Metro 2033 released

The game hit retail stores and digital distribution services (including Steam) in North America today.  Eurogamer has a review.  A few selected quotes:

Wherever you are it's atmospheric. This is a world that is heaving with apocalyptic detail, but also submerged in its own gaseous horrors. Both on the surface, and in certain areas of the Metro, you'll require a gas mask, which uses filters like a gun uses ammunition. The first time you die because of exposure to gases, you begin to realise that this is a shooter that is as much about survival as about the story, or the combat.

The most frustrating and least forgivable of the combat design decisions is the inclusion of instant-death traps in many of the environments. While the tripwires are generally fairly obvious, being blown up by one because you were diving around a corner in the midst of a firefight will result in a gamepad being hurled across the room. Worse, the explosives can't be blown up with a grenade, as you might expect.

So it's a bunch of minor things about the core game that tarnish what is otherwise an excellent shooter. I should stress just how inventive and beautiful this game is: the action is expertly punctuated with unexpected experiences, such as collapsing into a hallucination, or manning a giant flamethrower, or struggling to find your way on a collapsed Moscow street while being hunted by flying demon creatures, or smuggling yourself aboard a train full of nazis, or helping guide a lost child home...