UnderRail came to my attention as the Fallout game for fans of the classic Fallout rather than Bethesda's Fallout games. Not Obsidian, they get a pass (apparently). Set in the distant future where life on the surface no longer exists, humanity lives in the UnderRail, a series of tunnels and rail lines beneath the surface of the planet.

I had heard little about the game aside from some articles on RPGwatch. But when it went up on GOG and the premise was sold it sounded like the type of game I was after. It must of done something right as I very rarely plunk down AUSBUX for a games initial release.

The game pretty much ran right out of the install. Though I did set a lower resolution of x720 to start with as I found the game to look better on that setting I eventually rose it to x900 as some UI elements would not fit correctly. And fair enough, x768 is recommended as the lowest vertical.

While the underground nature of the game does mean a fairly muted colour pallet for most of what I encountered, all the graphics are nice and clean. I found it easy to tell what was what without looking for a tooltip. There is a LOT of junk you pick up throughout the game however, and said tooltip does come in handy for the inventory.

Training mission was interesting and does a good job of showing you how to play the game. There's a nice conversation unlock afterwards if you take a specific action while playing through it. I'm not sure how much of a consequence it will have later on, but it was nice to see it commented on when you signal that you are finished training.

The dialogue works well and you are given options to select for a response. Most of these are YES/NO variations but there is some flavour to it all, you can be polite or a total bastard in how you deliver your response. And if you don't have the points for that rough personality, expect to be shot. You do need to pay attention however to the text as there is no mini map and the quest-giver will give you directions on where you roughly need to go. There's no 'follow me' cursor telling you the exact steps and this rewards the extra exploration of the game.

The music is this is also very good. Josh Culler's OST is a mix of ambient and industrial and really blends well into the mood of the game. So well that I was not really noticing it and when it later turned up in FooBar2K's playlist while browsing the web I had to stop and find out what it was from. This is not meant to knock it, as I feel that this is what music should be like in a slower paced game. Done so well you don't even know it is there.

In my first mission to turn on some power stations to help reclaim territory I was killed by giant rats. And again. Then again. Then I remembered I had set up a melee character and was using the gun I was given (actually returned to me) instead of my fists. Changing this around, I was able to punch those bastards and move on with ease.

At least for human characters, there appears to be diplomatic solutions for a lot of the combat. Or you can go in for stealth. Or set up traps and countermeasures.

It should be possible to play the whole game with one of these methods and not have to kill a single entity. Which is wonderful. Even though the turn based combat is a large part of the game, having a non-violent option is a great thing to see in a game.

Along the way, I picked up a lot of initially apparently useless junk items. And you'll be wanting to keep this junk if you roll a character with decent crafting skills. You do get decent storage space at the start of the game so you don't have to lugg it around with you. And I found I could leave piles of items on the map without them being stolen or wiped on map loads. If encumbered, dump the heavy stuff and return later as it looks like it is not removed. Even by the scavenging underclass.

Combat is classic turn based combat built around action points. Different weapons and abilities use a different amount of AP. And your AP level can be lowered or boosted depending on what is affecting your character. This allows you to use the environment to your advantage, as you have the chance to hit someone, run through a door, then close/lock it behind you. If done right, you can cause the enemy to waste their own AP in trying to get to you. They're not that smart to do it back to you, but they will use their various special skills when they have the opportunity. And there is one of you and many of them.

Pro Tip: Punching Man can not interact with the explosive barrel the way you may think. I though I would be able to move the thing in order to set up a firebomb trap. Instead my character ran up to the barrel and punched it. Death of course happened right away.

The temptation for people is to call this "The Real Fallout 3", and while it can be compared I don't think that is quite fair. The game does show influence from Fallout 1 & 2, and other games such as Avernum, Arx Fatalis, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Along with a load of other games. But it is its own title.

Is it the cRPG people have been waiting for? I'm going to have to go with "Yes". The game would is huge, there's a lot of stuff to do (I've not even caught up with the other factions yet) and explore. Various ways to interact with the world. Crafting. Psyonics/Magical abilities. A fleshed out underworld. And a developer who's been providing updates and balancing to the game since release.

If you enjoyed any of the mentioned titles above and want to play a new turn based post-apoc game, I highly recommend giving this one a look.

Game Acquisition: Purchased at release
Platform Used: GOG
Tweet Thread: 1 - 25 December 2015
PC Used: Scorptec Venom 2009

Windows: XP SP3 / Vista / 7 / 8 / 10
Processor: 1.6Ghz
Memory: 2GB RAM
Graphhics: GPU that supports Shader Model 2.0 or higher
Hard drive space: 3 GB
Additional notes: UnderRail requires a minimum screen resolution of 1024x768 or higher.