History VideoGame / STALKER

** The RG-6 GrenadeLauncher. It's a weapon powerful enough to take on most any enemy in the Zone, as it uses rifled grenades (duh). But there are several drawbacks that severely limit its usefulness: 1) it has the worst reload speed out of any weapon, 2) the grenades have a rather steep arc, which can be very precarious at close range and forces you to aim carefully, 3) the splash damage can hurt or kill any neutral or friendly [=NPC=]s that might get caught in the middle of a firefight, 4) its ammunition is quite rare and expensive a piece, and 5) the weapon itself is extremely rare, quite expensive to repair and impossible to upgrade in the later games. You're probably better off using your under-barrel grenade launcher instead, if you can find it. Or better yet, the [=OTs-14=] Groza's or FN F2000's integrated under-barrel grenade launchers.

** 9x39mm rifles, while correctly depicted with much steeper bullet trajectory, got substantial power buff. In RealLife, SP-6 round were rated to penetrate light pistol-prof armor, while in the game they can perforate heaviest armor up to exoskeletons.
** And that just begins to scratch the surface. Another good example is the drug "Vinca", which appears in ''Call of Pripyat''. The in-game description lists it as "Ukrainian Vikasolum, the artificial equivalent of Vitamin K. The drug increases the blood's coagulation rate, causing small wounds and lacerations to close up faster." Guess what? Although the drug's in-game effects are (understandably) stronger than one would expect, the drug is real, and the effects and description are 100% accurate to its actual purpose.

* ShownTheirWork: Zigzagged. The parts of Pripyat (especially in the third game) and NPP are amazingly detailed, but most of the locations in first two games simply have no real equivalents in Zone (good luck to find sprawling abandoned factories or train depots). ''Call of Pripyat'' feautres many real life Zone locations placed very close together in completely random places. Developers also managed to create one of the ballistics models ever with the X-Ray engine, but bullet drop calcualtion is nowhere correct (pistol bullets do not hit the ground in 20 meters and rifle ammo, when fired across the wide street from third floor, do not drop enough to hit the second floor on other side).
** British [=L85A1=] rifle, whose early models in real life had very poor reliability and so were pulled from mass production; STALKER's lore actually plays on this and states that the decommissioned rifles made it to the Zone via the black market. Of course this is reflected in gameplay as well, with the [=L85A1=] having a ridiculously low reliability rating and starting to jam after the ''third mag'' of firing. Likewise, the subsonic 9x39mm rounds have fantastic performance against armor, but awful range as they start dropping much faster than their supersonic equivalents, just like real 9x39mm rounds.

* ShownTheirWork: At this point, the good folks in GSC Game World probably know more about the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone than the people that used to ''live there''. They took numerous trips there in order to make the gameworld as close to reality as possible, with the only significant changes being that places of interest are put closer together, as trekking through the empty countryside for 5 hours in real time would be boring. The actual town of Pripyat and NPP are also amazingly detailed, from building exteriors to small things like old Soviet-era propaganda posters, foliage and sounds. And as the RealityIsUnrealistic example states above, they also managed to create one of the most realistic ballistics models ever with the X-Ray engine, with correct bullet drop calculation and real life firearm specs being just the icing on the cake. One example is the British [=L85A1=] rifle, whose early models in real life had very poor reliability and so were pulled from mass production; STALKER's lore actually plays on this and states that the decommissioned rifles made it to the Zone via the black market. Of course this is reflected in gameplay as well, with the [=L85A1=] having a ridiculously low reliability rating and starting to jam after the ''third mag'' of firing. Likewise, the subsonic 9x39mm rounds have fantastic performance against armor, but awful range as they start dropping much faster than their supersonic equivalents, just like real 9x39mm rounds.

** Just about all the Warsaw Pact weapons in the game fall into this, like the Makarov or [=AKS-74u=]. The vast majority of the firepower you come across will be Russian-made (as is only logical since you're near Chernobyl) and while they aren't very accurate, they also are ''very'' sturdy and cheap, and their late-game cousins like the Storm or the AS VAL hit like freight trains. They're also common, so if yours starts breaking down and jamming (as long as that takes to set in) you can pick up others easily.

* ArmorPiercingAttack: The game has a very detailed ballistics system in which different ammo has different characteristics in regards to both damage and armor penetration, and each caliber has a few variations such as +P or armor-piercing for even more variety. A special forces Vintar BC sniper rifle loaded with SP-6 rounds can take down even a mighty Exosuit Stalker (who can normally soak 2-3 mags of assault rifle fire) with just 4 torso shots. Also, NATO weapons actually deal less raw damage than AK weapons, but are listed as having higher damage in the weapons stats because their 5.56mm ammo has significantly better armor penetration and thus are noticeably more effective against human enemies.

** Just about all the Warsaw Pact weapons in the game fall into this, like the Makarov or [=AKs-74u=]. The vast majority of the firepower you come across will be Russian-made (as is only logical since you're near Chernobyl) and while they aren't very accurate, they also are ''very'' sturdy and cheap, and their late-game cousins like the Storm or the AS VAL hit like freight trains. They're also common, so if yours starts breaking down and jamming (as long as that takes to set in) you can pick up others easily.

*** Within the first hour, you can go to the sawmill and one of the zombies will always carry an AN-94. While in poor condition, it is easily repaired for cheap (very easy if you grab tools while at the sawmill), but is very accurate, reliable, and uses 5.45mm ammo that is extremely common early on. Plus, you can get a scope added to it for cheap if Owl stocks one. It will more than last you until you can pay Nimble's prices for a Storm.

** The Lightened [=L85=] is dropped by Master, the target of the assassination given by Snitch in the Bar. Master has an Exoskeleton, but is neutral by default and you have the OneHitKill attack of the knife. Kill him, grab the gun and run away before Master's unique shotgun and Exoskeleton-toting buddy reacts. This peculiar [=L85=] deteriorates ''far'' less than the vanilla version, is way lighter and has an integrated suppressor, meaning it doesn't get damage and accuracy penalties for being silenced. If used with pragmatism, it will carry you to the end of the game.
** The [=SSP-99=] armor and L-R 300 rifle. The former, also known as the default Ecologist armor, has the best protection levels against anomalies (second behind it's armored variant) but piddly physical protection and can be obtained for free in stashes or, in ''Shadow of Chernobyl'', if you save Kruglov and go to Yantar after. The latter is the default weapon of Mercenaries and, while having the lowest stats for a NATO rifle, is plenty common among Mercs and later Freedom and outperforms all Warsaw Pact 5.45mm weapons.

** The FN F2000 in all three games. A balance of above-average firepower, precision and reliability, comes out of the box with a grenade launcher and a scope integrated ''and'' uses the common 5.56x45mm ammo. You get it in ''Shadow of Chernobyl'' by looting the bodies of Monolith troops in [[TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon the Sarcophagus]] (or, iwth a ''lot'' of luck, in a stash in the Red Forest) and in ''Clear Sky'' after crossing all of Limansk-13, right before reaching [[TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon the Chernobyl NPP]]. It loses this status in ''Call of Pripyat'', where you can get one at the beginning of the game if you can give enough money to order an assault rifle from Nimble and some luck.

* GhibliHills: [[spoiler:The Oasis]] is the ''only'' spot in the Zone completely free of radiation, where vegetation grows lush and untainted by fallout and pollution and the only spot where you can find the [[spoiler:Fruit of the Oasis, implied to be a fruit or plant turned into an]] artifact, the only one in the whole series to give several bonuses and no drawbacks. Good luck finding it, though. [[spoiler:It's deep down in a buried factory ''Call of Pripyat'', behind an endlessly looping room and a Psi Dog]].
* GhostTown: Pripyat, naturally. Also Limansk.

** ''Call of Pripyat'' has you decide the fate of multiple characters, factions, and settlements based on your actions. However, there is no true Golden Ending because at least one person will get the short end of the stick no matter what you do. Arguably, the best possible ending has [[spoiler:the Loners staying in Skadovsk and kicking out the Bandits, the Bloodsucker Lair destroyed, Duty and Freedom reaching an uneasy truce, the Ecologists getting all the data they need, solving the mystery of Cardan's friends, and recruiting all optional members for the underground trip to Pripyat and keeping them, the Army survivors, and Strelok alive until the end of the evacuation.]]

* GunAccessories

* MeleeATrois: Every faction, be it military, Duty, Freedom or Mercs want to kill someone else. There ''is'' balance, as the two main rival Stalker factions (Duty and Freedom), tend to occupy only the regions their bases are, only doing some raids on more neutral zones, and the military only patrolling the border, with the occasional raid on a strategically important location. Then there are Mercs and Bandits who attack almost everyone on sight (except ''Call of Pripyat'' but that [[EverythingTryingToKillYou won't last long]]). The zombies are self-explanatory. The only faction that doesn't have some sort of war going against someone are the Loners, though they are notoriously attacked by bandits, the military, and some Merc squads.

** Grab yourself a VSS Vintorez and every mission turns into this.

* TownWithADarkSecret: Limansk-13 was this before the Chernobyl disaster. On top of being so remote and secretive many people doubted it's existence, the population was extremely distrustful of non-residents, mumbling to themselves and constantly praising the Soviet regime even during food shortages. In addition, the inhabitants of the smaller villages nearby always had violent headaches when they stayed nearby, something he blames the radio research center the city housed and their massive antenna for. [[spoiler:The research center studied possible applications of mind control via radiowaves, with the antenna being the first field test of their research.]]

[[caption-width-right:250:[[Literature/{{1984}} If you want a picture of the future, imagine an elephant's foot trampling a human face]].]]

Now has a [[Characters/VideoGameStalker character page]] that [[WikiMagic could use some love]].

*** Patches seem to have made the Call of Pripyat version more practical. You still can't run with it and it's still inaccurate, damned heavy, and expensive to use, but you can get a (heavier but allowing for even MoreDakka) version for free from Zulu in Pripyat. Ammo can be bought from the trader at Yanov if get the Friend of Duty achievement, and aside from maybe a sniper rifle to pick off enemies at a distance or a shotgun for varmint duty the PKM will carry you through the endgame, because [[VideoGame/MetroLastLight nothing that can be killed survives an entire belt.]]

'''Attention: You are approaching the troper-secured border of an ecological disaster page.'''

'''You are approaching the troper-secured border of an ecological disaster page.'''

** The leader of the Mercenaries in ''Shadow of Chernobyl'', Wolfhound, is rather evil, however, indulging in activities like randomly murdering stalkers for fun. Even after Strelok eliminates him, the mercs camped at the construction site will remain hostile and sniping any loners that come around.

** Some of the remaining code could cause serious issues; for example, the Yantar lab was still technically affiliated with the Duty faction in the final game, and this could cause a vital NPC to become hostile to the player after waking up from the Blowout if the player was Freedom-affiliated at the time.
** Several were officially added in ''Call of Pripyat'', though Faction Wars was cut because they felt it wasn't working out well.
** This led to creation of several mods unlocking the original game content - and eventually releasing an official "development build" patch (at least, for the Russian version). You think the game wasn't NintendoHard enough? ''You'll have to fight your way through a zombie assault right after exiting the bunker [[WithThisHerring with a knife and a handgun]]''.

GSC announced in May 16th, 2018 that they were working on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 once again and were planning to release the game in 2021. Not much is known about the game, other than that the X-Ray engine used by previous installments in the series has been replaced with Unreal Engine 4, since most of the devs who had experience working with X-Ray had moved either to Vostok Games or [=4A=] Games after the collapse of GSC. After a long period of silence, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 was finally announced as a temporary UsefulNotes/XboxSeriesX exclusive on July 23rd, 2020.

All three ''S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'' games are highly renowned for their incredibly atmospheric setting and realistic gameplay, but be warned; they're not for the faint of heart - all three games are brutally NintendoHard, and are also known for being extremely creepy at times.

* HeavilyArmoredMook: Stalkers wearing exosuits are "walking dreadnoughts" capable of soaking 2 to 3 full mags worth of assault rifle fire before going down (compared to just a handful of shots to kill a basic Bandit and about half a mag or so to defeat most medium armor). Spetznaz EliteMooks are no slouch either, capable of soaking more than a full mag of assault rifle fire before dropping. Military Stalkers fall between Spetznaz and Exosuit wearers. All 3 opponents are best dealt with using headshots from an accurate rifle.

* VaderBreath: The player, whenever they equip anything with a gas mask.
* VendorTrash:
** The Makarov PM pistol, which is near-useless against anything larger than a pseudodog, yet every single denizen of the Zone seems to own one. You'll end up selling so many of them, you'd think they grow on trees.
** While less common, weapons wielded by zombies are so badly trashed they'll [[ReliablyUnreliableGuns explode in your face]] if you so much as approach a live cartridge to its chamber.
** In ''Shadow of Chernobyl'', '''''ALL''''' of the radioactive protection artifacts[[labelnote:list]]Jellyfish, Stone Flower, Night Star, Wrenched, Gravi and Goldfish[[/labelnote]]. ''No exceptions.'' They offer an utterly ignorable amount of protection (5% at the very best) from bullets or ripping attacks such as mutant melee swipes, traded for a prohibitive dump of radiation per second. The only way to equip any of these sustainably is by also equipping a radiation-purging artifact, and then you have to suffer from bad effects such as a reduced SprintMeter or longer times to auto-heal bleeding coupled with less effectiveness on bandage use. The ''only'' reason to gather and hoard these is because other stalkers have a lot of interest in them - traders have quests demanding them all the time, and the least valuable of them sell for 650RU to anyone, but if you sell them to Professor Sakharov in Yantar, you'll get the full price listed on your inventory screen. At least they're ''valuable'' vendor trash.
** In the same game but to a lesser extent, regenerative artifacts[[labelnote:list]]Stone Blood, Meat Chunk and Soul[[/labelnote]] are good on paper and dish out no radiation, but several things make them too impractical to really bother with: for one, the tradeoff for the regen is that your defenses to ''all'' sources of damage is harshly dropped, so you're fucked if you wander into a fight against anything with them on; two, even five Meat Chunks together only heal you fully in a full minute or so (and you can't try the same with Souls, which are even rarer than other level 3 artifacts), a fairly long time to wait around; three, their weight is outclassed by medical items and food, the two main sources of health in the game, which also heal faster and can be easily scavenged off stashes and dead stalkers.

* DifficultySpike: The Garbage in the first two games. In addition to being home to packs of blind dogs and the occasional pseudodog, large anomaly fields and radiation hotspots:
** In ''Shadow Of Chernobyl'', this is where you'll meet the [[AlwaysChaoticEvil Bandits]] for the first time, who'll constantly harass you during your time there, as well as guarding the access to Agroprom. Luckily, they're not very numerous or well-equipped and are in a turf war with the Loners, meaning you will rarely encounter them without some backup nearby.
** In ''Clear Sky'', while you're better equipped than in ''Shadow of Chernobyl'' thanks to Clear Sky and your tangles with the Military in the Cordon, the Bandits control the Garbage and will rob you of ''all'' your money the first time you enter it. Refusing to hand over your cash makes them permanently hostile ([[PermanentlyMissableContent making the Bandit technician, the only one able to fully upgrade the SEVA suit, locked out]]) and what they lack in equipment, they more than make up for it in numbers, as well as being all over the place. The only safe spot on the map, at first, is a tiny half-collapsed building occupied by Loners, which is not emission-proof and frequently harassed by blind dogs. If you take the time to help the local Loners as well as Duty and Freedom in their respective areas nearby, the difficulty drops as they send teams to slowly chip away at the Bandits' numbers and take control of the entrances. By the time the battle ends, the Bandits are down to a few resistance pockets and their main base, which you can wipe out by joining the Loners. Once you're done, the Garbage rivals Cordon in terms of safety.

GSC announced in May 16th, 2018 that they were working on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 once again and were planning to release the game in 2021. Not much is known about the game, other than that the X-Ray engine used by previous installments in the series has been replaced with Unreal Engine 4, since most of the devs who had experience working with X-Ray had moved either to Vostok Games or [=4A=] Games after the collapse of GSC.