A group of Russian modders are recreating Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl in Cryengine 2 which Crysis uses. I'm not 100 percent sure how far along they are but what I've see so far looks really good. As someone who really liked the gun play in Crysis and the overall atmosphere of the Stalker games it's going to be really cool to see these two put together into the same game.
The video below shows the mod in an early state. The Zone really comes alive in this engine and these guys are really doing a great job. I can't understand what's being said as I don't speak the language (I'm assuming it's Russian) being spoken but just watching it is enough for me it looks really good.
I just saw this video today and they seem to be further along in the process. The guns look a lot better and more in line with what you'd see in the original Stalker games, we also have a brief appearance of the Scar from Crysis and I wonder if they plan on keeping that in. They also show off the drivable cars which is really cool. If you look when he's driving the hands don't look right to me. I've seen other Crysis mods where the hands are suppose to be flesh and they never look right, like you can still see the Nanosuit under the skin textures. I don't know if that's something they can fix but I hope they do.
I'm extremely excited to see this come out if it does. I know huge mod projects like this can fizzle out and never be released but I hope this one makes it out. I don't even care if it's all in Russian when it's released I will still play it.
I will post updates about this whenever I hear new stuff but I can only go by what I read as I don't speak what I'm assuming is Russian.
You can check out their site too but again it's in what I think is Russian.
http://ap-pro.ru/
Showing posts with label Mods. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mods. Show all posts
Friday, March 18, 2011
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Once More Into The Zone - STALKER: Clear Sky (Clear Sky Complete Mod) Review
As I've said a bunch on this blog anyone who reads what I write knows I love Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl. I've played SOC countless times, Vanilla and with Mods installed. I absolutely love everything SOC brings to the table but I have never played any of the follow up games, Clear Sky or Call of Pripyat. I decided that was extremely uncalled for and decided to right this wrong and finally play both games.
Just moments ago I finished Stalker: Clear Sky with the Clear Sky: Complete Mod installed. I had previously tried to play Clear Sky but was met with glitches, bugs and other assorted crap keeping me from playing the game. The biggest one I encountered was early on where I just randomly died as I hit the quick save key. Well guess what happened? Yep, the death was in the quick save. I would of lost a lot of progress if I reloaded the auto save so I decided to just forget Clear Sky and go play Shadow of Chernobyl again.
Why did I wait until now to try playing this with a Mod installed? I like to play through games the first time as pure as possible or vanilla as some people call it. Even if I'm playing some really old game that needs a source port to run right on modern PCs I try to get one that doesn't change the base game at all. Complete is a series of mods that does this very thing. You can find a Complete mod for all three Stalker games and I figured if I was going to go through the buggy mess that is Clear Sky I should try Complete with it, so that's what I did. How does this notoriously glitch filled game handle with this mod and how is the game overall? Well read on to find this out!
Clear Sky is the second game in the Stalker series but it's a prequel to Shadow of Chernobyl taking place immediately before the events of the first game. You play the role of a Stalker named Scar. In the intro you see Scar leading a group of scientists through the Zone when an emission hits, killing all the scientists but leaving Scar alive. He's rescued by a group called Clear Sky and after awakening is told he has a connection with the Zone and further emissions will cause his central nervous system to break down and eventually kill him. From the outset that is your mission, to find out what is causing the Zone to lash out and put a stop to it. I won't go into it much more as it can ruin the story of SOC if you haven't played that yet as the two games do go together.
Clear Sky plays a lot like Shadow of Chernobyl which is to be expected but they did change up some of the mechanics, some of these changes are great and some are done so poorly they distract from the overall game. You go through the game in a first person view shooting at enemies and looking for loot to survive. You can access an inventory and equip Artifacts but even this has changed a little.
The biggest game change is the upgrade system, all weapons and armor can be upgraded through NPC characters in the major camps in the game. Weapons can be made to shoot faster, have better accuracy or even accept a different caliber of ammo. Armor can be made to offer better protection, add a gas mask or better night vision and you can increase the amount of Artifact pockets you can have. Unlike SOC in Clear Sky you start out unable to equip any Artifacts. You have to upgrade your armor to hold more and even that number can vary. Some armor while offering a better base protection do not have the ability to hold the maximum amount of Artifacts. The upgrade options for both weapons and armor are actually pretty deep with some upgrades cutting you off from others and so on. I really liked that I had to think about the path I wanted to take while upgrading and it actually made a difference in the type of gun I was wielding or the armor I was wearing.
The next biggest change are the way you find Artifacts. In SOC they were just laying around waiting for you to pick them up, that is not the case in Clear Sky. You have in your possession a detector which helps you find them in the Anomaly fields. You'll come across large fields of various Anomalies and this is where the detector comes into play. You use it to pinpoint where in the field the item is then go in after it, avoiding the Anomalies and trying to get out alive. This was a really nice addition as it makes you feel more like a Stalker having to survive in these dangerous fields to get the prize and make the Artifacts way more valuable.
Faction Wars, what's a Faction War? It's the worst freaking thing in this game and nothing but a pain to deal with. You have warring factions in Clear Sky, The Loners, The Bandits, Duty and Freedom. You can choose to join any of these groups and fight on their side but from the way they always need your help you'd think you're the only good fighter they have. I went with the Loner faction which is just made up of Stalkers and they were fighting against the bandits. At first it was okay just a little fighting here and there, kind of fun and a new addition. Then it all goes down hill. You will be called constantly to help out and if you don't you fail and the other side gains the upper hand. I don't know the breaking point for failing these that will make you get a game over or even if it's possible to get a game over from this but it still sucks. Hold a territory for your faction let's you get through much easier, here's an example. Early on in the game you go to the Garbage. If the Bandits hold the entrance you will get robbed when you enter and loose all your money. If you fight off the Bandits enough in the Cordon the Loner faction will get into the Garbage ahead of you and clear the entrance allowing you go through without paying. Stuff like that is a neat little touch but it ends up just being busy work.
I mentioned two locations above the Cordon and the Garbage. You may remember them from SOC, you'll be seeing a lot of the areas from SOC in this game. It makes sense because you're kind of leading up to the events in the first game and the Zone is only so big. At first I thought it was a little lazy to see so much reused but it adds to the element that Scar knows his way around the Zone and you do too as you've done it all before. I did think it was nice to see these areas like they were before Shadow of Chernobyl, like Freedom holding the Dark Valley and some sections of the Cordon actually inhabited beyond the Army base and the Rookie village.
I really liked what the Complete Mod did to this game. The first thing is the improved graphics. While Clear Sky vanilla is a better looking game than SOC this makes it look even better. All the redone textures are just amazing and help bring the Zone to life. Textures are all new, a new weather system has been added, the lighting is redone and that part just looks amazing. As the sun rises and the beams of light come through the windows or trees it's a really cool effect. The sound has been changed too adding in themes for each area and adding in a lot more guitar and vocal tracks for the NPCs who play guitar. Visually and auditorily this mod makes the entire game a million times better and I highly recommend you use this same mod if you decide to play through Clear Sky.
This wouldn't be one of my normal reviews if I didn't have a bug or glitch to complain about and it's time for that. Most the way through Clear Sky I didn't have any problems but the one bug I encountered was a nightmare and I almost gave up playing because of it. I was near the end of the game. You end up having to go through the town of Limansk to continue the story. Getting there isn't an issue but I was there for about 2 minutes and I was killed. No biggie, I'll reload and be fine. Nope! Crash to desktop, again not a big deal, the first time through SOC it crashed to desktop twice so I can give this "buggy mess" at least one crash. Well when I tried to reload my save it crashed again and again and again. Eventually I went with the beginning of the level auto save and that one loaded but the game crashed and so on and so forth. I looked online and read that this was a problem caused by the Complete mod making the game crash and that it only happens in the first part of Limansk. I was going to remove the mod and play through Limansk without it but then I read it's a problem with the base game and I could get the crash even without the mod. I did read that if you make it to the Construction yard in Limansk without crashing you're okay. After a few more crashed I eventually made it through the level and was able to finish the game without incident. This is a bad place to have to worry about dying as this is when the game get's crazy hard and I went through a ton of medkits and bandages getting to the end of this level so I wouldn't end up dying.
And this brings me to the last thing I want to say about Clear Sky and that's the difficulty. I know Stalker games are suppose to be difficult and I don't mind that but this one just all of a sudden get's super hard near the end, I mean the difficulty curve just rams up. I don't mind challenge but I can't stand when games do this and this one is no exception.
Overall Clear Sky was an okay game. I really liked some of the mechanic changes this game had which made me feel more immersed in the world. Faction Wars and the above mentioned bug almost ruined the game for me and I doubt it will be a game I replay anytime soon. My initial views on the vanilla game are probably still there but the polish Complete adds more than make up for the past issues. If you play this make sure it's with Complete, DO NOT PLAY VANILLA!
Stalker: Clear Sky - 7 out of 10
Link to download Clear Sky: Complete - http://www.moddb.com/mods/clear-sky-complete You can actually follow this link to get the Complete mods for Shadow of Chernobyl and Call of Pripyat also.
Just moments ago I finished Stalker: Clear Sky with the Clear Sky: Complete Mod installed. I had previously tried to play Clear Sky but was met with glitches, bugs and other assorted crap keeping me from playing the game. The biggest one I encountered was early on where I just randomly died as I hit the quick save key. Well guess what happened? Yep, the death was in the quick save. I would of lost a lot of progress if I reloaded the auto save so I decided to just forget Clear Sky and go play Shadow of Chernobyl again.
Why did I wait until now to try playing this with a Mod installed? I like to play through games the first time as pure as possible or vanilla as some people call it. Even if I'm playing some really old game that needs a source port to run right on modern PCs I try to get one that doesn't change the base game at all. Complete is a series of mods that does this very thing. You can find a Complete mod for all three Stalker games and I figured if I was going to go through the buggy mess that is Clear Sky I should try Complete with it, so that's what I did. How does this notoriously glitch filled game handle with this mod and how is the game overall? Well read on to find this out!
Clear Sky is the second game in the Stalker series but it's a prequel to Shadow of Chernobyl taking place immediately before the events of the first game. You play the role of a Stalker named Scar. In the intro you see Scar leading a group of scientists through the Zone when an emission hits, killing all the scientists but leaving Scar alive. He's rescued by a group called Clear Sky and after awakening is told he has a connection with the Zone and further emissions will cause his central nervous system to break down and eventually kill him. From the outset that is your mission, to find out what is causing the Zone to lash out and put a stop to it. I won't go into it much more as it can ruin the story of SOC if you haven't played that yet as the two games do go together.
Clear Sky plays a lot like Shadow of Chernobyl which is to be expected but they did change up some of the mechanics, some of these changes are great and some are done so poorly they distract from the overall game. You go through the game in a first person view shooting at enemies and looking for loot to survive. You can access an inventory and equip Artifacts but even this has changed a little.
The biggest game change is the upgrade system, all weapons and armor can be upgraded through NPC characters in the major camps in the game. Weapons can be made to shoot faster, have better accuracy or even accept a different caliber of ammo. Armor can be made to offer better protection, add a gas mask or better night vision and you can increase the amount of Artifact pockets you can have. Unlike SOC in Clear Sky you start out unable to equip any Artifacts. You have to upgrade your armor to hold more and even that number can vary. Some armor while offering a better base protection do not have the ability to hold the maximum amount of Artifacts. The upgrade options for both weapons and armor are actually pretty deep with some upgrades cutting you off from others and so on. I really liked that I had to think about the path I wanted to take while upgrading and it actually made a difference in the type of gun I was wielding or the armor I was wearing.
The next biggest change are the way you find Artifacts. In SOC they were just laying around waiting for you to pick them up, that is not the case in Clear Sky. You have in your possession a detector which helps you find them in the Anomaly fields. You'll come across large fields of various Anomalies and this is where the detector comes into play. You use it to pinpoint where in the field the item is then go in after it, avoiding the Anomalies and trying to get out alive. This was a really nice addition as it makes you feel more like a Stalker having to survive in these dangerous fields to get the prize and make the Artifacts way more valuable.
Faction Wars, what's a Faction War? It's the worst freaking thing in this game and nothing but a pain to deal with. You have warring factions in Clear Sky, The Loners, The Bandits, Duty and Freedom. You can choose to join any of these groups and fight on their side but from the way they always need your help you'd think you're the only good fighter they have. I went with the Loner faction which is just made up of Stalkers and they were fighting against the bandits. At first it was okay just a little fighting here and there, kind of fun and a new addition. Then it all goes down hill. You will be called constantly to help out and if you don't you fail and the other side gains the upper hand. I don't know the breaking point for failing these that will make you get a game over or even if it's possible to get a game over from this but it still sucks. Hold a territory for your faction let's you get through much easier, here's an example. Early on in the game you go to the Garbage. If the Bandits hold the entrance you will get robbed when you enter and loose all your money. If you fight off the Bandits enough in the Cordon the Loner faction will get into the Garbage ahead of you and clear the entrance allowing you go through without paying. Stuff like that is a neat little touch but it ends up just being busy work.
I mentioned two locations above the Cordon and the Garbage. You may remember them from SOC, you'll be seeing a lot of the areas from SOC in this game. It makes sense because you're kind of leading up to the events in the first game and the Zone is only so big. At first I thought it was a little lazy to see so much reused but it adds to the element that Scar knows his way around the Zone and you do too as you've done it all before. I did think it was nice to see these areas like they were before Shadow of Chernobyl, like Freedom holding the Dark Valley and some sections of the Cordon actually inhabited beyond the Army base and the Rookie village.
I really liked what the Complete Mod did to this game. The first thing is the improved graphics. While Clear Sky vanilla is a better looking game than SOC this makes it look even better. All the redone textures are just amazing and help bring the Zone to life. Textures are all new, a new weather system has been added, the lighting is redone and that part just looks amazing. As the sun rises and the beams of light come through the windows or trees it's a really cool effect. The sound has been changed too adding in themes for each area and adding in a lot more guitar and vocal tracks for the NPCs who play guitar. Visually and auditorily this mod makes the entire game a million times better and I highly recommend you use this same mod if you decide to play through Clear Sky.
This wouldn't be one of my normal reviews if I didn't have a bug or glitch to complain about and it's time for that. Most the way through Clear Sky I didn't have any problems but the one bug I encountered was a nightmare and I almost gave up playing because of it. I was near the end of the game. You end up having to go through the town of Limansk to continue the story. Getting there isn't an issue but I was there for about 2 minutes and I was killed. No biggie, I'll reload and be fine. Nope! Crash to desktop, again not a big deal, the first time through SOC it crashed to desktop twice so I can give this "buggy mess" at least one crash. Well when I tried to reload my save it crashed again and again and again. Eventually I went with the beginning of the level auto save and that one loaded but the game crashed and so on and so forth. I looked online and read that this was a problem caused by the Complete mod making the game crash and that it only happens in the first part of Limansk. I was going to remove the mod and play through Limansk without it but then I read it's a problem with the base game and I could get the crash even without the mod. I did read that if you make it to the Construction yard in Limansk without crashing you're okay. After a few more crashed I eventually made it through the level and was able to finish the game without incident. This is a bad place to have to worry about dying as this is when the game get's crazy hard and I went through a ton of medkits and bandages getting to the end of this level so I wouldn't end up dying.
And this brings me to the last thing I want to say about Clear Sky and that's the difficulty. I know Stalker games are suppose to be difficult and I don't mind that but this one just all of a sudden get's super hard near the end, I mean the difficulty curve just rams up. I don't mind challenge but I can't stand when games do this and this one is no exception.
Overall Clear Sky was an okay game. I really liked some of the mechanic changes this game had which made me feel more immersed in the world. Faction Wars and the above mentioned bug almost ruined the game for me and I doubt it will be a game I replay anytime soon. My initial views on the vanilla game are probably still there but the polish Complete adds more than make up for the past issues. If you play this make sure it's with Complete, DO NOT PLAY VANILLA!
Stalker: Clear Sky - 7 out of 10
Link to download Clear Sky: Complete - http://www.moddb.com/mods/clear-sky-complete You can actually follow this link to get the Complete mods for Shadow of Chernobyl and Call of Pripyat also.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl - LURK Mod
I'm a huge fan of Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl. I've played through it countless times but I have never done so with one of the full game overhaul mods that are out there. So the last time I decided to battle my way through the Zone I thought it was a good time to try a Mod as I did so.
The MOD I decided to use is one called LURK. It's put out by a group of people that post over on 4chan or at least they use to. I'm not sure if they still hang out on that board as I am a little late to the LURK party. I believe this was released in 2009 but it may be a little earlier than that. What I do know is I played the 1.1 release from June of 2010. After the very simple install process I was ready to see the Zone in a whole new way and I am really glad I did.
This Mod doesn't really change any of the core story to Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl (From here on just called Stalker) but it adds and takes away some things from the core game play. Once you've loaded the game and started you come to a new title screen with the LURK logo and all the usual options except multiplayer, that is gone and really who plays Stalker games for the multiplayer? I've never even tried it let alone spend any time with it. You start the game and see the usual cut scene of you being brought in to Sidorovich then you notice the changes.
All the textures have been changed and they look amazing. All the places in the Zone look like they're suppose to but they all look so much better than the core game does. Lighting effects are improved and really add to the whole atmosphere of this experience. Another thing done to help with immersion is the removal of the HUD. Gone are your life, brain and radiation meters. The mini map is gone as you have to rely on your PDA map to get around. The only thing that remains are some very small words letting you know your weapon stats, Rate of fire, ammo in the magazine and the surplus of ammo left. While knowing your current ammo is important they should of just done away with that and had a completely clean gameplay area. The other thing I really like is the improved weather effects. When it rains in the Zone it pours and when the sun goes down you can't see 5 feet in front of you. There was a time I was waiting for the sun to come up so I decided to run to a Stash right near the Stalker Village in the Cordon. On my way back I was jumped by a couple Boars and I had no idea where they came from and I couldn't see them until they were right on top of me it was really fun. The darkness also makes night missions way more interesting as you are in complete blackness except for a flashlight or the night vision if you've found a suit with it installed. The character models all look great, people and monsters alike all look way better than the core game. It may seem like here I'm just saying, "Hey this looks better, it's great!" But it's true the game flat out looks better and it still run all maxed out no problem on my system.
The overall biggest change to Stalker with LURK installed are the guns. First off the Mod adds a ton of new guns for you to use. While the base game had a good selection it felt a little light as you usually ended up with an AK of some kind and maybe a sniper rifle later in the game. With the weapon selection in this you have way more options. First off I used the AK as soon as I got my hands on one but soon I switched it up and started to play around with what else this offers. Guns behave more like they would in real life, recoil is crazy if you go full auto on a machine gun, the kick will have you looking into the sky and swaying all over the place if you hold down the trigger. When aiming you do not have a completely steady aim, it sways as you look down the sights or through a scope. The Mod creators said this is to add the "human element" to shooting as you will have sway when aiming a real gun and it's a cool addition. The guns in the base Stalker were not the most accurate, you could shoot someone pretty close and still miss completely. This has also been fixed and shooting from the hip works pretty well if you're in a close combat situation even without the crosshair. I was able to shoot people pretty easily from the hip and it best to do this in close quarters then try to iron sight. Near the end of my first playthrough of Stalker I was pretty much only using the G36 and it was the same thing in the Mod. As soon I was able to get one it was all I used until inside the Power Plant when I switched to the FN2000. So in the end I loved all the new guns but I ended up using what I always did and while it felt better to shoot it then in the base game I would of liked to find a new gun to depend on. But that's just me you're mileage with the the guns may change.
The other big change and apparently this is only with later versions of this Mod like the 1.1 I played are with the artifacts. In this Mod they are powerless, they do not give you the stat bonuses like they do in vanilla Stalker. I really, really liked this as you needed your own skill to survive and didn't depend on becoming a power house through the use of Artifacts. Now they're really vendor trash but they are worth a lot so it's still worth it to pick these up and take them back with you to sell. It brings the game more in line with the source material Roadside Picnic as I remember the artifacts not having any powers in the book but people still wanted them. Selling them is great because money has a bigger need in this Mod. You can repair weapons and armor, buy hotel rooms to pass time and all the vendors sell way more stuff then in vanilla.
I did have some problems while playing this but the biggest one was my own fault and I'll save that one for last. As you play the game can hitch up making it seem like it's going to crash. I can best describe this as being like lag in an online game, I'm going to guess it's the mod and the game's engine conflicting or something, I'm not sure but it's not a big deal. Speaking of crashes I did have a few. When I first played Stalker the game crashes twice the whole time through and that was with Windows Vista. This time I'm using Windows 7 and I had maybe about 3 or 4 crashes. Again not a big deal for a Modded game that was released before Vista was a thing but crashes are there so just quick save often.
(Slight Spoilers Ahead)The biggest issue I had was after fighting one of the Controllers. When a Controller attacks you the screen goes fuzzy and your vision goes all double. When this happened in Lab 16 I killed it and started to head back to the Bar. The double vision didn't go away but I figured this was due to the increase of difficulty in LURK, it would take longer for this effect to go away in real life I thought to myself. Well I made it back to Rostok and Duty opened fire. I didn't know why and with the double vision I had a hard time against them. After some research I found a patch for the 1.1 verison of LURK. I had downloaded the whole mod again thinking the patch was included in the zip file but I was wrong. One of the bugs the patch fixes is the endless Controller double vision. I installed the patch and the double vision went away. After that I went back to look at the path from X-16 to Rostok in my double vision daze I had killed some Duty guys, oops!
I mentioned the higher difficulty in the mod and yeah it's there. With all the guns being more accurate the NPCs are better shots and without the minimap to show you where they're all hiding you can get shoot from a good distance so you need to be careful and keep a good lookout. For me it added to the tension of being in the Zone but for some it may be overwhelming. If this sounds like something you may not be into play this at a lower difficulty. I didn't play on Master, I played on Veteran and until I had some good armor I was getting destroyed, with the proper armor and a good understanding of the shooting you can get through this game no problem. I think people play Stalker Mods like this one for the challenge so I'm going to assume anyone reading this isn't afraid of a challenge.
To end this, LURK is a fantastic total conversion of Stalker. Being the first one I've tried I have a lot of fun playing Stalker with this installed. I plan on trying out some of the other Stalker Mods out there namely Oblivion Lost which I've heard a lot of good things about but for now the main way I'll play through Stalker is with LURK installed.
I'm not going to assign a number score to LURK as it's a mod but if you own Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl download LURK and try it out it's so good and make sure you have the patch.
Link to download LURK 1.1 and the patch.
http://www.moddb.com/mods/lurk
The MOD I decided to use is one called LURK. It's put out by a group of people that post over on 4chan or at least they use to. I'm not sure if they still hang out on that board as I am a little late to the LURK party. I believe this was released in 2009 but it may be a little earlier than that. What I do know is I played the 1.1 release from June of 2010. After the very simple install process I was ready to see the Zone in a whole new way and I am really glad I did.
This Mod doesn't really change any of the core story to Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl (From here on just called Stalker) but it adds and takes away some things from the core game play. Once you've loaded the game and started you come to a new title screen with the LURK logo and all the usual options except multiplayer, that is gone and really who plays Stalker games for the multiplayer? I've never even tried it let alone spend any time with it. You start the game and see the usual cut scene of you being brought in to Sidorovich then you notice the changes.
All the textures have been changed and they look amazing. All the places in the Zone look like they're suppose to but they all look so much better than the core game does. Lighting effects are improved and really add to the whole atmosphere of this experience. Another thing done to help with immersion is the removal of the HUD. Gone are your life, brain and radiation meters. The mini map is gone as you have to rely on your PDA map to get around. The only thing that remains are some very small words letting you know your weapon stats, Rate of fire, ammo in the magazine and the surplus of ammo left. While knowing your current ammo is important they should of just done away with that and had a completely clean gameplay area. The other thing I really like is the improved weather effects. When it rains in the Zone it pours and when the sun goes down you can't see 5 feet in front of you. There was a time I was waiting for the sun to come up so I decided to run to a Stash right near the Stalker Village in the Cordon. On my way back I was jumped by a couple Boars and I had no idea where they came from and I couldn't see them until they were right on top of me it was really fun. The darkness also makes night missions way more interesting as you are in complete blackness except for a flashlight or the night vision if you've found a suit with it installed. The character models all look great, people and monsters alike all look way better than the core game. It may seem like here I'm just saying, "Hey this looks better, it's great!" But it's true the game flat out looks better and it still run all maxed out no problem on my system.
The overall biggest change to Stalker with LURK installed are the guns. First off the Mod adds a ton of new guns for you to use. While the base game had a good selection it felt a little light as you usually ended up with an AK of some kind and maybe a sniper rifle later in the game. With the weapon selection in this you have way more options. First off I used the AK as soon as I got my hands on one but soon I switched it up and started to play around with what else this offers. Guns behave more like they would in real life, recoil is crazy if you go full auto on a machine gun, the kick will have you looking into the sky and swaying all over the place if you hold down the trigger. When aiming you do not have a completely steady aim, it sways as you look down the sights or through a scope. The Mod creators said this is to add the "human element" to shooting as you will have sway when aiming a real gun and it's a cool addition. The guns in the base Stalker were not the most accurate, you could shoot someone pretty close and still miss completely. This has also been fixed and shooting from the hip works pretty well if you're in a close combat situation even without the crosshair. I was able to shoot people pretty easily from the hip and it best to do this in close quarters then try to iron sight. Near the end of my first playthrough of Stalker I was pretty much only using the G36 and it was the same thing in the Mod. As soon I was able to get one it was all I used until inside the Power Plant when I switched to the FN2000. So in the end I loved all the new guns but I ended up using what I always did and while it felt better to shoot it then in the base game I would of liked to find a new gun to depend on. But that's just me you're mileage with the the guns may change.
The other big change and apparently this is only with later versions of this Mod like the 1.1 I played are with the artifacts. In this Mod they are powerless, they do not give you the stat bonuses like they do in vanilla Stalker. I really, really liked this as you needed your own skill to survive and didn't depend on becoming a power house through the use of Artifacts. Now they're really vendor trash but they are worth a lot so it's still worth it to pick these up and take them back with you to sell. It brings the game more in line with the source material Roadside Picnic as I remember the artifacts not having any powers in the book but people still wanted them. Selling them is great because money has a bigger need in this Mod. You can repair weapons and armor, buy hotel rooms to pass time and all the vendors sell way more stuff then in vanilla.
I did have some problems while playing this but the biggest one was my own fault and I'll save that one for last. As you play the game can hitch up making it seem like it's going to crash. I can best describe this as being like lag in an online game, I'm going to guess it's the mod and the game's engine conflicting or something, I'm not sure but it's not a big deal. Speaking of crashes I did have a few. When I first played Stalker the game crashes twice the whole time through and that was with Windows Vista. This time I'm using Windows 7 and I had maybe about 3 or 4 crashes. Again not a big deal for a Modded game that was released before Vista was a thing but crashes are there so just quick save often.
(Slight Spoilers Ahead)The biggest issue I had was after fighting one of the Controllers. When a Controller attacks you the screen goes fuzzy and your vision goes all double. When this happened in Lab 16 I killed it and started to head back to the Bar. The double vision didn't go away but I figured this was due to the increase of difficulty in LURK, it would take longer for this effect to go away in real life I thought to myself. Well I made it back to Rostok and Duty opened fire. I didn't know why and with the double vision I had a hard time against them. After some research I found a patch for the 1.1 verison of LURK. I had downloaded the whole mod again thinking the patch was included in the zip file but I was wrong. One of the bugs the patch fixes is the endless Controller double vision. I installed the patch and the double vision went away. After that I went back to look at the path from X-16 to Rostok in my double vision daze I had killed some Duty guys, oops!
I mentioned the higher difficulty in the mod and yeah it's there. With all the guns being more accurate the NPCs are better shots and without the minimap to show you where they're all hiding you can get shoot from a good distance so you need to be careful and keep a good lookout. For me it added to the tension of being in the Zone but for some it may be overwhelming. If this sounds like something you may not be into play this at a lower difficulty. I didn't play on Master, I played on Veteran and until I had some good armor I was getting destroyed, with the proper armor and a good understanding of the shooting you can get through this game no problem. I think people play Stalker Mods like this one for the challenge so I'm going to assume anyone reading this isn't afraid of a challenge.
To end this, LURK is a fantastic total conversion of Stalker. Being the first one I've tried I have a lot of fun playing Stalker with this installed. I plan on trying out some of the other Stalker Mods out there namely Oblivion Lost which I've heard a lot of good things about but for now the main way I'll play through Stalker is with LURK installed.
I'm not going to assign a number score to LURK as it's a mod but if you own Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl download LURK and try it out it's so good and make sure you have the patch.
Link to download LURK 1.1 and the patch.
http://www.moddb.com/mods/lurk
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Call of Duty: Black Ops and Modding
Treyarch recently announced they were going to be releasing mod tools for Call of Duty: Black Ops sometimes after the game's release. After Infinity Ward decided that Modern Warfare 2 didn't need the ability to be modded I'm glad to see Treyarch stepping up and letting the mod community get their hands on the newest COD game.
I played MW2 on the PS3 but if the PC version had the mod tools released and mods were being made for it I would of picked up the PC version instead. As unbalanced as MW2 was and still is it would of made the game so much better if the modders could of tweaked the settings and actually made the game playable.
So with Mods coming and the announcement of dedicated servers it looks like COD: Black Ops if shaping up to be the best COD yet.
Plus zombies, don't forget this one will have zombies too.
I played MW2 on the PS3 but if the PC version had the mod tools released and mods were being made for it I would of picked up the PC version instead. As unbalanced as MW2 was and still is it would of made the game so much better if the modders could of tweaked the settings and actually made the game playable.
So with Mods coming and the announcement of dedicated servers it looks like COD: Black Ops if shaping up to be the best COD yet.
Plus zombies, don't forget this one will have zombies too.
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