stalker posts

Last summer developer GSC Game World announced plans for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, the first real sequel to the company's post-apocalyptic first person shooter that later spawned two stand alone follow up games. Now the official S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Facebook page has posted up a Q&A which gives a little more info on what we can expect from the sequel.

While the Q&A dodges some questions such as if the game will take place in one single zone, how many weapons will there be or if the series' popular character Sidorovich will appear in the sequel it does answer other. The game will have old characters returning while some new characters will pop up and new mutants will show up. The sequel will take place "in the triangle of CNPP, the cities of Chernobyl and Chernobyl 2 (where the huge antenna is located)". It will also have new X-Labs and secret underground complexes to explore and there will be more of a survival aspect to S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2. The PC port will use DirectX 11 for graphical features and the Q&A states, "Since we develop primarily on PC, you won't see any compromises in the PC version."

[Via VG247.com]

It was actually a slow day for news today. That may be the case for the rest of the week as well.

• Steam now has a new bug patch fix for DogFighter available to download.
• If you live outside the US you can purchase and download Emergency 2010 via Steam.
• The official S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Facebook page has some pictures of prototypes for a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. clothing line. Really.
• There is still time to bid on eBay on various cool items from Bethesda Softworks with the proceeds to go to the Brian Wood Memorial Fund.
• Want to see the coolest Kinect-based open source PC program ever? Here you go!
• Finally our sister site Massively just got a new makeover. Nice!

While concrete details of S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 have yet to be revealed, the upcoming first person shooter sequel is already running a contest that could get some of its fans to actually contribute to the game. The official S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Facebook page has announced that fans can sent in ideas for quests they would like to see in the game.

The quest suggestions will be evaluated by the development team at GSC Game World and the best ones will be used in the game with the creators of those quests mentioned in the final game's credits. The development team does reserve the right to alter some of the specifics of the quests submitted by fans while still retaining the essence of the original quest idea. The deadline for entries is March 1, 2011.

The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. first person shooter game franchise has spanned three PC game installments and a fourth is in the works. Now word has hit the internet that the game series about a post-apocalypse Chernobyl could become a TV series in its native Russia.

A teaser site and trailer for the show, which is appropriately grim and gritty, are already online (you can check out the trailer after the jump). Kotaku reports that the pilot for the show has been self-funded by the game's developer GSC Game World. Talks are underway with Russian and Ukrainian TV networks to turn the pilot into a full TV series. If that happens and if it is successful we might even see the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. TV series show up here in the US (legally, that is).

It's Tuesday which means some PC games are getting some price cuts for one or two days. Steam now has both the regular and limited edition of 2009's city sim game Cities XL on sale from now until Thursday. The regular edition is priced at just $4.99 while the limited edition has a $6.24 price tag on the PC game download service.

Over at Direct2Drive they have three games on sale from now until 1 pm Eastern time on Sunday. The recent racing game Split Second has a 50 percent price cut to $19.95. In addition, two of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. first person shooters (Shadows of Chernobyl and Call of Pirpyat) are being sold in a bundle for just $9.95.

The world of STALKER has gone through some precarious ups and downs since its original release. The original game was though to be vaporware for quite a long time. When released, bugs crippled people's enjoyment of the game and the game lacked promised features from the previews of years before. Still, the atmosphere drew players in like crazy, and despite its flaws, STALKER was a hit. Clear Sky expanded the game in some areas, such as the A-life system or the factions, but was definitely worse in others. It lacked the atmosphere that made STALKER so great, and only about half the areas were new. Call of Pripyat is the latest in the series, and its goal was to merge Shadow of Chernobyl's environment with Clear Sky's improved gameplay. The result is a game that is vastly better than its two predecessors, and a fantastic stand-alone game as well.

Next month, Russian developer 4A Games releases Metro 2033, a post-apocalypse first person shooter set in Moscow. Now the development team is trying to stave off rumors that imply the game's engine is based on the same tech used by the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series of shooter games, which take place in and around a post-apocalypse Chernobyl.

Eurogamer reports that Sergey Grigorovic, the founder of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. developer GSC Game World, has claimed in Russian media reports that Metro 2033's engine tech is based on an early version of S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s own X-Ray engine, although improved. However, while 4A Games' programmer Oles Shishkovtsov also worked at GSC Game World on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. he tells Eurogamer that is not the case. He states that the X-Ray engine is not capable of handling the features that are needed for current PC graphics technology. Therefore, "The final answer is 'no'. We do not have shared code with X-Ray, nor would it be possible to do so."

Metro 2033, which just announced it will support DirectX 11 graphics, will ship via THQ in mid-March.

For those interested in the brand new S.T.A.L.K.E.R. sequel, news is slowly trickling in. The developers are opening their arms to the community and revealing... pretty much what we already knew what would come of a sequel. However, in an interview with Rock, Paper, Shotgun, Oleg Yavorsky talks about the improvements to the artificial intelligence as well as the lessons learned from Clear Sky. Perhaps the most interesting facet, however, is this little quote:

We will present a complete set of new locations in Call of Pripyat. This includes the Pripyat river basin and its rusty fleet standing still for over 20 years now, the Kopachi village completely buried after the accident, Jupiter factory located on the outskirts of Pripyat, the railway station Yanov, and, to crown it all – an entire district of Pripyat, modeled in its real scope. Many players have repeatedly asked us to implement Pripyat in the game, so we decided to satisfy their wish.

Rather than rehash old locations, which was one of Clear Sky's major flaws, GSC has decided to include a wide selection of new, open-ended areas for the player to explore. Excellent! S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat is tentatively scheduled for a Q3 2009 release date.

Confirming rumors that were circulated a few weeks ago, GSC Game World has now officially announced plans to release S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat, the third game in their post-apocalyptic first person shooter series. Slated for release this fall the game takes place after the events of the first game in the series, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl (the second game in the series, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky was a prequel to Shadow of Chernobyl).

The story has the player taking on the role of an agent for Ukraine's Security Service that is sent into the radiation zone to investigate what happened to a failed military mission. The game uses real life locations in the Ukranine for its settings and will feature new quests, monsters, a new user interface and more. A publisher for the game has yet to be announced. GSC Game World has already released the first two screenshots from the title.