Stalker - The Good, The Bad, & The Ukranian

[vazquez595654]

I played about two hours of the game late at night while I was tired. My first impression is that it's boring. And it makes sense for it to be boring because of the big sand box world. Then again I am rather busy, so games have to be extremely good to impress me right now. No major flaws though. If you've got time on your hands I guess this is a good game to waste it on. Not like there's much else. Space Rangers 2 might be fun if you haven't played that yet.

The combat is somewhat unsatisfying, and for being a big part of the game, that kind of sucks. When you kill someone they immediately fall to the ground as if they had super gravity or something. And hitting an opponent doesn't have any kind of effect on them. Some kind of grunting noise or animation to indicate you hit an opponent would be nice. The AI doesn't seem too bad. They run and hide and stuff. Be careful to stay out of your own allies line of sight because they will just shoot and kill you.

The character movement is really Half-Life-ish. You run around at a 100 mph. Not like Deus Ex at all. They should really slow it down some. I had a hard time sneaking (too noisy) even when crawling.

The crosshair is really cheap looking.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

The rain effects look weird on my pc, I wonder if it's a driver issue(I did upgrade my drivers before playing) or a bug in the game.

I had fucked up rain, i went to nzone to see if they had any new beta drivers up, they did and they worked.

Get the equipment Nimble asked you for (the one you saved in the first mission), and keep it, don't give it to him (he will give you an artifact, but it's not worthy as the vests are harder to find).

Fuck

hmmm, i'm enjoying what i've seen, worth the £25 i spent on it.

The bandits are respawning a little too often though.

 

[serch]

I know that there aren't levels and such, but do you have stats like aiming, endurance, strenght...? I can't play things with no stats

 

[JrK]

No stats.

 

[taxacaria]

No stats.

Is there any char generation at all or have we to play with a predesigned char?

 

[JrK]

Predesigned! :D

Seriously, this game hasn't been or is not a RPG and hasn't been designed so. The only 'RPGY' content is inventory management and dialogue with NPC's with some basic choices. Maybe there are some important choices later on but I haven't seen any.

 

[Hazelnut]

Would it be fair to characterize it as a kind of sandbox Half Life with an inventory?

 

[JrK]

Would it be fair to characterize it as a kind of sandbox Half Life with an inventory?

Yup, only I would call it a Half Life 2 with inventory. The environment is sufficiently dystopian for it. Also, I think the graffiks look the same.

Then again, the writing is monumentally better in HL2; from what I've seen, which isn't much.

 

[Hazelnut]

Yeah I meant HL2.

 

[MisterStone]

Would it be fair to characterize it as a kind of sandbox Half Life with an inventory?

Yup, only I would call it a Half Life 2 with inventory. The environment is sufficiently dystopian for it. Also, I think the graffiks look the same.

Then again, the writing is monumentally better in HL2; from what I've seen, which isn't much.

So I guess the next question is... can we expect Fallout 3 to be much different from this?

I imagine that those guttless losers at Bethesda have been waiting for this game to release so they can use public reaction to it to angle more accurately for the largest piece of the market share for FO3. The only question is, what are they going to learn from it?

 

[Amasius]

So I guess the next question is... can we expect Fallout 3 to be much different from this?

Well, there will be stats...

 

[Texas Red]

Poor writing in HL 2? Never played it but from what I read on various forums, it is considered praise worthy by many. Of course since this comes from Gamespot and such, it may very well be true that the writing is poor.

But let me venture a guess. They leave half of the explaination out from HL, right? And thus creating only an illusion of great creativity. Just like Stephen King.

 

[Nicolai]

Hmm, have any of you guys taken out that military outpost that's right next to your starting location? I managed to sneak up on a small patrol and talk them into letting me borrow their assault rifles, but I'm having some trouble talking my way into their little camp.

Edit. Figured it out, all you have to do is to lure them into your startloc. They'll be too busy raping your fellow stalkers to notice that you're taking them out one by one.

 

[Higher Game]

Is this game Starforced like 99% of Soviet games?

 

[Fez]

Securom, from what I've heard. I think it depends on what publisher and area you are in though, it often does. Check which version/publisher your local retailer is stocking to know for sure.

 

[JrK]

Poor writing in HL 2?

I don't know if anyone said this but just to clarify I (tried to) said the opposite. I think HL2's writing is one of what should be the standards of gaming today. It's dialogue's, lore, monologue's and plot/story I've found very attractive and refreshing. There is a certain air of 'being finished' that lacks in many games these days. The feeling I get is that HL2 was made with love and completed with it, smoothing out all rough edges. In the end it's still an FPS yet one that stands out.

 

[User was nabbed fit]

Great game. No RPG, but a few elements here and there. Very entertaining for the tactically-inclined. The AI is brill, and it's pretty rewarding when you start finding better weapons. I just found a modified rifle which is my first firearm that can actually hit shit at distance.
Basically, if you like exploration, then you'll have a good time (I believe).

 

[cutterjohn]

Anyone try online play?

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

So how could I expect this to run on:

Athlon 64 3400+
Geforce 6800GS AGP
1GB Shittibrand DDR(Mario Mix) RAM

 

[Hazelnut]

Better than I could expect on:

Athlon XP 2200+
Geforce 6600GT 128Mb AGP
1Gb eBuyer brand RAM

:D

 

[Starwars]

I'm running the game on:

Athlon 64 3200+
1GB RAM
Radeon X800GTO (overclocked).

It runs really good for me, way better than I expected actually. The graphics settings is quite powerful, with lots of sliders and stuff. The one thing that absolutely killed my system was the dynamic lighting. Turned it off, and now it runs really well.

 

[User was nabbed fit]

The game with dynamic lighting on is completely different (visually). But you need a decent system to run it.

I have (and run everything on max @ 1280x960):
E6300
7800 GTX
1 GB RAM

Works fine except for a few seconds when entering new 'levels', but that's just temporary stutter.

 

[JrK]

Jimbob and Hazelnut: both your pc's will run this game fine, at least on the static lighting setting. I have a AMD Athlon XP 2400+ with 1,5 GB ram and a Geforce 6600 with a good soundcard and I can play the game fine as it is.

 

[KreideBein]

The game with dynamic lighting on is completely different (visually). But you need a decent system to run it.

I have (and run everything on max @ 1280x960):
E6300
7800 GTX
1 GB RAM

Works fine except for a few seconds when entering new 'levels', but that's just temporary stutter.

Are you playing it on the DX9 setting, or the DX8 setting? Also, how much memory does the game typically use?

 

[Claw]

One of the few games I ordered right after the release.
The fact that Play.com offers a really good price helps, of course.

 

[vazquez595654]

After 5 hours of play.

Bore-to-the-R-to-the-ring. This game is boring. I guess people tend to forget that living another life in another world isn't really that much fun. This game is about as fun as Flight Simulator. Go play Rainbow Six Vegas. No, seriously.