S.T.A.L.K.E.R Trilogy

S.T.A.L.K.E.R  was a revolutionary first person shooter game set in an open world taking place in Ukraine Chernobyl, the site of a nuclear disaster, populated by bandits, the military, loners and mutants. You fight your way through hordes of enemies to do what you set out to do, And nothing will stop you.




Three games exists, each varying on features and quality. The first game, Shadow of Chernobyl, is regarded the best, the second game, Clear Skies, is considered worst, and finally the third game, Call of Pripyat, takes the middle. Opinions vary, but the reason the Shadow of Chernobyl is consider the greatest game of the three is because of more fleshed out mods. While Call of Pripyat has a better vanilla experience, meaning it's more enjoyable unmodded than Shadow of Chernobyl.

Each of these games has a brand new map, varying in sizes and detail. They all feature "zones", which separates map sections from each other. The first game had the smallest zones, while going into the third game, it became much more open with three very large zones. In all three games, "groups" of enemies spawn randomly wandering the fields and streets and the different "factions" fight each other, even if the player is not in that area. That way, you can come across a fight scene or corpses.

The graphics of this game are still considered good by today's standards, and it has no lack of HD packs available. The weather system is very dynamic and looks amazing. Sun rays shine through trees and make shadows on the surrounding land, rain beats down and it literally feels very wet, battling through thick fog and being snuck up on by mutants. But you better be packing a decent graphics card or prepare for stutters.

The gun play is pretty good and still compares to today's games. One gun had multiple types of bullets, from hollow point, to armor piercing, it has a range for unarmored high damage types, to high penetration lower damage for the high level armored enemies. For example, the higher damage bullets would be used against mutants, which have a very high health pool and many deal back extremely high damage that would kill a new player as yourself just starting out.

I'll tell you about one mutant, the controller it,s called. A humanoid with an over developed brain who can kill you by just looking at you. If you don't use cover or kill him very quickly, he will simply scramble your brain and you'll be his slave in no time. I've had very fun moments trying to fight those guys in the open. The best strategy is using an automatic weapon and running up really close to him and just letting it rip into his face. Don' be surprised if it takes two clips. The moment during reloading could be your death.

The mutants are deadliest one on one, but when faced by a group of armed bandits, or even mercenaries, then it becomes as similarly hard a challenge to deal with. They try to flank you, grenade your current position and protect each others backs. Sometimes the AI does make very stupid mistakes, but it's not noticeable unless you purposely exploit them. The game has a stealth system too, but it only works sometimes, and loading the game near enemies literally makes them know where you are because of a engine limitation.

The best moments I personally think are the ones where you are traveling in a "tight" building or tunnel and face swarms of mutants. Not coming prepared before hand will surely lead to your painful death.
Then come the moments where you find other factions battling it out on the streets and having to either go around or take them all out if they aren't friendlies.

These three games have endless hours of content and also so called "stashs" exist through the land. Packages hidden in every corner containing useful items. Each of these stashs was hidden by a literal person you may have killed for later usage found by reading your victims PDA. A cache of backup supplies if things go wrong and here you are taking his hard earned loot, but not like he needs it anymore.

All three also have a wide range of mods which make loads of adjustments to everything, some make small changes, while others are total remakes from scratch to make something new. From this kind of selection, you will definitely find something that adds to your experience. From new guns, to new areas, take your pick.

Conclusion:

The trilogy does a great job of entertaining you. It is a must buy if you haven't experienced it yet. Containing challenging gameplay adjustable to your needs. And all three have a massive selection of mods to choose from some of which have even been voted the best of moddb.

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