Metro 2039: Darker Than Ever, Moscow in Ruins, Neo-Nazi Dictatorship Revealed in New Trailer

The announcement of a new installment in the famous Metro shooter series, based on the cycle of novels by Dmitry Glukhovsky, has taken place.

Prior to the presentation, the writer stated that the game would be “the darkest thing you have seen” and it seems this was not an exaggeration.

What is known

The Ukrainian studio 4A Games, with support from the publisher Deep Silver, showcased the debut trailer and revealed the first details of Metro 2039 at a small Xbox First Look show.

As noted by the head of development, the Metro series has never romanticized nuclear post-apocalypse, but the war in Ukraine, unleashed by Russia, has led the team to make the setting even darker, where the characters are left with no morals or hope for the future, only the necessity to survive in the ruins of Moscow.

The main character, but not Artyom, will return to the Metro, from where he left many years ago and vowed never to return. He wants to tell his former citizens what has changed in the world, but the situation is complicated by the fact that in addition to a huge number of mutants, members of the Novoreich — neo-Nazis who have previously been featured in the franchise but now have taken total control, led by the fan-familiar Hunter — have fortified their power in the Moscow metro.

Developers promise to raise the most complex and relevant topics, for example, the cost of silence, the horrors of tyranny, and the real value of freedom.

Most likely, all this combined with the Nazis is a thinly veiled allusion to what modern Russia is like, and Glukhovsky has personal reasons to show where dictatorship leads — Putin’s regime sentenced him in absentia to eight years in prison for his anti-war stance and a trumped-up charge sounding like “spreading false information discrediting the Russian army's actions.”

In Metro 2039, graphics and detail will reach a new level, and developers will once again use their beloved “environmental storytelling” trick, so that every interior and location will tell unique silent stories and complement the overall plot.

By the way, the events of the new game unfold four years after the finale of Metro: Exodus.

When to expect

The release of Metro 2039 is scheduled for winter 2026 on PC (Steam, EGS), PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series.

Source: Xbox First Look