Atlas Fallen will be the first co-op game made by German studio Deck13, mainly known to the gaming public for Lords of the Fallen and the two The Surge installments. The preview build didn’t feature co-op support yet, so when I had the chance to interview Deck13 Co-Founder and Managing Director (as well as Creative Director on Atlas Fallen), I asked him how the game handled having two players at once. Luckily, it sounds like the studio spent the necessary time to make it a complete experience.
Being someone who enjoys co-op games myself, I was eager to have us avoid things that always ruin co-op experiences. Therefore, while one player is hosting the game, the second player can do everything the first player can (apart from setting the server rules): they can find loot, start boss fights, talk to NPCs, and receive and complete quests. Progress and loot are shared. There are some matchmaking rules that the game applies in order to balance out the experience, but that’s mainly it. And yes, cutscenes do acknowledge the presence of another character which was a terrible effort, but it’s working and hopefully will be appreciated in co-op sessions. Designing an RPG campaign to completely work with either one or two players is much harder than we anticipated, and it led to some hard decisions along the way, but I’m glad that we pulled through with it and now have a true co-op experience.
In general, I think that combat-centric games get easier when played in co-op because two players can attack one enemy which otherwise would only have to deal with one human. There are several adjustments the game makes when fighting enemies in co-op so that they are a bit more fierce, the smaller enemies respawn more often, keeping both players busy in combat. But I think if two people use their skills on enemies, they always have an advantage. Also, there are some abilities in the game that are designed especially for co-op, e.g., a healing spell that heals both players, so players can tailor their builds towards their co-op session too.
Atlas Fallen is also the first semi open world game made by Deck13, not to mention a switch from the Soulslike inspiration of their most recent titles toward a different breed of action roleplaying games. The German studio recently decided to delay the game from May 16th to August 10th, which will give the developers more time to polish the game and also provide a less busy release window.
Powered by the in-house FLEDGE Engine, Atlas Fallen will launch for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series S|X at $49.99 on PC and $59.99 on consoles.
