The game takes what made Metro games great and makes it even greater but fails to add new stuff to the formula.
I really disliked the open world parts because I'm quite worn out of them always being the same and feeling like something the game would have benefited from NOT being in the game. But well there it is so I'll just have to bear with it. To be a little more honest, there are some parts I liked about the OW, like the fact you have to actually take out the map from your pocket and not just open an overlay that will pause the game. Also in Volga they made me want to do the side objectives by making the characters actually giving me a good reason to accomplish them like finding Nastia's teddy bear or a guitar for Stepan.
Aside of that it's impressive how the game is genuinely good when you go back to classic Metro with long corridors and cramped gunfights. This is basically what the first 2 games did good but even better thanks to the huge graphic update taking the ambiance even beyond what it was, especially with RTX on.
There are some gameplay issues like stealth is still not great and it's frustrating that you need to it to get to the good ending, Volga was easy but Taïga was horrendous. And the other major point is how floaty Artyom is, like sometimes you run in stairs and he will just start to stop being connected to the floor and you'll end up two floors down and just die.
And story-wise it's clearly the most well written one, I would have loved for every character on the Aurora to get screentime but well it's no big deal because the main characters are really good handled and that (good) ending...
So now that I'm up to date with this franchise I can highly recommend playing it just for its general ambiance and immersion.
I really disliked the open world parts because I'm quite worn out of them always being the same and feeling like something the game would have benefited from NOT being in the game. But well there it is so I'll just have to bear with it. To be a little more honest, there are some parts I liked about the OW, like the fact you have to actually take out the map from your pocket and not just open an overlay that will pause the game. Also in Volga they made me want to do the side objectives by making the characters actually giving me a good reason to accomplish them like finding Nastia's teddy bear or a guitar for Stepan.
Aside of that it's impressive how the game is genuinely good when you go back to classic Metro with long corridors and cramped gunfights. This is basically what the first 2 games did good but even better thanks to the huge graphic update taking the ambiance even beyond what it was, especially with RTX on.
There are some gameplay issues like stealth is still not great and it's frustrating that you need to it to get to the good ending, Volga was easy but Taïga was horrendous. And the other major point is how floaty Artyom is, like sometimes you run in stairs and he will just start to stop being connected to the floor and you'll end up two floors down and just die.
And story-wise it's clearly the most well written one, I would have loved for every character on the Aurora to get screentime but well it's no big deal because the main characters are really good handled and that (good) ending...
So now that I'm up to date with this franchise I can highly recommend playing it just for its general ambiance and immersion.