Thought I'd leave my comments, questions and (hopefully) constructive criticisms of the endings.

Main Quest

I reached the final missions by letting the Mycelium squads take the mushroom bits to Krasnoznamenny, but didn't side with Morozov in the end. The first thing I couldn't understand was what happened to the mushrooms after I killed the Mycelium guys and left. I got a dialog saying I couldn't bear to destroy them so I didn't even try slicing them up (is it possible to destroy them at all?), and I don't seem to have blown up the bunker or anything. What's to prevent literally anyone from getting in there and being posessed into finishing what Morozov started? And the ending didn't really explain whether or not the thing it was saying about the incoming meteor strike was at all true or if humanity managed to deal with it, is this being saved for a sequel or something?

EDIT: I loaded a game and tried destroying the mushrooms. It's possible and easily done, but makes the ending no different.

Krasnoznamenny

I chose not to help the ATOM guys in front of cult HQ take the city because I really had no reason to care about ATOM at all. The only connection my character had to the organization was the game telling me he's part of it. Before that I did all the quests I could find regarding the chamber of commerce - the coal delivery quest, making Caravanserai accept their rule, and exterminating the Circus (although I don't know how this affects Krasnoznamenny in any way beside helping the chairman get his revenge). A thing that came off weird to me was the chairman calling that a test, yet not giving me any quests afterwards.

So the ending itself made no sense to me. It said that Krasnoznamenny became ignorant of the reality of life in the wastes due to the safety of its walls and stagnated over time. Dafuq? It makes it sound like some kind of isolationist state, while actual in-game experiences portray a different reality. It's actively expanding, controls Fogelevka and Caravanserai, works with Dan to manipulate elections in Otradnoye, and forces the caravans of Peregon to get behind their protection monopoly as talking to Mambetov after the coal shipments quest tells us. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this points to an imperialist state, not an isolationist one.

You could think that the "stagnant isolation" bit could stem from it being difficult to enter the city proper, but it's really not. There's no reason to think that the guard at the entrance shakes everyone down the same way they do the player and the ATOM guys standing in front of Mycelium HQ at the end of the main quest. Not only is people coming in (and therefore making the town aware of realities of the wastes) common, it's surprisingly easy - they let in a score of heavily armed military-looking types who then proceeded to gang up on a building right next to the seat of their government, without even assuming a defensive stance in case this heavily armed group tries to stir up some shit (like, I dunno, taking over their entire town).

An argument might be that it's not the townsfolk themselves, but the leaders in the bunker that become ignorant of reality, but how can that be? The chairman himself grew up in the wastes, that one other guy just came back from helping me rig an election in Otradnoye and sent me to annex Caravanserai, and one used me to enforce a protection monopoly on their main competitor's caravans. So who precisely is unaware of the reality of the wastes here? The guy with the pig maybe? Because there's no one else left down there as far as I can remember.

Peregon

This one was particularly lackluster. It can be summed down to "Maxim Maximovich (who I'm pretty sure was called Fyodor in-game) led the place and it was all fine and dandy.". So does Peregon use its rival's stagnation to gain the upper hand or something? And how is Peregon even a proper rival to Krasnoznamenny, it's just a bunch of tents and a ship which has nothing on it but a bunch of stalls and a dog-fighting arena? Hardly seems like a wealthy trade-driven settlement.

Factory gang

The ending said that Dan and his men eventually became a respectable mercenary force. Which struck me as strange because all that was left of them by the time I finished all his quests was Dan himself, the one guy in his room, the cook, the junkie and one other guy. Even during the revolt they were so poorly armed and armored that they wound up punching each other to death. Why did Syoma Voronok's men from the container yard (who both outnumbered and outgunned the factory gang) not join in to help Shishak's men? Why were they even there in such numbers if that wasn't their intended purpose?

Dan also didn't seem to want to become the head of a mercenary company, but a feudal lord. How did Krasnoznamenny's stagnation and Peregon's rise affect his ambitions and territory? Dan seems to be protecting the paying caravans which pass through his territory - how come there are no merchants, caravan or otherwise near his base, where his men can best protect them?

Otradnoye

I rigged the elections in Katya's favor, and the ending said that the town did well under her rule combined with Dan's protection. But again - no detail at all. She was struck by news of Kovalev's death, and always seemed busy with work whenever I came after telling her of it. No word at all in the ending about how this affected rule, or her own life or anything. I think if Kovalev was important enough to warrant his own little in-game cutscene about being ambushed, his heir might at least get a slide in the ending video. I was also disappointed that I never got a chance to tell her that I found Artemyev in the mountain pass and avenged Kovalev's death. I'm pretty sure I never even got the chance to tell her he was her father. And his last words kinda implied that there would be some way for you to affect her well-being in the future, but there doesn't seem to be any other than the choice to tell her that he left or that he got killed.

Also, why did Kovalev tell Katya that he was leaving for good and only told me that he was driving around a bit without when he got ambushed by Artemyev's men, when he was actually leaving he told me that he was just going to Krasnoznamenny. Is Kovalev giving me two different accounts and Katya a third supposed to be part of his character or is it just an inconsistency?

Red Fighter

The ending I got for Red Fighter was it not lasting long between the other settlements. I don't know how it turns out if you fully upgrade your home, or get more people (I just had the cow guy, the gunsmith and the couple from the factory as far as I could tell). I only discovered Guzhin pretty late in the game, and I have to say that it's pretty lame that the only way you get to turn a very well-maintained uninhabited village into your base is to find some dude chilling on a hospital bed. It would be way more fun if you could do it on your own, and get people who you meet throughout your travels to join you there. Also, the eastern wastes are said to be a dangerous area, but Red Fighter doesn't even have any defensive structures. Wouldn't it just be easy pickings for any bandit or slaver in the area? Or do you get to build some if you spend more time developing it?

That's about all the ending slides I can remember. I don't recall places like Fogelevka, Caravanserai or the Castle even getting any. They did have very few quests themselves, but they're bound to have been affected by the happenings in other parts of the wastes. Caravanserai accepting Krasnoznamenny rule would probably have led to it becoming more prominent than the Castle in the Mountain pass region, and probably stirred up some conflict. The scrapyard mutants and the Circus getting exterminated would certainly have some effect on Fogelevka, as would Krasnoznamenny's expansion into the Mountain pass.

Sorry if I seem overly critical here, but whereas I wouldn't care about such flaws in an otherwise crappy game, in a great game such as ATOM they're just constant thorns in my side. I didn't like a game enough to criticize it this much in ages.

Extremely well observed. I just finished the game and I had very similar feelings about some of the endings. So thank you for your post, because I don't have to write it myself. Especially those ATOM guys standing outside, hehe. That would be like nothing ever happened to Morozov.

I thought destroying the mushroom would be essential. I was expecting the final battle to have some mind-altering portions to it, where the mushroom would rob you of AP or otherwise hurt you (even without maintaining visual with you) as if it were additional enemy. This was not a boss fight, there was no boss. Actually the fight above was harder due to positioning of troops. I was morally struggling the whole game to do KRZ quests since they represented the typical ruthless corrupt politicians and I did not want that cancer to spread into the wastes. I was hoping there would be an opposing force (Peregon?) that I could instead team up with, but no. So I welcomed the option that ATOM takes over KRZ, it was a major redemption to me, even though as you said I didn't care much about ATOM. I just really, really hated KRZ :). I agree, it is the opposite of what should have happened in your case, leaves a bad aftertaste. Yup, the game hypes you up about Peregon - biggest trade hub in the area, full of criminals and mercenaries, etc. I was avoiding it for a long time because I was scared it would be big and full of new quests, so I wanted to finish my current quests elsewhere. And when you get there, it's a bunch of tents. After making Maximovich a leader, I was expecting a dozen of complex quests from him where Peregon would be the opposing force to KRZ to at least set you up for this type of ending, but nope, you just do one quest and you're done with Peregon. I had moral objections to Dan's quests similar to KRZ quests. I was basically fulfilling Kovalev's original quest of infiltrating Dan's organization with the sole intention to backstab him at some point in the game so that he leaves Otradnoye alone. I really thought the uprising was my chance to pick sides and destroy Dan, but the game did not give me that option. And then the elections, surely Katya will weaken Dan's position, he would see me as a traitor and I would finally wipe his factory boys. Nope. And since I sided with ATOM and made KRZ defunct (which Dan heavily depended on), I was really expecting at least a sour ending for him as a consolation that the game did not let me directly destroy him in-game. Nope, he's alive and well, and exactly as you pointed out, why is he suddenly a mercenary and not a feudal lord? Exactly. That quest line did not really resolve, either in-game or in final endings. Disappointment. Very strange indeed. Right next to slaver camp and no problem. I could see how player could invest in defensive structures which would determine the final outcome for Red Fighter, but nothing like that was implemented. Good observation. I also miss those endings. Exactly. The game was SO brilliant I was scratching my head sometimes, because I genuinely did not believe that a spiritual Fallout successor would ever become a real thing. Too bad the final endings were mediocre :(

Just finished the game. I was confused about Kraznozymenany as well. I thought discouraging ATOM from taking over the town would lead to the "better" ending. Also, I was worried about the effect of not getting rid of the Circus, but I guess it had none.

I agree Peregon was a little disappointing. There was no real town there. In terms of the number and length of quests, it was fine however. (Kraznozymenany had so many damn people to talk to...)

I'm surprised Kovalev was not mentioned in the credits, and I wondered why I could not tell Katya about here parentage.

The final "boss battle" was weird. I thought I would continue on to the Death Tunnel for a real ending, but the game ended right there.

Anyway, great game! I liked it a LOT!

Well the people in charge of KRZ are portrayed as a paranoid bunch and getting worse - they do live inside a bunker after all, despite the city being relatively intact. I agree it doesn't quite fit though, since they're definitely expansionist (they're making allies with Dan, trying to scheme Peregon into becoming submissive to them, even getting a foothold in the Mountain Pass which is a weeks drive away).

It's kind of strange Kovalev getting all these special cut scenes, considering his part in the whole story is quite small. Perhaps to showcase how ruthless the new world is or something? Or maybe there were plans for many other cutscenes for other characters? Or his story was supposed to originally be grander but was scaled back? Or other parts of the story just didn't fit into his so he was sidelined?

Peregon, even after it was supposedly "improved" after recent patches, was incredibly disappointing. At the very least, I would expect that the "tent city" feature some kind of massive open-air market, with stalls etc., possibly with the traders changing on a regular basis as caravans come and go. After helping Peregon with their power struggles, a grand total of one trader rocks up, and then just hangs around forever (despite selling everything from a backpack). Actually the fact that even some of the "regular" traders sell stuff straight from their back packs was a bit strange - that makes more sense in Fogelevka, but in Peregon I'd expect any one who's actually a resident of sorts (even a short term one) to at least set up a stall or something. That guy selling stuff on the ship doesn't even have a stall - you'd think he'd make some kind of shop front from the crap in the ship at least!

BTW you can actually tell Katya about her dad - but you need to do it before the elections (after that she's too busy - kind of a weak excuse but still). I also expected Kayja to provide at least one or two follow-up quests at some point, but I guess she's still reading through the old reports or something...

Dan becoming a mercenary also made little sense, especially if you don't let ATOM take over KRZ. If ATOM does take over KRZ it makes a little more sense, since Dan probably figures he can't deal with them (or if he did, that they would eventually just take him out or something, which does make sense) - so becoming mercs makes some sense in that case, despite seeming to come from left-field.

I was also disappointed that we don't get involved with more politics, e.g. between Dan and Peregon, or Peregon and KRZ. There are a handful of missions where it's clear there's some shady shit going on between Peregon and KRZ (seemingly initiated by KRZ), and while it makes sense for KRZ to be tight-lipped about it, I would expect Peregon to want to hire you for some additional follow-on missions (spying on KRZ, getting evidence against them, possibly retribution or even assassinating one of their leaders in the bunker).

Likewise, apparently there's "bad blood" between Peregon and Dan, but apart from that one gang-hunting mission that Peregon puts you on, there's no evidence of this, and neither Peregon nor Dan seem keen to send you on further missions related to it (again, I would expect Peregon to want to hire you - Dan likely doesn't need any help in that area and probably thinks it's better for you not to know what's going on there).

Finally, the ending slides related to Red Fighter seemed way out of proportion to reality. The whole place is four hours and a small bunker, with a single chick acting as sniper/guard, no fences no towers, nothing in the way of defences. It would have been cool to be able to use the vast cash you end up getting to add even more crap to it - at least some guard towers, a wall (even just a shaky fence would be better than the fences with holes that it has), possibly having to convince some soldiers to work for you to help defend it. Even then, I don't see that place as being able to meaningfully compete with KRZ or even Peregon, even if KRZ is under martial law. Even Ortradnoye has walls and gun posts in addition to its two guards.

I like how you can get people to go to Red Fighter, especially those that actually do something. Although the chick with the hook is pretty pointless, considering that most people would have everything they could ever want by the time she gets there, and would likely not bother waiting around to take advantage of her skills at that point.

I do agree this was still an awesome game though.