Recent reviews by adyian

After playing for 20 hours and two patches, I think I can leave an honest review. I’ll compare this game to a lot of bigger studio games so people who think think this game is bad might reconsider.
Map design:
The map is beautiful. The level design and detail in this game are incredible, something we haven’t seen in years. The closest comparison is Metro Exodus, but that’s semi-open world with much smaller maps. For me, as someone who played the original Stalker games 10 years ago, exploring these reimagined locations is so nostalgic.
Connected zones/regions:
I honestly thought there would be loading screens between zones, like in the old Stalker games. But crossing from Zalysia to Garbage without a single loading screen blew my mind. Big step up!
Atmosphere:
The game nails the Stalker vibe. On the surface, it feels like the original games or even modded Stalker (Anomaly, GAMMA). Exploring buildings is tense because you never know what’s hiding inside, and emissions in the open make you panic if there’s no shelter nearby.
In Underground, the tension cranks up even more. It reminded me of Metro 2033 or Last Light. Dark, tight corridors with creepy ambient sounds make every step nerve-wracking. I love that they reused some sounds from the older Stalker games, it adds to the nostalgia.
Story:
I’ve never played Stalker for the story, so I didn’t expect much. But after a few missions, it started to pull me in. I even looked up videos about the lore to understand it better.But it’s still too early to say if it stays good or gets repetitive, but so far, it’s interesting.
Side activities/quests:
The side quests are great, on par with games like The Witcher 3 or Cyberpunk 2077. They’re unique, interesting, and often have multiple outcomes.
Weapons:
The weapons feel awesome. They sound powerful, the recoil feels realistic, and the animations are spot-on. After the first patch, they actually do decent damage, so no complaints here.
NPC Models:
The detail in NPC models is amazing. Random NPCs look as good as main characters in most AAA games. Their facial expressions, armor, and animations are all super polished. Compared to games from Ubisoft or Bethesda, where NPCs look like real sized plastic dolls, this is a huge plus.
Mutants:
So far, I’ve only seen mutants from the original games, but they’ve been upgraded with cool new abilities. For example, bloodsuckers can roar to disorient you, burers can grab weapons from dead stalkers and use them against you (which surprised me more than once), and controllers can spawn fake enemies. Plus, every mutant tries to hide if they can’t reach you, which is a nice touch.
Artifacts&Anomalies:
In older games, and even in modded Stalker, I didn’t care much about artifacts. But here, it’s very rewarding to find artifacts without getting shredded by anomalies. Also, you can inspect them up close, which is very cool. Now, not every anomaly is bad and trying to kill you. Some can break your fall or help you reach places you couldn’t get to otherwise.
Performance:
The performance isn’t terrible, but it’s not great either. I play on High settings (textures on Medium), 2K resolution, DLSS Quality, and no Frame Generation on an RTX 4060 laptop. It’s playable, but I had to tweak settings and use mods to make it smoother. The biggest issue is stuttering and FPS drops, especially in areas with lots of NPCs. The devs need to lower VRAM usage in these spots.
AI-life 2.0:
The game is missing its promised AI-Life 2.0 system. The devs say it’s bugged, but from a player perspective, it’s just not there. AI-Life is what makes Stalker games unique, so this is a big drawback.
Humanoid AI:
The AI for human enemies is pretty bad right now. Sometimes it feels okay, but most of the time they are dumb. Enemies forget about you after a few minutes, keep walking into doorways where you just killed five of their buddies, and don’t seem to care much. Even when fighting mutants, the AI looks clueless. I once saw a pig kill three stalkers without problems.
Day/Night Cycle:
It´s just too short and devs knows about this so this gonna be fixed pretty soon
Flashlight:
Current flashlight have like 5 lumens max. At least give me the ability to buy better flashlight, because the current one is pretty useless.
PDA:
The PDA feels like a step back from older Stalker games. Features like Contacts, Rankings, and Statistics are missing. This doesn’t feel like a Personal Digital Assistant, it feels like just another menu, like in any other game. Also, I know the Encyclopedia was only in Shadow of Chernobyl, but I would love to read descriptions about mutants, artifacts, anomalies, and even the main characters you encounter. Another thing is that, while the PDA was 2D in older games, the modded 3D PDA is 100% better, and everyone knows it. I wonder why they stuck with a 15-year-old 2D PDA.
Binoculars:
What? there are not Binoculars are you serious ? Come on devs you better than that
Too much loot:
I’m playing on Veteran difficulty, and after maybe 10 hours of gameplay, I don’t need to buy any meds or ammo for the rest of the game. I have way too much of everything over 100 bandages and 50+ medkits. I thought playing on the hardest difficulty would make me count every bullet and bandage, but instead, I have so much loot that I can use it freely without worry.
Difficulty:
Because of the amount of loot you can find everywhere, it’s pretty easy on Veteran difficulty. Yes, mutants are still hard to kill, but fighting humans to complete missions or capture base is way too easy. You’re supposed to be just another meat in the zone, not a super-soldier. That’s what Stalker was always about. I was hoping the difficulty would be closer to the Metro franchise’s Spartan Hardcore mode. I hope they adjust this or add a new difficulty, like "Loner Hardcore" or smth.

The game has a lot of issues, but the core of the game is there (except for AI-Life). Every con I wrote here can be fixed, and I trust the developers to deliver. This isn’t just another cash grab like you see from many big game studios. You can see the developers’ commitment and how they communicate with their customers. They want this game to succeed and become not just the Game of the Year, but the Game of the Decade. I’m confident we’ll be playing this game for another 10 years.
9/10 (10/10 when the AI-life will be actually there and fully working)

8 Hours waiting in quick matchmaking , 1 hour playing actual game. They should have put in beta at least 1 main story mission

H1Z1 is 2 years in early access and has only 4 good weapons (AR-15 , Pump Shotgun , Hunting Rifle and AK-47) , one map , errors , sh*tty graphics , lame animations , more errors , infinite loadings , this game is dying so has low player base... PUBG was 9 months in early access and now has 2 maps , 16 good weapons , nice looking graphics , parkour vaults animations , 2 millions players peak per day and it´s already out of Steam early access :D . H1Z1 is worst battle royale game what i ever played 100% not worth it. Go play Fortnite if you can´t afford PUBG.

Final verdict :
2/10 This game is garbage

This is the most original game what i ever played. There is no such a game like this.

I´m big fan of S.T.A.L.K.E.R trilogy and i love this type of games. S.T.A.L.K.E.R, Metro 2033 and Metro Last light are the best atmospheric games of all time. This game is like S.T.A.L.K.E.R and DayZ without zombies. Even graphics looks like in S.T.A.L.K.E.R :D
Pros:
-Runs well : This game runs very good. No fps drops , no laggs.
-Animations : This game has animations on everything - eating , drink, checking ammo, climbing on laddder has better animation than on DayZ , swimming animation, healing animation, pick up animation etc.
-Factions: There are 4 factions: Looters,Civilians,Traitors and Neutrals.Looters are bad guys they killing everyone expect their own. Civilians are good players they do not killing neutrals, they helping each other .It´s not like DayZ.In DayZ are everyone against everyone you can not trust someone in that game...
-Servers: I have 50 - 70 ping on European servers better than ubisoft potato servers.
-Hitbox: This game have better hitbox than cs:go.
-Weapons and ammo: This game have large arsenal of weapons and types of ammo and it´s very good balanced. Nice !
-NPCs :NPCs can kill you easily. They are very accurate they can hit you from far distance. But they have best loot , if you kill two of them you can have from them best gear :D . That´s why they are so hard to beat.
-Quests: This game have quests :D Nice !

Negatives:
-Map it´s not that big but they add more maps
-Only 24 player servers
-So many full servers
-Some bugs , not like in DayZ :D
That´s all :)

9/10

Worth it !

This is not a game... This is free dlc or mod for Arma 3 . It´s same sh*t with only 10 players on a huge map

I downloaded this game on free weekend.
I played a casual games 5 hours.
Then i played my first 3v3 competitive match.
Enemy team gave us a goal in first minute and my two teammates left the match.
I played 3 minutes and 30 seconds like a idiot because this game plays 10 years old kids who leaving match every time when they losing.
I do not recommended for non-premade players and never play this game solo.

This game has minimum requirements 100 IQ and brain. Not recommended for CS:GO players...

Unrealistic game.

Why the f*ck this game have only russian servers ???