Arktika 1

- 

We’ve only caught a few words of the presumably important briefing that our commander is dishing out as she drives us to the outpost we’ll be working from. Some of the details have stuck: we’ve been hired by Citadel Security to protect one of the last surviving colonies in the post-apocalyptic wastelands of Russia. Violent raiders and mutated creatures threaten the peace, while the temperatures brought about by a second ice age make even stepping outside perilous. But we’re more focused on all the buttons in this heavily armoured, and recently cosy, vehicle: we’ve lowered the electric windows and let the howling, frosty winds in; we’ve turned on the radio and are enjoying some jazz; and we’ve hurled a number of coffee cups and tablets out into the snow. As we pass a plane graveyard and pull up to the base entrance, an armed guard asks for ID. We hand him the photo card from the glovebox – time to be professional.

Despite being set nearly a century from now, Arktika 1’s setting will feel familiar to anyone who’s played any of the Metro games. But while there are plenty of thematic similarities, the parallels end there. “Story-wise there’s no link between the world of Arktika and the world of Metro – they’re two completely separate IPs,” executive producer