Atomic Heart 2’s Boss Fights Are Going to Be ‘More Painful’

Atomic Heart was many different things, but its boss fights often proved to be more talk than walk. While the visuals were impressive and the tension was palpable, some of these boss fights fell short of delivering the kind of challenge that makes emerging victorious a truly rewarding feeling. As it turns out, that’s something Atomic Heart 2 seems intent on changing because it restructures its major encounters to be a bit more painful to endure and, as a result, far more fulfilling to overcome.

In a recent interview with Game Rant, Mundfish Studio founder and CEO Rob Bagratuni divulged a wealth of information about Atomic Heart 2 and what players can expect it. He also specifically went into detail about Atomic Heart 2‘s boss fights and how the studio plans to make them more challenging than ever.

Atomic Heart 2 Is Ramping Up Its Boss Fights

Atomic Heart has never been an easy game necessarily, but its boss fights initially seemed to lean more into the cinematic than the mechanical. With a substantial amount of health and arenas that were certainly flashy in their design, many of Atomic Heart‘s biggest “baddies” were largely more about survival than mastery. That’s something Mundfish is actively looking to evolve in Atomic Heart 2, and it has even begun to experiment with that in the first game’s latest DLC packs.

According to Bagratuni, the sequel is aiming for a much deeper level of engagement across the board, but that means boss encounters are being rethought as well:

“We’re working on a deeper approach to the RPG elements and progression. Of course, we want to give players more freedom in what kind of character they will become with skill branching and progression, but actually, we’re trying to bring more depth and freedom to everything like core gameplay mechanics. We just want a deeper experience overall. We especially want to focus on boss fights. We saw in Atomic Heart‘s third DLC, the reaction to the last boss fight, that people liked it, so we want to make Atomic Heart 2‘s boss fights a little bit harder.”

What really stood out to Bagratuni and the rest of the team at Mundfish was how players responded to the difficulty spike in the final boss of Atomic Heart‘s third DLC. Here, the studio saw an opportunity to make sure the visual spectacle of its boss fights actually pays off from a mechanical standpoint. As a result, rather than simply giving enemies more health or attacks that merely look great, Atomic Heart 2 has its sights set on making each boss fight feel unique in a way that keeps players on their toes with every major encounter. Ultimately, this means fights that demand more than just impeccable survival skills and instead inspire growth in the player with each attempt.

Mundfish was particularly inspired by how streamers and content creators reacted to those challenging boss fights. Bagratuni said the team actively watched these playthroughs to study how players responded to failure, difficulty, and their eventual victory, and the reactions were exactly what they were hoping for:

“We jumped into the streams of some content creators who were playing the hardest difficulty of the last boss fight. They were dying and it created so much reaction. It was a lot of pain, but it was so visceral and incredibly fun to watch. It was a memorable experience for them too, and they’ve been very vocal about it on their streams. We really wanted to work on the sequel’s boss fights and make them more meaningful and even more painful.”

Based on Bagratuni’s remarks, Atomic Heart 2 isn’t just looking to punish players for the sake of entertainment but to instead make boss fights something with an eventual emotional payoff. With better RPG progression, more personalized playstyles, and mechanics that allow for greater player agency, the apparent goal is to make every major fight feel like a worthwhile achievement for players. If Mundfish pulls it off, those “painful” boss fights could be one of the sequel’s most defining characteristics.