Stalkers who prepare might live, Stalkers who do not will die. I was a Stalker who did NOT prepare, and I paid for it with hours of save scumming. This game is ominous, daring you to explore a place designed to be as hostile to you as possible, and in that mission it succeeds with abundance. Stalker does NOT feel good. It's overly technical, difficult to parse, and bleak in every shade and texture. To the extent that I don't know that I can recommend it.

But damn I really fell in love with it. I normally hate survival games, and dislike a LOT of tactical shooters. But Stalker captured the nostalgic feeling of playing Half-Life and other similar shooters as a kid out of her depth and reloading quick saves for her life. And it improved my shooting in other games?!? I genuinely cannot believe how well I've been aiming after getting through this? But be prepared to suffer. Due to supplies running out / armor breaking, I had to make the game's final push with no defense against radiation. It was a hell I could not have expected, and I made it with zero meds of any kind left. A single health kit or radiation med less and I would have had to reload hours of play. Which is going to haunt me more than the zone ever could have.

Amazing game, it's in my top 3. Perfect world building with charismatic factions that interact with each other (mostly aggressively xd), incredible weapons, armors, this game even have limb prosthesis! The character progression is really authentic and rewarding for being a very long process and also for starting as a shitty Lvl 1 Crook. And if we are talking about its lore... there is a shit ton of it which its really unique and interesting.

The worst aspects of the game may be the performance issues while travelling or switching between characters that are far from each other and also not having a polished player-faction interactivity.

Please, play this game.