There are three games in the original trilogy, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chornobyl, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky, and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Prypiat. We’ll be looking at each one, but S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky takes place before Shadow of Chornobyl even though it came out a year later. What’s interesting about the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. trilogy is how far ahead of their time they were. These are not your standard old FPS games from the late ‘00s. Ukrainian developer GSC Game World did something special here instead, creating one of the earliest immersive open world games in the genre. Sure, open world had been done earlier but the level of immersion and the sheer complexity of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games was unparalleled at the time and honestly, might still be. Oh, and for the record, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. stands for ‘scavengers, trespassers, adventurers, loners, killers, explorers, and robbers’, so basically the entire gamut of human experience. Think of the title as kind of a D&D alignment chart with stalkers managing to hit every aspect.
Let’s take a look at S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chornobyl first. Each game builds on the designs from the last, so you’ll find the mechanics fairly similar. Not the same mind you, but the basics are consistent from game to game. In Shadow of Chornobyl, you’ll take control of a stalker who has lost his memory. Saved by the stalkers at the Cordon on the edge of the Zone, you are asked to kill Strelock, another stalker who has been rumored to have made it to the center of the zone, where unparalleled wealth and artifacts are believed to exist. You’re given some basic supplies and sent on your way. There are a variety of optional missions to choose from and a couple of main missions that pop up and free reign to do what you please to achieve your goals. Seems simple, right?
For the new console release of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. trilogy, there are a couple of slight changes to the game to make it more accessible. Remember that this is originally a PC and mouse FPS, so a combat wheel has been added to allow you to quickly switch weapons without hotkeys. The UI and fonts are improved as well and there are some minor tweaks to visuals and music from the original games, but overall, this release is fundamentally identical to the original games. The biggest difference is really in the shift from mouse to controller, making aiming more challenging and a lack of solid aim assist means that hitting targets is remarkably difficult, especially with automatic weapons. This is actually fairly realistic and using those types of weapons lowers accuracy, but in the game, that means that hitting enemies can be tough, even at close range, so be prepared.
Unfortunately for you, fresh meat, Shadow of Chornobyl is remarkably unforgiving on standard difficulty. Wandering off to take a simple job like killing some pesky mutant dogs is almost guaranteed to lead to your rapid demise and the countryside, even in the edges of the Zone, is filled with radioactive anomalies that will bubble the flesh off your body. Walk into one of these distortion bubbles at your own peril because you won’t last long. On the exploration side, you’re on foot everywhere. The distances are far and you can only see as far as a normal human. The bad guys and monsters can see you from pretty far away too, so your chances of sneaking about are pretty low. Be prepared for combat at any time and from any direction. This isn’t like other open world games. Enemies come at you fast and hard with no warning and are particularly well-armed and dangerous. Anything you need, you’ll have to scavenge too because stores don’t work like other games.
Since you’re scavenging goods off of bodies, you’ll end up with a bunch of guns, ammo, and other utilitarian loot. Each item has a value assigned to it, but there are only a couple of places to sell weapons and you only get a pittance for them. That’s fine because there aren’t many places to spend money either. Instead, you’re going to want to upgrade weapons as you find new and better ones and drop the dead weight. Encumbrance is a serious issue in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and you’re going to need to be as light as possible if you want to be able to survive the rather intense combat. Normal rules of open world games just don’t apply here. Keep the food, the bandages, and the anti-radiation gear, a few guns (one for each type of ammo) and dump the rest. The more you carry, the slower you run and the faster your stamina drains, making you ineffectual at best in combat, and death inevitable.
There are a few things helping you out in Shadow of Chornobyl though. First is your PDA. Just like any menu system, it tracks quests, provides a map, and has an area for equipment and notes on plot. On-screen you have a minimap in the top left that shows your position. It’s got a little number on it in yellow which represents the number of other humans present within scanning range. That scanner also shows the location of any dead stalkers on the map as white dots, allowing you to raid them for badly needed supplies. Your display also shows whether you are irradiated or bleeding and your health and stamina, as well as whether you are crouched or not. You’ll be bleeding a lot in the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games and the judicious use of bandages will keep you from bleeding out and abruptly dying unexpectedly. It’s an interesting approach because the level of realism in Shadow of Chornobyl outstrips anything else of the era. It’s truly a foundational approach to game design.
Missions are equally ahead of their time (remember, this game is from 2007 and is essentially unaltered). You will receive radio transmissions or information from discussions with other stalkers. You might even find PDAs (personal data assistant, you young whippersnappers) on their dead bodies with information on where their stashes of goods are or what missions they were on. All of these lead you to new areas and combat where the enemies are vicious. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is an unforgiving series and Shadow of Chornobyl will definitely challenge you. One of the first major missions you receive takes place once you sneak past a checkpoint into the Zone. You can also kill all the guards, but chances are you’re pretty cautious at this point. Once you get within radio range, some stalkers radio for help that bandits are attacking the local junkyard where they’re staked out. Your job is to join the fray and hold them off. What you’ll discover quite rapidly is that enemies can see you from very far away and their bullets are extremely accurate. Hiding behind cars and peeking out is enough to get you killed and so is running in guns blazing. You’ll have to force your way forward under heavy automatic gunfire with more and more enemies joining the fight.
Unless you’re spectacularly good, chances are you’re going to fail here. There are just too many skilled enemies and they’re good. You only have a few allies and they die fast, even with you backing them up. This is what gets to the heart of what makes the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games unique. You can easily fail missions. Kill enough bandits and you succeed in the mission, but the bandits keep coming. If you’re creeping around sniping them and fighting slowly, they’ll kill all your allies and you suddenly fail, losing your reward and rapidly getting surrounded. If you’re trying to scavenge the battlefield, you’ll come under heavy fire as soon as you’re out in the open. There aren’t many good options in a war zone and Shadow of Chornobyl makes that abundantly clear. Often, the best course of action is to flee while you can and find alternate approaches because the obvious ones are not survivable. The level of realism here is absolutely astonishing and it really adds to the experience.
Maybe you survive the onslaught and maybe you don’t. Maybe you get some information about Strelock and end up going down the road to a factory to talk to someone. But taking too long while he’s under fire means he dies and the lead evaporates permanently. There aren’t many second chances here and that’s an amazing approach to design. Plenty of modern games purport to do this and utterly fail at it. Hell, Dragon’s Dogma II (review here) stated that many of the quests were time sensitive, but none of them pull it off like GSC Game World Does with S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl. With multiple endings, a variety of text-dense and interesting story, and challenging combat, this is one hell of a game.
Moving on to S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Clear Sky, we have a similar experience. The core gameplay is the same as Shadow of Chornobyl, but Clear Sky has more of a plot, with players taking the role of the stalker Scar, the sole survivor of an event within the Zone, rescued by a secret cadre of scientists studying the anomalies. In addition to the open nature of the game, there’s now a faction element that has you running missions for the scientists at the Clear Sky encampment. It’s up to you who to support but there’s a new menu in the game that shows faction progress and who has the most power and resources at any given time. Depending on your faction choices (and they’re entirely open) you might end up making it difficult to proceed in the storyline if you support the wrong factions. There are weapon mods and repairs available now and a variety of new weapons and even limited fast-travel options from stalker guides (if you have the cash). Chances are you’ll mostly want to explore on your own though…the world of Clear Sky is pretty compelling. The only other major change is the introduction of emissions; radioactive events requiring you to take cover and killing every exposed creature. They are integral to the plot, but they will definitely kill you.
You’ll eventually realize that Clear Sky is a prequel to Shadow of Chornobyl rather than a sequel, but the series is written out of chronological sequence and you’re going to want to play it that way for the narratives and references. Some things in Clear Sky won’t make total sense if you haven’t played Shadow of Chornobyl and the incremental improvements to the UI and gameplay are more natural this way. For example, artifact detectors aren’t introduced until Clear Sky and then are improved in Call of Prypiat. Hotkey selection and representation also improves from game to game so going back to Shadow of Chornobyl would feel particularly strange.
Clear Sky is a more narrative experience than Shadow of Chornobyl as well. The storytelling is better and the overall plot is more cohesive. There’s something less primal about the second game though. Perhaps it’s the faction system, which is exclusive to this game, requiring you to at least pay attention to the politics of this area of the Zone. You just feel slightly less free and more guided in Clear Sky than either of the other games in the series. That’s not a bad thing necessarily and it serves to set Clear Sky apart as distinctive from the other games, but at the same time, the simple fact that that system disappeared again with Call of Prypiat indicates that it just wasn’t working quite as well. Either way, the storyline here is more engaging and the revelations about the Zone (once you get far enough) are fascinating. Expect the same level of intense difficulty and the same overall gameplay as the first game here though. There’s no need to go into intense detail on gameplay here because it’ll be almost a mirror of Shadow of Chornobyl.
Finally, it’s time to look at the final game of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone Trilogy, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Prypiat. This is the game that ties everything together, culminating in a rather satisfying conclusion to the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. story. As with each game in the series, the overall ending is impacted by your actions throughout the game, but there’s really no way to tell what affects the plot without looking it all up online. That’s kind of the fun of things too since there’s a degree of replayability in the whole trilogy.
Call of Prypiat puts you in the shoes of Major Alex Degtyarev, a stalker working for the Ukrainian government who is investigating the failure of a helicopter mission exploring the Zone. Eventually, you’ll end up heading towards the city of Prypiat and fighting your way through a host of anomalies, emissions, and killer mutants and bandits in order to find out what’s really going on in the Zone. There are a number of additional improvements to Call of Prypiat. More complex weapon degradation and upgrading, an enhanced UI with more visible quick menu items, and more useful anomaly artifacts top the list. These changes refine the series’ gameplay even further, making Call of Prypiat the highlight of the trilogy in many ways.
As mentioned previously, the factions are removed from the game and everything is on you again, making Call of Prypiat feel more like the original game than Clear Sky and improving the overall feel of openness that the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series does so well. Aside from minor changes, tweaks, and improvements in design, expect much of the same thing from Call of Prypiat as you would from the previous two titles, an immersive and challenging open world experience that is unlike almost anything else in this genre of gaming. The enemies do seem smarter in this final title though, and they tend to flank and attack more effectively, working in teams to pin you down. There are some new monsters too, radioactive mutations that will likely kill you the first time you meet them. It’s an excellent finale experience that really shows what GSC Game World is capable of.
With all that out of the way, let’s take a look at some other major components of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone. This is an old series and the big fear when it was announced was that it wouldn’t look all that great on new hardware. Sure, the games have been accessible on PC forever but how do they look on Xbox Series X and PS5? On the XSX, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. looks utterly fantastic. That’s not a huge surprise since the Series X is a Windows-based platform and these are Windows games. But on a 1080p, visuals are crisp and clean and it’s hard to believe that Shadow of Chornobyl is 17 years old. It’s a gorgeous game and while the polygons are showing their age, the overall experience is fantastic, detail levels are extremely high, and everything runs smoothly. All three games look great and load fast. Slight updates make the huge amounts of text within the game easier to read on modern screens but if you have any visual issues, you’re going to need a pair of glasses as this is still an incredibly text-dense series of games. Moving over to the PS5, things aren’t quite as rosy however. Visuals are a bit muddier and less clean and colors aren’t quite as crisp. There’s a noticeable drop in visual quality from the XSX to the PS5 for all three titles and it’s slightly worse on Clear Sky and Call of Prypiat for some reason. They still look great, but they just don’t look as good as they can. Presumably this has something to do with the conversion to a non-Windows environment but the result is that players on the PS5 aren’t going to be as impressed as those on the Xbox. There are performance patches on the way for both PS5 and XSX however, so hopefully this will be remedied in the coming updates.
Moving on to sound, there’s plenty going on here too. What you might not expect for games this old is that there’s a surprising amount of voice work. Characters are constantly speaking in Ukrainian in the background of the games and main plot dialogue is all spoken English which is both well-acted and features appropriately accented speech, making you feel like you’re in the Exclusion Zone. With each game in the series, the voice acting gets more complex and covers more and more dialogue. You’ll still be reading a ton, but there’s some really high-quality work here, especially for the age of these titles. All this spoken dialogue adds an extra level of immersion to the gameplay and hearing all the locals speak in Ukrainian creates the illusion of being lost in a truly foreign land. It’s an impressive accomplishment.
Unfortunately, the PS5 suffers again in comparison to the Xbox for sound issues. Static discharges in the soundscape and glitches in the sound appear with some regularity. For example, the rainstorms Call of Prypiat had regular intervals of static that wrenches players from game immersion. Reloading the game didn’t seem to help either. Xbox had none of these issues and while they were intermittent, they still show the superiority of the Xbox version of the game. It’s likely that these issues will be patched out as well, so don’t worry too much of PS5 is your only option but be aware that it’s a slightly less ideal version of the series currently.
It’s honestly impossible not to recommend S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone to anyone with even a remote interest in science fiction, FPS games, and open world games. These are absolute gems of game design, refined and re-released for a new generation of players and they’re just as incredible and fun as they were back on the PC almost two decades ago. The entire trilogy holds up extremely well and is a compelling experience that will provide you with a ridiculous amount of gameplay and some intriguing storylines while you prepare to play S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 when it is finally released. GSC Game World has announced that mods are going to be added in addition to performance patches, adding a whole additional dimension to gameplay and a ridiculous level of replay value so for $40, you’re getting one hell of a package. This is legitimately a series that every gamer with even the slightest interest should own and it is well the time you will inevitably invest in it.
This review is based on digital copies of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Legends of the Zone provided by the publisher. Both Xbox Series X and PS5 versions of the game were played for the purposes of this review. Note that each game in the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series is available individually on console as well as in the Legends of the Zone Trilogy at $20 each.
Nate Van Lindt has been a gamer since the days of yore (aka Commodore 64), and has played a bit of virtually everything out there. He's also an avid comic book collector, both vintage and current, and reads a fair amount of sci-fi and fantasy. On top of that, he watches a fair number of movies and TV shows as well. Oh, and he has a family, a full-time job, and lives somewhere in the urban wilds of Southwestern Ontario, Canada, foraging for old video cables and forgotten game soundtracks.