The best Russian games of recent years
If you look through the pages of old domestic magazines about video games, then it seems that the Russian game industry was born in a state of severe crisis. And every year everything became worse: the word "vomgla" did not arise from scratch. But while game journalists were lamented about the catastrophic situation of affairs, the players from all over the world enjoyed " Truckers ", King’s Bounty , " Corsarers "," Space rangers "," Il-2 attack aircraft "," Mor https://sister-site.org/golden-mister/ ", "Tetris" , in the end.
Time has passed, what has changed? Yes, budgets Red Dead Redemption 2 Russian studios still do not shine-but they generally shine for few. New Minecraft there was no wide open spaces, but minecraft and there may be only one. And in everything else the picture is the same: people from around the world play Russian games. We decided to recall a dozen games of recent years, over which the mythical "vomgla" was not powerful.
"Tuk-tuk-tuk"
Ten years ago Studio Ice-Pick Lodge I received a strange letter with a proposal-requirement to make a game on the basis of attached materials-photos, notes, videos. The mysterious package greatly resembled “Letter of Happiness” from the category “crossed this message to ten friends, otherwise your mother will die”. However, the creators " Mora »We decided to try my luck … This is how the official version of the birth of a horror-survivor sounds " Tuk-tuk-tuk ".
The main character of the game is a certain worldwide, and he, apparently, does not really like to leave his abode. However, at night his house and nearby forest become an incredibly dangerous place. Terrible monsters, which the game calls “guests” are approaching from everywhere: they seep into the house through faults, looking like a human eye, extinguish the light in the rooms and look for the host. At first, the hero has a simple task – to hold out alive until the morning. But then it becomes more complicated when the beech begins to approach and a strip of nervous tension begins to melt before our eyes … In general, the game came out unusual, stylish and very strange-quite in the spirit of Ice-Pick Lodge. Despite the simplicity of the “external” idea of leaving the comfort zone, it gives the widest expanse to theories, guesses, speculations and all sorts of readings. Finally, she is really scary.
Although if you evaluate it as a real answer to a “letter of happiness”, then something did not ask her: after the “tuk-tuk-tuk-tuk”, the next game of the studio appeared only six years later and turned out to be a financial failure. But this is a completely different story.
Beholder
A lot of games, series, films and books with all their might tried to inspire an audience with a simple thought: totalitarianism is bad. But few people managed to convey this message more convincing than the authors Beholder (read, by the way, our interview with them). Even though its creators try not to give moral assessments to the actions and decisions of the hero.
The idea is simple. The main character is the caretaker of an apartment building inhabited by alive and very different characters: each has their own classes, characters, goals and problems. And the duty of the protagonist is not so much to monitor the serviceability of the water supply and the presence of bulbs in the corridors, but in vigilant surveillance of residents and denunciations of any suspicious activity. It’s not necessary to look for violators for a long time: someone has a smuggling in the suitcases, someone is listening to the forbidden radio, and someone seems to do nothing, but still suspicious … Do not throw him anything into the table box? Polish people in uniform will quickly come behind him and the unsyptical tenant perishes somewhere in the dungeons, but the hero will be paid a cash prize. And money is a medicine for a wife and daughter, this is an education for a son, it is a chance to leave the country and be somewhere in a European paradise, where you do not have to constantly look around.
And it seems that it seems that not to be bastard is easy, but in fact all events and decisions are tied to such a tight ball that any broken thread means death. Either a hero, or his family, or someone from the inhabitants of the house.
Punch Club
At the time of the release Punch Club It was difficult for many to believe that we have a domestic product. Although, if you look closely, the Russian roots in Punch Club are very noticeable: both from the bear in the name of the developer studio, and from the mass of references to the 1980s and 1990s, which are best understood by the inhabitants of the CIS. In fact, the whole game is one continuous reference to memes, films, songs, mass culture and realities of those years. Wherever you look, you will see the Terminator, Chuck Norris, Jay and the silent Bob, Batman, Ninja Turtles, Mortal Combat and dozens, hundreds, thousands of other Easter days-up to carpets and balalalaks.
The hero Punch Club is a talented novice boxer whose father died by the hands of an unknown killer who now needs to take revenge: in general, everything is like in the militants of the 1980s. For this, the guy builds a primitive gym in his garage and begins to pump the characteristics of training. And in order to have something to live, finds a job, at the same time participates in street battles, gradually earns a rating, communicates with friends … In short, full of events, life quickly begins to resemble a grind with a constant lack of time. But the process, oddly enough, is incredibly delayed: in no case can you stop if you do not want the boxer to lose its shape before it is done by justice.
Punch Club sales in the first year brought the creators – a small St. Petersburg studio Lazy Bear Games (At the time of work on Punch Club, only three people consisted of her staff) – a million dollars. Even convinced pirates admitted that they could not help paying for such a game. So the incredible popularity of the simulator of a street boxer was a surprise primarily for the creators themselves
Atom RPG
Atom RPG most often compared with the first, classic parts Fallout , Fortunately, the setting of nuclear post -apocalypse is very similar. In addition, the system of characteristics is a close relative of Special, and the game has the opportunity to cope with any test with any set of statistics. And, of course, no one is going to lead the player by the handle: the task was given, think for yourself how and where to perform it. But you are quite easily forgotten about comparisons with the legendary creation of Brian Fargo and the company, because the RPG atom is Russian, in all its details and aspects (we remember about Gulchatai?).
The game is what to scold. For old -fashioned graphics to obsolete, for the bulky and uncomfortable interactions with the inventory, for the zero motivation of the hero, for the useless economy, the ocean of water in dialogs and the stupidity of artificial intelligence … But all this is miraculously forgotten, you just have to plunge with your head in a simple plot, start Find a bunch of references to the “post-apocalyptic 1990” with Yakubovich and Galustyan or run into a moral dilemma, in which someone's pain and fear breaks through the usual hokhma. And in independent addition " Trudograd"Released last year, all this turned out even better.
The Great Perhaps
There are Russian games by which you can’t immediately say that they were made in the wide expanses of the power. TO The Great Perhaps This definitely does not apply: she immediately gives herself out with giblets. The story of an astronaut with a magic lantern flying to destroyed land is saturated with a well -known nostalgia for not so distant times of the USSR. It is no coincidence that the game has such conflicting reviews: it makes a much less impression on those who do not understand why Tsoi is alive, why you should not bend under a changeable world and how great it is your distant.
The destroyed post-Soviet world among the creators of the game turned out to be so convincing that the forums were seriously proved that this mosaic was seen at the neighboring metro station, and even tried to find real places in game screenshots. To no avail, of course: all this was invented, but invented talentedly and with incredible attention to the details. And even if not everything was perfectly done the first time, the name of the studio Caligari Games It is worth remembering. Moreover, she is already working on the next project: quest Whatverland.
"Escape from Tarkov"
Hardcore network shooter Escape from Tarkov It is heard for a long time, but the game is still at the stage of beta testing. Yes, her version only a few days ago was replaced by 0.12.10.2.12528, so up to 1.0 is still very far away. Nevertheless, the developers and the community behave as if the release has long been held. The studio holds serious championships, trades with proprietary T -shirts, baseball caps and dials of early access and, he is rushing out the cheaters. And even shoots series based on game raids. And the players managed to survive the non-granular state of the alpha version, they have long been accustomed to regular abuse of progress and their masses of online records are forbidden by their mass. And even make tattoos in honor of their favorite game.
Where does such fanaticism come from? This is because Escape from Tarkov can be called one of a kind without hesitation. On the scope of ambitions, scale and quality, even despite the fact that the release dates on the horizon cannot be seen. Developers from the St. Petersburg Studio Battlestate Games They were not afraid to make the game “not for everyone”, knock out players from the comfort zone, make them suffer – and at the same time tirelessly ask for supplements. The entire gameplay consists in sorties into a fictional city of Tarkov for weapons, resources and supplies, but the gameplay is replete with details, which many other shooters, in principle, do not care. The worked out weapon customization system, where each barrel can be disassembled almost to the last screw, a detailed setting of all equipment elements, up to the contents of the pockets of the unloading vest. Realistic physics of shooting and movement, user market, where players directly affect price fluctuations. Locations that recognize real landscapes of the Russian outback, and not just their miniature versions.
In a little -known studio Battlestate Games From St. Petersburg it turned out that the eminent creators did not master great hopes Survarium. In the end, in which other shooter you can die from the fact that you forgot to insert the cartridges into the store of your gun?
The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante
A small independent studio Sever As if she took a postulate about the “most reading” nation for the credo – her first major job, The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante, almost completely built on reading. We read the diary of a nobleman, telling about everything that happened to him from early childhood until his death (possibly early and very tragic), and we influence his life path. How did his relationship with an arrogant older brother have developed? Whether he managed to save his family from a shit, threatening to quarrel the descendants of the eminent house once and for all? Whether he helped the revolution or sided with the system? All this, on the one hand, is very realistic, and on the other, some mysticism is going on here. Society is divided into castes, all people, like cats, literally have several lives, and each death brings closer to understanding of something completely extraterrestrial, unthinkable. Those who are interested in “polygon” role -playing games will probably recognize this universe: The Life and Suffering of Sir Brante concept was developed by the Krasnoyarian Fyodor Slyusarchuk, one of the authors of the universe ” Mascot ".
Loop Hero
If we assume that part of the success of the game owes their publishers, then the auto -waist Loop Hero and its authors, small studio Four Quarters , Lucky from the very beginning. The team took under the wing herself Devolver Digital , which has repeatedly proved that she had an incredible scent on unusual projects and non -standard solutions.
Loop Hero has enough unusual and non -standard. The powerful lich literally destroyed the matter of space and time, but the protagonist, who lost his memory, miraculously survived on the island in the middle of the black abyss. Now he needs to rebuild the dead world: recalling places, creatures, objects and other scraps of the past, he builds new islands in the middle of the abyss, gradually folding into the path. But we do not have power over the hero: he moves and fights on his own. We only help him to remember, and then we use fragments that have surfaced from non -existence, laying out the cards of monsters, treasures, amplifiers and locations on the card. At the same time, individual buildings and territories affect the hero both in itself and in combination with each other, and under certain conditions the world begins to change … In short, experiments lovers will not soon come off from studying possible combinations.
The gameplay came out at the same time difficult, unpredictable and addictive, from the category of "well, another circle – and sleep". Therefore, the success of the game looks quite deserved: over a week since the release, its circulation exceeded half a million, and the peak online in Steam reached 51 thousand people – at all good for a modest pixelian cirow from an independent studio.
Partisans 1941
In the old years, fans of military strategies spent days and nights for the games of the series " In the rear of the enemy "Created in Ukraine with the participation of a Russian company" 1C-SoftKlab ". And now the Moscow Studio Alter Games I released a project that literally returns us to the rear of the enemy: " Partisans 1941". Real -time strategy was published in Steam last fall and has already managed to get an addition " Again into battle ".
Since the action of the game takes place under the nose of the invaders, and our heroes are partisans, the main emphasis is on quiet subversive operations, penetration, sabotage, espionage and work with the local population. But this does not mean that fans of decisive measures cannot pick up the machine guns and dig all the Germans on the map: for the sake of such a shelter, they are provided. And the moments of response can be devoted to the arrangement and development of the partisan camp in the depths of the forest or send their warriors for mushrooms or fishing.
The exit of "Partisan 1941" players met with excellent reviews. Although the game does not reach the tactical depth and diversity (while?) to the best parts of famous Desperados or Commandos , The fact that fans of games about the Second World War can be distracted from the beaches of Normandy and the indispensable cranberries already puts it in an honorable place in our selection.
No matter what they say about the “vomgl” and a deep protracted crisis, in terms of all parameters, the Russian game industry is experiencing a noticeable rise. Domestic developments already occupy up to 2% of the world market, and this figure only seems small.
We talked about the most important and noticeable games, but at the same time we remained overboard, for example, Pathfinder: Kingmaker , to which Chris Abellon put his hand, Breathedge , which did not amaze with gameplay, but pleasantly surprised by the sense of humor of the authors, Snowrunner , which looks worthy against the background of the rest of the series, or recent Demon Skin , created by the only self-taught developer. And on the horizon is already looming King’s Bounty II , Black Book , " Remember .. ", SelfLoss , And Atomic Heart , from which a lot is expected. And we are for the most high expectations to be met!