STALKER - Reviews

[MinionZombie]

I'm chuffing all over the game so I am, but haven't played it since this morning, I'm getting twitchy ... might have to cram in a short sesh before I head off to see my short film "VHS" get a screening this afternoon in Hereford as part of the Viewfinder Film Festival.

[capncnut]

With a console game, you press a button and you lock on (like True Crime: NY - you pressed a button and you lock on, it was PISS EASY), that's flat out lame by comparison. With a PC, it's all you, the aiming comes down to you and you alone. As for feel and movement, that doesn't really come down to whichever platform you're on, it's game specific. Like STALKER - you can't sprint & strafe, ergo, realism, there's also a bit of a side-to-side wobble as you run, simulating the feel of running. Weapons have kick back, sometimes lots, also, you have to fight weapon wobble, like in Brothers in Arms - so you're constantly correcting the mouse to improve your aim. Elsewhere, like Call of Duty 2, you hold down Shift to hold your breath, and your aim becomes accurate - and that's realistic, simulating real life - and I can vouch for that, because it's the same deal when holding a camera with no tripod, especially if you're in certain positions. There's more shake until you hold your breath, then you achieve a sort of steadiness that you didn't have before. So ... nyah-nah-nah! What absolute twaddle. You are comparing the entire control system to that of True Crime which was one of the worst games ever made. Lock on is game specific, i.e. if it's a part of the game, it's a part of the game! Most aiming is done simply by moving your control stick left and right, nothing more. No mouse option so you can click and shoot on each head - how f**king lame is that? Besides, a console game and a PC game would be about the same difficulty for you. Seeing as though you cheat your way through 99.9% of 'em.

[EvilNed]

I just got STALKER. I just got my comp back from the shop. I'm just about to get radioactive.

[LouCipherr]

I just got STALKER. I just got my comp back from the shop. I'm just about to get radioactive. Go EvilNed go! When you are glowing green from the radiation, please come back and report your results. LC

[EvilNed]

lol you guessed it, I'm radioactive... Minor spoiler below: I got to pass through that tunnel with the wierd radioactivity entitys but I cant figure out how. The dead guys diary says that I should learn their pattern, but they dont really move in a pattern that benefits me in anyway. It's like one long tunnel riddled with deadly radioactivity. Not sure how to break through, last time I died in like 5 seconds. Minor spoiler end: The game is good. I got some nice graphics, my specs are 3800+ AMD, 1500mb RAM and a Geforce 7800 GTX. The game flows without any problems. My experience so far is that it's an entertaining game that's very gritty and big on good gameplay. I've had several shoot outs with bandits that almost killed me, but with save and load I came up on top hehe. So far the game is NOT as free as I had imagined. Here and there barriers, fences and stuff like that are set up to prevent you from exploring the entire game. Infact, it wouldn't surprise me if alot of the stuff featured on the full scale map is just sealed off. So while it's very open, you can't go anywhere you want too. Maybe you can later in the game, but in the beginning you can't and I figure that's just how the game works.

[Tricky]

*ahem* console max payne,red faction,half life,call of duty,the GTA series,wolfenstein,all auto aiming!some not quite as much as others,but all guided your aim in when you were pointing within the hit box of the enemy. Its annoying when playing online PC games and some people are using aimbots though,they get you before you even pull the trigger,battlefield 2 & counter strike are notorious for it

[MinionZombie]

What absolute twaddle. You are comparing the entire control system to that of True Crime which was one of the worst games ever made. Lock on is game specific, i.e. if it's a part of the game, it's a part of the game! Most aiming is done simply by moving your control stick left and right, nothing more. No mouse option so you can click and shoot on each head - how f**king lame is that? Besides, a console game and a PC game would be about the same difficulty for you. Seeing as though you cheat your way through 99.9% of 'em. 1) TC:NYC was one example, the quality of the game has nothing to do with the fact it has lame-dick aim lock on so you don't have to aim for squat. 2) The analogue versus mouse statement makes no sense at all. 3) I only cheat in Single Player. In multiplayer (either online or with friends) I never cheat...and irrespective of the use of cheats, you still have to do all the aiming on your own with no assistance on the PC. On consoles you get help - and interestingly, people bitched about "Black" not having aim lock on! Clearly, "Black" was a PC shooter pimped on the console. 4) Tricky - nice list. 5) STALKER is cock-rockingly good. EvilNed - press 6 and you'll select a bolt, which is what you should select when approaching friendlies/neutrals, especially when you want to talk to them. Anyway, you can throw the bolt into the anomaly, you have to do it two or three times for each anomaly, but if I'm thinking of the same tunnel as you near the start of the game (filled with electrical anomalies when I went there) you can travel through it, you just have to bolt-kill those anomalies as quick as possible so they don't re-appear behind you and get you trapped/killed. I'm loving this game, I attacked more STALKERS, talked to a group who were camping out, and then went off in search of a suitcase to bring to someone who gave me a 'timed' (1 "day" to complete) mission. The only nuisance with those is you have to keep checking your map to find your way, only your main mission (to do with the story, it appears) guides you with an arrow & distance on your HUD...but it's not a major cock block, not even a flick to the beanbag. Oh man ... STALKER!!!!!

[EvilNed]

I'm on that very same Suitcase mission. I infiltrated the military base after learning the hard way that barging in through the main gates wasn't such a smart idea. So I shot my way through a hole in the back and mowed down any soldiers that came at me piecemeal and quickly dashed for the building where the documents were. I searched floor after floor, occasionally stopping to put a few bullets through soldier brains, and then found the documents. When I was about to leave I was greeted at the doors by three soldeirs who put me down... Bleh! My far best experience so far however was earlier when I had to liberate a fellow STALKER and his gang from a group of soldiers. I accidently put on the final duel theme from For a Few Dollars More, and thought it fit so much that I kept it on. I ran through the small compound, wasting soldiers left and right with grenades, pistol, shotgun and machine gun to a kick ass spaghetti western tune. I felt kinda invincible.

[MinionZombie]

So I shot my way through a hole in the back What do you mean by that? Like shooting through the wire fences you find in the landscape? I came across one of those, so I had to treck back through a field loaded with anomalies and came across a military road block ... dropped them bitches and raided their bodies. Also got attacked by a gang of wild dogs when I was chatting to a bloke in a broken down house getting some information from him.

[EvilNed]

No, the military outpost was just ill-kept and they had an almost unguarded entrance at the back. I wish I could shoot through fences. But the game simply isn't as big as we were promised...

[MinionZombie]

hehe, shooting through fences wasn't promised before though, so that's okay ... you come across any havoc engine style physics yet, though? Maybe there just isn't anything to boot about at the start of the game...? I wish vehicles were still there, but I can understand why they took them out after it was explained - you don't explore as much, you'll miss many sights to see, and what happens if you drive into an anomaly? All tricky things to get around ... still though, sometimes it could come in handy.

[EvilNed]

I once climbed up on a ledge and shot a bandit in the back so he flew down three or four stories. But that's about as close as "cool havocy" I've come across. Still, I'm having a good time with the game.

[capncnut]

1) TC:NYC was one example, the quality of the game has nothing to do with the fact it has lame-dick aim lock on so you don't have to aim for squat. Again, what made it one of the worst games ever. 2) The analogue versus mouse statement makes no sense at all. To you only. 3) I only cheat in Single Player. In multiplayer (either online or with friends) I never cheat... and (blah, blah, blah). Who brought up multiplayer? you still have to do all the aiming on your own with no assistance on the PC. On consoles you get help - and interestingly, people bitched about "Black" not having aim lock on! Again, utter twaddle. 5) STALKER is cock-rockingly good. Change the subject, why doncha. Might as well delete the post while you're at it. It is common knowledge that the PC is waaay easier to control than the console. I have played these games as well you know. I completed Deus Ex Invisible War on the PC in a matter of hours, on the console it was a totally different ball park. Okay, the graphics were better on the PC but that's it. Same goes for Half Life 2 as well.

[EvilNed]

FPS are totally unengaging on a console. Sitting three yards away with an analog stick is nothing compared to being hunched right infront of the computer with direct control over the screen. A FPS game on a console isn't more challenging. It's just harder to control. There's a difference, and it's not a good one. I never once heard anyone praise a game because it was "hard to control".

[MinionZombie]

I bumped into a wood palette and it moved! So there's some havoc in there somewhere, lol...I guess it just doesn't really come into play this early in the game. Went and got some fancy ass jacket from a blocked off underground tunnel and then brought it back, then helped out a bunch of guys in a train yard type industrial building, gave a guy a medipack, I've got a good rating, I'm a trustworthy, helpful kinda STALKER. Mind you, there was one point with a guy in a white hoody being held up at gunpoint by bandits who were demanding his credentials, but he didn't have them. I was gonna try and save him, tried for a headshot on one of the three baddies, but they killed the white hoodied guy anyway...I wonder how you can save that guy?