Recent reviews by Zen

In many ways more of a spiritual successor to the Red Orchestra series than the Rising Storm series, despite what a first glance might have you believe. Given RO2 released in 2011, now 15 years ago, this feels like the closest we might ever come to a long awaited RO2 sequel and not a moment too soon (maybe just a coincidence the year chosen for the name was '83 maybe not). At one point it seemed as though this beautiful enigma of a game might be lost to development hell and never see the light of day. Fortunately though, fate had other plans...

I'll jump straight into it, there is jank. Plenty of jank. This is an early access game and it both feels and often plays like an early access game. There is clearly still a bunch more work to be done regarding player movement, time to death e.g. bleeding, tanks and grenades, to which I can't lie, feel pretty much unusable right now (the grenades seem to throw substantially off centre so you end up tossing them into all sorts of walls and objects you thought you'd miss by a mile). There are only 3 maps at time of writing and no levelling system, although one is clearly in the works. This is not a finished product, nowhere near close yet.

However! This game undoubtedly has aura. The classic Red Orchestra feel is woven through-out the bones of this and in my humble opinion, plays much more like RO2 than RS2 (which I personally think is a good thing but each to their own). The gunplay is tight and grounded, and most of the guns feel weighty and good to shoot. The AK kicks like a mule as you'd expect and the M653 is a personal favourite on the NATO side. The voice acting for both NATO and PACT factions is great and I am very happy to see the return of the suitably traumatic death screams. For those who don't know, at the time a controversial addition to RO2, where players bodies will let out all sorts of anguished cries and pleas upon being killed. My initial concern that the "vibe" of the game would be a little too neon/80s was dispelled immediately upon entering my first game. The colour palette is varying shades of washed out browns, greens and greys and the world feels matte and lived in which is welcome. Overall very impressed with what I have seen so far.

Saving the best for last, THE MAPS. The maps are fantastic. They've had a really really strong start with these and each one already feels like it could be a classic on par with some of the best that RO2 had to offer, although I will need some more time playing to say definitively. However all of them are well balanced and interesting to both attack/defend. I have already had a few instances of that classic edge of your seat final 10 minutes that I remember so well from RO2/RS2 which is another good sign.

As a disclaimer, the player count is currently still quite low although it does seem to be picking up after the recent 50% discount. You can expect to find a full server during the weekends, although not yet in week. However the game is playable and there's always been at least half a server playing during the week in my experience so far.

Make no mistake while its still pretty rough in many places, the foundations here are really strong. There is an outstanding FPS in here somewhere, and if the devs can successfully navigate this early access period, it looks like this could be a real sleeper hit. I'll be playing plenty in the meantime and I hope you, dear reader, consider jumping onboard and supporting the game as it matures. While I am biased, this genre of mid-scale FPS has been sorely missing from the market over the last decade, and it would be nice to have '83 as the go to for 'accessible realism' fans for many years to come.