S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2
- Thread starter Hekotat
- Start date
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Guest, it's time once again for the massively important and exciting FoH Asshat Tournament!
Go here and give us your nominations!Who's been the biggest Asshat in the last year? Give us your worst ones!
Metalhead
Blackwing Lair Raider
- 980
- 2,619
The only thing I remember from the first game was it was also pretty jank. Also I had just started dipping and got sick and puked everywhere while playing it. I never picked it back up but everytime I'm reminded of Stalker I can taste Skoal Wintergreen.
- 5
- 1
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Vorph
Silver Baronet of the Realm
- 11,576
- 5,383
Aside from the performance, which I don't really have a problem with on my system those are my exact thoughts about the game after the first day. Enemy spawning is even worse than what he said though. It was supposed to have an updated 'A-Life' system like the original, but they quietly removed all mention of that from the Steam page. What they did instead was just make enemies constantly spawn like 10m away from you, already aware of your presence even if you're "stealthing" or not actually in their LOS. So what happens as you wander the world is you attack a camp and kill everyone, then before you can get to looting them a patrol spawns right behind you and you just barely squeeze out a win there, and finally as you start sorting through all their broken weapons a fucking pack of 10 dogs or rats spawns and kills you.“
t’s important to mention that I’m writing this review just three hours after the release of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2. Unfortunately, at this point, I cannot recommend purchasing the game. The technical state is deeply disappointing — the optimization is severely lacking, with constant and noticeable FPS drops that disrupt the overall experience. On top of that, there are an overwhelming number of visual and audio bugs that break immersion and make the game frustrating to play.
The story feels unengaging and disjointed. In my three hours of playtime, I found myself aimlessly running back and forth across the map, completing uninspired side quests that lacked any depth or purpose. For a game of this scale and legacy, the lack of even basic mechanics is shocking. Features such as harvesting parts from mutants — a core element of the original games — are entirely absent.
The character’s PDA, which was such a vital tool in the previous titles, is now barren and uninformative. There is no tracking for key statistics like mutant kills, player interactions, or any meaningful data that could add depth to the experience. This feels like a huge step backward compared to its predecessors.
While it’s clear that the developers aimed high, the current state of the game feels rushed and unfinished. It’s difficult to imagine how long it will take to address the numerous issues and bring the game to a truly polished state. For now, I would recommend holding off on buying S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 until significant updates and improvements are made. Fans of the series deserve much better than this.
To make matters worse, the game’s balancing feels completely off. For instance, at the very start of the game, I encountered no fewer than four Bloodsuckers. Each one required nearly three magazines of ammunition to kill, which made the fight feel unnecessarily tedious rather than tense. And then there was the breaking point: I ventured into a mine to retrieve some kind of stash. As I approached the stash, about 50 rats suddenly spawned behind me out of nowhere and swarmed me in an instant. Within a second, they had killed me. It was absurd, unfair, and utterly demoralizing.
After waiting nearly 14 years for this game, I’m left with no desire to continue playing. The excitement and anticipation I had for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 have been replaced with frustration and disappointment. The game feels like a rushed, unpolished shell of what it could and should have been. Unless significant updates and fixes are made, it’s hard to see how this could ever live up to the incredible legacy of its predecessors. For now, I can only recommend that others hold off on buying this game until it is properly finished — if that day ever comes.”
Sounds like a solid review.
Free on Gamepass and nothing to play so downloading now
And yeah, mutants in general are just massive bullet sponges that are pointless to kill except that they won't hesitate to kill you back, and it's extremely rare that you're able to sneak around them. Most of the time you end up using multiple magazines of ammo and health items, for zero rewards unless it happened to be part of a quest.
Performance-wise, I get well above 60 fps with everything on Epic, motion blur off, and using FSR 3 (quality, no framegen). There's definitely some micro-stuttering in friendly camps with a bunch of NPCs around though, and sometimes it's not exactly "micro" either.
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Big Phoenix
Pronouns: zie/zhem/zer
- 46,653
- 99,467
Drajakur
Molten Core Raider
- 569
- 462
I'm not really having performance issues but the game itself so far has been pretty underwhelming. Like Vorph said, the enemies typically spawn in knowing exactly where you are and just charge towards you, making any kind of meditative or strategic setup basically pointless. Mutants are bullet-spongy annoyances that clearly aren't worth the trouble. The world is, I don't know, "kind of" interesting to explore but I haven't yet found it to be on par with like a Fallout for discovery. There are also just quality of life annoyances: the time it takes to switch weapons, having to arm your melee weapon and crouch to smash boxes instead of being able to quick strike them, having to uninstall my flight gear because the game kept trying to take its input, UI weirdness, etc.
Right now I'd probably give this game a rather generous 7/10. If I was having worse performance it would be a 5 or 6. I was expecting to just lose myself in this game but that hasn't happened.
Right now I'd probably give this game a rather generous 7/10. If I was having worse performance it would be a 5 or 6. I was expecting to just lose myself in this game but that hasn't happened.
Fucker
Log Wizard
- 12,931
- 29,657
It's a pass, then.
Two big games hit Gamepass this week and they are both duds that I have been waiting for.
- 1
Regime
LOADING, PLEASE WAIT...
- 17,005
- 40,452
Same I was so excited what a let down.
watch Indiana Jones be a stinker
Glad I got a PlayStation and Steam.
- 2
- 1
Vorph
Silver Baronet of the Realm
- 11,576
- 5,383
Was about to uninstall this, but I noticed there's some mods on nexus already. Downloaded ones that drastically decrease the hp of mutants, cut durability loss in half, and an engine.ini that claims to fix stuttering and turns off some of the shitty post process 'features' like chromatic abomination. Personally I think the only real problem with durability is retarded shit like giving you a unique gun from a quest that is at 10% and costs like 13k to fix, but unfortunately no one has made a cost decrease mod.
Still won't fix the ai dropping enemies practically on top of you, but maybe it'll be playable until they get to patching.
Still won't fix the ai dropping enemies practically on top of you, but maybe it'll be playable until they get to patching.
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Sludig
Potato del Grande
- 10,040
- 10,709
Sounds like this company was invaded by modern young programmers that suck and spend most of their time making political statements.
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Utnayan
F16 patrolling Rajaah until he plays DS3
- 16,583
- 12,697
Unless the game industry course corrects we won't see anything better - it just keeps going downhill.
Game services such as Gamepass or Playstation Plus shit doesn't help it either because they get paid regardless if it's good or not and it goes back to the good ol least common denominator development cycle.
And it is going to take republicans and common sense folks an entire generation to fucking course correct this shit hole we are in now from 2008 and deprogram this shit. Basically we need to be red for, at minimum, 16 years straight.
The damage that has been done is astronomical.
Game services such as Gamepass or Playstation Plus shit doesn't help it either because they get paid regardless if it's good or not and it goes back to the good ol least common denominator development cycle.
And it is going to take republicans and common sense folks an entire generation to fucking course correct this shit hole we are in now from 2008 and deprogram this shit. Basically we need to be red for, at minimum, 16 years straight.
The damage that has been done is astronomical.
- 1
- 1
jayrebb
Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
- 14,707
- 14,624
Hearing strong word of mouth from people who are trudging through the bugs and lack of polish.
Should be noted though they did modify their game. If you aren't modding it's a bit unplayable and it's 100% a wait for the first major patch.
Should be noted though they did modify their game. If you aren't modding it's a bit unplayable and it's 100% a wait for the first major patch.
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I am about 7 hours in, just finished the first zone. Game is huge.
That said, it took around 2 hours before I started modding it
- Lower health of mutants so they become less bullet spongy. I've seen streams of people with modded health of mutants still requireing multiple mags to take down larger mutants. Which is fine, but shouldn't be close to impossible to take down the early ones either.
- Reduced stamina cost of 50% when sprinting
- Reduced cost of repairing weapons by 40?ish %
- Reduced weight of items (food, medicine, ammo)
- Added one of the "optimization" ini tweak things, which seems to have worked (Have a 4090 though, so shouldn't have needed to)
- Changed day/night cycle to 4x day. Original settings feel like winter here, where it is dark until 9am then grows dark again at around 3-4pm.
Having played it some, it certainly isn't a bad game. Quite enjoy it. Though switched to native voice over because the English VO is not good. Might be that the native one isn't "good" either, but it's the luxury of not knowing the language and it's harder to tell if the delivery of the lines is off. Have gamepass, absolutely recommend it (with mods), as for buying it, it's currently a wait for sale or patches.
Undoubtedly a game that will become very good once more mods/patches are added, especially things like a full Anomaly mod.
Current wish - mod that lowers rate of spawning dog packs. Not any other enemy, just the dogs.
That said, it took around 2 hours before I started modding it
- Lower health of mutants so they become less bullet spongy. I've seen streams of people with modded health of mutants still requireing multiple mags to take down larger mutants. Which is fine, but shouldn't be close to impossible to take down the early ones either.
- Reduced stamina cost of 50% when sprinting
- Reduced cost of repairing weapons by 40?ish %
- Reduced weight of items (food, medicine, ammo)
- Added one of the "optimization" ini tweak things, which seems to have worked (Have a 4090 though, so shouldn't have needed to)
- Changed day/night cycle to 4x day. Original settings feel like winter here, where it is dark until 9am then grows dark again at around 3-4pm.
Having played it some, it certainly isn't a bad game. Quite enjoy it. Though switched to native voice over because the English VO is not good. Might be that the native one isn't "good" either, but it's the luxury of not knowing the language and it's harder to tell if the delivery of the lines is off. Have gamepass, absolutely recommend it (with mods), as for buying it, it's currently a wait for sale or patches.
Undoubtedly a game that will become very good once more mods/patches are added, especially things like a full Anomaly mod.
Current wish - mod that lowers rate of spawning dog packs. Not any other enemy, just the dogs.
- 3