Metro Exodus comes in two flavors: the base edition, and the 'enhanced' edition, which ray-traces every light source. It also provides DLSS, which downsamples the image, and then upsamples using ai to create an image that is indistinguishable from native resolution. In other words this game is simultaneously gorgeous and less demanding on hardware.
I can't speak to how the base game looks minus ray-tracing, but the enhanced version looks amazing. Obviously this all depends on your hardware and how high you can push the settings, but with DLSS it's a visual treat for the majority. Being outside of the Metro allowed the devs to create lush environments with light sources other than dim candles and light bulbs.
Anyone familiar with the franchise already knows what to expect. First person shooter with a bit more nuance to it than what is typical. You have a flashlight that needs manual recharging, weapons that cam jam and need cleaning, and a lot of little gadgets that you can customize. There's crafting of ammo, weapons, and upgrades now. Otherwise, same quality shooting as before. I miss the 'bullets as ammo' feature from the first game, but given that we're leaving the metro it wouldn't work anyway.
The real selling point here is the 'open world' aspect of the game. The 'semi-open world'. Exodus features several maps. The introduction is as linear as ever. But once you're out in the world proper, you get what I'd call a 'mid-sized' open-world map. The story progresses linearly, but you also have side-objectives that present themselves. Not a lot, but enough of them. When it's time to pack up for a new location, we have a short intermission on the train before entering a new 'semi-open world'.
I like it. It doesn't become GTA or Far Cry, so the narrative remains in-tact and you won't be spending days outside of the main plot. But it gives you more freedom of movement than the basic A to B map structure of most linear shooters. And it hammers home the 'survivalist' aspect of managing air filters and health because you can more realistically be in trouble away from base.
The only downside is that, narrative-wise we are leaving the Metro. We are searching for life outside of it. Which is fine, but we are also leaving a defining plot-point of the franchise: The Dark Ones. They're creatures that hide in the tunnels of the Russian Metro and have telekinetic abilities. The first two games established them as a misunderstood force for good that hold a connection with the protagonist. A connection that holds promise for rebuilding society in a post-nuclear war world.
Because we are no longer in the metro, we no longer see them. Which is so...odd. THE plot point is just...dropped. The plot is logically moving to the next step, but it's abandoning half of the franchise lore and direction. It's very weird. Not bad, necessarily. Just...odd.
And while we're on it, I want to mention how long the characters yap on and on. About not much. You don't have to stick around for every character speech or interaction, but if you want the full story you'll feel obligated to. And wow do they babble on and on and on. I don't know if the intent was 'immersive' writing, but the effect was 'wow this guy won't stop talking get to the point'.
I feel like the narrative is a missed opportunity, because it eliminates a lot of the mystique of the world. It goes in an interesting direction a quarter of the way through, before becoming a tale of finding somewhere to settle. Fair enough, but it's very 'basic' as opposed to the fantastical writing you'd expect of a game. There's a 'is the war still on-going?' subplot before being resolved, which is a bit of a shame. It feels like we left the dark ones and a lot of the interesting plot threads for the most sensible and realistic, but also the most basic.
I'd still argue that this is the best game in the franchise. It doesn't do anything new, but it does what it's been doing better than before. Where the franchise goes from here will be interesting, because given how it ends it feels like we're becoming Fallout. Settlements in the wasteland and bandits roaming around, with cults and weirdos making new societies. I'd love to see how they'll tie it back to the Metro and dark ones, because they can't leave those plot threads hanging.
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