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

[S.H.O.D.A.N.]

- no A-Life

Have someone looked at the actual code to determine that there's no A-life system in the game, or that its functionality has changed compared to previous iterations? Because the devs boldly claim A-life is still in the game.

 

[Terenty]

Sure, A-life is in the game, how can it not be, I mean they released so many trailers and deep dives dedicated to this unique system to show it off before the game came out...oh wait

 

[Konjad]

A-Life is in. You just need to believe and use your imagination.

 

[ArchAngel]

There is no A-life but a new version callex F-life

 

[Herumor]

Not even proper key bindings? Was that fake news? Saw keybinding options in a gameplay video.

He's posted a comment on the video to clarify what he's talking about:

Just to be clear about the rebinding as some people seem to think I don't know how to rebind the keys or climb a ladder lol The problem with the game is you can not climb the ladder unless you use WSAD, I use TGFH so when I walk up to a ladder it automatically mounts the bottom rung but will not climb, I have to press W in order to climb up the ladder. I also try to bind J and Y but they are still bound to their default setting, there are many other keys that simply won't bind. I hope this clears it up.

 

[Dark Souls II]

"A-Life will work any second now, I promise, we just need $500 billion more to get it working, don't listen to the vatnik propaganda and keep buying the game and don't refund it."

- Volodomor Zolonsky, Lead Dovolopor, Stolkor 2: Hort of Chornobol

 

[Odoryuk]

I feel like there might be some kind of a double sided bias going on all over the internet that intercepts and skews the reception of this game. I don't think there ever was something like this in recent 20 years

 

[NecroLord]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

 

[Konjad]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

I haven't played it, but from what I read it's not STALKER but it might be a good game on at least -50% discount.

 

[baba is you]

Don't buy it yet. At least the A-life related issues need to be resolved.

 

[Turisas]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

I haven't played it, but from what I read it's not STALKER but it might be a good game on at least -50% discount.

Yep definitely not worth the full asking price in its current state.

 

[randir14]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

I'm having fun with it, but there are enough issues that it's not worth full price. Key sites have it at a big discount if you want to buy it.

 

[Brickfrog]

modders all over nexus are saying that A life is in the files but not functioning as expected.

 

[Iucounu]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

I haven't played it, but from what I read it's not STALKER but it might be a good game on at least -50% discount.

So it's not worth spending 3k on a new gaming PC?

 

[United Nations]

I feel like there might be some kind of a double sided bias going on all over the internet that intercepts and skews the reception of this game. I don't think there ever was something like this in recent 20 years

I'm 100% not surprised that STALKER 2 is getting canned by critics and audiences alike because of performance problems and issues with in-game mechanics.

Am I the only one who remembers a near identical reception of Shadow of Chernobyl when it was first released in 2007?

Or am I nuts to think that the original SOC critic reviews were in the 7.0 range and have been retrospectively inflated to match the game's huge cult following due to its dedicated modding community?

If SOC's third party development timeline provides a blueprint for what will happen with HOC, then it will be at least a couple years before the game will be polished enough for anyone other than beta testers and modders to fully enjoy.

 

[Konjad]

So is it a good purchase?
Yay or nay?

I haven't played it, but from what I read it's not STALKER but it might be a good game on at least -50% discount.

So it's not worth spending 3k on a new gaming PC?

You should definitely spend it.

 

[ArchAngel]

I ran into random empty village fairly close to base and two bloodsuckers jumped me
It didn't go well. This game needs traps and mines.. or flash or other types of grenades.

Also respawning enemies and mutants are really stupid. If they respawned every few days I could maybe say OK but they respawn multiple times per day..

Lower your difficulty setting

Nah, I will come back when I have better armor and weapons.

 

[ArchAngel]

OK, I finally exited to the next region (north one) and got the quest to save some stalker guys from a factory full of ward soldiers. I was told to use stealth if possible but whatever I tried to kill one ward guy guarding each of the entrances using silenced pistol others soon get alerted anyways and then swarm me. Fighting that AI is then super irritating. They all act like they got thermal vision and always know where I am, even when I am behind walls and change position. Or I cannot see shit as I retreat through bush and hills and shit but they all see me perfectly and hit me easily with those shitty AKU weapons they carry. Feels like fighting invisible enemies with rifles.. this is stupid.
Game basically forces you into CQC with automatic weapons and hiding behind corners as that is only way to not get hit by this cheating AI.

 

[ArchAngel]

Also whoever here complained that you get too much loot and stuff didn't play enough to get to phase to need to repair their weapons and armor. Repair prices are hilariously expensive. Even with weapons and armor above 80% durability (that can get that just from one shorter raid) full round of repairs cost me like 5000+ coupons. I basically have to sell extra meds and shit so I am not broke after that.

Maybe in endgame you are swimming in money but end of first area, start of 2nd you are certainly not (at least I am not as I also spent coupons to upgrade weapons and armor I am using).

 

[TheKing01]

Just curious who's idea it was to axe the PDA updates?

 

[PanteraNera]

OK, I finally exited to the next region (north one) and got the quest to save some stalker guys from a factory full of ward soldiers. I was told to use stealth if possible but whatever I tried to kill one ward guy guarding each of the entrances using silenced pistol others soon get alerted anyways and then swarm me. Fighting that AI is then super irritating. They all act like they got thermal vision and always know where I am, even when I am behind walls and change position. Or I cannot see shit as I retreat through bush and hills and shit but they all see me perfectly and hit me easily with those shitty AKU weapons they carry. Feels like fighting invisible enemies with rifles.. this is stupid.
Game basically forces you into CQC with automatic weapons and hiding behind corners as that is only way to not get hit by this cheating AI.

Stealth is a hit or miss, most of times miss. Often the AI tried shooting me through walls. That and the broken spawning system, where at some places the enemies just keep respawning in front of you made me put the game on hold and wait for another half year or probably more to see if things get better.

 

[Gerrard]

I thought this would be playable on my potato PC because I had around 40FPS in the tutorial areas, but then when a storm is happening it drops my framerate by 50% or more. No idea what it does to cause that.
Also, the in-game settings are kind of shit, even with the view distance set to lowest the actual in-game view distance is massive.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

There's a suspicious degree of certainty in saying that. Bruh, the game came out 17 years ago, you wanna tell me you remember how buggy or non-buggy it was? I call BS.

i do remember. most of its bugginess was about engine instability resulting in way too many crashes. other than that, i played 1.0 to the end with no issue. definitely not of the kind mentioned here, like t-posing and floors disappearing. that's really in the "what in the fucking fuck" realm stalker came nowhere close.

 

[NecroLord]

OK, I finally exited to the next region (north one) and got the quest to save some stalker guys from a factory full of ward soldiers. I was told to use stealth if possible but whatever I tried to kill one ward guy guarding each of the entrances using silenced pistol others soon get alerted anyways and then swarm me. Fighting that AI is then super irritating. They all act like they got thermal vision and always know where I am, even when I am behind walls and change position. Or I cannot see shit as I retreat through bush and hills and shit but they all see me perfectly and hit me easily with those shitty AKU weapons they carry. Feels like fighting invisible enemies with rifles.. this is stupid.
Game basically forces you into CQC with automatic weapons and hiding behind corners as that is only way to not get hit by this cheating AI.

Stealth is a hit or miss, most of times miss. Often the AI tried shooting me through walls. That and the broken spawning system, where at some places the enemies just keep respawning in front of you made me put the game on hold and wait for another half year or probably more to see if things get better.

Stealth was also not that well implemented in the original games.
I only remember using stealth in that mission where you have to infiltrate the military cordon and retrieve an item in Shadow of Chernobyl.

 

[ArchAngel]

OK, I finally exited to the next region (north one) and got the quest to save some stalker guys from a factory full of ward soldiers. I was told to use stealth if possible but whatever I tried to kill one ward guy guarding each of the entrances using silenced pistol others soon get alerted anyways and then swarm me. Fighting that AI is then super irritating. They all act like they got thermal vision and always know where I am, even when I am behind walls and change position. Or I cannot see shit as I retreat through bush and hills and shit but they all see me perfectly and hit me easily with those shitty AKU weapons they carry. Feels like fighting invisible enemies with rifles.. this is stupid.
Game basically forces you into CQC with automatic weapons and hiding behind corners as that is only way to not get hit by this cheating AI.

Stealth is a hit or miss, most of times miss. Often the AI tried shooting me through walls. That and the broken spawning system, where at some places the enemies just keep respawning in front of you made me put the game on hold and wait for another half year or probably more to see if things get better.

Stealth was also not that well implemented in the original games.
I only remember using stealth in that mission where you have to infiltrate the military cordon and retrieve an item in Shadow of Chernobyl.

Stealth is made worse by enemies all being able to see in the dark perfectly. They almost never use any light, fighting them in darkness looks like fighting a group of ninjas with machine guns lol
And since 1 minute in the game is 2s, days go by super fast and night fighting is way more common than I would like.

Funniest shit was when I did a previous mission where you need to enter a sphere thing, I arrived there around noon, went inside and by the time I reached objective it was night and by time I had to exit it, it was day already and I really didn't waste too much time inside.
So many bad design decisions in the game..