having done my first playthrough of SoC in the year 2024 after catching it on steam sale i had a great experience with it, its a good reminder how truly graphics dont matter and artstyle/athmosphere/feeling/lighting can do way more than visuals alone.
All without fancy modern Ray tracing or hdr displays. Playing through anomaly mod last couple years, even tho do update textures a bit, really made that apparent to me, what exactly it was that I fell in love with a long time ago, for a game that barely ran out of the box even.
@ I will be completely honest. It wasn’t for me. I LOVE the story:l/setting but the gameplay was real bad. I switched to Metro exodus (£4) and that scratched the itch better. Some of the people who made stalker worked on metro so those games share similarities, but with great gameplay. On PC I bet stalker is much better than console. But still give it a try, it might be for you
Fantastic review. I loved the weirdness of the game when it first came out on PC so I loved revisiting it on my Series S with the console re-release. Not many games are able to create an atmosphere quite like STALKER did. Really hope the sequel is able to maintain the same feeling. Great video!
Good stuff, have a sub bro :) I'm so surprised to hear about the console ports. It's so cool that more people can experience these games. I'm playing through the trilogy as well, but on pc, and I'm currently finally getting to COP for the first time. The atmosphere is just hard to recreate, it's immersive and addicting. I can't wait for the sequel!
It's the old 3D sound EAX effects that aren't properly reintegrated and enabled in the console releases that cause that lack of depth sadly. Probably for old 3D sound licensing issues or some complications with not having in depth programming controls and perhaps an incompatibility with the consoles' audio processor, or the devs couldn't be bothered to reimplement it.
2:00 After starting it back in the days, I just finished it today on the PS4. And I still didn't know that you can smash open those boxes! Could have helped me in the Monolith level.
Just played this for the first time on PC today, the entire day. Playthrough from start to finish. Had ao many questions about the story and lore. Its actully got an extremly engaging foundation on its lore, factions, motives, etc.. gameplay was great too. Only had one crash on PC, minor bugs that reloads fixed. Nothing game breaking playing it vanilla on windows 11, even on an ultrawide montior (cutscenes and UI will be stretched, but game renders as normal). Im eagar to play the other two and also the new one slated for this year. To be fair though, horror has never been my thing, and i genuinely had the hairs on my arms standing during many underground segments. Kinda hope the other two are more focused on above ground skirmishes, looting, surviving, but i imagine that would be missing a huge part of the forumula people love with STALKER
I had this amazing glitch in clear sky on console where a bloodsucker eating an npc would glitch hard and stretch and warp their bodys horribly like 5-6 foot arms and often sends the bloodsucker to space if they are outside and if they are inside its obscenely loud
It's not a proper playthrough unless the show stopping bugs made you cry!!! That was truly my experience with the original release before any patches. I had a show stopper that made my game crash when leaving Cordon, was weeks if not months later I revisited when it was patched and got to continue
The bridge? :) I translated a German forum back then where someone figured out a fix using the .ini files. Never before in my life had felt so accomplished then finally crossed that threshold and the game didn’t crash 😂 Love these games but to say were ever perfect, belies someone who never played them back then. Except Pripyat, never really had any issues with it. Clear sky either tbh, but always saw that as more tech demo than sequel in any way.
Very good video, thanks man. I want to buy the whole trilogy but I'm still waiting for a PS5 update (I think the devs mentioned they'll do it at some point). The other deterring factor is that it's still quite expensive (on PS Store) for a very old game.
I grabbed the Legends of the Zone bundle during that last PSN sale and I think it was 35 bucks... Around twelve bucks a piece. Better than the unit price of buying them individually but it could sure be cheaper. A mod platform got added in last month but I hadn't seen anything about a "current gen" version.
From what I read Jonathon Nolan, the creator of Chernobyl Diaries, cites Stalker as the inspiration for the film. So Chernobyl Diaries is like Stalker.
I'm honestly slightly surprised they didn't update some of the assets with mods; it would only be fair after they let us play around with the source code for free all these years
I guess I'm the past I'd always played with a mod that replaced the Family Rifle with the CS hunting rifle model. Really threw me off when I picked it up and it was a generic sawnoff this time
i'm currently enjoying SoC on my ps4 and was wondering should i wait to finish the game and THEN watch your review? I will have this saved on my stalker playlist either way, more stalker content is good for everybody
There might be a mod, I'm vaguely remembering you could use console commands to get into a third person view on the pc release. No built in option on the console though
I'm so upset over the console version. I got to the end and CRASH! Started a different saved file....CRASH. Went back and played several missions over again and as soon as I get to the same spot....CRASH. I can't finish the damn game!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll have to purchase it on pc just to see the ending. What was the point of the console version??????
going through the last section on Master is one of the most annoying times ive had with a game, but other than that i loved the game. Theres a certain element of dread this one has over the other two entries, feels a lot more mysterious
The sequels get more polished as shooters, but as the shooting becomes more reliable and they introduce various equipment optimization features, it seems to hurt the atmospheric dread a bit. The unreliability and chaos of the first game is what gives some of those early mutant encounters that extra oomph.
I'm working on a review for an indie rpg right now but I'll probably hit Clear Sky next. I just don't like to play an entire series straight through, it blends together too much
Actually wish they would release this console build on pc but it would have to be free for pc version owners so i quess they see no benefit for giving the fans something for free lol.
Same. It plays better on pc. I'm guessing they'll either release it as a 'remaster' right before 2 comes out, or next year for the 15th anniversary. But it'd be a nice goodwill gesture if they just upgraded the existing pc versions for free.
Dude, nearly noone realised that it was an Ukrainian Game in 2007 cuz of the Russian Language (which is btw still the most spoken Language in Ukraine, besides their Government tries to convince em to not speak it)... And its called Shadow of Chernobyl - they didnt change the Name for the new Editions. They Changed the Name for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2. But tbh - good Review so far. :-)
They did change the spelling for the console re-release to "Shadows of Chornobyl", you can check the listing on either console's store. It's different in the game art and boot screen as well. I assumed to match the modernized/sequel spelling, but if you check the GSC Console version announcement on Steam someone asked why and they explained it as a better transliteration. I'm absolutely not qualified or interested in discussing their reasoning for that, or the nuances of languages and regions other than my own. You're right though, I went to a rural American public school so I probably thought of this game as just "Obviously Not American" in 2007.
@@JotunWarrior ah, i know what i made wrong... i looked for reviews on newspages instead the shop emselfes... i want to apologize for that mistake on my end. 😕 The reason why they did this is obvious from sad events i guess, so there is no need to discuss that. As i said b4: Good Review 👍. Wish they would have brought it also on Nintendo Switch - that have been awesome (Even Metro 2033 is running on it... would have been so cool to relife old times on Switch...)
@@JotunWarriordon’t want escalate this in any way either, but like in rural Canadian school when came out. Yeah, like didn’t know was geographically in ukraine until met someone from there in uni good while later who explained all that to me. When reactor melted down, it was part of the USSR, for sake of a lot of the lore in the game, that’s what matters, not modern geopolitical stuff cos entire game always been a parallel reality where the zone occurs. The army badges in the game though, are most deff Ukrainian armed forces though, but in that reality probably getting support from all sides of geopolitical spectrum; just to keep some out of everyone else’s backyard and the spread of relics beyond official govt study, under control. Barely delved into in the game, but that’s why the mercs are in zone for example, for rich corporations who want to get artifacts to study, turn into commercial products or w/e right. Which iirc, the entire body of the UN is dead set to prevent, hence the military cordon. …thx for coming to my Ted talk 😂
The most polished one. I think CoP is way too easy, artifacts suck to the point where it's only worth it to run weight increase, pretty big areas but not much variety, main story is kinda unsatisfying, if you know stashes they make you mad OP fast hurting replayability at the same time. It's still a great game but it has some strange design choices which make SoC superior in my eyes.
@@sneakyleaky7670This guy knows what's up. Well said. Don't forget that basically every location is designed for a specific quest or event, and once you finish that part, nothing interesting can ever really happen there again because A-Life was gutted.
You're good at this. In fact, this is the best, most informative review of SoC on consoles I could find. Keep it up.
having done my first playthrough of SoC in the year 2024 after catching it on steam sale i had a great experience with it, its a good reminder how truly graphics dont matter and artstyle/athmosphere/feeling/lighting can do way more than visuals alone.
All without fancy modern Ray tracing or hdr displays. Playing through anomaly mod last couple years, even tho do update textures a bit, really made that apparent to me, what exactly it was that I fell in love with a long time ago, for a game that barely ran out of the box even.
but graphics matter, in fact it was game with the best graphics before crysis
@@AIFT_Staff But its not in 2024 when he played for the first time.
This game is a fucking masterpiece, enjoyed it so much
Just bought it on ps5 due to this review. Really well put together video, keep it up!
How's the game so far? Got it recently but I won't play it for a little while because I'm currently playing a game at the moment.
@ I will be completely honest. It wasn’t for me. I LOVE the story:l/setting but the gameplay was real bad. I switched to Metro exodus (£4) and that scratched the itch better. Some of the people who made stalker worked on metro so those games share similarities, but with great gameplay.
On PC I bet stalker is much better than console. But still give it a try, it might be for you
this is a very well written script, i thought i was watching a joseph anderson video.
i want to say more, but i dont know what, very good video.
Thanks! Saying anything at all helps a lot :]
Great review man! Keep it up like this and your subs are sure to rocket. All the best!
Thanks!
Fantastic review. I loved the weirdness of the game when it first came out on PC so I loved revisiting it on my Series S with the console re-release. Not many games are able to create an atmosphere quite like STALKER did. Really hope the sequel is able to maintain the same feeling. Great video!
Really good review man, thought you had thousands of subscribers. Hope you will get there!
Thanks!!
Good video. I beat this game recently and I liked it very much. Can't wait to see your review for Clear Sky.
Glad to hear it! It's probably gonna be a month or so, I'm changing jobs right now so everything's in flux
Good stuff, have a sub bro :)
I'm so surprised to hear about the console ports. It's so cool that more people can experience these games.
I'm playing through the trilogy as well, but on pc, and I'm currently finally getting to COP for the first time. The atmosphere is just hard to recreate, it's immersive and addicting. I can't wait for the sequel!
Thanks!
Just finished it last night. Starting clear sky later. Can’t wait
You played on ps5? How was it? Ive never played a stalker game so was hoping to get into it!
It's the old 3D sound EAX effects that aren't properly reintegrated and enabled in the console releases that cause that lack of depth sadly. Probably for old 3D sound licensing issues or some complications with not having in depth programming controls and perhaps an incompatibility with the consoles' audio processor, or the devs couldn't be bothered to reimplement it.
2:00 After starting it back in the days, I just finished it today on the PS4. And I still didn't know that you can smash open those boxes! Could have helped me in the Monolith level.
My God.....after all of these years (was 13 when SoC released) I had forgotten about Sids door of death :D Yes I remember that one very well now.
Cool review, thanks!
Thanks for watching!
Just played this for the first time on PC today, the entire day. Playthrough from start to finish. Had ao many questions about the story and lore. Its actully got an extremly engaging foundation on its lore, factions, motives, etc.. gameplay was great too. Only had one crash on PC, minor bugs that reloads fixed. Nothing game breaking playing it vanilla on windows 11, even on an ultrawide montior (cutscenes and UI will be stretched, but game renders as normal).
Im eagar to play the other two and also the new one slated for this year. To be fair though, horror has never been my thing, and i genuinely had the hairs on my arms standing during many underground segments. Kinda hope the other two are more focused on above ground skirmishes, looting, surviving, but i imagine that would be missing a huge part of the forumula people love with STALKER
The first time you run into a Snoke is unforgettable!
this is a very good video
I had this amazing glitch in clear sky on console where a bloodsucker eating an npc would glitch hard and stretch and warp their bodys horribly like 5-6 foot arms and often sends the bloodsucker to space if they are outside and if they are inside its obscenely loud
Same happened to me although not 5-6 foot rather 20-25m between the intersection trees and the factory walls. Guess what, the game crashed :D
It's not a proper playthrough unless the show stopping bugs made you cry!!! That was truly my experience with the original release before any patches. I had a show stopper that made my game crash when leaving Cordon, was weeks if not months later I revisited when it was patched and got to continue
The bridge? :)
I translated a German forum back then where someone figured out a fix using the .ini files. Never before in my life had felt so accomplished then finally crossed that threshold and the game didn’t crash 😂
Love these games but to say were ever perfect, belies someone who never played them back then. Except Pripyat, never really had any issues with it. Clear sky either tbh, but always saw that as more tech demo than sequel in any way.
Kinda wild that "scary" game that I was shitting myself as a kid ended up a lot as my favorite game of all time (stalker, L4D, etc)
nice work, sub!
Appreciated!
Have you experienced the audio cutting in and out? Especially in the underground labs… I have this issue on ps4
I don't think i had that issue on ps5, but the game is notorious for random little bugs
@ I’ve noticed it with the whole legends of the zone trilogy, primarily in the underground levels… even with the latest updates
Very good video, thanks man. I want to buy the whole trilogy but I'm still waiting for a PS5 update (I think the devs mentioned they'll do it at some point). The other deterring factor is that it's still quite expensive (on PS Store) for a very old game.
I grabbed the Legends of the Zone bundle during that last PSN sale and I think it was 35 bucks... Around twelve bucks a piece. Better than the unit price of buying them individually but it could sure be cheaper. A mod platform got added in last month but I hadn't seen anything about a "current gen" version.
Is the game similar to that movie Chernobyl Diaries (2012)
From what I read Jonathon Nolan, the creator of Chernobyl Diaries, cites Stalker as the inspiration for the film. So Chernobyl Diaries is like Stalker.
Iconic serie
I'm honestly slightly surprised they didn't update some of the assets with mods; it would only be fair after they let us play around with the source code for free all these years
I guess I'm the past I'd always played with a mod that replaced the Family Rifle with the CS hunting rifle model. Really threw me off when I picked it up and it was a generic sawnoff this time
i wish the pc version had controller support
S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl was a notable gaming experience, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
i'm currently enjoying SoC on my ps4 and was wondering should i wait to finish the game and THEN watch your review? I will have this saved on my stalker playlist either way, more stalker content is good for everybody
If you're playing it already I'd say just finish it, then you can kinda compare notes after :]
@@JotunWarrior sounds good brother
im on ps5 and i just bought it for 4.99 its on sale, is there a 3rd person option because 1st person gives me migraines after 30mins
There might be a mod, I'm vaguely remembering you could use console commands to get into a third person view on the pc release. No built in option on the console though
on PC u should get the collection on GoG, or Anomaly/Gamma mod for free
I'm so upset over the console version. I got to the end and CRASH! Started a different saved file....CRASH. Went back and played several missions over again and as soon as I get to the same spot....CRASH. I can't finish the damn game!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll have to purchase it on pc just to see the ending. What was the point of the console version??????
I always carried too much bread and sausages 😭😂
Would Tarkovsky have played this game?
tarkovsky would only play stardew valley
Whaaat??? Can I play on PC with a controller?
They haven't updated the steam version to be controller compatible. Not yet, at least
going through the last section on Master is one of the most annoying times ive had with a game, but other than that i loved the game. Theres a certain element of dread this one has over the other two entries, feels a lot more mysterious
The sequels get more polished as shooters, but as the shooting becomes more reliable and they introduce various equipment optimization features, it seems to hurt the atmospheric dread a bit. The unreliability and chaos of the first game is what gives some of those early mutant encounters that extra oomph.
Can we expect a dlc review?
What dlc?
Clear Sky PS5 review soon?
I'm working on a review for an indie rpg right now but I'll probably hit Clear Sky next. I just don't like to play an entire series straight through, it blends together too much
call of pripyat!!!!!!!
Actually wish they would release this console build on pc but it would have to be free for pc version owners so i quess they see no benefit for giving the fans something for free lol.
Same. It plays better on pc. I'm guessing they'll either release it as a 'remaster' right before 2 comes out, or next year for the 15th anniversary. But it'd be a nice goodwill gesture if they just upgraded the existing pc versions for free.
@@JotunWarrior Agreed!
I tried to play this game once but I could just not get over how ugly the viewmodels/animations were.
Dude, nearly noone realised that it was an Ukrainian Game in 2007 cuz of the Russian Language (which is btw still the most spoken Language in Ukraine, besides their Government tries to convince em to not speak it)... And its called Shadow of Chernobyl - they didnt change the Name for the new Editions. They Changed the Name for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2.
But tbh - good Review so far. :-)
They did change the spelling for the console re-release to "Shadows of Chornobyl", you can check the listing on either console's store. It's different in the game art and boot screen as well. I assumed to match the modernized/sequel spelling, but if you check the GSC Console version announcement on Steam someone asked why and they explained it as a better transliteration. I'm absolutely not qualified or interested in discussing their reasoning for that, or the nuances of languages and regions other than my own.
You're right though, I went to a rural American public school so I probably thought of this game as just "Obviously Not American" in 2007.
@@JotunWarrior ah, i know what i made wrong... i looked for reviews on newspages instead the shop emselfes... i want to apologize for that mistake on my end. 😕
The reason why they did this is obvious from sad events i guess, so there is no need to discuss that.
As i said b4: Good Review 👍. Wish they would have brought it also on Nintendo Switch - that have been awesome (Even Metro 2033 is running on it... would have been so cool to relife old times on Switch...)
@@JotunWarriordon’t want escalate this in any way either, but like in rural Canadian school when came out. Yeah, like didn’t know was geographically in ukraine until met someone from there in uni good while later who explained all that to me. When reactor melted down, it was part of the USSR, for sake of a lot of the lore in the game, that’s what matters, not modern geopolitical stuff cos entire game always been a parallel reality where the zone occurs. The army badges in the game though, are most deff Ukrainian armed forces though, but in that reality probably getting support from all sides of geopolitical spectrum; just to keep some out of everyone else’s backyard and the spread of relics beyond official govt study, under control. Barely delved into in the game, but that’s why the mercs are in zone for example, for rich corporations who want to get artifacts to study, turn into commercial products or w/e right. Which iirc, the entire body of the UN is dead set to prevent, hence the military cordon.
…thx for coming to my Ted talk 😂
Jesus Christ, did Edward Norton narrate this review? I couldn't move past the voice.
Oh now I hear it LOL
install stalker linux 2404
sudo apt install install install stalker not skalpel
Pretty sure you spelled it wrong. You get an A for effort though!
bruh I was in highschool when this game came out. Get out of here kid.
Congrats?
Call of Pripyat is the best one
I agree, it's got everything that makes STALKER great, let's hope STALKER 2 will take that even further for the series
If memory serves.... yeah it kinda is
The most polished one. I think CoP is way too easy, artifacts suck to the point where it's only worth it to run weight increase, pretty big areas but not much variety, main story is kinda unsatisfying, if you know stashes they make you mad OP fast hurting replayability at the same time. It's still a great game but it has some strange design choices which make SoC superior in my eyes.
@@sneakyleaky7670This guy knows what's up. Well said. Don't forget that basically every location is designed for a specific quest or event, and once you finish that part, nothing interesting can ever really happen there again because A-Life was gutted.
Subjective
S.T.A.L.K.E.R on Console , wtf🤢🤮🤮