S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 review: a glorious and beautiful pain in the ass

Wandering alone makes you feel special STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl. Perhaps you are wandering through a damp, misty swamp surrounded by giant reeds. A deep purple sky made of continuous clouds takes up half of the screen. Huge rusty machines create strange and eerie silhouettes. Gunshots can be heard in the distance. The sounds grow closer, followed by the unmistakable groans of the mutated beast. It sharpens your sense of facing nature, regardless of whether you live or die. This is not unpleasant survival. To call the Zone home is to feel an almost fundamental sense of freedom. It is the illusion of putting one foot in front of the other and being purely present in the present moment.

It’s better to walk. stalker 2a fascinating and currently buggy sequel. pioneer 2000’s shooter trilogy, you’ve been doing that a lot. This map is based on a real-world exclusion zone created after the 1986 nuclear disaster, measuring 64 kilometers by 64 kilometers. Objectives tend to be found in abandoned buildings scattered across hostile terrain. You clutched the metal bolt next to your rifle and set off (hopefully wearing a gas mask) on another long journey. It is wise to periodically test for abnormalities by throwing the bolt in front of you. In some cases, the air itself becomes distorted or bent. Some people create tiny glass shards that can tear their skin and become airborne. Contact with any of them can quickly become fatal.

This version of the Zone is wonderfully beautiful and painful, and it can hold its own with other Zones that dot pop culture. A restricted site featured in Andrei Tarkovsky’s 1979 film. stalker Or Area X in Jeff VanderMeer’s novel Southern Reach. It’s exciting to see Ukrainian studio GSC Game World depict open-world video games in such an evocative way, in a way that defies much of the conventional wisdom about how they should look and work. .

in stalker 2the zone is noticeably horizontal. Please forget about “”look at that mountain”;When you get a good view, all you see is a shimmering expanse of moorland and grassland.The color palette is particularly muted, with a rich mix of dull browns, nauseating greens, and charcoal blues. It gives a simple and sometimes vulgar impression. Most of the inhabitants of the zone are depressed men drinking energy drinks. Did they come to this extreme environment to escape something at home? Is it because it reflects a hidden part?

For Skiff, our spiky protagonist, the answer turns out to be both. His house outside the zone is set on fire by a rogue anomaly. He enters looking for answers before becoming embroiled in a conspiracy to steal valuable technology. The story begins to diverge from there. You can freely interact with different factions, including a specialized military group called the Wards and a band of metaphysical dreamers led by a man called Scar. But I soon lost track of who I had colluded with and wronged. The complex web of motives, grudges, and backstories was often baffling. like tarkovsky stalker or extinctionthe quests here felt slippery and ever-changing, so I simply walked toward the quest marker, an evocative cacophony of synth sounds swirling in my ears.

The first few hours are painful. If you don’t have much cash, you’ll end up recovering damaged weapons that are susceptible to sabotage. Over time, the game softens as your arsenal of precisely rendered weapons gradually expands. An AI-driven emergent moment that created the original. stalker Cult classic franchises also begin to materialize from the metaphysical ether. At one point, I agreed to chase mutants out of a building for two of my stalker buddies. While I was doing that, a rival group opened fire on us, all the while a pack of mad dogs ransacked both sides. The next three minutes were bloody, chaotic, and absolutely amazing. In another moment, I was taking a group of enemy stalkers back to the base of a faction that lived in a giant irradiated garbage heap. As the enemy approached the perimeter, the guards took up defensive positions and opened fire in a seamless, dizzyingly coordinated concert.

but stalker 2 It’s not just about replicating the achievements of our predecessors. The open world deepens the moody proto-walking sim elements of the original. This zone is so large that preparation is even more important than in previous games. This takes place alongside a tapestry of navigation, combat, resource management, and all-important rest, all set in a day/night cycle that has a real impact on gameplay. There’s a lot of room to reflect on your actions, especially when you’re walking long distances. In my own case, even though I had good relationships with almost all of the major NPCs, why did I feel the need to mercilessly kill them? and I immediately transformed into another monster.

when stalker 2 When it works as intended, it’s a new sandbox that can create both dark and lighthearted moments while giving the illusion that the world functions independently of player input. But maybe it’s inevitable because of the game. difficult development Due to the Russia-Ukraine war, more than half of the development team moved from Kiev to Prague, but there are some differences.

The biggest problem is combat. While gunfights are crisp and responsive, enemies are often facing the wrong direction for the threat they should be facing. The Stranger is how some human enemies (who aren’t actually mutants with the ability to become invisible) miraculously appear out of thin air. Another strange glitch caused a character’s head to be separated from their body during a cutscene. The gunfight that followed was a farce. Should I aim where the head is floating or where it should be? These moments appear too often to be shaken off, but they dispel the illusion of the zone’s persuasiveness.

stalker 2 It arrived in a way that felt close to greatness. About 10 hours into the game, Scar, a wide-eyed, poetic outsider, offered his thoughts on the Zone. There is the “dark” side, which has the ability to strip humans of their free will, and the “shining” side, the wonderful and miraculous side of this transformed place that shines a new light on the very nature of life. “We want the Shining Zone to emerge,” Scar says longingly.

After applying some patches, stalker 2 You may still become this “shining” version of yourself. As it stands, the game requires you to follow the spells being cast. The rewards are considerable for those who can overlook the erratic combat, bodies swaying through the scenery, and other audiovisual quirks. The core feeling of surviving in an uncaring environment never goes away: lightning crackling in the distance, rain pouring down, and the ominous noise of distant gunshots.

STALKER 2: Heart of Chernobyl It launches on November 20th on Xbox and PC.