S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl

Publishers: GSC Game World, Plaion
Developer: GSC Game World
Platforms: Xbox Series X/S (Reviewed), PC
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $69.99 USD – Available Here $99.95 AUD – Available Here

Overview

Among the many post-apocalyptic games that have been released throughout the years, the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. franchise has always held a certain reputation for being brutal, unique, and often busted with jank. Despite having three games released over the course of as many years, the franchise has long been one thought dead, but in the radioactive fallout of Chornobyl, is anything truly dead? GSC Game World has returned and strived through unfathomably difficult circumstances to bring the franchise back with S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl. With such a tumultuous development and hopes for the franchise at an all time high, have they managed to deliver here?

Story

Thankfully, considering the time difference between STALKER games, players do not require any direct knowledge of the previous games, though doing so will provide some important context to the game’s various mutants, anomalies, and why the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone, simply called the Zone, is the way it is. Instead, players take on the role of Skif, a mainlander who suddenly finds his home torn up by a powerfully strange artifact that had landed outside the Zone. In an attempt to find out what this artifact does and recharge it with the energy it needs to be as potentially life-changing with how valuable it might be, Skif takes on the risky job of sneaking into the Zone and performing some scans to try and power the artifact.

What was meant to be a simple trip in and out of the Zone quickly takes a turn for the worst as Skif finds himself betrayed and left for dead with nothing but a nearly empty pistol to his name and a radioactive and mutated dog chewing on his boot. With the rare help of a passerby, Skif learns of a town nearby that might have some people inside that may know the way to track down the people who nearly killed Skif. Maybe. For a price. Nothing is free in the Zone and a helpful hand is rare indeed and nothing drills that into the skull of Skif faster than the first few hours of the game’s story that sees players traveling through numerous locations trying to learn little bits of information that simply send them towards their next target, chasing breadcrumbs in the Zone filled with anomalies, bloodthirsty bandits, Stalkers with a bone to pick, numerous factions that are at odds with one another, and of course, violent mutants.

STALKER 2‘s initial tutorial mission that sees players planting the scanners before Skif’s betrayal serves as a way to introduce players to some elements of the game’s mechanics such as some mutant types, random bandits that’ll fire upon Skif without a second thought, and of course resource management but it also serves as the most direct narrative of the game that sets players up on their initial quest for revenge. The story moves slowly at the start, partly due to how unprepared Skif is to take on the various challenges that exist in the Zone but mostly because he’ll be relegated to doing work for those who hold the leverage of knowledge over him, sending Skif, and therefore the player, on numerous outings for hours before the meat of the storyline starts to kick in. While we won’t go into detail here about when and what happens that really kicks things into overdrive and makes the story of STALKER 2 feel more impactful and well put together than any other release in the series, it must be said that once this narrative gets going, it feels extremely well handled.

This is partially due to how player choice plays a role in how certain things turn out, how characters around the Zone will react to Skif, and other smaller elements. While STALKER 2 may not feature any RPG skills to force dialogue checks, players can still select dialogue for Skif that will determine his tone with characters, sometimes kicking off fights even, and these are put into great effect throughout the game. Nowhere do these types of choices come into play more than in some of the sidequests that players can undertake outside of the main storyline. While some choices may simply boil down into giving an item to one faction or another, raising Skif’s standing with them and potentially harming it with the other, there is almost always some extra level of nuance to a mission. 

One of the earliest involves a trip to a dead anomalous poppy field that contains a religious artifact for someone who has lost their entire family. Upon arriving, players will find that a caretaker has kept watch over the poppy field to supposedly protect people from venturing into the deadly poppies that will put those who linger too long in the beautiful flowers through strange hallucinations before sinking them into a permanent slumber. Players can either take the risk of exploring the field themselves or gather equipment from others that died in the field and deliver it to the caretaker for a direct map to the location of the relic and, upon recovering the relic, they’ll be prompted with another choice. Do you deliver it to the man who requested his lost family heirloom? Or turn it into the caretaker for a powerful and souped up rifle? This is a simple enough choice that is only the tip of the iceberg as to the type of choices that players can make and while it rarely feels “proper” to save scum or make use of the game’s quick save system to do so, it generally feels right when it comes to these choices. Especially when some offer some rather sinister options that aren’t directly given. In this instance? We traded the relic for the firearm only to shoot the caretaker in the head and take it back from his body along with a key that revealed that perhaps he wasn’t minding the fields out of goodwill in the first place. Then we returned the relic properly, receiving both rewards in the process with none the wiser.

Obviously not every quest has these types of options and some may fail the quest outright should the player try to deviate from the proper course, but many of them have alternatives. In fact, the world of STALKER 2 is one where there is always a gray area and almost everyone is out for themselves in one way or another. Will you be the nice guy and fish a gun out of a river for a poor soul that lost it in favor of earning some respect from the base? Or simply keep it for yourself. Give an artifact to someone so they can escape safely or kill them off and keep the valuable? Is the person that even gave you the quest the one in the right at all? These questions spring up quite often in side-quests and there are even those random events that can result in no reward at all, not even Coupons, the in-game currency.

To top these side-quests and their high variability off, the world itself is often a living and breathing thing. Using the developer’s “A-Life 2.0” system, players can be venturing across the Zone only to find a random group of humans in a firefight with a pack of blind dogs or facing off against a deadly bloodsucker that is darting back and forth while invisible to pick them apart. Other times players may find themselves exploring a ruin only to hear gunshots outside and find that two opposing factions are trying to kill each other outside. Should you intervene and save one side? Pick off the survivors? Or just wait and loot the corpses of those unfortunate enough to die in the firefight. All these choices are up to you. Even something as innocuous as sitting at a campfire and playing the guitar with other random Stalkers can find players talking and trading with these temporary friends or having to face off against a powerful mutant that was drawn to the commotion. 

This level of random world events keeps every expedition through the Zone an interesting one, since players never know when that empty field might just contain a fresh foe or event happening the next time they run through it. That being said, there is some annoyance here as the game’s systems fail to properly balance some of these encounters. In more than a few instances our Skif found himself facing down a pack of blind dogs that are far deadlier than they sound only to finally eliminate them and then hear even more barking in the distance, leading to either another desperate fight for survival or simply fleeing the area and hoping for the best. The Zone is an unforgiving land and while its story is an interesting one that is more nuanced and features plenty of choices to be had throughout it, players will need to struggle to survive nearly the entire time to make their way through it. 

Gameplay

Although STALKER 2 may feature an inventory system, various choices that players can make, and a number of survival systems to handle, it is worth noting that this first person game is far from an actual RPG. Players will not gain experience points for slaying random bandits or taking down every mutant they come across, instead the best way to stay alive the Zone and grow stronger is with proper planning, finding and upgrading valuable equipment, and even obtaining artifacts. That being said, the Zone is a punishing place filled with more dangers than players can ever expect, thanks to pre-set encounters and anomalies and the aforementioned A-Life 2.0 system that will throw random events the player’s way during exploration.

Initially, players will always feel like they are on the back foot when it comes to exploring the Zone, especially since many of the starting pieces of gear aren’t the best and Coupons are somewhat scarce. However as players learn the ropes they’ll find that they will have plenty of things to manage while exploring or preparing to venture out. Thankfully, each primary town has an inter-connected “stash” that players can use to store away any ammo, spare equipment, or even extra food and healing items they may not need on an adventure out towards their goal. Even then, being prepared doesn’t necessarily mean things will be easy, especially with how many survival mechanics and limitations are put on the player.

Not only is Skif only able to carry around 80kg of equipment at a time, with his movement and stamina regeneration growing slower the more encumbered he is, but every piece of equipment short of his flashlight and scanner degrades with use. This means every shot from a firearm, impact from a bullet into the vest, or stepping into a whirlwind anomaly will damage his equipment. Damaged armor is less protective while degraded firearms have a tendency to jam, requiring an extra reload to clear the jam and stay in the fight. Repairing equipment comes at the cost of valuable Coupons, something that is exorbitantly expensive compared to many other items players can simply purchase. This means players may need to risk using their favorite gun only to have to waste their entire reward repairing it afterwards or fall back on guns grabbed in the field that are already degraded and have a chance at jamming when needed most.

This adds an extra layer of tension to every encounter in STALKER 2 and the tension is already high enough as it is.. Players will encounter random bandits that shoot first and ask questions later, factions that may be hostile to them or simply want to protect their land, or even have to deal with an interaction turned violent and be ready for a firefight. Many of the guns in the game feel satisfying to use, with enemies properly responding to getting hit more often than not, and a headshot downing a human enemy almost always in one shot. Scoped weapons make things a bit easier here but players will need to make sure they aren’t treating the enemy AI as stupid. Yes, it is stupid more often than not as there are plenty of occasions where enemies will run out into the open and make for easy pickings or take cover with a large portion of their body hanging out, but for as many times the AI fails, it proves to be tactical as well. Staying entrenched in cover can lead to enemies flanking your position, moving to take wide-open shots at the player while their buddies keep them pinned down or toss grenades to flush the player out of hiding or take the chance to move as well. Countless times we’ve seen the enemy AI act quite intelligently in the field and keep the pressure on us and when players have to manage not only their health but also bleeding effects as well, this is quite a dangerous situation and makes standard enemy encounters often feel tense and worthwhile when facing down a group.

The various mutants that players encounter are something of a mixed bag on the other hand. Standard mutants such as mutated blind dogs or enormous rats are deadly in packs but are fairly easy to pick apart but then there are the stronger more dangerous mutants such as the invisible Bloodsucker’s that only appear when they attack, Poltergeists that throw items and appear as mist, and even those that can mimic friendly speech before zipping out to slash at you with mutated feline claws to name a few. These aren’t even the deadliest ones around as many mutants have different ways to debilitate or affect the player outside of direct attacks as well and since players have no way to defend or even dodge these attacks outside of strafing, they’ll need to simply pump bullets into them until they drop. Almost all mutants, with the exceptions of the rats, dogs, and fleshes, are tanky problems to deal with that will not only dwindle a well-stocked Stalker’s ammo reserves but their healing items as well. This can feel more than a little frustrating sometimes, especially since some mutants seem to have inconsistent health pools and are more annoying to fight than anything else, making fleeing a more viable option if possible especially since mutants rarely drop useful rewards unless they are a target of a quest.

If hostile humans and bloodthirsty mutants weren’t enough, the Zone’s various anomalies will be just as deadly. These anomalies come in a variety of types ranging from standard to highly specific ones that have even been given special names by the residents of the Zone. The player’s scanner will beep to alert when they are near an anomaly and can either avoid it or toss a bolt into it to trigger it early, allowing for safe passage depending on the type. Some anomaly locations have the chance of containing an artifact as well that players can uncover. These artifacts offer a variety of bonuses such as increased resistance to certain elements or damage types or even increased carry weight at the cost of emitting constant radiation that the player will need to drink booze or take pills to eliminate. There are even “arch-artifacts” that contain special powers with no radioactive effects. These artifacts can be equipped like armor and are highly valuable, making them a great source for Coupons if players don’t need them or find one that does more harm than good.

Outside of the aforementioned equipment degradation system, STALKER 2 has a variety of survival mechanics as well. A few of these have been mentioned before, with players bleeding from gunshot wounds of claw marks that slowly degrade their health over time as well as radiation that not only distorts the screen but also increases the amount of damage the player is dealt. Alongside these are hunger, thirst, and even tiredness mechanics though they all feel rather basic. The only notably detrimental one is tiredness of these three, as being sleepy can cause the player to blink or even fade off for a short period of time, leaving them vulnerable to attack. As for hunger and thirst, players will never find themselves running low on these items enough to suffer from them. This leaves these mechanics feeling a bit too simple in nature and makes one wonder why they were there at all at times.

Now it wouldn’t be a STALKER game if it wasn’t chock-full of bugs and while some of these are meaningless and even endearing, such as a mutant body sliding away like it’s on ice or a pair of feet sticking out of the ground because the bandit spawned upside down, some are far more detrimental and still persist even after multiple patches. While some issues have been fixed, such as quest-breaking bugs that wouldn’t properly spawn a proper NPC to interact with or have the NPC impossible to interact with, there still are a number of issues throughout the game that are both annoying, such as permanently locked doors that are meant to be accessible, and also game-breaking. One such bug involves a late-game mission that, when triggered, forces the NPCs to halt in place and never move from their spot, making it impossible to continue the main storyline. The only current way to seemingly get around this bug was to reload a save over an hour prior and somehow manage to make the NPCs interact in a way that they wouldn’t connect with one another and trigger the issue again. There is always some jank to be expected in a game this massive, especially given the eurojank that the STALKER franchise is known for, but these issues run the gambit of being less charming and more frustrating than anything else, once again reinforcing our earlier suggestion to make frequent saves into separate files to avoid a hard progress lock.

Audio & Visuals

It must be said that STALKER 2 is an absolutely gorgeous looking game with its approach to the apocalyptic and decrepit land within the Zone. The dilapidated buildings that players must deal with, the monstrous looking designs of the mutants that players will need to face off against, the unique wonder of some anomalies, and even the tranquil beauty found within this hellish zone are a wonder to behold. There are some texture issues that frequently appear in certain locations and the game does seem to suffer from traversal stuttering when running too quickly between locations, but playing on quality mode does make for a gorgeous looking game. This is especially true with the atmospheric effects, with the sinister lightning storms feeling like they are cracking down, quite literally in some cases, right next to the player nevermind the Emission Storms that will send players scurrying for safety or face horrible death.

The game’s voice work is a bit of a mixed bag and that is mostly thanks to the fact that the English dub, while serviceable, isn’t the best around in any regard, be it Skif’s performance or the many NPCs players encounter. This means that players will want to choose the other voice track, the native Ukrainian language, to get the most out of the game. Not only does it sound more natural and fluid, the voice actors here sound far more emotive and better suited for their roles. The soundtrack features a unique collection of background music that pops up whenever a radio might be nearby featuring  Ukrainian music and other songs, though most of the time players will simply be in silence as they travel the zone, with only their footsteps, geiger counter, and distant gunshots and growls keeping them company.

Overall

STALKER 2: Heart of Chornobyl’s very existence is a triumph in its own right and the fact that GSC not only managed to create such a massive world for players to explore, that is dripping with interesting locations to explore and numerous systems to manage is a feat as well. With an impressive story that takes a bit too long to get going, but once it does features some truly outstanding moments as well as the moment to moment gameplay that often keeps the tension high, and STALKER 2 is a challenging treat that you just don’t see that often these days, especially in this style. Yes, there are bugs galore and janky elements to deal with as well as numerous frustrating elements as well, but it’s the Stalker way to persist through these issues to survive and that happens to be the case here. While the title is certainly in dire need of some extra polish and bug fixes that are happening quite frequently after release already, those ready to dip their toes into the irradiated Zone will find STALKER 2 a satisfyingly enjoyable challenge.

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