@@inertia_dagger no because that would require thinking out gameplay.. and the important thing is to have the thing, to make it seem like a thing.. but it can't actually have consequences or any sort of you know overarching game play or gamification cuz then they'll complain about it and it's better if it's boring or annoying rather than complicated or challenging..or thought out in any way beyond the original prompt because I mean.. I don't really think Bethesda likes thinking about things really at all if their games are any indication.. it really seems like the most thinking they do in game design is how to not think and how to make sure the players don't have to either.. which is probably for the best cuz too many thoughts might end up realizing how dumb their games are.. or how god-awful their dialogue system is and dialogue is LOL or any of the structure outside of running around playing in the worldscape.. it's much much better if you disconnect any sort of thinking process on the actual gameplay factor, that way they can make up the whole thing in their head.. and write blogs and stuff cuz I probably should stop at this point
This is the manifestation of the perfect platonic ideal of all UA-cam content. Its glory will be forever immortalized in textbooks and statues for future generations. This UA-cam content will be seen as an enduring symbol of an untouchable height all UA-cam content creators futilely strive for. It will one day be mistaken as something only existing in myth. Thanks for the plug.
I appreciate the sheer verbosity of what you typed here, and how it's in service to saying nice things about someone I also like - but what the fuck does "The perfect platonic ideal of all UA-cam content" actually mean? You like Grimbutt's stuff, but as just friends? Did you just friendzone his videos?
People always talk about Bethesda fans having to fix games, they don't have shit on STALKER modders. Easily one of the best and most dedicated fanbases out there.
Maybe it's because Stalker was made by a small studio while Bethesda won game of the year for every single game they made after Morrowind (except FO76) and are still re-releasing new Skyrim editions 10 years later that have extremely-common, extremely-well-known bugs not only from the original release but also from 20-year-old Morrowind since they run on the same engine?! You are comparing apples to oranges so hard here. Stalker sold 2 million copies while Bethesda is worth 3 billion dollars. It's ludicrous that one of the richest companies in game can't fix bugs in their game releases for 20 years, knowing that the community will do it for them, free-of-charge instead. And somehow, even being made by a company many times smaller than Bethesda, Stalker turned out infinitely more stable, polished and bug-free than Fallout 76.
Exactly I just noticed that and posted a comment , the production quality is so high that I sometimes forget it's still a small channel . Love the guy wish he gets more appreciation .
2:40 "Beautifully rendering a sickly, old, dying world full of cruel people eager to make it even worse if it means more money." G-good thing this is just a video game and not real life, h-haha... hah...
Iirc in soc, Nimble, a surviving member of clear sky, makes mention of the faction and how it was wiped out. The faction isnt talked much about in the series, primarily since it was kind of secretive and not many stalkers knew about it.
R.I.P. Volodymyr Yezhov. Developer behind S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky, was killed defending the city of Bakhmut in Ukraine's Donetsk region on December 22/22.
I still don't understand how you have less than 50k subscribers , UA-cam never recommends great channels like yours , if it wasn't for a random commenter recommending you like a year or 2 ago I wouldn't be here enjoying your content , the comment was in the replies of mandalore video about pathologic, i still remember that rainy day like it was yesterday , spent the entire night watching your old videos and wondering why you have the voice of an adolescent lol, anyway, love your videos , wish I could donate but I have no job lmao .
I did get here through a yt rec. But the backlog is all pretty high quality and stuff I would had watched 6 years ago when it came out. The videos have good views, comments, interaction, etc. Add that people like me saw a video and then made this a standard background noise channel after watching everything. I have no clue what the deal is.
The weakest of very strong franchise.. nowadays I usually just play the fan-made version where all maps from all 3 games are merged into one game. Many bugs fixed - Chernobyl storyline with fixed factions.. just glorious. Might very well be my fave 1st person game of all.
Been thru it, while you wait maybe go get some Kratom, the red bali works like painkillers. Hope this helps. (Be careful not to take too much as it can hit hard with some people.)
Hope ya feel better soon, those suuuck. I get them far too often so I'd recommend keeping a pair of pliers nearby at all times. (Seriously tho, wish ya well!)
@@kanetombs1275 No shit?! I thought that whole Kratom thing was exaggerated in how effective it is. Red Bali, you say? I'll have to look into that! Local head shop, perhaps?
Ranking my favorite Stalkers: 5. That guy in the van that's following me 4. The secret Government Agency that spies on me 3. My third grade gym teacher 2. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky 1. You
OR, maybe not one we deserve nor one that we need, but a hero nonetheless! Arguably, as I dunno how many heroes confess to burning bodies..... Cleanliness is next to godliness, though, so I'd score that in his favor.
@@johnnybensonitis7853 I think you raise a valid point. That perhaps it is selfish of us to appraise such magnificent specimens by our own relation to them.
Don't know why I've played (and finished it) more times than ShoC (ususally drop after reaching Pripayt, don't want to deal with Monolith and endless corridors in Power Plant filled with hi-tech 1shot-kill aimbots) or CoP, which was too chillout.
Another great review Grim! I have a suggestion, how about a review of “Shadowman” and “Omikron: the nomad soul” Both games are on steam. I think it would be awsome to know your thoughts on these games. Peace Everyone, Stay safe!
My favorite STALKER game is Stalker Anomaly, fixes most every issue i ever had with the game and gives me the freedom i always wanted with added depth.
The enemies hit like a truck though, also the anomalies are extremely annoying because of you much more of them there are, I and up quicksaving even more than in vanilla Stalker, that autumn mod on master difficulty so far is my favorite mod in how I like to experience the game, also. The anomaly devs seemed to have borked the AI even more, enemies spot you from like 400 meters away
Definitely my favourite game in the series! I found it far less tedious and more atmospheric than SoC, and more engaging than CoP. Only thing I hate are the grenade snipers.
You know what they really should have done with the story in this game? Make it so at the end, you find out that actually YOU have been Strelok hunting Strelok all along AGAIN. My mind is blown just thinking about it!
SoC is my favorite followed by CoP. I couldn't finish Clear Sky it just didn't hold an appeal to me and so many mechanic / direction changes they went with turned me off. That being said, keep up the great content! Your channel will absolutely blow up. Keep putting in work and being patient. You make high quality unique content. I look forward to each upload. You'll make it big on youtube if you keep this up
Loving these longer videos, appreciating how much work goes in to them, and the quality is there throughout. And yes, you should do more Supernatural videos.
Man, from what I heard about your high ups and expectations of the game, you should try out S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Oblivion Lost Remake, mod-recreation of the project from 2002-2003 - conceptually and atmosphericly very far from what was made in the end. And WAY far from Clear Sky (of course it is kinda raw and rough around the edges since they patching whole game up from the builds and leaked disdocs) Still, for me, it is the closest form to what S.T.A.L.K.E.R. meant to be - a dreadful and haunted open-world survival-horror. *You can find last version on moddb, or you can wait for the final version 3.0, that should come out this year. **The trailer, if somebody interested: ua-cam.com/video/RRr-UUpnPaM/v-deo.html ***21.06.21 Actually, finished all main early concept-mods of a game, I ended up liking "Vector of Alienation" the most - it's an addon for Oblivion Lost, which carefully improoves it overall - visual design and gorgeous lightmaps, cutting out unpolished features and side content and, most importantly, finally brings a kinda decent writing into the game that able to match it's atmosphere. It's standalone, translated, included pack of custom tweaks for preference, and download-install-play version is ready on moddb, what's more to want? So again - "Vector of Alienation" > OG OLR, just how it is.
Here's a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. music video I made some years ago-go that you might dig: ua-cam.com/video/0AvFh4Hci5Y/v-deo.html The song is 'His Eyes' by Pseudo Echo (heh, "psuedo"), the theme song to 'Friday the 13th: A New Beginning'. Btw, did you apply those principles I discussed in my "training simulator" video? They're applicable to Clear Sky, but to a lesser degree. I was immediately disgusted with Clear Sky when I found out that you can't aim pistols or grenade launchers. Or rather, you can aim some launchers but not others. And the ones you can't aim are the ones I like most (the modular kind that mount on rifles). And why is the LR-300 so inaccurate? 5.56 fired out of that barrel length will hit its mark just fine within average combat distances, yet in Clear Sky, it scatters all over the place out past average room-length distances! Within that same distance, a 12-gauge shotgun with a cylinder-bore barrel (of practically any length ranging between 10 to 20") will deliver fist-size patterns using any kind of shot. What do we get instead, even with the TOZ-34 "Grandfather's Gun?" Hollywood-style shotgun patterns! It's insulting! Also, they got through three whole games without ever figuring out how peep sights work. The LR-300's sights (which, as you might recall, I discussed in my "training simulator" video since they were revamped in Oblivion Lost by OLP team way back in 2008) are wonky all throughout the entire 'nilla series! You're supposed to aim *through* the peep, not *over* it! Judging by what we've seen in "(No) Escape from Tarkov(sky)," S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 probably won't have any of that old familiar weapon-related incompetence. But I've never understood how or why that was ever the status quo to begin with! That sort of thing is tolerable in a game like Halo (like unnecessary gun cocking and whatnot), but it never belonged in a sophisticated game series like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (and it still doesn't). Oh, but Tarkov doesn't get a pass either since it lacks proper chamber-loading with the mighty KS-23 (a gun that would be more useful in the Zone than in Tarkov since it would be ideal for monster hunters who specialize in hunting "big game"). It should hold three 23x75mm rounds in the tube, plus one in the chamber. The Anomaly mod has, from what I've seen, two variants of the KS-23: the standard model and the short-barrel "M" model. And I think they hold the correct four rounds, but the "M" model has a stockless pistol grip for no reason. Who would ever want to fire a stockless 23mm monster gun?! It would jump out yer hands, yo! Paranoia 2 screws up its KS-23 by limiting its capacity to three rounds for no reason. Plus, in that game, it's pathetically weak compared to what it is in real life which is a horrifying mutilation machine (thus making it perfect for Zone use despite its limited capacity). It has a rifled bore and is therefore classified as a "carbine," though we Western spies might call it a "slug gun." Having a rifled bore means shot patterns will be looser than they otherwise would be due to rotation being imparted onto the wad and the shot pellets contained within it, but it also means improved accuracy and effective range with slugs (which are typically used to disable vehicles by destroying the engine block to death). *Edit/Note:* Legend has it that Scar went on to become the Monolith commander known as Charon, named after the ferryman of the river Styx, who you fight in Pripyat toward the end of ShoC. Given your penchant for the esoteric, I figured you'd dig that fun fact.
That sea consciousness thing reminds me of You are Empty. I highly recommend you give it a shot if you like that oppressive Eastern European atmosphere. It's janky as heck and it's weird looking but it has its own charm.
Agreed, I found it surprisingly atmospheric. The shooting was fine too and the enemies are nice satirical communist stereotypes (apparently). Also, some of the best cutscenes I have ever seen in any game!
The atmosphere in that game is pretty nice, but the shooting is a bit hit or miss. Some sections are actually kinda decent, others are a bit lame. It's definitely not a bad game.
Man, that turret around the beginning of Clear Sky... I was a SoC veteran, was super stoked on Clear Sky, and after beating my head against that turret for a while, I didn't touch Clear Sky for a long time.
If Sky Reclamation is installed, you will see it in the bottom left corner of the main menu. It says 1.5.10 Sky Reclamation project or something like that. It also has addons that can modify more of the game. Clear Sky knows that emissions will keep on happening even without human interference, however they will be much rarer and not as powerful. That is why they want to stop Strelok. They dont want the Zone's emissions to spill out past the outer perimeter and into Ukraine and Belarus or the rest of Europe. The interesting thing is that the RU community did care a bit for the exact questions about Strelok's previous journeys. And they are the biggest Stalker fanbase. That the game did not really do it justice in terms of the story is ... another problem entirely. I overall rate Clear Sky above average for video game stories since while the plot itself is meh, the secondary writing and factions are generally quite a bit above average. Its worse than SoC and cannot compare overall to actual heavyhitters in video games like SOMA or Pathologic 2 or PlaneScape Torment, but its above average. Just... somewhat pointless for most SoC players ironically. If someone hasnt played SoC though, it would immerse them fully since its all new to them. I know from experience, I used Clear Sky with SRP and my own balancing on top to get my friends into the series. The Faction Wars is a good concept and sometimes it works. The SRP mod makes it work most of the time (but alas, not all of the time). The problem is that it is one of those game systems that needs actual level design either to be built to accomodate for it OR have a lot of space for flanking maneuvers and protracted frontline engagements. The Great Swamps is closest to that in Clear Sky, hence why the system works OK there. But even it is too small. Other maps are just too small and are basically turned into corridors and chokepoints. Now I like me some chokepoints and corridors from time to time, but not 90% of the battlefield to be that. That is why the system fails in Clear Sky. It never had a chance to work. In the options menu you have a key that orders the closest squad next to you to attack. That is what they await. Or to shoot the enemy. That works too. I never had a problem with the machinegun, but I always had the Swamps fully explored and had the High-End Clear Sky battlearmour (15 000 Rubles) with upgrades by the time I went to Cordon. So the machinegun while dangerous, wasnt that dangerous to me. You can disable Iron Sights Depth of Field from the graphics menu. Veteran and Expert stalkers often drop upgraded guns. For example Duty Experts drop upgraded AN-94 Abakans and those do make money, but you are correct. GSC nerfed weapons prices and quality to make players choose a weapon and stick to it, upgrading it. It was to make the faction wars and artifact hunts feed into the progression loop more directly. NPC dialogue did improve, but mostly for normal NPCs. In Shadow of Chernobyl, you can ask 1 question to a random NPC. It was "Anything new in the Zone" or something like that. In Clear Sky you can have more of a dialogue with the random NPCs and some of their dialogue even foreshadows or acknowledges things you will do / have done in the area. It is not enough, IMHO, but it is a step up. There are several mutants in the Red Forest (and Swamps) and some enemies / neutrals in the game that arent marked on the map. But they are very few. I can understand seeing friendlies on the map. I can kinda understand neutrals too. But enemy soldiers? Mutants? Stupid decision for sure. Mods can fix this, there is an addon in Clear Sky Reclamation that does that. The Dynamic music can be disabled thankfully. Funy thing is, I believe that if Clear Sky is your first STALKER game, it may be your favourite game in the series, warts and all. I personally come from SoC and... like Clear sky. But it is even more flawed than SoC. Anyways, my STALKER game rank: NLC 7 > OGSR > SoC > Clear Sky > Call of Pripyat.
Hey Grimbeard. Thank you for your brilliant reviews! I've been a huge S.T.A.L.K.E.R. fan since years before Shadow of Chernobyl even came out. I've spent literally thousands of hours in each game in the series, both vanilla and modded. Hell, I even went to the S.T.A.L.K.E.R.-fest convention back in 2009, listened to Grigorovitch's Sweet Dreams, and got a free jewel-case copy of Call of Pripyat for wearing an M-65 jacket with blue jeans and heavy boots! Still love each of the vanilla games and can't say which one is the best. Each has things it does better than the rest, and each has things it does worse. Shadow of Chernobyl. It has the best atmosphere of despair and loneliness. Even today, it combines its sound and visual design so good it hardly can be matched by modern horror games. The Yantar section is in my heart forever. It also the only game in the series where you can take the story seriously, although it's evident the narrative in the game is very undercooked and has a lot of holes due to the troubled development cycle. SoC's game design, on the other hand, didn't age well. A lot of systems like artifacts, dialogs, economy, equipment management, factions, stealth are either work bad or don't work at all. The AI is pretty good and the gunplay works, but it the shooting felt a little archaic even when the game came out. Clear Sky. The most beautiful game of the three. Has a less dark atmosphere than SoC, its weather and lighting effects and great art design of the new levels give you the most artistically satisfying presentation of the Zone. Swamps, Red Forest, and Limansk look excellent even today. It's also the only game in the series that has an actual working economy and a lot of really satisfying gunplay. There are not many things in existence better than the feeling you have when carrying out a solo assault on the construction site in Limansk with your suit maxed out and stuffed with rare artifacts, and your AK-74 fully upgraded for close combat. On the other hand, the game is broken in many places. While the severe bugs were fixed, the faction war isn't working as it probably should have, the story is a graphomaniac mess, a lot of content was cut out, and the final level is laughably broken and afwully designed. By the way, originally it was intended that to get from the hospital to the power plant, the player had to go through the massive Pripyat Underground. But that level wasn't finished and appeared only in the next game. You can still hear it being mentioned by Lebedyev at the end of the hospital level. Call of Pripyat. This game is the only one in the series that actually has a coherent, modern game design and world structure. This game is much smaller in scope, but it miles deeper than the previous two. The main story is stupid and almost non-existent, but there are dozens of hand-crafted side-quests which can be finished in various ways and a lot of unique and comparatively interesting characters you interact with. You even gather a party of misfits to go through a big mission with you! What's the best about it all, is that the outcome of almost every your decision throughout the game will be mentioned in the ending montage which is the most satisfying ending montage I ever saw in games: the slides, the music, and the outcomes themselves work just great. Visually, CoP is the least appealing of the three. The game has three really large locations instead of a dozen small ones, so the developers had to cut down on density and detail on those locations to make them work stable on their old engine. The atmosphere is still thick as hell, but the environment feels more artificial than in SoC and Clear Sky. While the overall game design is improved, and all its systems work pretty well, being pierced together by interesting quests, the game feels a little empty. There are not many enemies to shoot, so there's a little motivation to find and upgrade unique weapons, there are many places to explore, but you find mostly supplies you don't need very much, there's no lore or narrative outside quests, and the final section of the game, Pripyat, the city from the title, your final destination, is excruciatingly empty for content. It has only few quests and the game ends pretty clunkily since there's no corridor-shooter level where you'd be given a chance to make use of all the equipment you had been upgrading for the whole game. TL, DR: These games are brilliant but each of them is so flawed and full of missed opportunities and unrealized potential but I can't express enough how I love these great games. Guess, I'll go and replay the vanilla Clear Sky now!
Despite being janky, the Stalker series remains in my all-time favorites and I've replayed them three or four times over the years. The atmosphere is top-notch, the graphics still hold up today, and (at the time of release) these games were quite unlike anything else. Also I'm a sucker for fps-rpgs, open worlds, gritty Soviet aesthetics, urban exploration, horror, Chernobyl's exclusion zone, and combloc weapons. The whole concept may as well have been made precisely to appeal to me, so it'd have to be pretty horrible for me to dislike it. Regardless I maintain these games are classics that anyone with interest in any of that stuff should play; as long as you're not a hardcore CoD or other arcade shooter fan, because these tend to be pretty realistic* in their weapon behavior, and brutally difficult in general. Not as scary as Shadow, but had it's moments and the gameplay and world was overall improved. Also gonna take the opportunity to say that Roadside Picnic, the short novel these games are (loosely) based on, is good stuff and worth reading. *Aside from the shitty, ridiculous degradation system that has the guns constantly jamming and becoming inaccurate after a hundred rounds or so. I'll accept it for the AR/M16 based rifle (lol) but almost all the weapons are Russian and _specifically known worldwide for their reliability_ over tens of thousands of rounds despite abuse and lack of maintenance ... Ugh. Gun nerd rant over.
I found you about 3 days ago and I've been blowing through your content since. How the fuck are you not at 100k or higher? The skits you've got in between footage are great. Parapug and Chad are definitely top notch.
I write this comment before watching your video, just to give my unreflected perspective. Clear Sky gave me some of the best and worst memories playing a game ever. And I absolutely love it. The faction wars are utterly broken and basically pure luck and there are plenty of bugs beyond that, but there's so much to explore, the game is dripping with atmosphere and it's the start of the improved RPG elements I love Call of Pripyat for. You need quite a bit of resistance to frustration to enjoy this game, but you'll be rewarded with amazing gameplay and exploration. The last push of this game is so much better than in the first game, too! Well, except for the very end, the "boss fight" if you will. But before that, going through a city, pushing through the abandoned hospital etc. is just amazing. I still rank this game as the lowest of the three, but I think my gushing makes it very clear that's still awesome.
Hey Grim, how you doing? Having just developed a crippling addiction to STALKER Anomaly over the last couple of weeks, you can't imagine how happy I am to see you talk about this game series 😄
Frickin frick yeah! You could have told me that you're ubexing in my neighborhood. I could have brought some vodka (I guess pálinka instead) and semechki to chill by the trash fire and play some guitar reminiscing about all that could have been if the disaster didn't happen. Jokes aside, absolutely great video my dood. I think your assessment on this game is really damn accurate. I wasn't aware that there are many people holding this one to such a high regard. For me it was always the most mixed bag of a game in the series but it still has that slavjank-charming quality and atmosphere that makes up for all its shortcomings! Can't wait to see what's your take on Pripyat, Mr. Gopnik Gothman... Gothnik?
The only guy who's content you can binge watch and see a negligible difference in quality throughout the years, the only long form reviewer who's reviews I dont watch while falling asleep, because they are so chock full of great writing and editing I actually insist upon paying full attention for the entire video. Keep up the great work.
After Pripyat, play Anomaly. It even has 1 woman in it. And after community feedback, they made the dialogue with her less thirsty, which is probably the most equity this franchise is going to get without a torrent of manbabies crying about it.
I think this game may actually be my favorite in the series. I prefer the atmosphere of this game to that in SoC. the swamp area is unbelievably gorgeous in the morning, those volumetric sunrays coming through the torn up roof… ah, simply beautiful. I also appreciate the weapon repair and upgrading system, I think it's an addition that was sorely needed. the expanded faction system really fleshes out the character of the Zone, and I don't mind the endless shootouts - in fact, it was the highlight of my experience with this game (the new dynamic combat music helps these encounters feel more lively). artifact hunting (as well as artifacts themselves) is also much better in Clear Sky than in SoC.
Great video, and very accurate in my opinion. I just played CS on time I think, but I always go back to SoC and CoP. But the Zone is still beautiful in this game! Will you do CoP next? Cheers!
Grim you really need to review stalker anomaly, a standalone mod that encompasses all 3 games with a hell of lot of more content, fixes and new stories where you can play as any faction you choose. AND IT'S FREE
You want a tier list? okay: Roadside Picnic>Stalker SoC>Metro2033>Stalker The Movie>Metro Exodus>Stalker CoP>Metro Last Light>Stalker Clear Sky>Stalker CoC>Chernobyl HBO Series>that one wacky Stalker Soc mod>Metro remastered (kinda sucked the originals are better)>the machine gun from clear sky that shoots you when you enter Cordon i mean who thought that was a good idea?>that slavic stalker inspired MMO that i got from a sale for 50 cents and only played 30 minutes>whatever i forgot.
Lots of good points. I appreciate that alternative exit from the Great Swamps being mentioned. :D That's by the way one aspect of Clear Sky that is underappreciated: The different transition points for the maps. At times they add some character to the maps. Same goes for the different anomaly setup, though the latter is clearly something transitional when looking at Call of Pripyat. Even so, I very much appreciate Clear Sky basically being this remix of SoC in terms of environments. The maps are too lively (except for the lacking number of mutants) and people are too loud and too english (SoC uses more Russian), but even so. I especially like the Great Swamps which seem way too big and without much unique content, but that's why I like them. It's kind of an wide open space in which the player can get lost in and enjoy the atmosphere - at least once the faction war is over. It's also worth mentioning that one reason why the A-Life in SoC is so good is the attention to detail and the way the AI is forced to replenish their losses by walking back to where they belong by crossing through parts of the maps. It creates relatively natural, dynamic encounters, but only when the player is around. This way the actual reinforcement process doesn't get impeded. CS doesn't really have this subtlety. It's very much macro vs micro here. Too many men. Also, props for pointing out how anomalies are handled differently in CS. The funny thing about this system is that - as opposed to the faction system - it's not really integrated into the game. As far as I can tell, there is no reason to actually mess around with anomalies or artifacts. I did on my last playthrough and as it turns out artifacts are mostly needed as protection to be able to explore other anomalies :D Still, they started introducing the unique anomalies that made up the majority of them in CoP, so aside from anomalies being more deadly and artifacts being properly integrated into them, that's also a good thing.
You deserve a million subscribers. its sad that some idiot can blow up eating random food and complaining and then seeing all the work you put into your content and go under the radar, even with the mass of video game essays and such. I really wish you the best, it would have been cool to go through primary school with you.
Sadly i can understand only about 85% of what r you saying (i'm russian) but I still enjoy your videos! You've found your thing, i can see you're so into it, cool.
You don't understand... It's not slav magic, the game itself is an artefakt from the Zone. It makes a little Zone around you every time you boot it up, and the jank is just the part of it. It's how your pc reacts to the Zone.
Such a gem of a channel and it's criminal how you're not over 500k+ subs, your blend of humor, pacing, scripting and overall presentation of your videos are always so intriguing and enjoyable. Keep up the amazing work Grim, stellar work !
IIRC the first stalker had some really weird balancing in anything but the hardest difficulty leading to the gunplay being worse on lower difficulties.
I have to agree with not enough memable dialogue. Glad GSC came to their senses when they made Call of Pripyat and hired nothing but the best voice actors that canned food and stale loaves of bread can buy.
If Sky Reclamation is installed, you will see it in the bottom left corner of the main menu. It says 1.5.10 Sky Reclamation project or something like that. It also has addons that can modify more of the game. Clear Sky knows that emissions will keep on happening even without human interference, however they will be much rarer and not as powerful. That is why they want to stop Strelok. They dont want the Zone's emissions to spill out past the outer perimeter and into Ukraine and Belarus or the rest of Europe. The interesting thing is that the RU community did care a bit for the exact questions about Strelok's previous journeys. And they are the biggest Stalker fanbase. That the game did not really do it justice in terms of the story is ... another problem entirely. I overall rate Clear Sky above average for video game stories since while the plot itself is meh, the secondary writing and factions are generally quite a bit above average. Its worse than SoC and cannot compare overall to actual heavyhitters in video games like SOMA or Pathologic 2 or PlaneScape Torment, but its above average. Just... somewhat pointless for most SoC players ironically. If someone hasnt played SoC though, it would immerse them fully since its all new to them. I know from experience, I used Clear Sky with SRP and my own balancing on top to get my friends into the series. The Faction Wars is a good concept and sometimes it works. The SRP mod makes it work most of the time (but alas, not all of the time). The problem is that it is one of those game systems that needs actual level design either to be built to accomodate for it OR have a lot of space for flanking maneuvers and protracted frontline engagements. The Great Swamps is closest to that in Clear Sky, hence why the system works OK there. But even it is too small. Other maps are just too small and are basically turned into corridors and chokepoints. Now I like me some chokepoints and corridors from time to time, but not 90% of the battlefield to be that. That is why the system fails in Clear Sky. It never had a chance to work. In the options menu you have a key that orders the closest squad next to you to attack. That is what they await. Or to shoot the enemy. That works too. I never had a problem with the machinegun, but I always had the Swamps fully explored and had the High-End Clear Sky battlearmour (15 000 Rubles) with upgrades by the time I went to Cordon. So the machinegun while dangerous, wasnt that dangerous to me. You can disable Iron Sights Depth of Field from the graphics menu. Veteran and Expert stalkers often drop upgraded guns. For example Duty Experts drop upgraded AN-94 Abakans and those do make money, but you are correct. GSC nerfed weapons prices and quality to make players choose a weapon and stick to it, upgrading it. It was to make the faction wars and artifact hunts feed into the progression loop more directly. NPC dialogue did improve, but mostly for normal NPCs. In Shadow of Chernobyl, you can ask 1 question to a random NPC. It was "Anything new in the Zone" or something like that. In Clear Sky you can have more of a dialogue with the random NPCs and some of their dialogue even foreshadows or acknowledges things you will do / have done in the area. It is not enough, IMHO, but it is a step up. There are several mutants in the Red Forest (and Swamps) and some enemies / neutrals in the game that arent marked on the map. But they are very few. I can understand seeing friendlies on the map. I can kinda understand neutrals too. But enemy soldiers? Mutants? Stupid decision for sure. Mods can fix this, there is an addon in Clear Sky Reclamation that does that. The Dynamic music can be disabled thankfully. Funy thing is, I believe that if Clear Sky is your first STALKER game, it may be your favourite game in the series, warts and all. I personally come from SoC and... like Clear sky. But it is even more flawed than SoC. Anyways, my STALKER game rank: NLC 7 > OGSR > SoC > Clear Sky > Call of Pripyat.
I bought the first Stalker when it came out, when I was still in high school. I loved it even without any patches. I distinctly remember though not really having any interest at all when Clear Sky was announced. I was suspicious that it was coming out so quickly after Shadow of Chernobyl.
The way you only remove ONE of the two shells from a double barrelled shotgun when you reload after only shooting once is both a great touch and a source of incredible anxiety. I mean, what if I picked the wrong one in the heat of shootyshoots?
I love how a major update to Sky Reclamation Project was released not long after this video. May have improved your experience on the 'systems actually working' side a little bit. I have been thinking about doing a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. marathon and unfortunately Clear Sky doesn't seem worth revisiting in that catalogue.
I'm enjoying the trend of discussing the one thing, but in terms of something that was similar, yet slightly better. Here we're learning about Stalker, but in the context of a different, and superior Stalker. And in Supernatural, we learn about that show, but also how it compares to XFiles, which is similar, yet better. Its like we're getting a review and a half.
After you finish the next expansion you HAVE to do some kinda mod showcase/review cause some of the complete overhaul mods for Call of Pripyat are legit, aeons better than COP and CS. The only STALKERs I play regularly are SOC and the COC mod
I'm so glad you made this, because I was not going to play it but did play SoC a good bit and Pripyat way more. As well as an unhealthy amount of Anomaly. Of the original 3, I give it to Pripyat for game play, SoC for atmosphere and of course I play Anomaly for both at once. And of course I come here for our shared taste in games and television series filmed in Canada, if anything I want more darkened streams down the road on maybe Lost or Twin Peaks.
Grimbeard, I'm a big fan and I just wanted to say
THEY'RE KILLING OUR GUYS, WHERE ARE YOU?!
At least its not "Another settlement need your help".
@@jepeman at least when it comes to settlements you don't have to run right there and then to save it
Get out of here stalker
@@inertia_dagger no because that would require thinking out gameplay.. and the important thing is to have the thing, to make it seem like a thing.. but it can't actually have consequences or any sort of you know overarching game play or gamification cuz then they'll complain about it and it's better if it's boring or annoying rather than complicated or challenging..or thought out in any way beyond the original prompt because I mean.. I don't really think Bethesda likes thinking about things really at all if their games are any indication.. it really seems like the most thinking they do in game design is how to not think and how to make sure the players don't have to either.. which is probably for the best cuz too many thoughts might end up realizing how dumb their games are.. or how god-awful their dialogue system is and dialogue is LOL or any of the structure outside of running around playing in the worldscape.. it's much much better if you disconnect any sort of thinking process on the actual gameplay factor, that way they can make up the whole thing in their head.. and write blogs and stuff cuz
I probably should stop at this point
This is the manifestation of the perfect platonic ideal of all UA-cam content. Its glory will be forever immortalized in textbooks and statues for future generations. This UA-cam content will be seen as an enduring symbol of an untouchable height all UA-cam content creators futilely strive for. It will one day be mistaken as something only existing in myth. Thanks for the plug.
You could say it's *exclusive* content
I appreciate the sheer verbosity of what you typed here, and how it's in service to saying nice things about someone I also like - but what the fuck does "The perfect platonic ideal of all UA-cam content" actually mean? You like Grimbutt's stuff, but as just friends? Did you just friendzone his videos?
@@brandonp3455 turts is referring to it as the neutral ideal. The Apex Predator of UA-cam content, so to speak.
I was gonna explain about Platonic solids and stuff, then I realised I couldn't be bothered.
@@aaronmarko Didn't expect a sufficient explanation, but glad to receive one all the same.
Is this some sort of Supernatural spinoff? I'm confused by the lack of Supernatural content.
gAmE iS gOoD?
@@adamwest8711 *Gayme - iz - good*
Sammy, there's been a monster sighting in Chernobyl. Pack your bags, we're going to Ukraine!
As a russian, your "Граната!" was amazing. Hats off
There's always Russians in videos about stalker, it's like you guys get a notification anytime someone mentions it lmao
@@rabbischlomobengoldbergstein I'm here entirely for Grimbeard :D
@@rabbischlomobengoldbergstein that name tho
@@BlackWolf9988 Cool it with the anti semitic remarks
@@JannyBesmircher early life section on wikipedia
People always talk about Bethesda fans having to fix games, they don't have shit on STALKER modders. Easily one of the best and most dedicated fanbases out there.
False, you have it switched around there.
Stalker and star war empire at war, both still modding and updating so many years later
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Anomaly is my jam!
Maybe it's because Stalker was made by a small studio while Bethesda won game of the year for every single game they made after Morrowind (except FO76) and are still re-releasing new Skyrim editions 10 years later that have extremely-common, extremely-well-known bugs not only from the original release but also from 20-year-old Morrowind since they run on the same engine?!
You are comparing apples to oranges so hard here. Stalker sold 2 million copies while Bethesda is worth 3 billion dollars. It's ludicrous that one of the richest companies in game can't fix bugs in their game releases for 20 years, knowing that the community will do it for them, free-of-charge instead.
And somehow, even being made by a company many times smaller than Bethesda, Stalker turned out infinitely more stable, polished and bug-free than Fallout 76.
yeah they just made a whole new game
Civvie11: SlavJank
Grim Beard: Slavic Magic
Always incredibly happy to see your work!!!!
Same
I think the thing in my life that is keeping me from being truly happy is that grimbeard STILL has only 32k subs. Like how is that possible?
Exactly I just noticed that and posted a comment , the production quality is so high that I sometimes forget it's still a small channel .
Love the guy wish he gets more appreciation .
We have to gatekeep this channel, just a little longer...
@@Looneyboy 67k now. He is growing exponentially.
@@SentientDMT actually 68k
73.3k baby!
The funny thing is, even when he "only" had like 20k, there were still multiple verified channels in his comments!
Can't wait for the Call of Pripyat review
Same.
Still waiting.
There are dozens of us!
2:40 "Beautifully rendering a sickly, old, dying world full of cruel people eager to make it even worse if it means more money."
G-good thing this is just a video game and not real life, h-haha... hah...
Iirc in soc, Nimble, a surviving member of clear sky, makes mention of the faction and how it was wiped out. The faction isnt talked much about in the series, primarily since it was kind of secretive and not many stalkers knew about it.
And also it triggered a massive blowout that killed a lot of non-CS stalkers, so maybe other factions are a lil bitter
R.I.P. Volodymyr Yezhov. Developer behind S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky, was killed defending the city of Bakhmut in Ukraine's Donetsk region on December 22/22.
I still don't understand how you have less than 50k subscribers , UA-cam never recommends great channels like yours , if it wasn't for a random commenter recommending you like a year or 2 ago I wouldn't be here enjoying your content , the comment was in the replies of mandalore video about pathologic, i still remember that rainy day like it was yesterday , spent the entire night watching your old videos and wondering why you have the voice of an adolescent lol, anyway, love your videos , wish I could donate but I have no job lmao .
I did get here through a yt rec. But the backlog is all pretty high quality and stuff I would had watched 6 years ago when it came out. The videos have good views, comments, interaction, etc. Add that people like me saw a video and then made this a standard background noise channel after watching everything. I have no clue what the deal is.
hi im from the future in 2024 he will have 131,000 subscribers
I just grabbed a coffee and got the UA-cam notification for a new Grim video. That's happiness
The weakest of very strong franchise.. nowadays I usually just play the fan-made version where all maps from all 3 games are merged into one game. Many bugs fixed - Chernobyl storyline with fixed factions.. just glorious. Might very well be my fave 1st person game of all.
Gonna skip an hour of work just to watch this.
#Goth🕸Gamer🐈⬛Nation🕷Unite
I'm stuck home from work with an infected tooth. This is a nice distraction. Edit: due to nasty tooth abscess, I can't, like, make out or anythinnnng
Dude, I get a tooth extracted tomorrow because a wisdom tooth grew in a fucky angle and broke one of the other teeth. These things suck, bro.
Been thru it, while you wait maybe go get some Kratom, the red bali works like painkillers. Hope this helps. (Be careful not to take too much as it can hit hard with some people.)
Hope ya feel better soon, those suuuck. I get them far too often so I'd recommend keeping a pair of pliers nearby at all times.
(Seriously tho, wish ya well!)
@@kanetombs1275 No shit?! I thought that whole Kratom thing was exaggerated in how effective it is. Red Bali, you say? I'll have to look into that! Local head shop, perhaps?
Ranking my favorite Stalkers:
5. That guy in the van that's following me
4. The secret Government Agency that spies on me
3. My third grade gym teacher
2. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky
1. You
i love how professionally unprofessional you are. must take a lot of work keep it up boi!
I was told I couldn't leave until I liked, commented, and subscribed
Can I please leave now... I... I want to see my family again
Great vid today!
Yeah, you're good now
Me seeing Grim Beard back to reviewing STALKER again: oh nice
Me seeing this video length: *HOLD UP*
It was a bit short right?
Can’t wait for Pripyat
It pretty much rendered Clear Sky obsolete.
Grim Beard isn’t the hero we deserve, rather the hero that we needed.
Yeah, we dont deserve him, too good
Do I deserve him?
Yes, despite his long ramblings.
OR, maybe not one we deserve nor one that we need, but a hero nonetheless! Arguably, as I dunno how many heroes confess to burning bodies..... Cleanliness is next to godliness, though, so I'd score that in his favor.
@@johnnybensonitis7853 I think you raise a valid point. That perhaps it is selfish of us to appraise such magnificent specimens by our own relation to them.
Don't know why I've played (and finished it) more times than ShoC (ususally drop after reaching Pripayt, don't want to deal with Monolith and endless corridors in Power Plant filled with hi-tech 1shot-kill aimbots) or CoP, which was too chillout.
Yeah cop was a bit too forgiving
@@chillhour6155 forgiving? It's more like going on cruise control...
Look at the comments, Grim. They really love you. And do you deserve such love? Do you, Grim?
I await the review for Call of Pripyat, having finally started playing CS recently, I found CoP changed things up quite a bit more than Clear Sky did.
Another great review Grim! I have a suggestion, how about a review of “Shadowman” and “Omikron: the nomad soul” Both games are on steam. I think it would be awsome to know your thoughts on these games. Peace Everyone, Stay safe!
I second Shadowman for sure.
I second Omikron
Yeah ahadowman is so underrated that has flied under the. Radar even most retro reviewers haven't covered or mentioned it
Shadowman, Shadowman, Shadowman!
Is that the one with voodoo and snake in the hat, right?
I wouldn’t wish Omikron: Nomad Soul on my worst enemy….actually it’s beyond that.
I wouldn’t wish it on humankind’s worst enemy.
Honestly don't even care about most the games you review, just think you're a genuinely entertaining and funny person.
That machinegun at the start really is the final boss of the game.
My favorite STALKER game is Stalker Anomaly, fixes most every issue i ever had with the game and gives me the freedom i always wanted with added depth.
I've spent about 300+ hours with that game, it's my comfort zone.
The enemies hit like a truck though, also the anomalies are extremely annoying because of you much more of them there are, I and up quicksaving even more than in vanilla Stalker, that autumn mod on master difficulty so far is my favorite mod in how I like to experience the game, also. The anomaly devs seemed to have borked the AI even more, enemies spot you from like 400 meters away
Definitely my favourite game in the series! I found it far less tedious and more atmospheric than SoC, and more engaging than CoP. Only thing I
hate are the grenade snipers.
You know what they really should have done with the story in this game? Make it so at the end, you find out that actually YOU have been Strelok hunting Strelok all along AGAIN. My mind is blown just thinking about it!
Found this channel a few weeks ago, and it's pretty much all I've been watching on UA-cam since, this guy is captivating and has impeccable humor!
SoC is my favorite followed by CoP. I couldn't finish Clear Sky it just didn't hold an appeal to me and so many mechanic / direction changes they went with turned me off. That being said, keep up the great content! Your channel will absolutely blow up. Keep putting in work and being patient. You make high quality unique content. I look forward to each upload. You'll make it big on youtube if you keep this up
Loving these longer videos, appreciating how much work goes in to them, and the quality is there throughout. And yes, you should do more Supernatural videos.
I called the number on my screen. No one answered and now there's nothing left in my inventory. What gives?
Man, from what I heard about your high ups and expectations of the game, you should try out S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Oblivion Lost Remake, mod-recreation of the project from 2002-2003 - conceptually and atmosphericly very far from what was made in the end. And WAY far from Clear Sky
(of course it is kinda raw and rough around the edges since they patching whole game up from the builds and leaked disdocs)
Still, for me, it is the closest form to what S.T.A.L.K.E.R. meant to be - a dreadful and haunted open-world survival-horror.
*You can find last version on moddb, or you can wait for the final version 3.0, that should come out this year.
**The trailer, if somebody interested:
ua-cam.com/video/RRr-UUpnPaM/v-deo.html
***21.06.21 Actually, finished all main early concept-mods of a game, I ended up liking "Vector of Alienation" the most - it's an addon for Oblivion Lost, which carefully improoves it overall - visual design and gorgeous lightmaps, cutting out unpolished features and side content and, most importantly, finally brings a kinda decent writing into the game that able to match it's atmosphere. It's standalone, translated, included pack of custom tweaks for preference, and download-install-play version is ready on moddb, what's more to want? So again - "Vector of Alienation" > OG OLR, just how it is.
Here's a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. music video I made some years ago-go that you might dig: ua-cam.com/video/0AvFh4Hci5Y/v-deo.html The song is 'His Eyes' by Pseudo Echo (heh, "psuedo"), the theme song to 'Friday the 13th: A New Beginning'. Btw, did you apply those principles I discussed in my "training simulator" video? They're applicable to Clear Sky, but to a lesser degree. I was immediately disgusted with Clear Sky when I found out that you can't aim pistols or grenade launchers. Or rather, you can aim some launchers but not others. And the ones you can't aim are the ones I like most (the modular kind that mount on rifles). And why is the LR-300 so inaccurate? 5.56 fired out of that barrel length will hit its mark just fine within average combat distances, yet in Clear Sky, it scatters all over the place out past average room-length distances! Within that same distance, a 12-gauge shotgun with a cylinder-bore barrel (of practically any length ranging between 10 to 20") will deliver fist-size patterns using any kind of shot. What do we get instead, even with the TOZ-34 "Grandfather's Gun?" Hollywood-style shotgun patterns! It's insulting! Also, they got through three whole games without ever figuring out how peep sights work. The LR-300's sights (which, as you might recall, I discussed in my "training simulator" video since they were revamped in Oblivion Lost by OLP team way back in 2008) are wonky all throughout the entire 'nilla series! You're supposed to aim *through* the peep, not *over* it! Judging by what we've seen in "(No) Escape from Tarkov(sky)," S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 probably won't have any of that old familiar weapon-related incompetence. But I've never understood how or why that was ever the status quo to begin with! That sort of thing is tolerable in a game like Halo (like unnecessary gun cocking and whatnot), but it never belonged in a sophisticated game series like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (and it still doesn't). Oh, but Tarkov doesn't get a pass either since it lacks proper chamber-loading with the mighty KS-23 (a gun that would be more useful in the Zone than in Tarkov since it would be ideal for monster hunters who specialize in hunting "big game"). It should hold three 23x75mm rounds in the tube, plus one in the chamber. The Anomaly mod has, from what I've seen, two variants of the KS-23: the standard model and the short-barrel "M" model. And I think they hold the correct four rounds, but the "M" model has a stockless pistol grip for no reason. Who would ever want to fire a stockless 23mm monster gun?! It would jump out yer hands, yo! Paranoia 2 screws up its KS-23 by limiting its capacity to three rounds for no reason. Plus, in that game, it's pathetically weak compared to what it is in real life which is a horrifying mutilation machine (thus making it perfect for Zone use despite its limited capacity). It has a rifled bore and is therefore classified as a "carbine," though we Western spies might call it a "slug gun." Having a rifled bore means shot patterns will be looser than they otherwise would be due to rotation being imparted onto the wad and the shot pellets contained within it, but it also means improved accuracy and effective range with slugs (which are typically used to disable vehicles by destroying the engine block to death).
*Edit/Note:* Legend has it that Scar went on to become the Monolith commander known as Charon, named after the ferryman of the river Styx, who you fight in Pripyat toward the end of ShoC. Given your penchant for the esoteric, I figured you'd dig that fun fact.
I come back to your STALKER reviews every now and again for comfort viewing, hope you do Call of Pripyat sometime!
That sea consciousness thing reminds me of You are Empty. I highly recommend you give it a shot if you like that oppressive Eastern European atmosphere. It's janky as heck and it's weird looking but it has its own charm.
Agreed, I found it surprisingly atmospheric. The shooting was fine too and the enemies are nice satirical communist stereotypes (apparently). Also, some of the best cutscenes I have ever seen in any game!
The atmosphere in that game is pretty nice, but the shooting is a bit hit or miss. Some sections are actually kinda decent, others are a bit lame. It's definitely not a bad game.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Anomaly Is the definitive stalker experience at this point.
So good.
The definitive grinding cordon checkpoint for 3 hours to get parts for crafting experience
Man, that turret around the beginning of Clear Sky... I was a SoC veteran, was super stoked on Clear Sky, and after beating my head against that turret for a while, I didn't touch Clear Sky for a long time.
ah yes, the stalker where the devs are like "mmmyes, lets ruin the gunplay for some fucking reason"
also the atmosphere is a little gimped
Look on the bright side, when stalker 2 comes out i promise clear skies will stop being the bad one!
@@wearecoterminous the thing is your probably right
Clear Sky seems the buggiest but the gunplay was fine?
@@legion999 It really wasnt. If you compare the game's gunplay and shooting mechanics to soc, its night and day
If Sky Reclamation is installed, you will see it in the bottom left corner of the main menu. It says 1.5.10 Sky Reclamation project or something like that. It also has addons that can modify more of the game.
Clear Sky knows that emissions will keep on happening even without human interference, however they will be much rarer and not as powerful. That is why they want to stop Strelok. They dont want the Zone's emissions to spill out past the outer perimeter and into Ukraine and Belarus or the rest of Europe.
The interesting thing is that the RU community did care a bit for the exact questions about Strelok's previous journeys. And they are the biggest Stalker fanbase. That the game did not really do it justice in terms of the story is ... another problem entirely. I overall rate Clear Sky above average for video game stories since while the plot itself is meh, the secondary writing and factions are generally quite a bit above average. Its worse than SoC and cannot compare overall to actual heavyhitters in video games like SOMA or Pathologic 2 or PlaneScape Torment, but its above average. Just... somewhat pointless for most SoC players ironically. If someone hasnt played SoC though, it would immerse them fully since its all new to them. I know from experience, I used Clear Sky with SRP and my own balancing on top to get my friends into the series.
The Faction Wars is a good concept and sometimes it works. The SRP mod makes it work most of the time (but alas, not all of the time). The problem is that it is one of those game systems that needs actual level design either to be built to accomodate for it OR have a lot of space for flanking maneuvers and protracted frontline engagements. The Great Swamps is closest to that in Clear Sky, hence why the system works OK there. But even it is too small. Other maps are just too small and are basically turned into corridors and chokepoints. Now I like me some chokepoints and corridors from time to time, but not 90% of the battlefield to be that. That is why the system fails in Clear Sky. It never had a chance to work.
In the options menu you have a key that orders the closest squad next to you to attack. That is what they await. Or to shoot the enemy. That works too.
I never had a problem with the machinegun, but I always had the Swamps fully explored and had the High-End Clear Sky battlearmour (15 000 Rubles) with upgrades by the time I went to Cordon. So the machinegun while dangerous, wasnt that dangerous to me.
You can disable Iron Sights Depth of Field from the graphics menu.
Veteran and Expert stalkers often drop upgraded guns. For example Duty Experts drop upgraded AN-94 Abakans and those do make money, but you are correct. GSC nerfed weapons prices and quality to make players choose a weapon and stick to it, upgrading it. It was to make the faction wars and artifact hunts feed into the progression loop more directly.
NPC dialogue did improve, but mostly for normal NPCs. In Shadow of Chernobyl, you can ask 1 question to a random NPC. It was "Anything new in the Zone" or something like that. In Clear Sky you can have more of a dialogue with the random NPCs and some of their dialogue even foreshadows or acknowledges things you will do / have done in the area. It is not enough, IMHO, but it is a step up.
There are several mutants in the Red Forest (and Swamps) and some enemies / neutrals in the game that arent marked on the map. But they are very few. I can understand seeing friendlies on the map. I can kinda understand neutrals too. But enemy soldiers? Mutants? Stupid decision for sure. Mods can fix this, there is an addon in Clear Sky Reclamation that does that.
The Dynamic music can be disabled thankfully.
Funy thing is, I believe that if Clear Sky is your first STALKER game, it may be your favourite game in the series, warts and all. I personally come from SoC and... like Clear sky. But it is even more flawed than SoC.
Anyways, my STALKER game rank:
NLC 7 > OGSR > SoC > Clear Sky > Call of Pripyat.
Hey Grimbeard. Thank you for your brilliant reviews!
I've been a huge S.T.A.L.K.E.R. fan since years before Shadow of Chernobyl even came out. I've spent literally thousands of hours in each game in the series, both vanilla and modded. Hell, I even went to the S.T.A.L.K.E.R.-fest convention back in 2009, listened to Grigorovitch's Sweet Dreams, and got a free jewel-case copy of Call of Pripyat for wearing an M-65 jacket with blue jeans and heavy boots!
Still love each of the vanilla games and can't say which one is the best. Each has things it does better than the rest, and each has things it does worse.
Shadow of Chernobyl. It has the best atmosphere of despair and loneliness. Even today, it combines its sound and visual design so good it hardly can be matched by modern horror games. The Yantar section is in my heart forever. It also the only game in the series where you can take the story seriously, although it's evident the narrative in the game is very undercooked and has a lot of holes due to the troubled development cycle.
SoC's game design, on the other hand, didn't age well. A lot of systems like artifacts, dialogs, economy, equipment management, factions, stealth are either work bad or don't work at all. The AI is pretty good and the gunplay works, but it the shooting felt a little archaic even when the game came out.
Clear Sky. The most beautiful game of the three. Has a less dark atmosphere than SoC, its weather and lighting effects and great art design of the new levels give you the most artistically satisfying presentation of the Zone. Swamps, Red Forest, and Limansk look excellent even today. It's also the only game in the series that has an actual working economy and a lot of really satisfying gunplay. There are not many things in existence better than the feeling you have when carrying out a solo assault on the construction site in Limansk with your suit maxed out and stuffed with rare artifacts, and your AK-74 fully upgraded for close combat.
On the other hand, the game is broken in many places. While the severe bugs were fixed, the faction war isn't working as it probably should have, the story is a graphomaniac mess, a lot of content was cut out, and the final level is laughably broken and afwully designed.
By the way, originally it was intended that to get from the hospital to the power plant, the player had to go through the massive Pripyat Underground. But that level wasn't finished and appeared only in the next game. You can still hear it being mentioned by Lebedyev at the end of the hospital level.
Call of Pripyat. This game is the only one in the series that actually has a coherent, modern game design and world structure. This game is much smaller in scope, but it miles deeper than the previous two. The main story is stupid and almost non-existent, but there are dozens of hand-crafted side-quests which can be finished in various ways and a lot of unique and comparatively interesting characters you interact with. You even gather a party of misfits to go through a big mission with you! What's the best about it all, is that the outcome of almost every your decision throughout the game will be mentioned in the ending montage which is the most satisfying ending montage I ever saw in games: the slides, the music, and the outcomes themselves work just great.
Visually, CoP is the least appealing of the three. The game has three really large locations instead of a dozen small ones, so the developers had to cut down on density and detail on those locations to make them work stable on their old engine. The atmosphere is still thick as hell, but the environment feels more artificial than in SoC and Clear Sky.
While the overall game design is improved, and all its systems work pretty well, being pierced together by interesting quests, the game feels a little empty. There are not many enemies to shoot, so there's a little motivation to find and upgrade unique weapons, there are many places to explore, but you find mostly supplies you don't need very much, there's no lore or narrative outside quests, and the final section of the game, Pripyat, the city from the title, your final destination, is excruciatingly empty for content. It has only few quests and the game ends pretty clunkily since there's no corridor-shooter level where you'd be given a chance to make use of all the equipment you had been upgrading for the whole game.
TL, DR: These games are brilliant but each of them is so flawed and full of missed opportunities and unrealized potential but I can't express enough how I love these great games.
Guess, I'll go and replay the vanilla Clear Sky now!
so when stalker 2 comes out are we gonna get a lets play?
Despite being janky, the Stalker series remains in my all-time favorites and I've replayed them three or four times over the years. The atmosphere is top-notch, the graphics still hold up today, and (at the time of release) these games were quite unlike anything else. Also I'm a sucker for fps-rpgs, open worlds, gritty Soviet aesthetics, urban exploration, horror, Chernobyl's exclusion zone, and combloc weapons. The whole concept may as well have been made precisely to appeal to me, so it'd have to be pretty horrible for me to dislike it. Regardless I maintain these games are classics that anyone with interest in any of that stuff should play; as long as you're not a hardcore CoD or other arcade shooter fan, because these tend to be pretty realistic* in their weapon behavior, and brutally difficult in general. Not as scary as Shadow, but had it's moments and the gameplay and world was overall improved.
Also gonna take the opportunity to say that Roadside Picnic, the short novel these games are (loosely) based on, is good stuff and worth reading.
*Aside from the shitty, ridiculous degradation system that has the guns constantly jamming and becoming inaccurate after a hundred rounds or so. I'll accept it for the AR/M16 based rifle (lol) but almost all the weapons are Russian and _specifically known worldwide for their reliability_ over tens of thousands of rounds despite abuse and lack of maintenance ... Ugh. Gun nerd rant over.
Nice, you've learnt how to slav squat and peak from the covers, you are almost ready for the Misery mod
This made my day better. I also enjoy the supernatural videos, not to over look your dope tracks. I’m a big fan of what you do.
Yay, I'm glad to see the new video, goth brother!
Fun fact, I’ve experienced these emissions before. When I was in high school there would always be a massive blowout before I went to school.
I found you about 3 days ago and I've been blowing through your content since. How the fuck are you not at 100k or higher? The skits you've got in between footage are great. Parapug and Chad are definitely top notch.
It's a great day when there is new Grim to watch!
I write this comment before watching your video, just to give my unreflected perspective.
Clear Sky gave me some of the best and worst memories playing a game ever. And I absolutely love it. The faction wars are utterly broken and basically pure luck and there are plenty of bugs beyond that, but there's so much to explore, the game is dripping with atmosphere and it's the start of the improved RPG elements I love Call of Pripyat for.
You need quite a bit of resistance to frustration to enjoy this game, but you'll be rewarded with amazing gameplay and exploration.
The last push of this game is so much better than in the first game, too! Well, except for the very end, the "boss fight" if you will. But before that, going through a city, pushing through the abandoned hospital etc. is just amazing.
I still rank this game as the lowest of the three, but I think my gushing makes it very clear that's still awesome.
Hey Grim, how you doing? Having just developed a crippling addiction to STALKER Anomaly over the last couple of weeks, you can't imagine how happy I am to see you talk about this game series 😄
Grimbeard stalker review saved for Friday ohhhh yeaaaah
Frickin frick yeah! You could have told me that you're ubexing in my neighborhood. I could have brought some vodka (I guess pálinka instead) and semechki to chill by the trash fire and play some guitar reminiscing about all that could have been if the disaster didn't happen.
Jokes aside, absolutely great video my dood. I think your assessment on this game is really damn accurate. I wasn't aware that there are many people holding this one to such a high regard. For me it was always the most mixed bag of a game in the series but it still has that slavjank-charming quality and atmosphere that makes up for all its shortcomings!
Can't wait to see what's your take on Pripyat, Mr. Gopnik Gothman... Gothnik?
I'm so stealing "gothnik" as soon as I find even the flimsiest excuse to drop it into conversation.
The only guy who's content you can binge watch and see a negligible difference in quality throughout the years, the only long form reviewer who's reviews I dont watch while falling asleep, because they are so chock full of great writing and editing I actually insist upon paying full attention for the entire video. Keep up the great work.
what's the name of the song that is playin in the background around 27:40 ?
After Pripyat, play Anomaly. It even has 1 woman in it. And after community feedback, they made the dialogue with her less thirsty, which is probably the most equity this franchise is going to get without a torrent of manbabies crying about it.
I think this game may actually be my favorite in the series. I prefer the atmosphere of this game to that in SoC. the swamp area is unbelievably gorgeous in the morning, those volumetric sunrays coming through the torn up roof… ah, simply beautiful. I also appreciate the weapon repair and upgrading system, I think it's an addition that was sorely needed. the expanded faction system really fleshes out the character of the Zone, and I don't mind the endless shootouts - in fact, it was the highlight of my experience with this game (the new dynamic combat music helps these encounters feel more lively). artifact hunting (as well as artifacts themselves) is also much better in Clear Sky than in SoC.
Great video, and very accurate in my opinion. I just played CS on time I think, but I always go back to SoC and CoP. But the Zone is still beautiful in this game! Will you do CoP next? Cheers!
Just discovered your channel yesterday, and love your sense of humour. Good editing and review 'structure' too.
can't wait for the CALL OF PRIPYAT video
actually, I *can* wait.
see you all around here somewhere.
Amazon search: "Piss shirt"
not even surprised.
Maybe he just played Disco Elysium.
The phone gag made my day! ❤
Hey man, that intro worked, I liked commented and already subscribe
Grim you really need to review stalker anomaly, a standalone mod that encompasses all 3 games with a hell of lot of more content, fixes and new stories where you can play as any faction you choose. AND IT'S FREE
Hearing goons on the internet state that Chernobyl is "in russia" is hard to hear post Feb 24 2022
I've been dying to see you cover this game. Now I can die.
Hey I know you from middle and high school! 😂 Crazy
🥁
You want a tier list? okay:
Roadside Picnic>Stalker SoC>Metro2033>Stalker The Movie>Metro Exodus>Stalker CoP>Metro Last Light>Stalker Clear Sky>Stalker CoC>Chernobyl HBO Series>that one wacky Stalker Soc mod>Metro remastered (kinda sucked the originals are better)>the machine gun from clear sky that shoots you when you enter Cordon i mean who thought that was a good idea?>that slavic stalker inspired MMO that i got from a sale for 50 cents and only played 30 minutes>whatever i forgot.
Oh and my rank is SoC>CoP>CS but the best stalker is one of the mods with everything. Pick one.
Lots of good points. I appreciate that alternative exit from the Great Swamps being mentioned. :D That's by the way one aspect of Clear Sky that is underappreciated: The different transition points for the maps. At times they add some character to the maps. Same goes for the different anomaly setup, though the latter is clearly something transitional when looking at Call of Pripyat. Even so, I very much appreciate Clear Sky basically being this remix of SoC in terms of environments. The maps are too lively (except for the lacking number of mutants) and people are too loud and too english (SoC uses more Russian), but even so. I especially like the Great Swamps which seem way too big and without much unique content, but that's why I like them. It's kind of an wide open space in which the player can get lost in and enjoy the atmosphere - at least once the faction war is over.
It's also worth mentioning that one reason why the A-Life in SoC is so good is the attention to detail and the way the AI is forced to replenish their losses by walking back to where they belong by crossing through parts of the maps. It creates relatively natural, dynamic encounters, but only when the player is around. This way the actual reinforcement process doesn't get impeded. CS doesn't really have this subtlety. It's very much macro vs micro here. Too many men.
Also, props for pointing out how anomalies are handled differently in CS. The funny thing about this system is that - as opposed to the faction system - it's not really integrated into the game. As far as I can tell, there is no reason to actually mess around with anomalies or artifacts. I did on my last playthrough and as it turns out artifacts are mostly needed as protection to be able to explore other anomalies :D Still, they started introducing the unique anomalies that made up the majority of them in CoP, so aside from anomalies being more deadly and artifacts being properly integrated into them, that's also a good thing.
You, cheeky breeky you. You're spoiling us with the classics.
Although, this game at launch was one of the few game who actually broke me.
You deserve a million subscribers. its sad that some idiot can blow up eating random food and complaining and then seeing all the work you put into your content and go under the radar, even with the mass of video game essays and such. I really wish you the best, it would have been cool to go through primary school with you.
Pripyat is in Ukraine!? Wtf, how did I never know this. Apparently I didnt pay much attention in school or when I watched that HBO thing.
Sadly i can understand only about 85% of what r you saying (i'm russian) but I still enjoy your videos! You've found your thing, i can see you're so into it, cool.
You don't understand...
It's not slav magic, the game itself is an artefakt from the Zone.
It makes a little Zone around you every time you boot it up, and the jank is just the part of it.
It's how your pc reacts to the Zone.
Such a gem of a channel and it's criminal how you're not over 500k+ subs, your blend of humor, pacing, scripting and overall presentation of your videos are always so intriguing and enjoyable.
Keep up the amazing work Grim, stellar work !
i can't believe I had to wait 56 minutes for you to give me an instruction
IIRC the first stalker had some really weird balancing in anything but the hardest difficulty leading to the gunplay being worse on lower difficulties.
Grimbo's gotta be one of the best content creators out there I find myself laughing in likely every single video
Hell yeah. Time to disassociate.
For over an hour!
@@biscuithammer00 I like how you just looked at that edit button and just thought ‘nah’ before replying to yourself.
@@adamwest8711 Nah
[Insert blind praise mixed with some flabbergasting about the relative lack of subs and/or views HERE]
Much relate. Kickstart timeline
Does this mean we also get a call of pripyat episode? Oh boy, I hope we do!
I have to agree with not enough memable dialogue. Glad GSC came to their senses when they made Call of Pripyat and hired nothing but the best voice actors that canned food and stale loaves of bread can buy.
If Sky Reclamation is installed, you will see it in the bottom left corner of the main menu. It says 1.5.10 Sky Reclamation project or something like that. It also has addons that can modify more of the game.
Clear Sky knows that emissions will keep on happening even without human interference, however they will be much rarer and not as powerful. That is why they want to stop Strelok. They dont want the Zone's emissions to spill out past the outer perimeter and into Ukraine and Belarus or the rest of Europe.
The interesting thing is that the RU community did care a bit for the exact questions about Strelok's previous journeys. And they are the biggest Stalker fanbase. That the game did not really do it justice in terms of the story is ... another problem entirely. I overall rate Clear Sky above average for video game stories since while the plot itself is meh, the secondary writing and factions are generally quite a bit above average. Its worse than SoC and cannot compare overall to actual heavyhitters in video games like SOMA or Pathologic 2 or PlaneScape Torment, but its above average. Just... somewhat pointless for most SoC players ironically. If someone hasnt played SoC though, it would immerse them fully since its all new to them. I know from experience, I used Clear Sky with SRP and my own balancing on top to get my friends into the series.
The Faction Wars is a good concept and sometimes it works. The SRP mod makes it work most of the time (but alas, not all of the time). The problem is that it is one of those game systems that needs actual level design either to be built to accomodate for it OR have a lot of space for flanking maneuvers and protracted frontline engagements. The Great Swamps is closest to that in Clear Sky, hence why the system works OK there. But even it is too small. Other maps are just too small and are basically turned into corridors and chokepoints. Now I like me some chokepoints and corridors from time to time, but not 90% of the battlefield to be that. That is why the system fails in Clear Sky. It never had a chance to work.
In the options menu you have a key that orders the closest squad next to you to attack. That is what they await. Or to shoot the enemy. That works too.
I never had a problem with the machinegun, but I always had the Swamps fully explored and had the High-End Clear Sky battlearmour (15 000 Rubles) with upgrades by the time I went to Cordon. So the machinegun while dangerous, wasnt that dangerous to me.
You can disable Iron Sights Depth of Field from the graphics menu.
Veteran and Expert stalkers often drop upgraded guns. For example Duty Experts drop upgraded AN-94 Abakans and those do make money, but you are correct. GSC nerfed weapons prices and quality to make players choose a weapon and stick to it, upgrading it. It was to make the faction wars and artifact hunts feed into the progression loop more directly.
NPC dialogue did improve, but mostly for normal NPCs. In Shadow of Chernobyl, you can ask 1 question to a random NPC. It was "Anything new in the Zone" or something like that. In Clear Sky you can have more of a dialogue with the random NPCs and some of their dialogue even foreshadows or acknowledges things you will do / have done in the area. It is not enough, IMHO, but it is a step up.
There are several mutants in the Red Forest (and Swamps) and some enemies / neutrals in the game that arent marked on the map. But they are very few. I can understand seeing friendlies on the map. I can kinda understand neutrals too. But enemy soldiers? Mutants? Stupid decision for sure. Mods can fix this, there is an addon in Clear Sky Reclamation that does that.
The Dynamic music can be disabled thankfully.
Funy thing is, I believe that if Clear Sky is your first STALKER game, it may be your favourite game in the series, warts and all. I personally come from SoC and... like Clear sky. But it is even more flawed than SoC.
Anyways, my STALKER game rank:
NLC 7 > OGSR > SoC > Clear Sky > Call of Pripyat.
I bought the first Stalker when it came out, when I was still in high school. I loved it even without any patches.
I distinctly remember though not really having any interest at all when Clear Sky was announced. I was suspicious that it was coming out so quickly after Shadow of Chernobyl.
You give me content I give you comment. May the algorithmic horrors give their dark blessing upon you nerd
According to the game's lore, emissions are more like a fever; the Monolith faction is more akin to white blood cells.
I'm continually intrigued by your channel's lore.
I wonder if or when will you give the viewers the full picture of this set of stories.
Never underestimate the power of Slavic Jank,
The way you only remove ONE of the two shells from a double barrelled shotgun when you reload after only shooting once is both a great touch and a source of incredible anxiety. I mean, what if I picked the wrong one in the heat of shootyshoots?
i never looked at it that way and now im terrified
I love how a major update to Sky Reclamation Project was released not long after this video. May have improved your experience on the 'systems actually working' side a little bit.
I have been thinking about doing a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. marathon and unfortunately Clear Sky doesn't seem worth revisiting in that catalogue.
I'm enjoying the trend of discussing the one thing, but in terms of something that was similar, yet slightly better. Here we're learning about Stalker, but in the context of a different, and superior Stalker. And in Supernatural, we learn about that show, but also how it compares to XFiles, which is similar, yet better. Its like we're getting a review and a half.
After you finish the next expansion you HAVE to do some kinda mod showcase/review cause some of the complete overhaul mods for Call of Pripyat are legit, aeons better than COP and CS.
The only STALKERs I play regularly are SOC and the COC mod
I'm so glad you made this, because I was not going to play it but did play SoC a good bit and Pripyat way more. As well as an unhealthy amount of Anomaly. Of the original 3, I give it to Pripyat for game play, SoC for atmosphere and of course I play Anomaly for both at once.
And of course I come here for our shared taste in games and television series filmed in Canada, if anything I want more darkened streams down the road on maybe Lost or Twin Peaks.
No comments about mandaloregaming in the credits??? Does no one stay for the credits?
I haven’t played any S.T.A.L.K.E.R. gams and am therefore unable to provide the engagement you requested Grim, please forgive me
(good video)