Best S.T.A.L.K.E.R game?

[NecroLord]

What is your favorite game in the series?

Shadow of Chernobyl, the game that started it all. Arguably the most atmospheric and terrifying game in the series. The Chernobyl reactor is just awesome, one of the most memorable areas in the series and also really difficult, those Monolith bastards are heavily armed and armored and they are after your blood... This game is just really good, even after all these years. Bit rough around the edges, some bugs, but nothing too egregious.

Clear Sky...
Look, I tried to like this game, I really did, but it is a fundamentally flawed one, at a time when GSC just didn't know what to do with the series. The faction system is absolutely fucked, extremely buggy (just as the game in general), the game is way too linear, but it still has that awesome Stalker atmosphere and well designed areas.

Call of Pripyat.
NOW we are talking, baby! Very stable game (extremely rare crashes whenever I play it and general lack of bugs and glitches), the most "open" and nonlinear game in the series. Introduces two new nasty mutants - the monstruous and extremely agile Chimera (careful if you are encountering one during the night, it will give you a fucking heart attack) and the telekinetic Burer (those bastards have some nasty tricks up their sleeve, they will telekinetically throw objects at you and even pull your weapon out of your hands!).
Also has a really cool achievements system (each achievement has benefits and only some of them have drawbacks).
Yeah, this game is just awesome and my favorite in the series due to its overall polish and balance between atmosphere, roleplay and survival elements.

 

[Ryzer]

I prefers Shadow of Chernobyl a lot more simply because it doesn't try to follow Call of Duty's gameplay. The zone is way more creepy and the story more engaging.
The atmosphere in the first game is also unparalled even today.

 

[Vic]

Only played the first one so not gonna vote, but I have a feeling it would still win if I played all.

 

[Konjad]

Shadow of Chernobyl for sure. It is and probably will forever be the best game in the series. Pripyat was okay, but lost the novelty, the story was forgettable, and the atmosphere was partly gone, you never felt alone in there. Clear Sky was total garbage.

I don't expect stalker 2 to come close to shadow of Chernobyl, but I hope it can be a bit better than call of pripyat, otherwise it will be a waste of effort

 

[Freedos]

Call of Pripyat is great, I loved it, buuut...Shadow of Chernobyl ftw because its progression, novelty and atmosphere. One of my favourite FPS games.

I don't think Clear Sky is terrible by itself, but it was a big step down and the worst of the franchise by a huge margin.

 

[Gerrard]

CoP is the best without question, SoC is actually pretty fucking bad in terms of gameplay mechanics, and if you think otherwise it's because you haven't played it in 10+ years and are thinking through nostalgia filter.

 

[Hag]

Played Soc and CoP, and would go for SoC.

CoP is much more polished, well crafted, has greater replay value (well, has any replay value at all), but the final act is shit.
SoC is unbalanced, easy to abuse, is completely broken at times but has the greatest atmosphere and most memorable maps. It is simply much greater than the sum of its parts. Also really scary.

 

[NecroLord]

but the final act is shit.

Pripyat itself is great.
However, I find the Gauss Rifle to be truly indispensable during the final stage of the game, where you have to traverse Pripyat and make it to the helicopter landing site, while being attacked by groups of mutants and even worse, heavily armed Monolith fanatics.
Can be tough, but an upgraded Exoskeleton and a sniper rifle (Lynx) and the Gauss Rifle make this last mission a lot easier.

 

[Hag]

Pripyat itself is great.
However, I find the Gauss Rifle to be truly indispensable during the final stage of the game, where you have to traverse Pripyat and make it to the helicopter landing site, while being attacked by groups of mutants and even worse, heavily armed Monolith fanatics.
Can be tough, but an upgraded Exoskeleton and a sniper rifle (Lynx) and the Gauss Rifle make this last mission a lot easier.

Well, I for one did not like Pripyat very much. But the final mission is one of my all-time gaming highlight : for some reason several scripts did not work properly and the guy I was supposed to protect started running back and forth between checkpoints, plus another side mission triggered at the same time and it ended up looking like a Monty Python sketch with characters doing stupid shit in the middle of the apocalypse. Tried several times, always the same result. In the end I rushed for the exit in a 5 fps hell and ended the game without even having to fight my way out.

 

[Iucounu]

Shadow of Chernobyl is the most coherent game in the series. Great migrating A-Life and reputation mechanics, though it takes more than a casual playthough to start noticing these qualities. It has excellent plot, backstory, lore, level design, art direction, ambient music and voice acting. The cinematic cut scenes never interrupt the gameplay.

Clear Sky is very underrated, but admittedly uneven. It retains most of the qualities from SoC, but with much better graphics. It also adds new mechanics like equipment upgrades, the artifact hunting minigames, and expands on the joinable faction mechanic. Dialogs and NPC chatter can be very funny at times. But being a prequel, the plot becomes a bit predictable. It has fewer scary underground levels than SoC. The final level is broken. Occasionally the game may crash randomly, so it's best to make manual saves e.g. before travelling to a different level. The Faction War feature can sometimes be buggy (but more often you simply haven't figured out how it works --it's not easy). Personally I view the Faction War more like bonus content suitable for freeplaying. In fact the entire Clear Sky game works best for freeplay, I usually ended each playthough before entering the Limansk level and started all over again.

Call of Pripyat is mediocre at best. Graphics quality (lighting, IIRC?) is mostly worse than CS. Ambient music is bland. Voice acting is boring (Ukrainean version) or annoying (English version). Migrating A-Life is mostly gone. Reputation system is mostly gone. Joinable factions are mostly gone. The major levels feel like theme parks. Most gore and offensive language from the previous games is removed (to attract younger players?). The difficulty is dumbed down in almost every way. Although the game doesn't crash, at least back in the day NPCs and mutants often appeared out of thin air right before you (due to unoptimized code), and the in-game cut scenes often caused long delays (not sure if these issues still persist with newer PC hardware).

 

[Iucounu]

Clear Sky...
...
way too linear, but it still has that awesome Stalker atmosphere and well designed areas.

Call of Pripyat.
...the most "open" and nonlinear game in the series.

I don't think any of the games are linear, but they do try to gate your initial progress at various locations. For example, in CoP you can't go to Pripyat right away, and you can't return to the Underpass level afterwards. Both SoC and CS end with linear corridors, though.

Also has a really cool achievements system (each achievement has benefits and only some of them have drawbacks).

That's actually one of my main gripes with CoP. To me, those achievements just give the player a pat on the back in a 4th wall breaking manner, but almost nothing changes in the actual gameworld (what do you get, slightly different trader inventory?). Compare that with SoC, where you get an entire bonus level for figuring out the "true" ending; or with Clear Sky, where you can only upgrade the SEVA suit fully by staying neutral with the Bandit faction. (You can also make the Renegades neutral in CS by avoiding shooting them and then join the Bandit faction, but that may not have been intended by the developers.)

 

[Iucounu]

SoC is actually pretty fucking bad in terms of gameplay mechanics

In what way? I agree the stash box inventory can be a bit clunky.

 

[Gerrard]

SoC is actually pretty fucking bad in terms of gameplay mechanics

In what way? I agree the stash box inventory can be a bit clunky.

The guns in SoC are awful. I have replayed all the vanilla games recently, and I could not believe how fucking bad the guns in SoC felt. They are awful until you are in the last 3rd of the game, because the game's gear progression is structured like a linear shooter. You cannot get "good" guns until you progress far enough. And they are made awful by having terrible accuracy for early guns (accuracy also gets worse with condition). This is where the complaints about enemies being bullet sponges come from. It's so bad that you're forced to haul around hundreds of rounds whenever you head out to any location where you expect fighting (and the game has a ton of fighting, despite what people in nostalgia goggles will try to claim about the zone being empty) because it can take an entire mag to kill one guy.
The only useful artifacts are ones that regenerate stamina and reduce radiation. They are also just lying around randomly and worth peanuts, despite being the thing that people risk their lives for going into the zone.
"Radiant quests"
Backtracking
2 weather types
And finally, the CNPP approach level with your screen shaking every 30 seconds for 10 seconds, enemies shooting RPGs that have a 15 meter explosion radius with no damage falloff AND completely ignoring solid cover that kill you in one hit no matter what armor you have, all the while you are on a strict time limit, is literally one of the worst levels in FPS history. The last 2 levels aren't much better either.

CoP is also the only game where the A Life actually does something, by the way. You are completely wrong.

 

[luj1]

first?

 

[Iucounu]

SoC is actually pretty fucking bad in terms of gameplay mechanics

In what way? I agree the stash box inventory can be a bit clunky.

The guns in SoC are awful. I have replayed all the vanilla games recently, and I could not believe how fucking bad the guns in SoC felt. They are awful until you are in the last 3rd of the game, because the game's gear progression is structured like a linear shooter. You cannot get "good" guns until you progress far enough.

The sawed-off shotgun is a very early game gun that's pretty good at close range (such as against most mutants). The Viper sub-machinegun is not too bad either, and can be found at the latest in Garbage (I wouldn't try a frontal attack on Military with it though). The AKM and especially the Obokan assault rifles are not bad at medium range, especially with AP ammo. The Bandit Poker carries a combat shotgun and can sometimes be found already in Agroprom Underground. Sid may even sell you a Tunder early on with a little luck (though it's very expensive).

And they are made awful by having terrible accuracy for early guns (accuracy also gets worse with condition). This is where the complaints about enemies being bullet sponges come from. It's so bad that you're forced to haul around hundreds of rounds whenever you head out to any location where you expect fighting

Usually one or two headshots is enough. If you aim for the chest you may need a few more hits due to body armor. However, firing pacing matters: full auto is obviously a waste of ammo, but I recall the game is also scripted so that even firing single shots too close after each other will cause subsequent shots to miss automatically.

If you sneak into the attic of the Cordon Military base you can easily headshot-kill even Military NPCs in the room below with just a pistol, then pick up their AKMs and clear out the whole base.

The only useful artifacts are ones that regenerate stamina and reduce radiation. They are also just lying around randomly and worth peanuts, despite being the thing that people risk their lives for going into the zone.

The rarer artifacts in SoC are incredibly useful, since they have no radiation side effects. Many of them are hard to find though, even if you know where to look. Here are some that you should never sell once you've found them:
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Shell#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Battery_(artifact)#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Spring
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Pellicle
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Mama's_Beads

"Radiant quests"
Backtracking

These are good enough, since the nice thing about the Stalker games is simply moving around in the Zone. So any excuse to get from point A to B is a good one; the entertainment comes from the journey, not the destination. I much more prefer this to most other games, that use elaborate quest writing but lifeless gameworlds.

CoP is also the only game where the A Life actually does something, by the way. You are completely wrong.

Maybe we mean different things here. I'm mostly thinking of mutants and human NPCs migrating long distances, even across multiple levels, resulting in endless replayablity and all kinds of unexpected situations. Such things don't happen in CoP.

A couple of nice articles about Stalker's A-Life in general:
https://blackshellmedia.com/2017/08/12/a-life-an-insight-into-ambitious-ai/
https://janjilecek.medium.com/a-life-emergent-ai-and-s-t-a-l-k-e-r-70a9cdde3fac

 

[NecroLord]

SoC is actually pretty fucking bad in terms of gameplay mechanics

In what way? I agree the stash box inventory can be a bit clunky.

The guns in SoC are awful. I have replayed all the vanilla games recently, and I could not believe how fucking bad the guns in SoC felt. They are awful until you are in the last 3rd of the game, because the game's gear progression is structured like a linear shooter. You cannot get "good" guns until you progress far enough.

The sawed-off shotgun is a very early game gun that's pretty good at close range (such as against most mutants). The Viper sub-machinegun is not too bad either, and can be found at the latest in Garbage (I wouldn't try a frontal attack on Military with it though). The AKM and especially the Obokan assault rifles are not bad at medium range, especially with AP ammo. The Bandit Poker carries a combat shotgun and can sometimes be found already in Agroprom Underground. Sid may even sell you a Tunder early on with a little luck (though it's very expensive).

And they are made awful by having terrible accuracy for early guns (accuracy also gets worse with condition). This is where the complaints about enemies being bullet sponges come from. It's so bad that you're forced to haul around hundreds of rounds whenever you head out to any location where you expect fighting

Usually one or two headshots is enough. If you aim for the chest you may need a few more hits due to body armor. However, firing pacing matters: full auto is obviously a waste of ammo, but I recall the game is also scripted so that even firing single shots too close after each other will cause subsequent shots to miss automatically.

If you sneak into the attic of the Cordon Military base you can easily headshot-kill even Military NPCs in the room below with just a pistol, then pick up their AKMs and clear out the whole base.

The only useful artifacts are ones that regenerate stamina and reduce radiation. They are also just lying around randomly and worth peanuts, despite being the thing that people risk their lives for going into the zone.

The rarer artifacts in SoC are incredibly useful, since they have no radiation side effects. Many of them are hard to find though, even if you know where to look. Here are some that you should never sell once you've found them:
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Shell#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Battery_(artifact)#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Spring
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Pellicle
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Mama's_Beads

"Radiant quests"
Backtracking

These are good enough, since the nice thing about the Stalker games is simply moving around in the Zone. So any excuse to get from point A to B is a good one; the entertainment comes from the journey, not the destination. I much more prefer this to most other games, that use elaborate quest writing but lifeless gameworlds.

CoP is also the only game where the A Life actually does something, by the way. You are completely wrong.

Maybe we mean different things here. I'm mostly thinking of mutants and human NPCs migrating long distances, even across multiple levels, resulting in endless replayablity and all kinds of unexpected situations. Such things don't happen in CoP.

A couple of nice articles about Stalker's A-Life in general:
https://blackshellmedia.com/2017/08/12/a-life-an-insight-into-ambitious-ai/
https://janjilecek.medium.com/a-life-emergent-ai-and-s-t-a-l-k-e-r-70a9cdde3fac

SoC is rough around the edges, like I said. The finale in the Chernobyl Reactor can be absolutely frustrating (there are Monolith snipers AND an attack helicopter to avoid/deal with).
Call of Pripyat is a lot more polished overall.

 

[cretin]

SOC and its not close

Both CS and COP have their moments, but overall feel like rushed products from a studio that was circling the drain. CS reuses SOC levels, and COP is a huge graphical downgrade (likely in response to the negative reviews they got on CS from potato players) as well as having a ridiculous, boring and tacky feeling last final third.

 

[NecroLord]

and COP is a huge graphical downgrade

The fuck?
CoP is arguably one of the best looking games in the series.

 

[cretin]

and COP is a huge graphical downgrade

The fuck?
CoP is arguably one of the best looking games in the series.

yeah because you play it now, with mods ffs.

On release it had gutted draw distances and missing effects. It was a clear downgrade from cs

 

[NecroLord]

and COP is a huge graphical downgrade

The fuck?
CoP is arguably one of the best looking games in the series.

yeah because you play it now, with mods ffs.

On release it had gutted draw distances and missing effects. It was a clear downgrade from cs

Always played vanilla, never with mods.
All three games should be played vanilla (at first).
Always preferred vanilla, some of the mods go way too far for my liking.

 

[Hag]

The guns in SoC are awful. I have replayed all the vanilla games recently, and I could not believe how fucking bad the guns in SoC felt. They are awful until you are in the last 3rd of the game, because the game's gear progression is structured like a linear shooter. You cannot get "good" guns until you progress far enough.

I disagree and that's actually a reason I never managed to finish a replay of SoC. When you have played the game once, you know where the goods are. Just you reach the bar, and go North of the barracks helping repel the Monolith attack, enter the corridor entry of the Red Forest and voila, best assault rifles in the game (bar final area of course) at one third of progress, plus dozen of other high tier weapons to sell for huge bucks. Kills the fun and the economy for me.

And if you find early weapons to be bad, just play on master as you should and headshoot everyone. Easy.

 

[NecroLord]

And if you find early weapons to be bad, just play on master as you should and headshoot everyone. Easy.

Another aspect of the difficulty in the series which I like. On Master difficulty you take more damage but so do your enemies. However, mutants are way tougher on Master.
Really, Master is the way to play the games.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

first one.
clear sky was bad and third one was retarded: here you have a 10m tall hill which for no reason contains more lethal anomalies than the whole zone you must cross. no, you can't walk around it. no, you can't jump over these waist-high fences.

 

[toughasnails]

and COP is a huge graphical downgrade

The fuck?
CoP is arguably one of the best looking games in the series.

I really do think that there was a decline in artistry between CS and CoP. Take CS's opening swamp, then compare it CoP's own opening swampy area. The former is more memorable, moodier, prettier, it was designed in such a way that draw distance isn't something you'll notice whereas the grass pop in and Oblivion-y looking distant land geometry instantly strikes you in CoP. Now if only CS's original areas were in a different game. Again take the opening swamp with its ruined church, desolate farms, dense vegetation, imagine slowly navigating thru and exploring all that with an air melancholy desolation that SoC evokes combined with anxiety due to limited visibility, rather than it being overpopulated with warring groups and you constantly stumbling on hostile NPC's or being called to join fighting at some spot that is under attack.

 

[Gerrard]

And they are made awful by having terrible accuracy for early guns (accuracy also gets worse with condition). This is where the complaints about enemies being bullet sponges come from. It's so bad that you're forced to haul around hundreds of rounds whenever you head out to any location where you expect fighting

Usually one or two headshots is enough. If you aim for the chest you may need a few more hits due to body armor. However, firing pacing matters: full auto is obviously a waste of ammo, but I recall the game is also scripted so that even firing single shots too close after each other will cause subsequent shots to miss automatically.

Getting headshots beyond 15-20 meters with the shitty early game guns is pure luck, and as such aiming for the body is more economical. Good luck spending 30 rounds on a single enemy when there's 20 guys around.

If you sneak into the attic of the Cordon Military base you can easily headshot-kill even Military NPCs in the room below with just a pistol, then pick up their AKMs and clear out the whole base.

That's because of the aim_bullet mechanic, which increases bonus damage to the head if you haven't fired recently.

The rarer artifacts in SoC are incredibly useful, since they have no radiation side effects. Many of them are hard to find though, even if you know where to look. Here are some that you should never sell once you've found them:
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Shell#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Battery_(artifact)#Shadow_of_Chernobyl
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Spring
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Pellicle
https://stalker.fandom.com/wiki/Mama's_Beads

The problem with these artifacts is that you can just not walk into the anomalies instead. Their only cool use is the exploit where having 4 of a kind would heal you instead, but you're never going to find 4 of a kind in a normal playthrough, without grinding fetch quests, unless extremely lucky. The artifacts that give bullet resistance have very little effect because of how damage is calculated IIRC.

CoP is also the only game where the A Life actually does something, by the way. You are completely wrong.

Maybe we mean different things here. I'm mostly thinking of mutants and human NPCs migrating long distances, even across multiple levels, resulting in endless replayablity and all kinds of unexpected situations. Such things don't happen in CoP.

CoP is the only game where you will see different mutants fighting each other, because in other games all generic mutants are part of the same faction. All NPCs traveling long distances does is make the find item quests more annoying.

just play on master as you should and headshoot everyone. Easy.

Oh look, another dumbass who doesn't know how the game works trying to teach others. Classic.