The game is driven along by a core storyline, which you could follow unswervingly for a fairly linear experience. A bleak Ukrainian environment, yesterday.ĭealing with the different characters in the zone is essential for your progress. Another layer of atmosphere is laid down. Otherwise it's untranslated Russian all the way, with warning shouts and incidental language all delivered in the motherland tongue. Nor is it all-Russian language, since much of what you need to know arrives simply in English text form, and vital bits of spoken dialogue are delivered in English, but with a heavy Eastern European accent. I've no idea if the dialogue sounds crappy if you can speak Russian, but the use of language is striking for a Britisher like me. Eventually he puts the guitar away and the stalkers chat in Russian, with occasionally laughter breaking out. Coming upon a fireside camp, where five men in stalker suits sit and listen to one of their number playing an acoustic guitar, is quite mesmerising. Who would make a living in the zone except for damaged, distant men? That's not to say that the game world is characterless, and there's plenty of subtleties that create weirdly rich moments with the NPCs. Stalker's NPCs are far from the refined caricature of Alyx Vance instead they're functional and two-dimensional, but they also seem to suit the game world completely. These characters are almost all forgettable, lifeless creatures. Each of these characters is trying to make his fortune in the zone, and many will have jobs for you, if you want them. You'll start out doing jobs for one of the traders and end up dealing with a surly mafia barman, a vicious fascistic General, a beleaguered scientist, and other random, grizzled men. The stalkers rely on a network of traders to ply their zone-bound business. Derelict the zone might be, but it is far from abandoned. So anyway, what I should have done instead of trying to pass the creatures in the valley was head back to the trader who had given me my mission and purchased some more ammo.
Getting hold of increasingly expensive Stalker suits is essential, since they protect you from radiation and give some armour against the increasingly high-calibre gunfire. Patching yourself up relies on the time-worn standard of health-kits, but also bandages and food, which can be applied in different situations to bump up your battered self. It's frustratingly hard at times, and the lack of a quicksave means lots of ugly sorties to the main menu to save your location.
It reminds me of Operation Flashpoint, where the tension mounts as you track down that last hostile and take his head off before he can remove yours. You're not going for headshots to feel good about your gun skills you're doing it to save ammo, and to stop him from ending your adventure. Rather than the refined gun-juggling of something like Half-Life 2, this is a case of just putting the other guy down as quickly as possible.
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