Tuesday, March 24th 2020
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 Announced and Teased, More Details Throughout 2020
GSC Game World announced the second chapter and latest entry to the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. franchise, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2. The survival horror FPS made its debut in 2007 at a time when PC graphics were taking a technological leap. The Kiev-based game studio since dished out the "Clear Sky" prequel and "Call of Pripyat" sequel last decade, but has since been a recluse to the AAA gaming scene. The development of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 appears to be already underway. The game will leverage Unreal Engine, and there's a fairly high possibility of it being Epic Games Store exclusive given its sweet revenue-sharing model that directs 88% of the sales to the game publisher.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 developers (or at least a Twitter handle claiming to represent them), posted two key tweets. One shows a teaser screenshot of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 in development; and another with a message from the developers to fans of the game franchise. "The second chapter of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. saga will be our most ambitious game so far. It will live to the legendary legacy," the statement reads. The developers didn't, however, state any timelines. "Consider it (the teaser screenshot and announcement) our humble present, with more to come in 2020," the statement concludes.
Source:
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Official (Twitter)
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 developers (or at least a Twitter handle claiming to represent them), posted two key tweets. One shows a teaser screenshot of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 in development; and another with a message from the developers to fans of the game franchise. "The second chapter of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. saga will be our most ambitious game so far. It will live to the legendary legacy," the statement reads. The developers didn't, however, state any timelines. "Consider it (the teaser screenshot and announcement) our humble present, with more to come in 2020," the statement concludes.
27 Comments on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 Announced and Teased, More Details Throughout 2020
Wouldn't trust anything coming from Grigorovich. The only reason the original Stalker even made it to release, is because they had THQ reps on-site kicking their ass for the entirety of development process. And all it took is >5 years to make it from prototype to half-assed game in dire need of 3 dozen patches to be playable.
Now, that he ran the company into the ground, broke all connections and lost all trust in the industry, and makes outrageous claims about Stalker 2 for the past 2 years - I doubt this will get anywhere, or if it does - it'll be a generic half-assed title on third-party engine like UE4
, or nostalgia-induced abomination on "reworked" Xray Engine.EDIT: it's alredy confirmed to be UE4.
I know the UE4 is a good tool and actually does a good Job if you put the Right minds to work with it, but the Xray Engine was one of the Thing smaking Stalker Special. Not out of the box. And yes, only after what felt like a Million Patches the game (and every "Sequel") was playable (None of them were enjoyable Right away) but once they were patched and you found the correct console commands to Change some of the graphics-settings they didn't have Sliders or Buttons for in the menu the game was Beautiful and the Feeling "inclusive" and great.
Sadly, just like you said, it wasn't because of the dev-team doing an amazing Job, but thanks to a lot of bug-Fixing and the community finding out what to do / what to Change to make the game as good as the dev's promised it might be / would be but didn't deliver on that.
With all community-stuff (high-res-texture reworks, community Patches, configs to improve Image Quality, added Features/etc.) and modern GFX-Cards Stalker still Looks good and feels good (just like Crysis and rage can :) ) but compared to other "great engines designed to run on hardware not available on release date" it's purely thanks to the community. Not the Producer. And thus it doesn't bode well to hear what they are about to do --- and that they drop what made it Special and went the "Pub-route" taking the UE4 and porting their textures into it -- and that's most likely what it'll be like. A storyline in between Stalker/ClearSky/CoP, imported and upscaled textures from 2007-2010 and some "ue4 magic" to make it look Fancy, but Nothing else.
Which makes me sad. Stalker is one of the games which I really enjoyed spending a lot of time in (again, after/with all Patches + community fixes for stuff the Producers didn't care About anymore after having to spend already massive Hours on Basic fixes for stuff that should have never made it into the release game --- some pre-access games work better than the final product of all three games of the Stalker series --- it's a bit an "early Anthem" which made it to release of version 2&3 even though 1 was already broken ;) ))
Until something is actually for sale and people have actually bought and played it, I will regard any teasing as just that: a tease.
The render 'screenshot' is also quite fun. Any kid can do this in photoshop.
Nice try, but we know what you are, Grigorovich. You remind me of the power plant boss in Chernobyl series. Denial even in the face of overwhelming evidence that you're full of shit.
Call of Pripyat was okay. It came back closer to the roots of SoC with the creepy atmosphere and underground labs and such, but I felt it was still kind of lacking in the story aspect.
I guess I'm curious as to how this one will play out, if it does see the light of day. I remember some of the things they wanted included in the first STALKER game that never made it in....who knows how this one will turn out.
I am going to be honest - they should have improved XRay engine instead, but I am fairly sure that development of version 2.0 would cost more than to license UE4.
And I am quite sad that the original team went to shit, with all the drama. Though then again, they way, way overpromised, it would have been the Witcher 3 of it's time if they really would have put in all what they said would have for the AI, like it being able to complete the story quests and actually beat you to the end, true "life". Imagine seeing a newbie from starter village actualy getting artefacts in Yantar, with upgraded gear, acquired not via scripted event, but actual, even if offline, XP.
A proper sequel!
Actually... I'll put this in HL3 category of will believe once I'm playing it.
One of the things that made stalker what it was was the game engine
I said come in, don't stand there!
You can't go there!
Hello? Hello?
Marked One?! What the hell?!
What the heck are you bringing me in all this crap for?
Aw man, dog food is more valuable than this!
What is this shit?
...well, I can only hope this pans out. They'll definitely earn a sale from me... even if it is an EGS exclusive. I'd prefer it to be available on Steam, but Stalker is one game that would push me hard enough to sign up for EGS. Good hunting, Stalkers!
What employer has its staff not releasing product for NINE years? :kookoo:
"Studio" re-opened in 2012, but I'm not even sure who works there (37 employees listed on LinkedIn, half of which are supporting staff, marketing and community managers). The old crew split up in several independent studios(one of which made Survarium and abominable Fear the Wolves), while the new generation of talented devs is probably working at either Crytek Kiev or the new shiny Ubisoft office.
BTW, GSC did Cossacks 3 (remake of their first game on ) back in 2016. That's the only title since their re-opening.
Grigorovich basically uses "STALKER 2" tease every time people forget GSC exists. First "leaks" happened right after reopening and before the official announcement, then there was a second flood of rumors right before Cossacks 3 release, then it was an "official" announcement in 2018 (with nothing but crude concept art), and now we basically have a rehash of the same thing from 2018.
www.stalker2.com/
Also liked Stalker in this order:
Chadow of Chernobyl (Awesome)
Call of Pripyat (Awesome)
Clear Sky (Didn't like this as much as the the other 2) Seemed unfinished.
Seems like there's always more questions than answers. Hopefully Stalker 2 answers these and presents more questions for Stalker 3... :D
But I put up with the thing because I like the game and its concept. And I also want to support the dev's so they can bring us a Stalker 2 Trilogy then Stalker 3 Trilogy and may be a Stalker :eek:Prequel Trilogy and so on and so forth :laugh::clap::D:cool:
Playing Metro Exodus right now, simply stunning.
Shadow of Chernobyl had nearly half of its locations/monsters/weapons/gameplay removed before release due to lack of progress and buggyness.
Clear Sky only got some publicity for being a DX10 showcase, but also suffered from content "hack and slash", even though it reused most of the stuff from SOC (including removed locations mentioned above) and had a nice head start in terms of engine and content. Basically it was what SOC was supposed to be, if it was nearing finishing stages (but still not finished).
Call of Pripyat in its essence is a DLC, not a full game. They took whatever was cut from Clear Sky and glued it together with boring side quests and repetitive backtracking.
Clear Sky was definitely a better one of these three, but neither came even close to a finished game.
Awesome looking video, not too pleased about that Day One XCock instead of all platforms, but it will be on PC at some point.
And it better be available on PC via Steam or have a choice on which platform we want to utilize.