very early game soft spoilers
I managed to play an hour or so of the game. The early part feels really boring. Disregard that I tried to fly my spaceship to Kreet for five minutes without realising that I had to press A and select it to land on it because I probably skipped some tutorial prompt. When I get to New Atlantis the game feels really lifeless. There are many interactable characters around with good voice acting but the combination of the atmosphere, the music, the way that conversations go, the generic chosen one plot, it feels really boring.
Does it get better?
Also my diplomat character cannot persuade for shit.
Atomic Heart is ultimately still an anti-communist neoliberal game unfortunately, but the game's portrayal of the Soviet Union is more sympathetic and fairer-handed than I expected. I like that the protagonist P3 is hilarious, despite being a total asshole. I feel like this game suffers from what Bioshock Infinite did; Neoliberalism about "both sides" and "communism is just as bad as capitalism because corruption" though.