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Description
The Ukrainian town of Chernobyl was the site of a severe nuclear accident in 1986. In an alternate timeline, following attempts to repopulate the area, another unexpected accident occurred twenty years later. By the year 2012 the area, which was dubbed "Zone", has become hazardous with mutated animals, bandits, and mysterious anomalies. These anomalies differ in their effects, but they all have one thing in common - they are deadly. Despite that, the Zone attracts scientists, explorers and scavengers (known as "stalkers") hunting for valuable artifacts. Military organizations have been formed, fighting for dominance in the Zone.The player controls a stalker who has lost his memory in an accident. After being rescued by another stalker, he discovers himself in a village located on the outskirts of the Zone, with only a single clue: he has a note in his PDA telling him to kill an unknown person with the nickname "Strelok".
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl is inspired by the science fiction novel Picnic on the Roadside (1977) by the Soviet Russian authors, the brothers Arkadi and Boris Strugatsky. The game is an open-ended first-person shooter featuring a thirty square kilometer playing area which the player is free to explore. There are also many characters the protagonist can communicate with; in this sense the game has similarities to RPGs, although there are no attributes or skills to improve. The protagonist may also develop relations with NPCs. Helping a faction will boost his reputation with it, which may result in better items for purchase or information, while attacking a member of said faction will ruin his reputation and prompt other members to attack him. Along with the main quest, the player can also complete side quests, some of which have time limits.
The player has to carefully manage the protagonist's inventory, not only because there is a carrying capacity, but also because weapons and armor degrade as they are used. The player can also use artifacts, which can be usually found near anomalies, to his benefit. Artifacts offer different kinds of bonuses, but often have negative side effects: for instance, an artifact could improve the hero's bullet resistance but also increase his radiation level.
The game features ragdoll physics, destructible surroundings, HDR lightning, dynamic weather, day and night cycles, and multiplayer for up to 32 players.
Screenshots
Promo Images
Trailer
Alternate Titles
- "迷失地带" -- Simplified Chinese spelling
- "STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl" -- non-punctuated title
- "S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion Lost" -- Working title
- "S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Cień Czarnobyla" -- Polish title
- "Stalker" -- Common abbreviation
Part of the Following Groups
- 3D Engine: X-Ray
- Covermount: Level (Romania)
- Gameplay feature: Arena fighting
- Gameplay feature: Armour / weapon deterioration
- Gameplay feature: Burden / Encumbrance
- Gameplay feature: Hunger / Thirst
- Gameplay feature: Multiple endings
- Gameplay feature: Radiation / radioactive poisoning
- Games referenced in movies
- Green Pepper releases
- Inspiration: Author - Arkadi and Boris Strugatsky
- Inspiration: Literature
- Physics Engine: Open Dynamics Engine (ODE)
- Scripting language: Lua
- Setting: 2010s
- Setting: Chernobyl Exclusion Zone
- Setting: Country - Ukraine
- Setting: Future now Past
- S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series
User Reviews
Critic Reviews
4Players.de | Mar 26, 2007 | 85 out of 100 | 85 |
PC Zone | Mar 20, 2007 | 8.5 out of 10 | 85 |
Gaming Target | Apr 23, 2007 | 8.5 out of 10 | 85 |
Eurogamer.net (UK) | Mar 19, 2007 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
Games Finder | May 20, 2014 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
1UP | Mar 20, 2007 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
Gamesmania.de | Mar 26, 2007 | 75 out of 100 | 75 |
JeuxVideoPC.com | Mar 19, 2007 | 15 out of 20 | 75 |
Out Of Eight | Apr 10, 2007 | 6 out of 8 | 75 |
Cheat Code Central | Mar, 2007 | 2.9 out of 5 | 58 |
Forums
Topic | # Posts | Last Post |
---|---|---|
SEVA Suit cosplay | 1 | Angel80 Feb 16, 2015 |
Kruglov taking radiation measurement bug | 1 | Angel80 Feb 15, 2015 |
RPG? | 35 | GTramp (77633) Aug 23, 2013 |
Patch Guide? | 5 | Zovni (10627) Oct 17, 2011 |
Essential mods? | 3 | Indra was here (20853) Jul 29, 2010 |
RPG? | 22 | Yashma Aug 01, 2009 |
Play the 2004 build | 4 | Pseudo_Intellectual (64350) Mar 05, 2009 |
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. cosplay | 8 | MichaelPalin (1418) May 14, 2008 |
Any plot guide yet? | 2 | St. Martyne (3649) Sep 20, 2007 |
Patch it before you play it | 2 | Virgil (8604) Sep 02, 2007 |
Trivia
1001 Video Games
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.PDA
At some point of the game, you find one PDA called "Gordon's PDA". Some people say you find it in some scientist's corpse, but it seems to be more random than that. Reading it, the owner tells how he was first in Black Mesa, then in some Russian town and then here in Ukraine. This is clearly a reference to the Half-Life series and the possibility of that series' protagonist Gordon Freeman visiting the zone as an stalker.The funny thing is how Freeman looks like a total rookie trying to survive in the Zone, to the point that he even has to trade his crowbar for a can of food. The bottom line comes when you realizes that you have just killed Gordon Freeman (which is why you have his PDA), who hasn't been able to survive to the Zone after all.
References to the game
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl was parodied in an episode of "Die Redaktion" (The Editorial Team), a monthly comedy video produced by the German gaming magazine GameStar. It was published on the DVD of issue 08/2007.Weapons
The survival knife that the player character (the man known as "Marked One") uses for fighting is almost certainly based on an HB-1-01, manufactured by the Russian company Izhmash. Information also contributed by 88 49, and Patrick Bregger.Related Web Sites
- The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. wiki (The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. wiki (Game page on the .S.T.A.L.K.E.R. wiki, a Wikipedia style database about the .S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series (English)))
- Wikipedia (Detailed information about the game on Wikipedia)
Mortimer (79) added S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl (Windows) on Mar 20, 2007
Other platforms contributed by firefang9212 (76623)
Credits (237 people)
193 developers, 44 thanks
Producer:
Sergey Grygorovych (‑GSC‑)
Project Lead:Lead Designer:
Andrew Prokhorov (Prof), Yuriy Negrobov
Lead Programmer:Level Design (Art Department):
Andrey Tkachenko (Rainbow), Sergey Kurbatov, Veniamin Tuz, Kim Demidenko, Evgeniy Zaitsev, Alexander Pavlenko (SU‑27), Vladimir A. Efimov, Dmitry A. Shpilevoy, Bogdan Suprun, Sergei Karmalsky (Karma), Yuriy Petrovskiy (Jip), Max Shelekhov (ghouL), Oleksandr Pshenychnyy (LEX), Yaroslav Grabovskiy, Yevgeny Karpenko (Frodo)
Animation (Art Department):Character models (Art Department):
Vyacheslav Goncharenko (Glory)