...Wow I actually Spelled Chernobyl right!

Yesterday, in the mail I received my 3 games which I bought from GoGamer.com, for a really cheap price. Doom 3 for TEN dollars, imported Splinter Cell: Double agent, for TEN DOLLARS!, and STALKER for twenty seven bucks. All of which are more expensive at your crappy EB games, or Gamestop, or where ever you noobs buy your games.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is Oblivion with Guns, and the formula is great! The story consists of basically you are an amnesia ridden mercanary, or "Stalker" in the wastes of Chernobyl. You get jobs from some head honcho, and work your way up the ranks of the other stalkers, and doing main missions seems to progress the story, and doing side quests tends to give you cash, or something rare and valuable.

The story is deeper then that, but I barley completed my third mission, because the combat ai is tough. You throw a nade, and they run from it. Shoot at them, and they run for cover. You camp, they flank.

The most impressive way these bastards killed me today, was when they ambushed me outside of a warehouse. I just cleared out the area, so I just strolled out of there and got sniped from atop a distant bridge. I went for cover, and just fired at these guys with my ak-47 by leaning my head out of the door frame. I kill 2 out of the three that were attacking me, while the last guy with a sawed off double barrel shotgun runs away. I run after the guy firing, and he passes a cargo trailer next to him. I run past the trailer, and get instantly killed. A guy was waiting the whole time on the opposite side of the trailer with a crappy pistol, and shoots me once in the side of my head, taking me out. Tricked by unpredictable AI.

Besides awesome tactical shooting, Stalker has a bunch of RPG elements. a fallout style inventory system, which effects your physical endurance, bartering, talking to other people, side-quests, vast area to explore, non-linear gameplay, beautiful, yet dark unique setting, and a lot more features I don't want to spoil.

the crappy parts of this game are very few that I could think of. the npcs speak russian when in combat or idle, but if you complete a mission, and a npc tells you nice job, they start speaking in English. I wish they kept the original Russian voice overs, and added subtitles.

The Fallout style weight inventory system kinda gets annoying since it hinders your endurance, and if you are trying to sell 3 ak47s you just took off a military death squad, but have to walk across the wastes to trade them, it takes forever. Plus it gets annoying when you get attacked by mutant dogs, and you can't run from them because they keep biting away your endurace.

The ragdolls are alright, but if they fall from a high distance, they look like deflated balloons falling out of the sky, otherwise they look great. There is no interactive gore, except for blood decals. I want to brutalize the corpses of the asshole theives, who try to jack you all the time, but you can't so I just drag the dead bodies to a flaming barrel and try to cook them. Also, It would be really helpful if the corpses that you loot would decay to inform the player of time of death, and if you looted the corpse or not. Thats about all I could think of, small shit.

Stalker is a game with depth. The combination of a hardcore tactical shooter with lean rpg elements mesh greatly together. The game universe is very dark and depressing, but with beautiful rusted, and overgrown environments. It even has multiplayer! Just about everything in Stalker complements the other, and makes for a unique experience from the rest of the post ps2 era, incestuous fabrications, that are retarding the gaming market.

What the fuck does S.T.A.L.K.E.R. stand for any how?