Nice atmosphere. To the persistant warfare-gamer I would advice to test this. But there is to many weaknesses for me.

User Rating: 5.5 | S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl PC
By gammis | Review Date:
After a pretty vague introduction you are set to run errands around the Chernobyl area. In most games you need some time to get used to the graphics and the game controls, but in some it takes more time then others. This game has some difficulties in game play and graphics that makes it hard for me to continue play. On the other hand there's a good atmospheric feel and a lot of tactical combats that makes a nerd like me very happy. The biggest reason I stopped playing this game before the finish line was the lack of story. At some points I didn't know where I was, what I was supposed to do there, who was against me and why… It takes a really determined warfare-nerd to play this through.

The Good:
* Atmosphere: The surrounding area around Chernobyl is frightful and mystic, much due to the sounds and music.
* Free movement. There is different ways to go. This makes the game more tactical.
* Good voice acting: I really liked Sidorovich and his explanation of the POD.
* The POD has a good mission tracker, even if you sometimes don't understand why you got the missions.
* AI behaves differently depending on your moves in combat.
* Good battles!!
* Cool knockback when head shooting.
* Frightfully strong special monsters, which appear where you don't expect them.
* Cool free roam (of AI dogs and boars for instance, they even attack each other).
* Good inventory when managing it, even if you cannot pause in the meanwhile – which gives you another tactical procedure.
* Cannot burst away the ammo – makes it even more tactical.
* Absolutely not to easy
* Interesting graphical effect of radiation.


The Bad:
* The patches are hosted only at fileplanet.
* When running the game I cannot use my laptops external sound functions or ALT+TAB.
* Bad spelling – I guess it's better in Russian.
* Hard to get used to map functions and other similar controls.
* Bad graphical acting (Mouth doesn't move as they speak).
* AI moving weirdly: Units jumping back to the position it had one second ago.
* Some people just talk Russian, which is a bit irritating for one that dosn't know it.
* Needs more background story. Both about what happened at Chernobyl and about the Stalkers and why they are needed.
* Missed text when being attacked: at some points you'll get attacked when in dialog, then you'll maybe never se that dialog again. So read FAST.
* Sometimes it's hard to understand who is who, both in combat and in free roam.
* Allied AI moves you away from your position if you are in their way.
* I miss recoil on certain weapons.
* Lacking graphical detail – not top notch of 2008.
* Would need more movies.
* Died directly when loaded a save game – wasn't dead when saved.
* Hard to pick up what you want from the loot.

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