STALKER gone gold , releasing tuesday.

[TrinireturnofGamez]

 Think Oblivion with AK47s and mutants , and you have STALKER , same freedom to do what you want in a different setting , comes with multiplayer functionality as well .  The first 'RPG FPS'  i believe , you collect items (with a mass limit) and complete missions with first person shooter controls and gameplay, a day night cycle etc.
   Very large world to explore , like oblivion, and freedom to do so at  your will , promises to be enjoyable . The multiplayer is also interesting : it incoperates the real time day/night  cycle and a system like counter strike where you buy weapons with the money you get from kills.

MINIMUM SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS:
Microsoft Windows XP (Service Pack 2)/Microsoft Windows 2000 SP4
Intel Pentium 4 2 Ghz/AMD XP 2200+
512 MB RAM
10 GB available hard drive space
128 MB DirectX 9c compatible card/ nVIDIA GeForce 5700/ATI Radeon 9600
DirectX 9 compatible sound card
LAN/ Internet connection with Cable/DSL speeds for multiplayer
Keyboard
Mouse.
RECOMMENDED SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6400/AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+
1 GB RAM or better
256 MB DirectX 9c compatible card/ nVIDIA GeForce 7900/ ATI Radeon X1850.
10 GB available hard drive space
DirectX 9 compatible sound card
LAN/ Internet connection with Cable/DSL speeds for multiplayer
Keyboard
Mouse.


http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=74255

[TriniXaeno]

anyone actually played this game?

I've been looking forward to it for so many years

now my heart is no longer in it.

Does look pretty decent though.

[W1nTry]

Hmm seems that HDR is gonna make for some truely terrifying moments in the game... I say HERE BRING!!!

[TrinireturnofGamez]

 played it , plays like an MMORPG , weak storyline integration and not that much polish , okay gameplay.... Good if you love WoW or that sort of thing .

[Arcmanov]

NEVER have i been so DISAPPOINTED in a game in my LIFE!!!!

In my opinion, this game is BALLZ!!!  I'm GLAD I 'acquired' this game.  If I had bought it, I would be BLUE vex right now.
Believe me folks when I say the main part of the gameplay in this game, the SHOOTING, is MASSIVELY FLAWED.

HOW a man go take 3 to 5 9mm bullets to head and still be able to run around and kill me!!?

WHY does the crouch/ low crouch do almost NOTHING AT ALL!!?

HOW COME the highest fps I could get in this game with all settings on high @ 1440 x 900 is a whopping 27!!?
The fps drops to MUTHAF@#KING 13 in some places....... THIRTEEN FPS!!?  WTF!!?

I could go on and on, but what's the point?  This game sucks big, hairy, gorilla NUTSACKS!!!

What an ABSOLUTE WASTE of 10 download days and bandwidth!!!

SSSTSTTTTTTEEEEUUUUPPPPSSSSSSS............................

[Berzerk]

hmmm to each their own. im loving it a hell of a lot. been awhile since ive meet ai this intense, been awhile since that atmosphere of a game grabbed me to this extent.

i dont think the gunplay is that flawed, allyuh patched up? patch fixes several issues,
=

As a rule I never really get into a game, especially one with some flaws till a proper patch comes out.
 v1.0001 March 26, 2007 =-
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Patch Release Notes


-*Important Installation information*-

There are different versions of the patch for the different SKU's released worldwide and for the Digital Distribution version.
After installing the patch, you will still be able to play multiplayer games across the different SKUs, but it is very important that you install the correct patch for your SKU.

If you live in the USA please download and install

stk-US-10001.exe

If you live in the rest of the world please download and install

stk-WW-10001.exe

If you purchased your copy through the Direct Download service, please download and install

stk-DD-10001.exe



Saved Games

Please note that Saved games from previous versions will NOT work with the patch.
After installing this patch, please go to "C:Documents and SettingsAll UsersDocumentsSTALKER-SHOCsavedgames" and make sure any saves that were created prior to installing the patch are deleted.
You will need to make sure that hidden folders are visible on the view tab of the folder options menu.



Connectivity

After installing the patch, please note the version number that has been added to the bottom left corner of the Main Menu screen.
You will only be able to connect to servers hosted on that same version.



The patch fixes the following bugs:

1. Buttons remain "pressed" and value changes on its own in Options
2. Players can kill teammates with the knife when friendly fire is set to 0
3. Game crashed when client player types a server command in console
4. Game crashes when entering a MP game after dying in SP
5. Multiplayer map names will appear in debug text format when voting to change a multiplayer map during gameplay.
6. The game crashes while attempting to purchase an item, after pressing Buy button multiple times from the Buy Menu.
7. The game crashes when the user triggers an anomaly after the anomaly time is set to 0.
8. Purchased affordable weapons fail to be in the inventory when one item purchased exceeds the user's monetary amount.
9. The player will lose the weapon he has stored in his inventory as well as the equipped weapon when the equipped weapon is dropped in MP.
10. The host is able to pause the game during an MP game.
11. Players are able to duplicate other player names by using the "name" command in the console.
12. The user is unable to view a fly-by cutscene if their PDA is open while triggering the cutscene.
13. The user can speed up time with the * key on the numpad in SP
14. Players can damage and kill other teammates while friendly fire is set to 0.0
15. The starting weather in-game does not accurately reflect the starting weather set by the server host in multiplayer match
16. The corpse created by a user switching teams remains in the game when playing multiplayer team deathmatch or artifact hunt.
17. Options "show weapon" and "NPC identification" fail to function
18. The up and down function for the look feature are inverted through out the game.
19. The server will crash when the players vote to change maps, but don't select a map to change to.
20. Players will take no fall damage when friendly fire is set to 0 on the server
21. The player dies when trying to exit out of the skin menu back into gameplay
22. Death by an anomaly is not recorded as a negative frag when playing Team Deathmatch.
23. Game Crash when opening buy menu from certain spot in Artifact Hunt mode
24. The prompt for the buy menu and entry via pressing the spacebar appears when in spectator mode during any network game.
25. Professor Kruglov sometimes can't open the door to the mobile science lab
26. When player stands close to a wall and shoots grenade launcher, the grenade falls out of the map without damaging anyone.
27. Possibility of killing enemies through the roofs and walls
28. When killing Wolf before completing any of additional quests given from him, these quests doesn't change status from "Active Tasks" to "Failed Tasks" in PDA.
29. Problem with quest: "Kill gang leader" when piece of text in PDA is directing user to kill leader in Dark Valley. Quest is completed after kill this bandit on Garbage level.
30. Disappearing piece of scroll belt in Main Menu when the player changes resolution to 800x600
31. Anomalies were not appearing when turned on in server options menu.
32. Game crashed when creating a Team Deathmatch server with spectator on.
33. Problems with ‘Slug’ artifact.
34. Possibility to take the decoder through the Wall
35. Issue with cash in inventory on MP build
36. NPC called Seriy has 3 different names: Seriy, Gray and Grey.
37. Problem with price of weapon in inventory
38. Game crashed when vote for kicking a player ended
39. Rare game crash during multiplayer match, after players choose a team.
40. Exploit with update rate command
41. Wood in barrels is flickering, although there's no fire there.
42. Player can jump between 2 stalkers and table inside the bar and become stuck.
43. Two side quests from Sakharov have wrong description.
44. After playing in multiplayer mode and then starting single player game, Sidorovich has one of multiplayer nicks instead of his name.
45. Game crashed when player fight with pseudodogs on red forest.
46. The game crashes to a non-responsive state (task manager) when attempting to host multiplayer game a second time with an invalid CD-key.
47. On Win 2000 PCs, the Windows Desktop cursor has no functionality when minimizing the game (Alt+Tab).
48. The game will result in a soft crash when a player dies from radioactive poisoning, then immediately falls into the tunnel well that leads out of the Agroprom Underground level.
49. The arrow buttons remain depressed when clicked and dragged off the boxes, thus making the value increase or decrease indefinitely in the options menu of network games.
50. Game crashed during map rotation. This issue occurs several times while playing with maps (Vehicle station, Desolated Village and Deserted Factory)
51. Game crashes when entering an MP game after dying in SP
52. The Host will crash and all Clients will either return to the main menu, crash to the desktop, or the program will shut itself down and return the user to the desktop, when attempting to drop a player while users are In-Game
53. Users are able to pick up an opponent's grenade after it has been thrown and then use it themselves.
54. The players name switches to a random player's name with a _1 after it in multiplayer if no name is entered in the network games menu.
55. Players fail to be kicked, after unanimously voting to remove them, during network gameplay.
56. Player is unable to ban other player, everybody vote for, line "voting succeed" appears and nothing happens. Player that was supposed to be banned still can play and do whatever he wants on the server.
57. The starting weather in-game does not accurately reflect the starting weather set by the server host in multiplayer match
58. Saved game are over written when attempting a second save uses the first saved game's name followed by a "space" and any other word or number during single player campaign.
59. The artifact is unaffected by gravity when dropped during an artifact hunt game.
60. Players take no explosion damage when the friendly fire damage option is set to 0 in the server options of a team deathmatch game.
61. The game will crash, halting progression when transferring from Station to the Sarcophagus.
62. When player wants to reload a weapon, and start fast shooting, he can't do that because weapon continues reloading.
63. The game crashes when a player is killed immediately after they are re-spawned into the game.
64. The weapons fail to scroll when using the mouse wheel after all the grenades have been used during single player gameplay.
65. Minor text bugs.
66. Various balance issues in Singleplayer and Multiplayer.
67. Various known exploits/cheats.
68. Various other issues.


personally i love this game, havent had any big set of issues, it looks amazing, and u gotta develop skill points with weapons (and better weapons) to get better accuracy. it was a bold (albeit flawed) attempt at tryin something kinda new in fps, and for the moment im enjoyin it, especially the atmosphere.

[Arcmanov]

You want a great game with stellar A.I. and great atmosphere?  Play Far Cry.  Better yet play F.E.A.R.
Is it a coincidence that both those games ALSO have a stellar ballistics model?

I really tried to give this game a chance.  I really did, but the flaws I encountered made me DESPERATELY
want to uninstall it and delete ALL TRACES of it from my system.  Imagine getting shot WHILE IN THE
INVENTORY SCREEN!!!!  RIDICULOUS!!!

Not every game can be a Far Cry or a F.E.A.R., I agree with that, but when you see what a fine
technical acheivement those games were, as a developer, you have to step back and say
'hey, they might actually have something here'.  Look at the Valve/Half Life 2 scenario.
Granted, the source-code was stolen, but they were still able to churn out one of the
FINEST games of all TIME, and after approximately FOUR YEARS of development too.

I'm intensely disappointed as you can tell, because I expected so much more.
I don't know I must be missing something.

I mean, just LOOK at the amount of issues that were fixed with that first patch.  Doesn't that say something?
GSC Game World shoulda give a partial REFUND with that patch. 

SIX YEARS in development for THIS!!?

SSSTTTEEEUUUPPPSSS!!!!

*Offers a prayer in Crytek's name*  Oh please almighty Crytek, I beseech thee, PLEASE do not let Crysis
sucketh big, hairy, GORILLA NUTZ!!!  PRETTY please!!?

[W1nTry]

WEll arc... just wait for Crysis... ur rig is certainly up to the task now! that aside GOW SWEAT FRIDAY @ 10PM BE THERE B1TCH!!!

[W1nTry]

errr...

STALKER seen running on borrowed code

Could radiation sickness cause piracy?

By Wily Ferret: Friday 13 April 2007, 13:54
Click Here
RUMOURS ABOUND abound that top PC shooter STALKER contains artwork pinched from other games.

Whilst the rumours are not confirmed, the evidence, summarised here, appears fairly compelling.

Pulling apart some of the game's textures reveals stunning similarities with, for example, water textures from Half-Life 2 and lighting textures from Doom 3. In the case of Doom, some of the texture filenames were even the same between the two games, with "lights_impflash.dds" present in STALKER, and referring to the Doom Imp monster.

There are many theories as to how this could be the case - STALKER's development was notoriously piecemeal, with much of the original team replaced at various points through the project. These could be placeholder textures put in by one team and not recognised by another. But the idea that permission had been gained was put to bed by Id Software's Todd Hollenshead, who told Shacknews that "From what I've seen on the web, it's concerning."

There's yet to be any word from GSC Game World, the developer, or THQ, the publisher. Expect this to kick off early next week. µ

[W1nTry]

An interesting and probably VERY IMPORTANT update from the modding community:

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.  gets a graphics upgrade

Who says April 1st is a Fool's day?

By Theo Valich: Friday 27 April 2007, 16:02
Click here to find out more!
PROJECT FLOAT32 WAS started by an ArsTechnica forum/irc user Nivenhbro (jjwalker), who wanted to check out whether long-delayed graphical wonder can be improved or not, and ended up with quite an interesting modification.

As with every third party modification, installation of this add-on is completely up to you, but seeing the list of improvements and seeing it in action - we give it our stamp of approval. Future patches may break this add-on, but we hope that jjwaker will not quit its development.

In short, the list of improvements features better bump mapping, real time calculared specular effects, full reflection vector calculations, soft shadow quality has been vastly improved and this is not all.

All of these improvements will not kill the frame rate, but rather cost either nothing or improve the frame rate by 20% or even more.

We are testing the game with this one on our testing hardware - single and dual eVGA GeForce 8800GTX ACS3 boards and the ATI Radeon HD2900XT's and so far, improvements are around 20-25 per cent for a far better product.

You can download the patch using our the L'INQ below. µ

NGOHQ.com download link

[Berzerk]

ive tried the float 32 mod. i highly recommend it. lighting and shadows have gotten a signifigant improvement, but not at cost of performance.

if u got stalker installed, give it a shot.

[W1nTry]

Welcomed update for fans and players of the game:

Stalker adds 15% frame rate

Patch sent from video card heaven

By Wily Ferret: Thursday 23 August 2007, 09:23
Click here to find out more!
THE NEW PATCH out for Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl is every video card fanboi's mana from heaven - it adds a free 15 per cent performance boost, upping the FPS of every system out there.

Numbered 1.0004 - just how many patches are they planning on producing? - the update adds a dedicated server mode, some bug fixes and a large number of optimisations to the graphics engine. These optimisations will add up to 10-15% on to the framerate, regardless of graphics card or driver version.

Benchmarketeers: this is a good thing. The release notes suggest that part of the increase in performance comes from moving some calculations of detailed objects to a second core in your multi-core system, should you possess one. Another optimisation re-writes some of the game's graphics shaders for better performance. A new network packets wrapper was also written which will result in a better ping in multiplayer and a less congested network.