WitcherOntheProwl wrote on May 14, 2025, 15:15:
Will no longer support GSC. After the horrible experience with STALKER 2. I am completely done with them. GSC has had a lot of time to properly patch the game performance which has failed. The enhanced does look okay. Just wonder if the enhanced editions will be more stable with mods this time around. I doubt it though.

The release of Stalker 2 mirrors the release of Stalker 1 - it was a buggy mess and was patched into something great over a looong time. Stalker 2 is pretty much the same - it was obvious from previews by people that played different alpha/beta versions of S2 that this would be an unannounced early access release and would take lots of work and many patches. This is why I'm still waiting for it to get really finished before buying it. But I think, it will be an amazing experience in the end.

The big question for this release will be what has changed in the script files. That will determine how "compatible" existing mods are.

VaranDragon wrote on May 15, 2025, 02:13:
Stalker 2 was by all accounts very underwhelming, compared to the original games. I for one decided to not buy it at the last minute. The original games though are fantastic. Some of the mods out there make them even more so, this looks decent, but there are mods that already make the game look even better than this.

That's a weird thing to say, when S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl currently has a 'Very Positive' rating on Steam with 81% of 110K+ reviews (85K+ English) being favorable... In case you've forgotten, the original games were not that much better received at launch compared to this sequel. There was loads of criticism about the stories, janky gameplay, various bugs and performance issues back then, too, and many professional reviews were solidly in the same 'mixed or average' category. Their Steam ratings are a bit higher now because they've benefited from more than a decade of patches and player nostalgia (the vast majority of Steam reviews for Shadow of Chernobyl are less than 5 years old, for example), and it seems a big chunk of the returning player base is having trouble distinguishing between what the vanilla games were really like back then and what they've played more recently of various popular mod packs. Expectations for the follow-up were extremely high, but by all the accounts that really matter, it's been a success.

Stalker 2 was by all accounts very underwhelming, compared to the original games. I for one decided to not buy it at the last minute. The original games though are fantastic. Some of the mods out there make them even more so, this looks decent, but there are mods that already make the game look even better than this.

Jim wrote on May 14, 2025, 21:01:
keep in mind one of their developers died in 2022 due to the war.

Former developer. Yezhov died as a hero in the battle of Bakhmut after voluntarily joining the Ukrainian armed forces in 2022 to defend his country.

A tragic and heroic death for sure but it is a bit weird how it always gets linked to GSC all the time just due to the popularity of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R series. He had more recently worked at Frogwares and quite a few other places (Fishing Planet most recently).

Volodymyr Yezhov has been working in the gaming industry since 2003. Volodymyr started their career at GSC Game World as a QA Engineer and Game Designer. Volodymyr then moved to Ulysses Games LLC as a Lead Level Designer and Scripter. From there they worked at Frogwares as a Game Designer, Community Manager, and Producer. Volodymyr then joined Playtestix as an Analyst and Hogsmith Games as a Producer and Game Designer. Since 2016, they have been working at Timecode as a Lead Game Designer and Producer. Most recently, they joined Fishing Planet as a Game Designer in 2020.

Source

Most people probably know this already but it's worth mentioning:

Years ago GoG allowed you to use your old Stalker retail CD keys and redeem the 3 games on their site.
I don't know if that's still a thing but it's worth investigating if you have your old CD/DVDs somewhere.

https://www.gog.com/redeem

har har, I expect you to keep working 80 hour weeks, even though a crazy dictator is doing his best to destroy your country, family, friends and property. don't let that distract you. keep in mind one of their developers died in 2022 due to the war.

Their home country was literally being invaded by a psychotic dictator regardless of where they relocated to. Did you really think that I thought they were programming in an old WW2 bunker as bombs went off overhead behind enemy lines? Probably not, as you are an unapologetic troll. Self-admitted I might add...

But anything for a 'gotcha' that might give the illusion of intelligence. I know how the internet works. You are NOT impressive.

yonder wrote on May 14, 2025, 18:49:

Prez wrote on May 14, 2025, 17:34:
To each his own. I'm more than willing to throw money at GSC. I can name 10,000 studios that are orders of magnitude worse while their country wasn't being invaded by a psychotic dictator throughout most of development.

FACTS

Far from it.

I have all the sympathy in the world for Ukraine and fuck Putin tenfold (or a billion fold) but GSC Game World relocated to the Czech Republic in May 2022. The invasion of Ukraine started on February 24th 2022. They had their offices in Kyiv which was always relatively safe.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 was released in November 2024. I'm curious about the very interesting math you'd have to apply to conclude that "most of development" happened during the invasion because it didn't.

FACTS.

Prez wrote on May 14, 2025, 17:34:
To each his own. I'm more than willing to throw money at GSC. I can name 10,000 studios that are orders of magnitude worse while their country wasn't being invaded by a psychotic dictator throughout most of development.

FACTS

To each his own. I'm more than willing to throw money at GSC. I can name 10,000 studios that are orders of magnitude worse while their country wasn't being invaded by a psychotic dictator throughout most of development.

Will no longer support GSC. After the horrible experience with STALKER 2. I am completely done with them. GSC has had a lot of time to properly patch the game performance which has failed. The enhanced does look okay. Just wonder if the enhanced editions will be more stable with mods this time around. I doubt it though.

I never played the original, since I didn't have a powerful enough computer back in the day, and heard it was a buggy mess on release. The graphics are still looking 20 years old. It's got that glossy Doom 3 look. But I should have a machine capable enough now, and hopefully they've squashed all the bugs.

There is a bunch of drama going on with mods, but if the purpose is for platform compatibility it makes sense. There isn't anything preventing people uploading stuff to moddb and so on.

I'm pretty sure it's the same engine with some enhancements, but old mods won't be compatible and they are limiting what can be modded because this multi-platform version has integrated with Mod.IO so that consoles can have asset swaps, too. Anything that touches scripts, configs, etc. is a no-go. Which is fine... What the community has done with the old games is so far beyond 'modding' that these re-releases don't even hold a candle to it, other than the ability to simply install and play the classic vanilla experience. Even if you just want better graphics, you can get way better shit than what they're offering here in the official remaster.

Nice. I have been specifically waiting for this shit in order to give the S.T.A.L.K.E.R series one last chance. Glad the "rumors" (well, more like an open "secret") were true.

I recently replayed the original STALKER after playing STALKER 2. Yes, the graphics are long in the tooth, but I stopped noticing after 10 minutes because of how great the game still is.

I doubt that many mods would continue to work with the newer versions, but playing the old versions is easily still viable as far as I am concerned.

EDIT: From the faq:

Will the remasters support mods created for the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games?

Existing mods are incompatible with the enhanced Legends of the Zone. However, the mod community and stalkers who enjoy the modified Zone experience can still play modifications, as the original trilogy remains available in stores.

That actually looks pretty impressive. One of the big complaints had been the aging graphics engine. May be time to give the old ones a replay. I wonder if existing mods would work on them, or what other changes they have under the hood.

Free is nice, since I have the old versions already on Steam.

FANTASTIC games if you are into "immersive sim" type games.