, когда самые сильные противники вооружены автоматами - непонятно. За всю игры успеваешь взять 6-7 скиллов, и я не представляю, кто в своем уме будет прокачивать небоевые ветки, ну только если не выбирать путь харизматичного терпилы-пацифиста.

Баланс в экономике тоже потрачен. Лимит на бабки у торговцев - подстава из подстав. А самое тупое, что продавцы оружия и брони - чуваки, которые выгребат большую часть твоих деревянных - покупают твое оружие и броню, то есть самые дорогие вещи, на которые ни у кого другого просто нет денег - за копейки. В чем логика, простите? Она вообще была? Или это сделано только для того, что ты страдал, таская на своем горбу 100500 дорогущих пушек в поисках каравана, который сможет выкупить у тебя максимум 1-2 позиции - и вперёд с песней, топтать карту в поисках другого каравана. Недостаток торговцев и запаса денег у них неслабо так раздражал всю игру.

Сюжетный квест довольно интересный. Главный плот разгадывается к концу игры благодаря раскиданным тут и там подсказкам от неписей. Побочные квесты разнообразные и увлекательные, понравилось гонять на тачке по Пустошам. Вайб классического фоллыча определенно присутствует. Интерфейс поначалу раздражает своей убогостью, но потом привыкаешь и уже вроде ок. Много скрытых квестов, проверок на навыки, разнообразный геймплей. Вообще мир довольно живой и интересный. Для первой игры по мне так отлично вышло.

Мне не очень понравилось развитие главного сюжетного квеста, который можно внезапно завершить до того, как закроешь побочные. Свобода выбора, конечно, хорошо, но уже лет -надцать так считается хорошим тоном какими-то пометками предупреждать игрока о том, что если он пойдет туда-то или сделает то-то, то всё, гейм овер. В итоге у меня пропали несколько интересных квестов, обидненько. Переигрывать, конечно, не буду. Но о потраченном времени не жалею и смело рекомендую всем фанатам постапок рпг.

you should definatly play it

Good!

Gets better the further you get. I restarted this game probably 20 times over the years and never got more than a few hours in. I'm glad I decided to give it another shot.

It's "meh". They really wanted to be Fallout 1/2, but somehow they managed to copy all the bad, outdated stuff while only bringing over some of the good parts of those classics and then layered their own, partially bad game design on top of it.

The game is unbelievably clunky, tedious and annoying. Everything from movement to inventory management to combat, feels like you're wading through molasses. Why do I have to go into a menu to see my buffs and debuffs? Why not display them in the corner of the screen with a tooltip on hover and a timer? Why is there no direct audio or visual feedback when I get irradiated or poisoned and why do I have to open a menu (again) just to see the exact values?

Want to use an item real quick? Open your inventory, drag said item into one of your hands, exit the menu, then click the item in your hand slot and click on yourself to use it. Wait for the animation to finish. Done. It was a stimpack and you need two more to fully heal? Do everything again. And again. Why not allow using items directly from the inventory with a single click? Or implement a hotbar or something. Strangely, some items (like books) can be used directly from the inventory, while others require this whole convoluted process.

Then there's the lack of tooltips when hovering over items in the world. I basically have to guess what I'm looking at. On top of that, a lot of gameplay mechanics are poorly explained. For example, I still have no idea how stealth actually works in conjunction with pickpocketing and lockpicking.

I even played the game with Cheat Engine's speedhack at 1.5x speed + unlimited carry capacity and it was still a slog.

All this jank and tediousness was fine 30 years ago (I played FO1 and FO2 back in the day), but it's 2025. A bit of QoL, polish and iteration on the gameplay wouldn't have hurt.

Traveling is a slog too. Forget something in a location and want to check real quick? Have fun walking painfully slowly across the map all the way back. Then you get hungry and have to rest. Then you get ambushed while resting... you continue and get ambushed again and so on... everything just takes forever.

Balancing is a mess, and your companions are basically walking death wishes, seemingly determined to get themselves killed at every opportunity.

The writing has its moments, but most of the dialogue is just... there. NPCs rarely say anything interesting and a lot of conversations feel like they exist just to fill space. There are frequent weird tonal shifts within the same conversations, too. Serious and dramatic in one moment, then suddenly goofy and cringe. Not sure if it's a translation issue and the original script is better, though. Eventually, I just started skimming through dialogue, only stopping when something actually seemed interesting - which unfortunately didn’t happen often.

It's not all bad - there's definitely some charm here and there and when things click, you can see what they were going for... but I dunno, man... I think you're better off playing Wasteland 2 & 3, Underrail or even the original Fallout 1 & 2.

I've heard Trudograd fixed many of these issues but since it's the direct sequel and from what I gathered you're supposed to play ATOM RPG first, I don't know if I'll ever get to it.

A bad Fallout knockoff with an unbalanced, poorly thought out RPG system with horrible progression. Automatic weapons rule the day, meaning other builds are only really viable on the easy difficulty, because guess what, half of the game is filled with guys carrying assault rifles and you'll die from the first burst coming your way unless you're lucky. The companions are useless as the only thing they do is get themselves killed. Hard pass. It's been almost 30 years since Fallout 2, we really ought to do more than this.

For those liking Fallout genre, with lots of similarities. The game is interesting and with a lot of fun. It's lacking some segments to be well polished, there are some issues with communications (if you start a talk without proper skill or selection, in the beginning when you just have to scout all the terrain, this options will not reappear later, so you'll lose some quest or options). Experience points are very slow, and very disbalanced (major missions and opponents give you couple of 100s of points, the same as with a mediocre opponents in the Wastes), the progress of the character is slow, so you'll probably finish the game with relatively low health, skills and traits (90% of the latter not being able to upgrade). If you're clever, you can do the game without it and upgrade health enough, so it's not a major issue.
All in all - the game is nice, but definitely has to be played after the Fallout, at least 1 and 2 (isometric). Thumbs up for the publishers/producers, the game is fun and I hear the sequel (Trudograd) is even more fun. :)

Great RPG experience, but it's too much about optimizing your character at start.

Nirvana.

This game requires you to have prior knowledge of itself to enjoy it. Like dont make a character with less than 6 dex if you want to be decent in combat. Or remember to bring another rope to a early game cave if you want to be able to get out. Its gotten annoying.

Well, this game is awful and interesting at the same time. And also addictive. Story itself is unique, but not that interesting because you dont feel like you actually do something for main story(even side quests feel more meaningful for the world, but whatever). Also its actually really easy to ruin your *whole* playthrough by picking wrong skills. For example, if you like me and want to mainly use automatic weapons, you will have to suffer 30-40% of the game because at the start of the game all weapons you have are either melee, handguns or bolt action rifles. And yeah, in this game you wont be able to use them if you dont have enough skill. In fallout games skill for gun type simply affects damage and you can use any type of gun no matter of your skills, but here it will be really problematic to do if you dont have enough skill because your chances to hit will be around 30% for each shot.

BUT if you put your skill points into handguns or melee you wont have any problems at the start of game, but instead you will have them in mid and end game since there are not much actually good end game handguns and they are really rare. Rifles are actually balanced since you find a lot of them during game. but idk automatic guns were fun to me anyway, despite pain at the start of the game.

Oh, and also economic in this game fucking sucks ass lmao. There is barter system(you can pay for items using your own items), which is cool, but also there are money you can use for trading. And these money will be pain in your ass, because not everyone can barter your items for fair price(like gunner or anyone who sells something actually useful). Also you need to pay with money in quests, you cant use items. But how you can get money besides quests? Selling! But can you do that? Fucking NO lmao, everyone is poor. People, who can buy your shit for fair price dont have money for that and they can you pay only with potato or idk any other NOT MONEY thing. The only guys who can buy stuff for money are caravans, but they are rare. And closer to the end of the game even caravans will be poor to buy at least one gun or something expensive you were carrying and you wont be able to get rid of stuff you have at all. To the end of the game i had like 20 different cool guns i could not sell because their price was higher than anything else and nobody could afford to buy them.

Also there is gambling. Which is cool, but devs did it awful. First of all, you have skill for gambling. WHY? Im the only who deciding should i take one more card, not the character. Its not interesting if your chance of win is directly affected by skill of your character, not you. Also biggest bet you can do is 20 rubles, which is just pathenic. I want to gamble my life savings, not just price for 2 apples.

Trudograd got rid of those mistakes, but well you need to complete this game first to try that one

Brick the chicken

An interesting role-playing game in the spirit of Fallout, maybe there are not so many variations, but the number of quests, characters and locations is enough for 1-2 plays, if your character is not suitable for everything. (and it can be edited).
Also there is almost no karma, so there is no crime in the wastelands if there are no laws!

ATOM RPG is an exceptional indie gem that brilliantly captures the spirit of classic isometric RPGs like Fallout and Wasteland while carving its own unique identity. Developed by AtomTeam, this post-apocalyptic adventure offers an immersive and richly detailed experience that caters to fans of deep storytelling, tactical combat, and atmospheric world-building.

Story and Setting
Set in a post-apocalyptic Soviet wasteland, ATOM RPG stands out with its distinctive setting. The game masterfully blends dark humor, social commentary, and a gripping narrative to create a world that feels both familiar and fresh. The storyline, filled with twists and morally complex choices, keeps you engaged while exploring the ruins of a once-thriving civilization.

Gameplay
ATOM RPG delivers a robust gameplay experience:

Tactical Combat: The turn-based combat system is both challenging and rewarding, requiring strategic planning and thoughtful resource management.
Character Customization: The RPG mechanics are deep, with a flexible character creation system that allows players to build characters suited to their preferred playstyles.
Quests and Exploration: Side quests and random encounters are thoughtfully designed, adding layers of depth and unpredictability to the experience.
Graphics and Sound
The game's isometric visuals are beautifully crafted, with attention to detail that brings the desolate world to life. The atmospheric sound design, including the haunting soundtrack, enhances immersion, making every step through the wasteland feel impactful.

Replayability
One of ATOM RPG's strongest aspects is its replayability. With multiple endings, branching quest lines, and a wide variety of ways to approach problems, players are encouraged to experiment and revisit the game to uncover its many secrets.

Community and Support
The developers have shown a strong commitment to their community by listening to feedback and regularly updating the game. This dedication has fostered a loyal player base and continuous improvement.

Conclusion
ATOM RPG is a testament to the creativity and talent of indie developers. It respects its inspirations while pushing the boundaries of the genre with a unique setting, compelling storytelling, and engaging gameplay. Whether you're a fan of classic RPGs or simply looking for a well-crafted post-apocalyptic adventure, ATOM RPG is a must-play title that delivers incredible value.

Rating: 9/10
Verdict: A richly crafted and unforgettable journey through the ruins of a Soviet wasteland. Highly recommended for RPG enthusiasts!

Reminds me a bit of STALKER. The thing about STALKER, though, is you can play either in English or Ukrainian language and you still can understand 100% what is going on. With this game, even trying to read the text based dialogue, I was lost most of the time. Grammar issues kept me from clear on what was expected of me and the log was no help. I really wanted to like this game but with such a short time left before my 1hr refund window is up, I didn't see anything changing for me.