S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky - PC Review

Customer Ratings:
List Price: $29.99
Sale Price: $11.00
Today's Bonus: 63% Off

Having been a big fan of the original STALKER, I was very eager to get my hands on this prequel. After a few days with it I have to ask: could this game actually have been made in Chernobyl? Because it is infested by pretty serious radioactive bugs! But first things first.

Like its predecessor, STALKER:CS has amazing graphics and, yes, they are demanding. Barely making minimum requirements means barely enjoying the game visually. Having said that, I have to admire the work that went into the graphical design, from playful rays of light and shadows of moving branches to dilapidated buildings and endless skies, the game will grab you from the opening scene.

The gameplay does not veer off the original but there are more customization options, both regarding the weapons and your character. What one will notice early on is that STALKER:CS is a harder game. Not only are artifacts much scarcer (making it harder to save up for that precious suit which will allow you to reach more precious artifacts...) but there are also instances when your character could be stripped of everything! Immersion is one thing, aggravation quite another.

Speaking of which, be prepared to experience not a few crashes and freezes. The game was either rushed and still in beta(!) or this is another form of Russian anti-piracy method: release the game unstable and then keep it dependent on downloadable patches. In any case, wait for the major patches to be released because saved games will usually not work with later patches.

On a final note, Amazon.com customers should count our blessings: everywhere else in the world (including Amazon.co.uk) STALKER:CS harbors StarFORCE but not here!

Thank God for anti-rad and class-action suits!

Click Here For Most Helpful Customer Reviews >>

Let me preface by saying that I am a huge fan of the first STALKER and played the redux mod numerous times so a few glitches and crashes don't annoy me all that much. I got the game immediately upon release and installed and played it for several hours before the game repeatedly crashed at the same point. I went and installed the most recent patch I could find and things became more stable. Unfortunately, my saved games were not compatible so I had to start over from the beginning.... Oh well, the game is fun as hell and I really love the new maps and little changes to the original ones. If you were a fan of the first STALKER this is a must own just be sure to patch it before you play.

Best Deals for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky - PC

I played Shadow of Chernobyl five times in a row. Finish it. Start again. Ridiculous, but true. It had plenty of bugs and issues and required a lot of patience, but it was completely worth it.

Having loved the first game, I was incredibly excited about the release of Clear Sky and have watched it as it developed over the last year. There have been a lot of negative reviews from various sources, and yes, this game is also very buggy. It has the Stalker Curse of hardware issues and wierd problems.

But I've been playing it for several days now with no significant (read as "game stopping") issues, and it is every bit as cool as I hoped it would be. I'm loving it as much if not more than Shadow of Chernobyl.

So, if you're patient and not afraid of the fixer-upper games that GSC is apparently intent on releasing, and you liked the first Stalker... I say give it a go.

Its brilliant and brutal, just like the original.

Honest reviews on S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky - PC

STALKER Clear Sky (SCS) is a sandbox shooter in the style of Fallout 3 and Far Cry 2. As with those examples, SCS is a long game as compared to many more linear FPS games. The extra time consists largely of traveling from one place to another, but this format also facilitates a more complex scheme of interaction between the player and the game environment. There are many places to explore, objects to uncover, and interactions with the game's many characters.

Being more of a fan of mindless run-and-gun FPS games, this is not my favorite game. Nonetheless, there is no doubt that a huge effort went into creating the STALKER games (including Shadow of Chernobyl) and the outcome of that effort was an impressively detailed and well orchestrated adventure. To me, Clear Sky is a thoughtful improvement over Chernobyl and is the better of the two games, but Clear Sky also capitalizes on the first game. Changing it too much would ruin it and disappoint those who got Clear Sky hoping to get more of what Chernobyl offered.

I admit I did a terrible job of playing the game, so probably didn't get the level of enjoyment possible by someone who immerses themselves in it more deeply. I went from mission to mission with very little exploring. I had no money and never did any trading. I finished the game on the VETERAN difficulty level without ever having a suit with any protection from radiation or bullets. I highly recommend having a look at one of the guides available on the internet. A few pointers can save you some grief and make the game more fun.

At the time I installed it, there was one patch available, which I installed. I had no technical trouble with the game under Vista x64 running on a core 2 duo with 4GB ram and dual SLI-linked 8800GTS 512 GPUs. I had video options set to max and the graphics were definitely on the leading edge of what's commercially available. There is a huge amount of detail to the environment, excellent lighting effects, and weather so real you can almost feel it. The lightning storms are impressive. One in particular was just stunning. You could see the bolts of lighting flash in the sky and the entire landscape would flash in harsh bright black and white with stark directional shadows. The best weather effect I've seen in any game to date.

Depth of field was a nice effect and worked smoothly without being an annoyance. Sound effects and voice acting were also top shelf. Aside from what it takes to accomplish a mission, I don't usually pay much attention to story line or character development, so I won't speak to that. The game allows user saves, including quick saves and it allows you to change the difficulty level mid-game which is a rarity.

I recently finished Far Cry 2 and thought SCS was a far better game in terms of variety, surprises, and action. SCS compares favorably with Fallout 3 in that the area of exploration is huge and each place is not just more of the same (as seemed to be the case with Far Cry 2).

The things I personally didn't care for in SCS were the annoying (invisible) radiation fields that you could stumble into as well as the amount of non-fighting game play that is required. I prefer non-stop shooting, but that's not a strike against the game so much as saying that this game targets those gamers who like to get more engaged in the RPG aspects of the story and environment.

Toward the end, the game seems to slip into more of a traditional FPS in that the missions (and shoot-outs) occur one after the other. As soon as you accomplish one aspect of a mission, you are immediately pointed toward the next step and the shooting is almost non-stop. Also, I really liked the environment better during these sequences. It was tough for me because, having no protection from bullets, I was easily killed and spent a lot of time watching the "LOADING..." screen. The game does not load very fast.

So, if you liked the first STALKER, Fallout 3, or Far Cry 2, you'll probably like SCS, which is the best (in my opinion) of all of them. It doesn't have a long learning curve, but take time to learn about the vests and the artifacts and what you can get by trading and upgrading weapons, etc. The manual could be better, but there are guides on the internet that make up for it.

Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky - PC

I played the first one, which was really buggy but incredibly fun. This game had less bugs (1.5.05 retail patch) until towards the end of the game, where it would crash almost instantly. If you saved the game in a place that the game "didn't like," it would crash upon loading. For reference, my setup involves an AMD 6000, 3.5GB (recognized under XP, 4GB physical), Ati 4870 512MB, XP SP3, Ati 8.9 drivers. The 8.8 drivers seemed to cause the system to crash to desktop even more.

Anyway, game-play (when it's working) is absolutely incredible. Immersive, fun, challenging, visually stimulating, etc. About 80% into the game is where all the bugs showed up. That, coupled with the utterly lackluster ending (also bugged) killed the game for me (since I had expectations from the first game). I would gladly have waited another 6 months for a finished game, a finished ending and less bugs. This could easily have been a 5-star game.

Regardless of it's shortcomings, it's still a good game and I will be purchasing any future Stalker games. The plot, game-play and immersiveness are too good to pass up.