After being revealed last year, developer Deck13 has kept a tight lid on its next game, Atlas Fallen. That all changed this week with a brief look at the gameplay in a new trailer, and for anyone curious about how this project differs from Deck13's previous work on The Surge series, the developer has uploaded a deep dive preview on its YouTube channel for the upcoming sandy action-RPG.

　　This explainer answers a lot of questions about Atlas Fallen, ranging from its plot to its world, how its gameplay works, character customization, and what makes it unique. Also, there's a section dedicated to explaining how sand works in the game, in case you needed more information on the one substance that can defeat Darth Vader.

　　The core of Atlas Fallen's gameplay is focused on sand magic and using those arcane powers to defend yourself against Sand Wraiths. Enemies come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and Deck13 says that you'll be able to use a wide range of skills to help you tailor your combat style. One notable example here is the sand shield, a parry system in which you can deflect enemy attacks using a powerful burst of magic and momentarily freeze your foes in place as you launch a counterattack. The bigger the enemy that you slay, the bigger the reward you'll receive from them.

　　Momentum also plays a key role in combat, and the more blows you land on an enemy, the more of this energy that you'll build up. Once you have enough Momentum, you'll be able to launch special attacks and activate buffs to your character, with the system encouraging you to be skillfully aggressive.

　　"We're trying to use what we had before with The Surge 2 and we've tried to go in a very different direction," creative director Jan Klose explained in the video. "We want to keep some things, we want to keep the fast pacing, increase it, and improve it. So we have super-cool agility in the game world. But what do we do with it? We use it not only for combat but also for exploration. A lot of the game is about agile movement, verticality, and exploration."

　　Atlas Fallen releases on May 16 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.

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