Metro 2033

This sense of soldiering on a budget is increased by the hand-pump dynamo which powers your headlight. The battery on this, often your only source of light in a pitch-black, mutant-infested crawlspace, never runs completely flat, but it does run low - meaning your light source dims considerably, narrowing to a dull beam which barely illuminates the floor in front of you.

The lighting model is, in fact, spectacular and this idea shows it off well. Each lightsource is dynamic and switchable - offering plenty of options for stealth when approaching the encampments of enemy humans.

These humans bear an uncanny resemblance to many of S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s, although I suppose there are only so many ways you can dress in fatigues and a gas mask - probably why I found Band of Brothers so confusing. They offer a different challenge to the fast, melee-only mutants, using tactical nous and a variety of weaponry to snuff Artyom. Encounters with these bandits tend to be piecemeal, guerrilla engagements, in stark contrast to the mad-rush assaults of the mutants.

Humans also set traps: trip-wires and grenade bundles very much in the Fallout 3 tradition. These need to be noticed and defused before they're tripped, as failing to do so is often instantly lethal. Alongside the explosives and spiky logs are the good old schoolboy cans on strings, sounding alarms which bring bandits running. Broken glass or porcelain underfoot can give the game away too.

If it all sounds a bit derivative so far, have faith; there are some nice individual touches here too. Heading above ground, or through an area of bad air, means donning a gas-mask, replacing filters as they begin to choke on radioactive dust. Above ground, the lenses of the mask will begin to frost up too, warping lines and silhouettes in ways which suggest the skulking movement of mutants extremely accurately.

Checking the filter condition is done via the your wristwatch, with a timer keeping track of the current mask's life expectancy. The watch also features a traffic-light LED to indicate the state of your cover, showing red when an enemy can see you. The map is a physical affair too, which you pull from your pack and illuminate with a lighter. Having no pause when checking directions in a twisted and dark basement certainly heightens the tension, especially when the bastard son of a gibbon and a jaguar is likely to attach itself to your jugular at any moment.

It's very much a game of scares and suspense, perhaps even jumpier than the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series ever was. Enemies are fast and aggressive, often as not pouring from grates in the ceiling or walls. It's easy to become surrounded, in the dark with nothing but an automatic BB gun and a knife to hand, and running is often the most sensible option. Panicking usually led me into trouble, though, as flapping ham-footed through even a brightly-lit and well-signposted Victoria can be confusing. At least the mutants there sell coffee and pastries.

There's definitely more of a sense of the surreal here than in most games, with reality sometimes fading into hallucinatory events and chilling daydreams. Often haunting without being hokey, these events are an important part of the linear-model which 4A has chosen, carefully unpicking pre-conceptions and conventions and slipping uncertainty into their seams. This dreamlike quality promises to be woven quite closely to both the plot and Artyom's fate.

Many of the team working on this are part of the core team which went separate ways from GSC after S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl crawled out of development, and there are enough sly references and in-jokes to make the similarities seem like a respectful emulation than a direct copy. The fact that this is a ten-hour, linear experience, coming on 360 as well as PC indicates a very different ambition from any of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games, despite many shared aspects - and many of the best things about GSC's series are present here too.

The line between homage and plagiarism is always fine, but in the games industry it's thinner than most. 4A is clearly on the right side of that line - borrowing and improving in addition to creating. And after all, who doesn't love the feel of a dusty gasmask in the dark?