Metro 2034 becomes Metro: Last Light

By Robert Purchese Published 4 May, 2011

Sequel to tense, atmospheric shooter.

Tense post-apocalyptic Russian shooter Metro 2034 will henceforth be known as Metro: Last Light.

Publisher THQ announced the name change during a boring-snoring earnings call yesterday.

We'd been tipped off in April about the name change, however, when THQ trademarked various Last Light website addresses.

Metro: Last Light is a sequel to Metro 2033, an unexpectedly well received game about shooting mutated zombie monster things in Russian subways.

Eurogamer awarded Metro 2033 an 8/10 for a "carefully written" and "lavishly imagined" romp. Reviewer Jim Rossignol also thought Metro 2033 was "one of the best-looking" games on Xbox 360.

Buoyed buy Metro 2033's reception, THQ has promised Kiev-based developer 4A-Games more money to develop Metro: Last Light, both to better polish the game and to market it to a wider audience.

There's a chance that the sequel could spread from PC and Xbox 360 onto PS3 as well.

Metro 2033.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds. @Clert on Twitter.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (22) Latest comment 1 year ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Raznilof #1 1 year ago

    Despite the problems that it certainly had, the game left a far greater impression than almost all of the top shooters from last year. Crysis 2 is the only exception for me since Alan Wake probably doesn't really count as a shooter.

    Looking forward to this!

  • Darren #2 1 year ago

    Lousy combat, some very iffy A.I., an absolutely dreadful section with exploding 'blobs' and an all-too-short campaign - it felt like two-thirds of a full game as it literally ended when I least expected it - meant that Metro 2033 was a disappointment for me on the PC. The DX11 visuals and atmosphere were really the only things going for it IMO. I'm not that excited about the sequel to be honest but if it is vastly improved then I might consider it.

  • ic4ruz #3 1 year ago

    It looks better than Crysis on PC !

    I'm playing through it now and really enjoying it, don't really see any flaw with it except for that it's really intense.(wich is bad?"

  • HermitArcader #4 1 year ago

    Post deleted at 09:17:39 22-12-2011

  • sjmlondon #5 1 year ago

    I, like a number of people I spoke to, found the first one totally unplayable. That god awful section with the gas mask, lousy hit detection, obtuse weapon selection controls, dodgy stereotypical russian accents 'Comrade, comrade' etc. I didn't hang about to fine out whether it got any better.

    Definately a marmite game.

  • ic4ruz #6 1 year ago

    Vertical stand: Metro 2033 sold most on PC So i'm guessing they are aiming at that market. (Metro 2033 console version is half as good as the PC version)

  • HermitArcader #7 1 year ago

    Post deleted at 09:17:39 22-12-2011

  • hiddenranbir #8 1 year ago

    2033 was amazing. Truly a landmark achievement in survival horror. It wasn't about clumsy RE controls or scripted 'jump out and shock you once' monster moments. It lasted the whole way through from start to end. The panicked breathing, the cold winter biting at you and all that lurked in the dark.


    Probably the only game where shadows not only worked -for- you, but in equal measure worked against you as well.

    Aiming and killing shit was fun although I can really understand the challenge one might have faced in the panic of looking around with analog.

  • Jonathan_Fakenham #9 1 year ago

    Once you got into the non-standard russian FPS implementation, the original was quite the experience.

  • agparrot #10 1 year ago

    "Buoyed buy Metro 2033's reception..."

    Come ON, EG, you are shirley better than this!

    I'm glad that the name change has happened, more games should abandon the tiresome formula of just adding a higher number to their title. Perhaps even risk using a different title for a sequel to a game, instead of Same Name: Different Appendage. I'm sure some gamers are clever enough to associate sequels with different names.
    Edited by agparrot at 04/05/11 @ 13:54

  • Bird59 #11 1 year ago

    I loved the first one, hope they don't Modern Warfarize the second one ....

  • TheGuvernor #12 1 year ago

    Classic game - massively under appreciated.
    Had no issues with it at all - a difficult game, that's all.

  • ISmoke #13 1 year ago

    I bought this game on Steam a few months ago, installed it and played about 5 minutes. I really should try and get around to playing that game. It seems to have quite a following

  • hiddenranbir #14 1 year ago

    Give it a try. Turn out the lights, close the curtains and throw yourself in.

  • ChthonicEcho #15 1 year ago

    @TheGuvernor

    This is your definition of 'massively underappreciated'? It's anything but that. Overrated? Arguable. Underrated? Hardly, if at all.

  • mrblonde #16 1 year ago

    2033 despite some shoddy shooting, had one of the best graphical engines Ive seen this generation in a FPS. The lighting is up there with the £60 mil killzone 2 and from a low budget PC centric Dev. Just think if they Dev for the 360 from scratch instead of a quick port from the PC and had a larger budget.
    Sony must have been scratching their heads, no cell , mega budget or blu ray but betters the vast majority of our exclusives. Another 360 console exclusive last year many missed in the 360's so called barren exclusive arsenal.

  • bad09 #17 1 year ago

    Really enjoyed Metro 2033. It wasn't perfect by along shot with poor weapons (but I guess as part of the setting that can't be helped!) and the silly floaty ball things section was just awful but it oozed atmoshpere and tension. I'm there for the sequel. Just hope ther lost the silly floaty ball things!
    Edited by bad09 at 04/05/11 @ 16:55

  • Evilly #18 1 year ago

    Loved the first one. Difficult compared to most fps games these but enjoyably so and never too frustrating that I wanted to put it down. Atmospheric and tense with a good story that made me want more. I played it on PC so I have no idea how it was on the Xbox.

  • TRUTH #19 1 year ago

    I loved Metro 2033 - If played like a traditional fps (run and gun) you'll not get far and get frustrated. I realized that your weapons are weak, but aim carefully to the head and chest the impact is more damaging. This is a game where you had to look who had Armour protection on or not. Sneak was important to get past certain sections and an essential part that had to taken rather carefully, rather then, just a gimmick to look cool with no real consequence as other fps. This was also a game that if discovered or manage to alert others - they will continue to hunt you, not follow a routine path and then stand still as in many fps games... It wasn't perfect, but the atmosphere and tension really was top stuff. The AI was average - but better then many COD games and many other fps out there.

    Play it slowly - search around- make sure you pick up night vision - aim well- sneak carefully-pick up sniper weapon/machine gun...Don't play it as a run and gun, only then you realize how good this game is...Looking forward to Metro: Last Light.
    Edited by TRUTH at 05/05/11 @ 07:11

  • CamberGreber #20 1 year ago

    Best looking PC game I have ever Played.

    Untill Witcher 2 of course.

  • TheGuvernor #21 1 year ago

    @ChthonicEcho

    Thanks for the link m8.
    I know Metro 2033 was well reviewed but seemed to get panned by gamers a lot.
    I guess if you were used to STALKER & its eccentricities Metro was easy going!

  • kongzi #22 1 year ago

    it was obvious they spent their time and resources on metro 2033 on getting the engine to work with all it's advanced features, and on story related things. I think it was a decision they made with a sequel in mind, that's why some stuff was very crude, like the shooting. No sense in polishing a turd that you're going to flush out anyway (for the sequel that is). So if they get all that together for the new one, we could be in for quite the amazing game. ANd like everyone has been saying since stalker came out, these Russian shooters have something going for them that's quite special, and different. Also these teams seem to able to not only keep getting work done, and titles released on a regular basis, they are still getting their (overly) ambitious ideas out there while western developers are all about commercializing and dumbing dow..euh sorry 'opening up'.