Former Metro studio's new cyberpunk shooter La Quimera has a rough landing in early access

Sci-fi FPSLa Quimera is the first game from Reburn, a new incarnation of Metro co-developers 4A Games Ukraine. It's out now in early access. That last bit is a surprise: the developers had planned to release the new shooter as "a large, complete journey", but had to make "certain pivots" in the face of resource constraints, technical complications and, presumably, the broad impacts of living in a warzone. This led to a launch delay last week and then, the abrupt announcement that La Quimera would start out as an early access project.

I've played the first of the early access build's four missions, and yeah, it all feels a bit undercooked, though I feel like the problem is less execution than concept. La Quimera simply doesn't feel like a very enthralling shooter, next to the developer's previous post-apocalyptic Moscow tunnel escapades.

It's set in a futuristic travesty of Latin America that is sort of Call Of Duty: Advanced Warfare trying to be Cyberpunk 2077 by way of Horizon: Zero Dawn, with neo-Aztec megacities and verdant metal ruins full of feral bots. You play a PMC trooper who embarks on a straightforward rescue mission and is promptly swept up in wider technofeudal shenanigans, which usefully lead to you becoming a guinea pig for some cybernetic implants.

Said early-game Stroggification brings with it a suite of secondary abilities and upgrades, which I've yet to acquire. They'll need to be exciting indeed, because La Quimera's gunplay is currently rather plodding for what is theoretically more of a power fantasy than Metro. In brief: you hide behind things and pick 'em off one by one till somebody flanks or lobs a grenade - rinse and repeat. There are two broad categories of gun: red types are for dudes, blue types are for drones. The weapons are tricked out and greebled to the max - one of the starting pistols looks like a ghost-busting hairdryer - but they don't (yet) have the storied intimacy of Metro's hydraulic BB guns and drum-fed shotties. They're just flashy gizmos.

You can say similar things of the story and world. The setting is touristy bordering on demeaning - this is one of those localisations where people tactically pepper the English with bits of high-velocity Spanish, as though the other language existed to supply punchlines. The dialogue is also sweary in a way that is almost overcompensatory enough to be charming, like you're witnessing kids utter their very first F-bombs, but mostly just insipid. Still, a lot of thought appears to have gone into the dense and gleaming or gutted and overgrown architecture and geography. It's just a shame La Quimera won't let you explore too far: this appears to be a universe of tunnels and tiered chambers, like Metro, except that being set in the open air, it needs holographic red mission boundaries to stop you wandering off.

It doesn't feel like a particularly tough game on Normal difficulty. Health must be replenished manually, but the game restores a little out of mercy when you're nearly dead, and there are regular checkpoints to soften the fall when you exhaust your capped supply of medikits. You also have the option of co-op, with players forming up in your hub base before embarking on missions.

La Quimera will remain in early access for "up to 18 months". Here's what you'll hopefully get in the full release:

- Deeper integration between narrative and gameplay in both solo and co-op modes.

- Expanded NPC involvement in story-driven gameplay situations.

- Improved pacing and balance between narrative sequences and gameplay encounters.

- Enhanced level design for combat, ensuring challenges remain engaging for both solo and cooperative players.

- A larger number of levels that complete the game's major story arcs.

I would definitely reserve your pennies for the moment. I can sort of see a serviceable shooter arising from this one's whirl of doodads, bandidos and cussing. Perhaps the later plot developments and fancier upgrades will save it from disaster. Still, if you're after a campaign shooter right now, you're probably better off digging out Metro 2033 again.