Pyromaniac Voices in a cold city

Nikolas wakes on a bench near a bus stop in a city he doesn't recognise, and the game never rushes to explain. You wander cold streets lined with Soviet-era architecture, and the whole thing is staged to feel like 2009: the clothes, the buildings, the quiet. It's a slow, deliberate walk through somewhere that feels genuinely lived in and slightly wrong.

The city is the heart of it. The sound design and the gloomy, stylised visuals carry the mood between story beats, and it's the part that stays with people after the credits. You use temporary items like keys to open your way forward, so progress means paying attention to what's around you rather than following a marker. Some players do lose the thread of where to go next; the goal tracker helps, but a bit of wandering is part of the deal.

The scorched things in the streets want Nikolas dead, and you fight back with whatever weapons you find. Combat is first-person and blunt: no dodging, no blocking, just you, a weapon and something burnt coming at you. It's rough around the edges, and the hit detection can be stubborn, so expect to trade hits now and then.

The story runs across five chapters and roughly two hours, built for one evening. The pieces only click near the end, and that final stretch is where the game earns its keep: the ending hits hard, and with four endings to find, what you do along the way decides which version of the truth you get. Beat the game once and Hard Mode unlocks, plus collectibles and unlockable hoodies and gloves give you a reason to walk those streets again.