Combat, sprinting and kicking enemies will increase the protagonist's heart rate, resulting in darkened vision and muffled hearing.

[2] The protagonist, an unidentified amnesic, must explore a quarantine zone established in the Lake District, Northern England five years after the Windscale nuclear disaster to uncover what had happened in the area.

[4] Players will have to fight against mutated creatures, cult members, rogue military agents, and robots created by the British Atomic Research Division.

The game was inspired by Fallout: New Vegas, which was described by Ben Fisher, associate head of design at Rebellion, as a "dense" experience and one that valued player choice.

Pulp fiction also influenced the game, with The Quatermass Experiment, The Prisoner, Doctor Who, The Wicker Man and The Day of the Triffids cited as the team's inspirations.