Atomic Heart

 ( Official Website ) 

The player wears a special glove, the Polymer Glove, which grants powers such as telekinesis, freezing, shield, electricity and others to defeat foes. Its powers can be combined with both melee and ranged weapons.

Weapons can be upgraded and embedded with various elemental effects using cartridges. These cartridges can be looted, crafted and equipped by the player on both melee and ranged weapons.

To cover distances faster in certain large open spaces, players can use cars left in these areas. Players also have to solve various puzzles that are encountered throughout the main campaign and side Polygons (Testing Grounds). After one of the released patches in June 2024, the game also offers accessibility settings, which include not only puzzles auto-solve, but also colorblind mode, auto QTE, auto-heal, and some others.

Sechenov later developed the THOUGHT, a neuroconnector that integrates Polymer into the human body, enabling direct interaction with robots. Designed to launch alongside Kollektiv 2.0, it was intended to usher in a true post-labor era. However, the launch resulted in a catastrophic failure, plunging Facility 3826 into chaos.

P-3 finds Petrov working with neurosurgeon Larisa Filatova, but Petrov seemingly dies while fleeing. Suspicious of Facility 3826, the Politburo sends Yegor Molotov, who threatens to halt the launch of Kollektiv 2.0. CHAR-les reveals a power struggle over Kollektiv between Sechenov and the Politburo. Sechenov orders P-3 to accompany Molotov, but P-3 blacks out and later finds Molotov murdered. Sechenov then reveals that Petrov is alive, having faked his death with Filatova’s help.

P-3 finds Petrov at the Theater, where Petrov reveals that civilian robots always had a combat mode secretly installed and accuses Sechenov of planning to use them for global domination. He gives P-3 a pair of rings before committing suicide. Suspecting the "Atomic Heart" project involves deploying combat robots to seize nuclear plants, P-3 takes Petrov's head to Michael Stockhausen, Sechenov's deputy, for memory extraction. However, Filatova intervenes and throws a grenade, resulting in Stockhausen’s death and knocking P-3 unconscious. CHAR-les reveals that the rings are top-secret devices which allow the wearer to join Kollektiv 2.0 while remaining "invisible" to the network, thus gaining unrestricted authority and control within the Kollektiv.

When P-3 wakes up, Filatova contacts him and meets him in secret at a secluded area in Facility 3826. She reveals to him that Kollektiv is a means to mind-control people, and Filatova was in charge of the facility that houses numerous volunteers of the project. P-3 also discovers that CHAR-les isn't an AI, but rather the preserved consciousness of Chariton Zakharov, Sechenov's colleague and a fellow researcher presumably murdered by Sechenov. Using Zakharov's security clearance, they uncover more of P-3's past: he was previously critically injured in a mission in Bulgaria alongside his wife and fellow agent, Ekaterina "Blesna" Nechayeva. While Blesna did not survive, Sechenov managed to fix P-3's brain injury by installing a Polymer implant, erasing memories of Blesna while also implanting her memories into robotic ballerina bodyguards called the Twins. In doing so, Sechenov gains control over P-3. Furious, P-3 decides to confront Sechenov. However, he blacks out again and wakes up in the care of his mother-in-law, Zinaida Muravyova, who has been anonymously assisting him throughout his mission in Facility 3826. She reveals that P-3 had killed Filatova while blacked out. At this point, P-3 can either choose to leave Facility 3826 or confront Sechenov, resulting in different endings.

If P-3 refuses to confront Sechenov, he destroys Zakharov and slips out of Facility 3826 and disappears, allowing Sechenov to continue with his plans to activate Kollektiv 2.0. Zakharov is shown to still be alive as a small mass of living Polymer and he manages to escape as well.

If P-3 chooses to confront Sechenov, he enters his office, where they argue before Sechenov orders the Twins to attack. After P-3 defeats them, Sechenov draws a pistol, but P-3 uses his glove to disarm him and shoots him in the gut. Wounded, Sechenov reveals that Zakharov manipulated P-3’s blackouts, making him unknowingly kill Molotov and Filatova. Enraged, P-3 tries to remove Zakharov from his glove, but Zakharov electrocutes him and escapes as a gray mass. Declaring his intent to exterminate humanity, Zakharov jumps into a vat of red Polymer, transforming into a massive black humanoid. He then picks up Sechenov, breaks his neck, and later consumes his body before vanishing. P-3 later awakens in an illusion, where one of the Twins reaches out to him as Blesna’s voice speaks.

NORA tempts P-3 with secrets about Blesna, but Lebedev connects him to Sechenov, who reveals that he preserved Blesna's brain in neuropolymer to revive her. He offers P-3 full access to his past and a leave of absence. P-3 agrees, resets NORA with the Twins' help, and restores order. As promised, Sechenov grants him leave, but as P-3 departs, Zinaida follows.

At Triton, P-3 and Blesna meet new allies: technician Nikolai, cetologist Nastya, and security officer Hunter. After helping them relocate a school of dolphins, one is assigned to retrieve the rings. Zinaida later sends one of the Twins’ bodies to Triton, upsetting Blesna. Nikolai reveals he was sent to deliver Samodelkin, a high-tech repair system created by Dr. Lebedev, and identifies Blesna as its key activator. With Samodelkin, P-3 repairs his arm and links it to Blesna.

As the group prepares to escape Triton, P-3 and Blesna are intercepted by MOR-4Y, a gigantic eel robot roaming the facility. Blesna, through Samodelkin's connection, transfers her consciousness to the Twin robot body, and assists P-3 in destroying MOR-4Y. The dolphin later returns and gives P-3 the rings, which he then puts on Blesna's hand. After taking a moment of respite on the surface, P-3 decides they are ready to pursue Zakharov.

Bagratuni and Galeev have known each other since the early 2000s, having worked at advertising companies. Bagratuni focused on marketing, while Galeev specialized in computer graphics. After the economic downturn in 2008, when the advertising market collapsed, the share of video games increased. Sedova and Bagratuni met at the company Newmedia Stars. Before merging with Galeev and founding the game studio Mundfish, they had completed several joint projects. The key figures at Mundfish do not have direct ties to Russia or its president, Vladimir Putin.

Mundfish has the main office in Cyprus and development offices in Abu Dhabi and Yerevan. At the age of 19, a producer Oleg Gorodishenin joined the studio (listed in Forbes 30 Under 30 in 2023). The development of Atomic Heart was initially funded by Bagratuni, Sedova, and non-public shareholders. According to Crunchbase, Mundfish raised $16 million in two investment rounds in 2019 and 2021. According to Forbes, the amount from the Chinese investment holding Tencent, the international investment company GEM Capital, and the founder of the game studio Gaijin Entertainment, Anton Yudintsev, could be around $20 million.

In the summer of 2018, Nvidia offered Mundfish Studio to release the game on the Nvidia RTX, which supports ray tracing and DLSS technology for GeForce RTX graphics cards. They provided their equipment, access to a special version of the Unreal Engine 4, and tools for the game's implementation. Nvidia partially took on the marketing promotion, showcasing RTX capabilities at maximum settings in an Atomic Heart trailer at the Gamescom gaming convention in Cologne. However, ray tracing was not implemented at the time of release. It was added in a beta version after an update on June 11, 2024.