When Atomfall was first announced, people were quick to slap the label "British Fallout" on it - but that barely scratches the surface of its eerie, sci-fi influences.

It launches this week.

This game is shaping up to be a fascinating mix of Stalker, Resistance: Fall of Man, and Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, with a dash of RPG mechanics thrown in. As you explore, you'll find skill points to boost your stealth, health, and combat abilities. Scattered notes and clues hint at a deeper mystery at the heart of the game - one that could make or break the entire experience.

Atomfall - Pre-Launch Trailer

In 1962 you wake up near the Windscale (now Sellafield) nuclear power station in Cumbria - five years after a catastrophic meltdown. You're stuck inside a massive quarantine zone, where survival is your top priority. Sounds tough, right? Well, it gets worse. The place is crawling with hostile cultists, irradiated monsters, and swarms of territorial terror bees (yep, you read that right). Think Stalker, but set in the rural north of England, and you're getting close to what developer Rebellion has cooked up.

At first glance, you might think Fallout is the main inspiration, but after spending two hours with the game, it's clear that classic British sci-fi plays a much bigger role. Picture this: you're wandering through the Lake District's picturesque landscapes - lush woodlands, rolling hills, and dry-stone walls - but something is off. Rusted-out 1960s cars and tanks litter the countryside, farmhouses are abandoned, and cryptic symbols whisper of something deeply sinister.

Rebellion has name-dropped Doctor Who, The Wicker Man, and John Wyndham's novels as key influences, and you can feel it. Pick up a ringing phone in a lonely red phone box, and you might hear a disembodied voice warning you about that seemingly friendly stranger you just met. Step inside a cave, and a ghostly entity attacks, infecting you with a paranoid mind virus. The whole thing screams Quatermass and Jon Pertwee-era Doctor Who.

Of course, it wouldn't be a survival game without combat, and Atomfall keeps things gritty. I ran into a gang of druids lurking in the undergrowth, which quickly turned into a desperate fight. Like Stalker or Escape from Tarkov, this isn't your typical run-and-gun shooter. You'll be scrounging for melee weapons like cricket bats and scythes, while any firearms you find are old, rusty, and may or may not actually fire the precious few bullets you've managed to collect. Rebellion has made it clear - this isn't a power fantasy; it's about barely clinging to survival.

It's not all combat, though. Some characters will offer trades or useful info, and you'll be free to roam the overgrown farms and derelict factories in search of answers. Just be extra careful around those glowing greeny-blue beehives - those little guys are both territorial and extremely poisonous.

Even in my short time with the game, the tension was thick. Crafting explosives out of random junk, slapping them together Blue Peter-style with double-sided tape, and relying on faulty handguns made every encounter feel like a desperate scramble.

That said, Atomfall does have some rough edges. The menus and weapon selection were a bit clunky, and given how important stealth is, it's frustratingly easy to accidentally blow your cover just because you forgot to reload your shotgun ahead of time. The stealth mechanics could also use some fine-tuning - it's not always clear when you're hidden and when you're not, which led to a lot of unintentional "surprise attacks" (on me, not by me).

But the big question is: what does an apocalyptic survival game set in the English countryside really look like? We'll need more than quaint cottages and vaguely menacing accents to capture the true horror of The Triffids, The Daemons, or that terrifying 70s public service announcement about playing Frisbee near an electricity substation.

That said, the fact that we're getting a Lake District-set survival horror game, dripping in British sci-fi weirdness, is enough to be excited about. And if Rebellion can nail the mystery and atmosphere, Atomfall could be something really special.