Metro 2039 is undoubtedly the darkest instalment to the series yet. If Metro Exodus was about hope – looking for a brighter future beyond the shattered ruins of Moscow – then its sequel is charting a "journey back into hell."
Having played Metro 2039 for a number of hours, I was keen to understand more about the way developer 4A Games is framing this descent into a metro system that abandoned hope long ago.
Thankfully, creative director Andriy Shevchenko and executive producer Jon Bloch were on hand to help us understand the ways this universe has evolved – mutated – in the years since the Spartan Rangers fled the metro, leaving it defenseless against a threat nobody could have seen coming.
This month, we're pulling on our gas masks to delve the tunnels for our Metro 2039 Big Preview, with hands-on impressions and dev access to 4A Games.
Metro 2039 takes place four years after Artyom and the remaining Spartan Rangers fled the Moscow Metro. What has changed in that time?
Andriy Shevchenko, creative director:
For the first time in the Metro universe, almost the entire metro is united under one banner. It's a huge change. Now, the Führer, Hunter, is leading the metro into the future – you're in a completely different system compared to the one seen in previous games. It's darker, and even more ugly in a lot of ways.
The Metro games were always pretty dark. What should we expect as we lead the Stranger back into the metro system after years of exile?
Andriy Shevchenko:
We are showing the horrors of tyranny. We are talking about the cost of silence and the price of freedom – for me, these are the main topics. It's the combination of these three filters that bring us into this Metro world.
Jon Bloch, executive producer:
If you look at the previous games, they're dealing with preventing war in their themes – and in the morality of the player's actions, choices, and the story around them. Metro 2039 is exploring the consequences of war, because war is here. That's one of the main reasons why we needed to approach the story this way. It carries a lot of weight in how we approach things this time, making the story a lot more personal, as opposed to being about the Metro and about the people within it.
In Metro 2039, we find a populace living beneath the poisoned ruins of Moscow united by a single leader – Hunter, a former Spartan, who rules the brutal Novoreich regime through propaganda and fear. What should players expect from this new story frame?
Jon Bloch:
This story is about our protagonist – the Stranger. It's about him – his past, his journey, and his mission. And it's about showing that, when these things happen, there is no good. It's all bad in these sorts of situations – when a regime takes over and does the things that they do. Where there was kind of a moral grayness in our previous games, we wanted to make sure that the morality was clear in Metro 2039. There is no hope. There is no future – except the one the Führer is promising to bring in.
The further you go, the darker it's going to become – meaning, the more claustrophobic and oppressive it needs to feel.
Jon Bloch, executive producer
I think players would probably agree that the Metro games have always been pretty dark, even in their brightest moments. How does this story compare tonally to what we experienced in Metro Exodus?
Jon Bloch:
Metro Exodus was about hope. It was about leaving the Metro. It was about going out to discover brighter and bigger futures. Metro 2039 is the reverse of that. It's this journey back into hell. Back into the depths. And the further you go, the darker it's going to become – meaning, the more claustrophobic and oppressive it needs to feel.
Andriy Shevchenko:
You're going back into the Stranger's past to understand the roots of everything in the Metro.
Hunter is an important character who ultimately exists on the periphery of Artyom's adventure in the first three Metro games. Why elevate Hunter to the position of Führer of the fascist Novoreich faction?
Andriy Shevchenko:
Think back to his words in Metro 2033: 'We are the protectogrs of the Metro. If it's hostile, you kill it." You can find more answers and details in Dmitry Glukhovsky's books, but that ideology is core here…
Jon Bloch:
…and what that ideology can turn into.
The atmosphere is thicker in Metro 2039, the people more clearly reckoning with the weight of these ideologies and decision-making of a central faction. How do we discern fact from fiction?
Jon Bloch:
Propaganda factors into this game in a big way. When you listen in on conversations, there's always a reason why people are saying what they are saying – and why different people will say different things. If you pay attention, you'll begin to understand what they believe in and where they got their information. We've always had a little bit of that in previous games, particularly when you were around fascist factions in the past, but it's really more important now – and something that deals in parallels to the real world as well.
Warped ideology isn't the only thing we'll need to contend with – a return to the Metro means a returning focus on the Dark Ones and discoverable anomalous zones. Why were these aspects important to bring back?
Andriy Shevchenko:
Ghosts and paranormal activity were a huge part of the original Metro, and with 2039 we are getting back to our roots. The best way for me to describe it is to quote Khan, a character from [Metro] 2033: "It appears that the devastation we brought upon ourselves was complete; Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory were atomized. So when a soul leaves the body it has nowhere to go, and must remain here, in the Metro."
If even souls can't leave the Metro, then there is no hope even after death. I really like this side of the Metro games. But it's not about just having ghosts for the sake of it – they tell stories frozen in time. We didn't use them back in Exodus because we left the Metro, and this limbo between the worlds. But now we are back there, and we're bringing back all of the series' best elements.
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