Trending
This is probably going to be one of the hardest reviews I've ever written since Stalker 2 made me absolutely love and appreciate the 50 hours I've spent in the Zone for this review but at the same time, I couldn't turn a blind eye to the game's various issues, from technical standpoint to gameplay.
If Stalker 2 was a polished experience, it would easily be my Game of the Year. And I don't mean it in a way that it needs to be absolutely bug free, no. I'm specifically talking about some of the major issues that prevented me from fully immersing myself in this world. I think that what GSC Game World have managed to achieve under the circumstances is nothing short of extraordinary but you, who are reading this review, want an honest opinion before spending your money and here's mine.
I don't mind seeing a mutant floating in the air or two stalkers glued together sitting on one chair. I don't mind when those pesky bandits start bouncing off the walls or skyrocket into the stars when I blast them with a grenade. Hell, I don't even mind when a fellow stalker blocks the only door leading outside of a base. And I certainly don't mind a classic T pose or when enemies suddenly stop shooting at me and start acting friendly (or completely disappear mid-fight??).
It's all part of the Slav Jank experience, I get it. BUT. When you play a game for 50 hours because you want to see the end of the rabbit hole that the story is taking you, only to encounter a game-breaking bug that prevents you from progressing, that's when my patience starts to wear thin.
It might be hard to believe, but out of my 50-hour playthrough, I played 30 hours without hearing a single gunshot sound from my weapons. Yes, for 30 hours, the guns were completely silent. Fortunately, this was one of the issues that GSC Game World addressed in one of the three major patches released during my playthrough but imagine having such an immersion-breaking issue from the get go. It's certainly a bad look for a shooter game.
Unfortunately, my issues with Stalker 2 don’t stop there. I ran into several side quests that were impossible to complete. One major example involved a base defence mission with fellow Stalkers. After we cleared out the attackers, the game still acted as if there were enemies nearby, even though there were none. I decided to leave the area and continue with another quest, only to later receive a "Mission Failed" message and an unsatisfying conclusion. It was incredibly frustrating and honestly, kind of heartbreaking since I cared about the people at that base.
Examples like these are countless and If I continued I'd probably be talking about problems for the rest of this review. It's not something that I want to do as there's a fantastic game underneath all of the bad and ugly that I've experienced.
Starting a review on a bad side is something that I usually try to avoid but I felt like I needed to get this off my chest straight away since there's a lot in Stalker 2 that I've enjoyed.
STORY: DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
The story follows Skif, a seemingly random bloke who lived his life on the Mainland until one day, an anomaly obliterates his home, leaving behind a mysterious artefact. Eager to get to the bottom of this, our curious protagonists decides it's time to pay a visit to the Zone.
As soon as Skif enter the Zone, things go south - he's attacked by an unknown group who steals his scanner and artefact. From there, Skif's main mission is to retrieve what's been stolen and teach the culprits a couple of lessons in the process.
The story sounds simple but believe me, it's anything but that. What started as a search for the scanner will turn into something much grander, with big plot twists and discoveries that will make your jaw drop. You'll have to make some tough decisions too in terms of who you want to support, which will have a major impact on the ending and can lock out some plot branches entirely.
To see every bit of content the game has to offer, you'll have to play Stalker 2 several times, which is no easy task since the story is 40+ hours long. That's not a bad thing as I never felt the story was being dragged out unnecessarily. Quite the contrary, the pacing was fairly balanced with few slowdowns here and there.
I was particularly impressed by the storytelling parts explaining the Zone, the origins of mutants and the beliefs of various factions. For someone who played Stalker games back in high school (I'm 30+ now) and knows just a tiny bit about the world, this was a welcomed addition and certainly made the story easier to follow.
Stalker fans will be ecstatic to hear that the story felt like a true love letter from GSC Game with returning characters and major reveals. It's evident that the developer poured their heart and soul into writing the story, and characters and making the Zone a believable place. Kudos for that.
Side quests are mostly great too. There are some simple fetch quests that aren't that memorable and serve as filler but there are plenty of fantastic side quests in the Zone that reminded me of the quality seen in The Witcher 3.
In one of the smaller side quests, I stumble upon a group of scavengers and their leader, who suspiciously tells me about the location of a valuable stash nearby. I didn't trust him fully but I went to find the stash, only to be ambushed by his loyal soldiers (and mutant dogs who joined the party). I deal with the bandits and sprint back to their camp which is deserted, obviously.
Ten hours after that encounter as I was exploring the Zone looking for loot, I found a ship in the middle of the swamp and four guys enjoying Vodka around a campfire. I approach them and recognize their leader who tried to set me up (prick barely recognises me). Guns go off and he and his buddies are now worm food and I go into the sunset with a smile on my face and their weapons in my inventory.
THE ZONE
I can say with certainty that The Zone is one of the most unique worlds I've ever experienced in video games. It feels alive at every square kilometre, like a separate entity watching everything we do there. It's really hard to put into words the feeling it evokes inside of you.
Stalker 2 aims to deliver a sense of loneliness with its storytelling and worldbuilding but I always had a feeling that despite being alone in this harsh space, The Zone was there, sensing, watching.
I'm genuinely not sure how GSC Game World managed to pull it off. Perhaps it's the mesmerising anomalies, which are like living beings themselves or it's other humans there looting, fighting with each other or the terrifying mutants.
The atmosphere is second to none, especially during the night, thunderstorms or Emissions. The immersion it creates is unparalleled and you really have to see it to believe it. It's genuinely unlike anything I've ever experienced in video games before, making exploration a very enjoyable experience.
Speaking about exploration, there's plenty to be found in Stalker 2. The world is jam-packed with hand-crafted locations (no procedural generation was used) which contain valuable loot from weapons to suits and artefacts.
I never felt bored going from one location to another as I explored the world but I'd wish there was more variety in content. It gets a bit repetitive when all you do is explore similar buildings and underground labs. But this is a minor nitpick and certainly not something that ruins the experience.
GAMEPLAY
GSC Game World have nailed the classic feel and gameplay of Stalker 2 with some improvements that makes the game more snappy and just a bit less clunky. The combat feels slow and heavy, encouraging a tactical approach instead of Rambo, run and gun, style.
I've played on "Stalker" difficulty, which is recommended by the dev team and can say that the game was very challenging, especially in the latter parts. Enemies won't go down easily unless you aim for headshots which mean instant kill most of the time.
Mutants are obviously the most dangerous enemy types in the game but other than Chimera, I've found that a couple of headshots or close shotgun blasts to the body will make Controllers, Bloodsuckers and Burers go down quicky.
Some of the experiences I've had with mutants are frankly terrifying, especially my first encounter with Controller, which made me shiver in fear. I've genuinely had a feeling that ghostly figures that appeared on the screen during the fight were coming out of my monitor.
You can avoid most of the fights in the open world by simply sneaking past enemies or running away from the combat but in those linear underground levels, you'll have to face your fears.
That's where the arsenal of weapons comes in. In Stalker 2, you'll get to choose from pistols, shotguns, SMGs, Assault Rifles and Snipers. Early in the game, I played mostly with an Assault Rifle but in the later stages, stronger shotguns or sniper rifles were pretty much obligatory as the enemies got a lot tougher to kill.
Weapons will be fairly inaccurate if you spray and pray, making combat really all about finding a good position for that perfect shot, while avoiding serious gunfire. The combat would be plenty of fun if the AI had a brain cell or two in their skulls. In a nutshell, the AI in Stalker 2 is terrible and at times, completely broken.
Human enemies don't seem to have any strategy in combat. They'll often run into the open making themselves easy prey for your sniper shots or run into the same cover where their buddy died just a few seconds ago.
They won't rush you, quite the contrary, I've had encounters where they would stay in one place for minutes, before eventually saying "Brothers, he's gone" even though I'm just metres away. They don't respond to your flashlight or any sounds you make while sneaking around. I've basically rolled over barrels and knocked off stuff from shelves in their near vicinity but they didn't respond.
One thing they're good at is hitting you from poor guns across large distances. Just a small peak over the hill and the threat indicator will appear, suggesting that enemies are slowly becoming aware of your presence. Seconds later, they'll start blasting and you'll feel like a bullet magnet.
The AI is certainly a far cry from the A-Life 2.0 system which GSC Game World promised, even though, on occasions, you'll see some gunfights between factions with mutants joining in for the ultimate carnage.
The survival aspect of the game consists of making sure you're eating and sleeping well, and taking care of your guns, which can be quite expensive. On numerous occasions I'd spend all my hard-earned coupons on simply repairing my gear and weapons, leaving me with nothing in the bank to buy a new shiny piece of equipment.
Preparing for every mission is of critical importance. You don't want to go into the world searching for artefacts (which give you unique benefits but also debuffs) or stashes before you've made sure to have everything you need like ammo, food and healing items while at the same time discarding unnecessary items which will take up space in your inventory.
Equally important is what you do with the stuff you find. You can sell it to vendors and use the money to upgrade weapons which is what I did, keep it in your stash if you're a hoarder or use it in the next mission. The choice is yours.
My main takeaway from Stalker 2's gameplay loop was that you should take your time. Don't rush this one. Play at a slow pace, plan your expeditions, take in the world and have fun. It's the best advice I can give you.
GRAPHICS, SOUND AND PERFORMANCE
Stalker 2 looks and sounds incredible. I know, I know. You're probably wondering how on earth I'm praising the sound when I just complained about not hearing my weapons for 30 hours. Well, once it finally started working as intended, I was impressed.
Guns sound great, the mix is not overly compressed resulting in a realistic sound, especially in open areas, where you can hear gunfights across large distances. It elevates the atmosphere and makes the world feel alive and believable.
I also really appreciated the slow, ambient music that plays during exploration. Paired with the game’s stunning visuals, it adds an extra layer of immersion — one of Stalker 2’s greatest strengths. I had one moment in particular that really stood out: as I was returning to the base from an expedition, it got a bit dark and it started to rain. The music and the picture at that moment came together so strongly, creating an experience that made me stop for a second, just take it all in and utter a silent "Wow".
In terms of raw visual fidelity, Stalker 2 looks absolutely stunning, especially in open areas where Unreal Engine 5's Lumen does an incredible job of presenting realistic scenery. Foliage is rich too as well as environmental detail. The most important part is that everything feels part of the world. I've never run into a location or an object that feels like it doesn't belong there.
Some of the interiors, especially underground labs, buildings and tunnels can look a bit empty, lacking that fidelity and level of detail that's seen in the rest of the game but it's not a big deal, to be honest.
When it comes to performance, there are not many positives to be said, unfortunately. On my PC, I've experienced several major issues including stuttering, frame-rate drops, cutscenes that looked like slide shows, crashes to the desktop, freezing, memory leaks and so on.
On Max settings, 4K resolution with DLSS set to Balanced, I was getting around 65-80 FPS depending on the location. With Frame Generation, FPS would rise to 90-100 FPS but that didn't matter much since the stuttering would still persist.
The performance in Stalker 2 leaves a lot to be desired so if you have a modest PC, I'd suggest you wait for more patches before playing for optimal experience.
CONCLUSION
Like I said at the beginning of this review If Stalker 2 didn't have so many serious issues, it would be my Game of the Year. It has a great story, memorable characters, a unique world to explore, and great visual presentation - pretty much everything to keep you immersed for hours.
And it breaks my heart to have to lower the score due to poor optimisation and technical problems. I'd be delighted to give Stalker a strong 90/100 or even closer to a full 100 score but performance and polish are an important part of video games that I cannot overlook.
Stalker 2 is not the first game to suffer from these issues but what sets it apart is how frequent and game-breaking they are. At the end of the day, it's simply too much, no matter how good the story, the world or gameplay is.
I'd be happy to revisit this review in the future when GSC Game World hopefully purge most of the problems and potentially give the game a higher score but my experience for this review was as described, hence the score below.
The Good
Classic Stalker 2 gameplay and feel- Incredible atmosphere that makes the zone feel like a living, breathing world
- A set of intriguing and compelling characters
- Strong story with plenty of twists and turns that will take you down the rabbit hole
- Stunning visual presentation
- Feels like a love letter to Stalker fans
The Bad
A swarm of serious bugs and technical issues- Poor performance and stuttering on a competent PC
- Broken AI and quests
