STALKER 2: Heart Of Chornobyl has great potential held back by technical problems – Review in progress

The announcement of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart Of Chornobyl It was received with a lot of excitement from its fans and even those who only followed the franchise from afar. However, the Russian invasion of Ukraine made its development very uncertain.

Despite the difficulties, the GSC Game World studio continued to work as much as possible, even releasing a documentary showing the challenging process of creating a game in the midst of war. Now, after some postponed dates, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart Of Chornobyl is officially among us.

The title is now available on PC and also on Xbox Series S and X consoles, arriving directly on Xbox Game Pass. I had the opportunity to play the title some time before launch and I leave you with my first impressions in my review in progress.

While the game shows a lot of potential, we experienced severe technical difficulties during the early access period on the computer — something that should be corrected over time. Check out more details below.

Review in progress

To be clear, even after over a week with the game, I still don’t feel like I can give my final verdict in the form of a full review. As this is an early build, I have faced many technical problems that have prevented me from making the progress I consider necessary for an analysis. According to the developers, the problems and bugs we faced in this analysis build are being resolved and this will be reflected in the version that players will have access to, but I cannot know with complete certainty what the game will be like for you.

I imagine that even with the updates that will occur at launch and in subsequent days, the game will suffer from some bugs and even performance problems, especially when it comes to more modest PCs, as is my case with a GTX 1660, 16 GB of RAM and a Ryzen 5 3600. Despite having decent performance while exploring the world, it was notable that my computer didn’t handle as well in the more populated cities of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2although I don’t know exactly how much of this was caused by poor optimization or a bug in specific places in the game.

To ensure that the problem was not linked to just one machine, we tested the game on other platforms here in the newsroom, including an RTX 4070. However, severe performance problems also occurred, making the review process difficult.

It’s worth mentioning that the analysis build received numerous substantial updates over the last week, which has already improved my experience in several ways. In some patches that downloaded the entire game again released in the last few days, the developers fixed around 1000 errors and bugs, according to an official statement.

Still, I think it’s best to play for a while longer and see what the state of the game will be in its first few days after launch, as a considerable patch is also being promised for when the title is released to everyone. With this extra time, I can make much more progress in the plot and, only then, write my complete report about the game.

Fighting for survival

What stands out most in the first hours with S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 it’s its atmosphere and world-building, making the alternate reality of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone even more fearsome and intriguing. The dangers are constant, whether from mutant creatures, anomalies or humans who are trying to get the better of the destruction and radiation. Combat can be brutal and direct confrontations are not always your best option for survival. Speaking of which, you still have to worry about your radiation level, possible bleeding and starvation.

All of this makes the tone of the game very clear: it will be a brutal adventure, in which you will have to think strategically on many occasions, leaving aside the desire to attack everything all the time. This also applies to your exploration of the different areas of the map, there are many times when it is necessary to take long journeys and there is not much civilization nearby. There is even a fast travel system, but going more towards realism, it is more limited and requires you to hire a service in specific cities to go to other cities where this service is available.

Therefore, even your explorations need to be planned in advance. You will need enough supplies to feed and heal yourself, little weight in your inventory to carry the loot you find along the way, weapons in good condition, ammunition and some patience for long walks. For someone who loves survival games, like me, I really like all these details, but I wouldn’t be surprised if inventory management and the limitation of fast travel were a negative point for a lot of people.

After all, as the game can be brutal and kill you in different ways, it is not uncommon to forget to save after a long journey and lose progress because you were attacked by mutant dogs along the way or because you walked over a deadly anomaly without to perceive. To avoid frustration like this, don’t be like me and learn early on to save very often and not fill your inventory with broken weapons that you’ll never fix.

It’s not easy for anyone

Speaking of broken weapons, I think an aspect that could improve in the future in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 it’s the loot we find in our explorations, or at least how we deal with it afterwards. I didn’t find a way to make our protagonist repair weapons himself, so it was always necessary to visit a technician and enlist his services. The problem is that this is quite expensive and the missions don’t usually give a lot of money, so the best way to earn extra profit is by selling the weapons you find around the world. Only most of them are usually broken and cannot be sold in that condition.

As it is not worth repairing weapons to sell them later, since you end up losing money, we learned very early on to ignore part of the loot in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2even though it is so important for our journey and our finances. I believe that a simple change of allowing the protagonist to repair weapons, even if with poorer quality, or even allowing sellers to buy broken weapons for a much lower price would greatly improve this aspect.

I also think that the game’s general economy could use changes, as it is often difficult to have the necessary money in some situations, whether for emergency supplies or even important items that would help you in certain missions. Honestly, these are things that don’t ruin the game, but I believe they made the experience much better for the player and would make successful combats, missions and loot found much more rewarding.

Moments of tension

What I need to say is that even though I made less progress than I would have liked, the aspect that surprised me the most positively are the missions. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl. I say this both about the main plot and the secondary quests that you find in cities or across areas of the map. Even the missions that seem simpler can be fun, but it is the consequences of the more complex ones that win you over and surprise you more, especially when you realize that certain decisions you made without thinking also have consequences.

As I said before, I need more time with the game to really evaluate if this continues to be the case, if it gets better, if it gets worse, etc. Fortunately, the first impressions in this regard were very positive and I believe it should be something very stable throughout the game, taking into account everything I’ve seen so far.

Another very positive point, in my opinion, is that combat also adds a good level of tension to the game. The different types of enemies, especially those that are invisible most of the time, can turn your explorations into a true horror game. I’m not ashamed to say that I’ve already run out several times even though I had enough ammunition, as the tense music, the darkness of the night and me looking in circles without knowing where I would be attacked was enough to apply the oldest technique of Joseph Joestar.

It is worth it?

Although I can’t say anything concrete yet, my general impression so far is that S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart Of Chornobyl it has great potential and could be a very fun game for fans of the series or even fans of Fallout, as there are many similarities in mechanics and gameplay between the franchises. Bugs and issues aside, I’ve really enjoyed many aspects of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2but you can also see some points that can be improved.

As the game will be available on Game Pass right away, you don’t even need to buy it if you want to try it out, just have the subscription on PC or your Xbox Series S or X. If that’s the case for you, I would recommend playing it. Play it anyway and find out for yourself what you think of the game, but if you actually want to buy it, you might want to wait a few days to see how it performs on these platforms.

For my part, I can promise that we will soon have the full review with a better idea of ​​what the game can really offer in this initial life cycle. Knowing the horrible scenario in which the game was created and the likely pressure for a release after so many postponements, my greatest hope for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart Of Chornobyl is that the studio can polish the game in the way it deserves, allowing the game to shine for what it is and not be overshadowed by technical problems caused by development surrounded by such tragic events.

STALKER 2: Heart Of Chornobyl was provided for review by the developer on PC, but it also has versions for Xbox Series S and X.