In a post celebrating survival-action game Atomfall’s launch milestone of 1.5 million+ players, which has since grown to 2 million players, Rebellion CEO Jason Kingsley drew attention to the studio’s way of making games.

“Our size and stability mean that we can take risks to create something as different as Atomfall. Happily, that risk is paying off.”

Amid a turbulent age of blockbuster game budgets, GamesIndustry.biz asked Kingsley if he believes Rebellion has got the scale of its projects – which include the popular Sniper Elite series – just right.

“I don’t think we’ve got it just right,” says Kingsley. “I think that one of the things Chris [Kingsley, Rebellion co-founder and CTO] and I want to do is repeat success. So we want to do more Sniper Elite, we want to do more Zombie Army, we want to do more Strange Brigade.”

“Now it looks like we want to do more Atomfall – it’s been successful, can we find the resources to do it? I don’t know. The idea has always been to have two thirds sequels, and one third new IP, pushing the boundaries. Partly because it’s actually interesting to solve the puzzles with a new IP.”

Atomfall, which launched on PC, PS5 and Xbox in late March (including Game Pass for PC and Xbox), takes players to an alternate history of the United Kingdom where the Windscale nuclear disaster turned a large chunk of the British countryside into a quarantine zone.

Escape is the goal, as players then sneak, barter and battle their way across multiple interconnected areas patrolled by rogue factions, soldiers and deadly robots.

Between its reveal and release, Atomfall drew superficial comparisons to the Fallout series. But its own reference points are more specifically British, including science fiction books like Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham or The Death of Grass by John Christopher.

“We try our hardest to control budgets and make them the appropriate size for our games”

Jason Kingsley, Rebellion

Still, the Fallout comparisons didn’t hurt. Atomfall drew a lot of buzz following its reveal at last year’s Xbox Games Showcase, and Kingsley points out that wishlists for the game “have completely broken our projections because they’re much higher than they were for anything else.”

The game’s many influences went beyond Bethesda’s RPGs, too.

“The Fallout series, along with any post-apocalyptic games, are obviously a reference point for us. It’s hard for it not to be. We did not set out to make an English version of Fallout at any stage, but we were very aware that it was an easy comparison to make, because [it’s a] post-apocalyptic landscape.”

“In some ways, the Metro series, or the STALKER series, are closer in themes…there’s been a nuclear accident, and you’re stuck in an area as a result of it. That’s more thematically [linked].”

Players seemed to agree that Atomfall had its own identity once they got it in their hands.

“We hoped – and it seemed to be the case – that as soon as people started to play it, they realised, ‘no, it’s trying to do its own thing’. Albeit in a similar broad genre of post-apocalyptic [games].”

As the statement about ‘size and stability’ around Atomfall implies, Rebellion has experienced continued success while many developers around it have undergone layoffs in recent years.

Managing budgets is important to the studio. “We try our hardest to control budgets and make them the appropriate size for our games. I’m flattered to even be talked about in the same area, or even vaguely occupying similar parts of the charts as fantastic games like Assassin’s Creed, which are costing hundreds of millions, I believe, I don’t know whether the actual budgets are public. But I believe it’s hundreds of millions.

“And obviously those games, ultimately, will sell better than our game. But our game is a very small fraction of that budget.”

Kingsley says that all of the publisher’s games are profitable. With the evergreen Sniper Elite games, its Zombie Army spin-offs and now Atomfall, Rebellion has stuck to a scope that makes sense for the company. “We don’t deliberately fit into this mid range, but that’s what we can do, and what we can do successfully. We literally can’t afford to spend 200 million on making a game. We just don’t have 200 million.”

Discoverability is something Kingsley ponders frequently. Steadily building up Rebellion’s reputation, game-by-game, is part of that line of thinking. “At the end of the day, if people come back and say, ‘I really liked Rebellion’s last game, I’ll take a look at their next game’, you can then build up an audience that will just at least sit forward when there’s a new game announced by us.”

The biggest discoverability boost for Atomfall, though, was the marketing support and sheer visibility that comes with launching on Xbox Game Pass. It wasn’t Rebellion’s first day-and-date release for the subscription service, but as a new IP, the circumstances worked in everyone’s favour.

“It’s been a huge success,” Kingsley said. “Microsoft has been a fantastic partner to work with, they’ve really leaned in to helping us. They brought their skills and their scale to bear on our small project, and it’s done really, really well for them, so they got a good deal, we got a good deal out of it as well.”

Kingsley’s hope is that the impact of reaching Game Pass users extends to consumers buying the game, too.

“With Game Pass, you can get people to try it, then as a result of those people trying it, they like it, and they then tell their mates on social media, ‘I found this game on Game Pass, I really enjoyed it, you should have a go.’ And then some of them are on Game Pass, and will [play] it. But some of them aren’t on Game Pass, and will also want to be part of that conversation. So, they’ll go and buy it.

“At least, that’s our theory – we don’t have the data in for that. But Chris and I both feel, one of the biggest challenges for a company like us is discovery. And Game Pass has allowed for a lot of discovery for our game.”

We asked Kingsley how Rebellion forecasted sales for Atomfall, given its Game Pass release.

“We have good ideas about the kind of scale, and we usually do a low, medium and a high projection. And we hope [that] medium is about right. You can also look at things like wishlists before release and have a look at that curve – that’s always a fairly good indicator.”

As mentioned, Atomfall wishlist numbers blew past Rebellion’s metrics, and the game ultimately performed ahead of expectations. “We’ve done a lot better than our mid-range estimates, actually, so that’s nice. It’s nice when marketing comes back to you and says, ‘yep, we underestimated our high-level success’, so that’s good, and quite pleasing.”

“Microsoft has been a fantastic partner to work with, they’ve really leaned in to helping us.”

Jason Kingsley, Rebellion

Beyond the discovery benefits, the upside of launching a new IP like Atomfall on Game Pass is guaranteeing some kind of financial return.

“Yes, it does mitigate risk, because without going into details, they guarantee you a certain level of income, regardless of what it will sell for,” Kingsley said. “But it potentially has a knock-on effect. Places like Xbox sales, for example. You could argue that all the hardcore are on Game Pass, and they’re the ones that might buy a new IP like this, so therefore, are you cannibalising one section of the audience? And I think, perhaps, yes, a little bit. But what you gain from that cost is disproportionate.”

It was flattering, too, that Xbox took an interest in the project, with Kingsley describing the arrangement as a “confidence booster” for its new game.

It’s been a very busy 2025 for the publisher so far, with the release of Sniper Elite: Resistance coming just two months before Atomfall. Kingsley says the successive launches were a ‘suboptimal’ situation, and that it just “kind of happened”. In particular, he says it was a strain on Rebellion’s marketing and communications function – ultimately, though, he believes it ended well.

“It’s worked. I wouldn’t plan it like that if we could possibly avoid it [laughs].”

Atomfall was Kingsley’s dream game. It was an idea he alluded to in press interviews for almost a decade. When asked if he has another passion project he’d like Rebellion to pursue down the line, the answer is one that won’t surprise anyone who’s watched Kingsley’s popular YouTube channel, Modern History TV.

“I would love to try and make something medieval and fantasy. Don’t know when, [or if] we’ll ever get resources – we’re over 500 members of full-time staff, and we don’t have enough people to do all the games we want to do.”

“I would love to do something that fits in with my YouTube channel, Modern History TV, but also fantasy as well. Medieval, dragons, that kind of thing. I’ve got a few ideas percolating in my head right now, so maybe one day, yes.”