I hate it when people upload a Stalker video like "Stalker is the best game" or "Why i love stalker" and then show a Anomaly modded into oblivion to a point where it looks as colorful as Borderlands. Or just GAMMA people..
@@monolith4653 Don't tell me you're that Fedora guy from Reddit Otherwise you guys really have copy pasted opinions Why do you "hate" when people like the same game as you do? When two fans of Skyrim meet each other, do they wank each other on how unmodded their game is? SMH...
@@monolith4653it's one thing if youve played the games. But the modding community has taken Stalker to new heights, and has kept it relative today. Anomaly and CoC to say a few, Gamma and EFP being mod packs for anomaly are great for your gunfighting style or zoner life. But if anything the modded stalkers are great and can almost be an entirely different game.
Yo we taking it to rostok with this one. I have no idea who you are but I’m always happy to see someone doing a Stalker video. Keep up the good work dog man.
Same here. I find new quality niche essayists by checking almost every english speaking videos bout the stalker universe be it roadside pic, videogame or movie related content!
honestly, i was kinda upset when stalker won the instagram poles and not terraria, but while watching the video, i got so excited about the worldbuilding of this game, the kung never fails to deliver!
@@kcjcusbc5004 @owenkung5000 sorry if I came across as crude. Hope you keep learning the little things that are different between cultures, the big things that are the same, and of course, learn to laugh along the way.
@@benjaminnickerson3961Tbh, the US is literally the only true world superpower, so Americans don't really have a real necessity to "conform" to anything other people do outside the country. They're literally the New Romans, they dictate the terms of the world...not the other way around. I know Europeans especially like to cope and deny this, but it's true and everyone knows it even if they try to use anything they can to dump on Americans for this or that
1:03:25 In regards to the Clear Sky MG nest at the entrance to The Cordon, it IS possible to get by the military outpost alive, but you have to keep jumping cover to cover behind rocks and trees before gunning it down the round, which can still leave you open to get shot up. Took me like 15 attempts, but it is in fact possible
Yeah, Clear Sky made me laugh my ass of @ being punished for having the gall to try & continue the game. Like “yeah I’ll go speak to Sidorovich. I miss my old..OMG WTF they have an MG42 now WTF?!?!” Made me use my binoculars and plan my path before trying 2 more times, both of which were white knuckle, toe curling-ly terrifying. Made the Zone feel like a forbidden place fr.
Oh, you played with a version, when GSC put back the option to kill the gunner. Originally it wasn't meant to be the way and even if you somehow managed to kill the gunner, the MG kept firing on it's own. Then they received a ton of complaints so they make it possible to silence the gun by killing the gunner. Then another patch came in, seemingly from some team working on other issues what overwrote the earlier patch concerning the gun. Then complaints arrived again and they put it back. Then another patch came in, some guy noticed that the design documents said the MG should not be silenced and "fixed" it, causing even more people to rip off their hair. Then it got fixed again. I don't even know how it is in the final version, because most mods just give you the option to kill the gunner. The idea behind this bullshit section was, that you were supposed to sneak from cover to cover, without the gunner noticing you. But sneaking in Stalker is broken as fuck and never worked (AI either can spot you through the other side of the map or never see you even if you stand next to them), so instead you have to run from cover to cover and run away. The dear fucking ret@rds at GSC even put up this fence running next to the tunnel, to make sure you can't just turn left and walk away, while making the stalkers at the bridge instantly hostile to you if you want to circle around using the way recommended by most youtube vloggers (best option is sprinting as fuck, jump under the fallen tree, wait until the gunner gets bored, then run to the hills until the gunner looses sight of you). As I said, originally you were not meant to be able to silence the gun, you were meant to run away. This is just one instance of Clear Sky design being an utter mess.
The "drone" sound in Shadow of Cernobyl during the doc cutscene is here because you didn't kill the controller during your first agroprom underground mission.
lmao i was wondering because when i backtracked the way to doc i remembered which manhole you leave the underground from so i could snipe the controller head-on
Roadside picnic is really one of the best books ive ever read and its pretty short so everyone should give it a read (or listen to an audiobook rip on youtube) . Its actually crazy how this book has inspired unique but still equally good pieces of media. like the book, the stalker movie, and these games are all some of my favorite works of art period.
There is a whole series of official STALKER novels. Back when the games were new, GSC partnered up with a russian publisher to release dozens of novels based directly on the games. The quality varies, some are barely a step above fan fiction, while others are written by prominent russian & ukrainian sci-fi & combat fantasy writers and are thus quite good. None are canon, each author has their own separate "STALKER universe" (although there is some limited cross-referencing), and even the basics like how anomalies, mutants and artifacts work vary dramatically between authors. Still, I inhaled these things as a kid, I read like one of those per week. Dad still has ~40 of those novels in the attic. My favorite is "Firing Line" by Vasiliy Orekhov, a story that follows a veteran stalker Hemul through a frantic chase through the Zone, set in the 2020s. The only issue is - they are all in russian, with only a couple translated into german.
"Dutyer" is probably a janky translation quirk. "Duty" is called "Dolg" in russian, and a Duty member is called "dolgovez". The "-vez" suffix works exactly like "-er" in english, so whoever translated the game to english just followed the same process - "duty" + "er" = "dutyer".
Lol yep. But it's a shit section to stealth through as well. You don't really have access to silenced weapons at that point and doing melee only is fucked. I managed to do it once, but once you reach the files I think it always triggers the alarm.
This is absolutely stellar my man! I'm not even halfway, and I'm very happy with it. STALKER is such a interesting series, and I'm glad to see a review that's this long and isnt just basically restating the plot!
1:38:00 If you talk to the bandit leader, there's essentially a skill check, where if your equipment is good enough you'll intimidate him into not demanding interest (otherwise you just get attacked).
I just found your channel by youtube algorithm and it’s been a while since it recommended me a channel so worthwhile, loved your cometary, loved your gameplay, thanks for such a great video
@@sci_ent_ificsui_neg9236why did you fake pretending to be another person when you clearly are the same person @shardell and hopped on an alt. You literally hopped on an alt to pretend that you were someone else defending the original post 🤣🤣🫵🏾
@@micksenser2516 Firstly, you absolute coping mecchanism addled f*ckwit, ... If I have something to opine? I WILL do so ...I have ZERO concern whether you have the limited cognition to comprehend so. Secondly, I use THIS account and have only done so since before your mother gave up injecting milk into your prebuscent sounding mouth. Have you had your fill of less than heterosexual cope now? .... I should I now take off tthe training gloves?
Speaking of savescumming, back when i played CS (it was the first stalker game i had EVER played) I used to save after each individual kill in a fight so youd scroll through my saves and see: swamps fight 1 kill swamps fight 2 kills swamps fight 3 kills swamps fight 4 kills swamps fight finished
I appreciate you playing these with very minimal modding i see too many people get turned off from the game for being too hard and i find a lot of that comes from the mods they get recommended that are meant for vets to play with once the basegame isn't enough anymore
Definitely enjoyed watching this, it was well paced and had thorough coverage of each of the games. Hope you do a GAMMA review and one for STALKER 2 someday.
Really nice vid. CoP is my favourite OG S. T. A. L. K. E. R game. I played SoC and CS when I was like 7-8 y/o and just couldn't understand wtf was going on. Then when I was maybe 11 I randomly bought CoP at some local games shop for like 150 rubles and fell in love with the game. After playing trough all vanilla games I can say that CoP has the most interesting side quests and side characters in the series. I also love attention to details and the world kinda reacting to your actions. Like how Topol's group becomes a cool science research group with top-tier armors if you keep all of them alive during ecologists' quests. Another example is how you can mention lots of things to Zulus when you're drinking with him(like how you've found the Oasis, cleared the bloodsucker nest and etc. Although some things in the game feel really undercooked(I really don't like that most of unique guns are just ordered from Nimble and aren't used as a reward for quests or loot from named NPCs). I also love Anomaly and Anomaly modpacks because they can provide the "some random stalker living in the Zone and doing some chores for Sidorovich" experience (peak Anomaly for me is literally hunting mutants, cooking their meat and going on artifact hunts).
The freeroam you mentioned Shadow of Chernobyl is only included with ZRP I think, because i dont recall it being in vanilla. Anyway great vid. Earned a sub.
Im glad that someone take a journey to Sralker series imo its one of most unique games u will ever play the atmosphere while of this game is topnotch , i watched the entire video and bring me memories of this golden serie u did amazing job explaing and editing through the video. Btw u finished the whole series and not knowing that there is quick healing shortcut and peeking mechanic in the game which it will make ur engagement way easier by pressing "E" and "Q" .
I want to thank you for this review. You got me to actually play the games and I can’t stop (I won’t lie Shadow of Chernobyls ending almost filtered me). I played them all back to back over these last two weeks and am currently installing Anomaly to give me more of the Zone. I have not been this inthralled by a game and it’s world since I played the og Dead Space on its release.
Bless you for bringing up the popular myths about difficulty levels in Shadow of Chernobyl. As someone who personally dug around in config files for hours, I tried to convey this simple fact multiple times, but a lot of people just ignore the proof right there in the code.
The realization that there is a 2 hours long video of one of my favorites series from all time, and almost 230 k people had seen it before me, its part of what makes me hope about our world. cheers. Great Vid, seen it in three sits. Im jumpting right know to the oblivion video.
GLORY TO MONOLITH! Good video man, im subbin. Also I HIGHLY recommend playing GAMMA. Its basically an even more open world version of STALKER. Im currently running a Mercenary run and its just so fitting.
It’s still hilarious to me that I found your TH-cam channel as a 23 year old grown man completely independently of when I was like 17 shitting my pants laughing at your meme account (I haven’t had social media in years now)
brother for context I was older six years ago than you are now. You stop calling yourself grown man at some point and try to find the little things that bring you childlike joy and wonder, it's too easy to lose.
@@autismofinn3144 I’m not saying anything negative or anything, just distinguishing between the two very different points in my life I discovered and enjoyed his kungtent
Funfact about that stalker that saves your life after the death truck crash. He´s modeled after the Stalker from the original movie. Reddish hair, similiar face a calm and mellow saviour. There´s tons of therories about how he might be scar, or later on might´ve become Charon (the monolith leader in prypiat) due to his relatively rare VSS which only appears on like three people in the whole series.
Ill never forget when Shadow of Chernobyl came out. It was the answer to the itch left since the original Resident evil PSX Trilogy. It got me into hardcore FPS and Action RPGs. Its hard to believe its nearly been 20 years since then. Im still playing with my Steam Deck
Only a short while into the video, but as a Stalker veteran, thank you for actually explaining for new people how the difficulties work. Used to think that master made bullets do more damage, until I actually heard other people discussing it and realised for myself that it's total bullshit.
Aaahhh you Cheeky Breeky! Well done with the highly entertaining reviews! I played the Stalkers first time this year, and they easily became one of my favorites! The setting is very interesting and unique, the gunplay / challenge is top-notch. I heard lot of praise for them back in the day, but missed them. Perhaps my PC was lacking etc. My other favorites include Fallout & Fallout 2, Disciples 2, Silent Storm games, Seven Kingdoms etc. When it comes to the gameworld / story / ending being reactive to player actions and choices, Fallout & Fallout 2 rank extremely high here. When it comes to gunplay, around those times F.E.A.R. was highly regarded and probably is today. Legends then, legends still i say. I haven't played it, though. Ok, back to the review. I wonder is there mods to nerf the AI grenades and squish bugs for Clear Sky? I'd like to think so. Regarding Call of Pripyat; First time i remember "cheesing" through the sleeping bloodsuckers by standing behind my fellow buddy / corner / something and just throwing grenades like crazy at them and shooting like hell. Very tough, and very memorable! Regarding the room with 4 hooded big guys, same strategy there. Lots of grenades and shooting. In Pripryat, there was one certain big complex. Aften completing the game, i went there for some aftergoodies. The complex would be eather occupied, or soon to be. So it great strolling with my boys there, often they would end up there. If the complex was occupied, then clearing it and keeping the complex as ours was challenging. If it was empty, then holding the line and keeping the complex as ours was fun too.
After checking out these games myself like you did, I had an insatiable itch for more and Anomaly and Gamma definitely scratch that itch that I'm sure you're having right now. Definitely do anomaly first, then gamma second. There are a LOT of changes to the gameplay made in Gamma which I and many other find to be enjoyable, but it's an experience in its own right. Make some videos on them, I'm happy to sub and wait for them!
I played all 3 of the stalker games the last year and I enjoyed all of them. Imo the best part about stalker was the exploration. Searching for items in an abandoned house while it's raining outside (in-game), was awesome. I am really excited for the new entry this year.
You CAN crouch down, go under the fallen tree (break the box if necessary), hug the fence on the left and sneak through to the rookie village in Clear Sky. Scamorovich will be very impressed once you've done so. I got it first try when I played CS for the first time too. Didn't even think that I'm supposed to go through the other route.
hi there... old timer here. first off, good video, always love it when someone covers the genre. some notes; - difficulty, also affects loot found in crates - it's "si-doro-wich" or "si-dro-wich", not "sido-rowich" - S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - the acronym is widespread, but made up, it doesn't stand for anything - the bridge in cordon; most common rookie mistake. fps trained us to "shoot first, ask never" - but in stalker there are some situations when talking to the enemy is totally an option - probably a bit more, but i just started the video and don't wanna be too picky if you want to explore the series further, i highly recommend the lost alpha from dezowave, it is a standalone game and tries to recreate the game as original intended with lots of cut content like the Sins faction or driving vehicles, another ending, etc.
Glad you finally gave these games a chance, if you're a fan of the first person shooter genre, or just gaming in general, the Stalker games will inevitably come up just like Half-life. CoP was my favorite of the 3, I've beaten it several times, and I also really love Anomaly. I've been playing through the True Stalker mod recently and it's another great addition to the series, as a standalone game.
Awesome vid. Thanks for all the time you put into this. Also Sid-oro-vich** Gause pronounced G-ow-se*** and Magazine******, a clip is something a Kar98 would use. A magazine is, well a magazine...like what would go into a Glock.
01:03:38 It is possible to get past the military checkpoint without getting killed although, you have to be quick about it. You basically want to run towards the second rock down the hill and crouch until they stop shooting. Then, once they stop shooting, make sure that you fully regenerated your stamina and run to the left. There should be a gap between the barbed wire and a bush, once you make it past that, then you just run for it and hope you won't get killed. It took me a while but eventually made it past them.
Cool video. I played the games shortly after they came out and desite all of the bugs and glitches, it was still a great experience. Thhe bugs were fitting, a byproduct of the era, because the eastern bloc was struggling during that time. I'm from a Lithuanian family and during the late 90's, 2000's everything was chaos. Please do a video about the Metro trilogy
For anyone interested, both the book and the film are really great. Especially the film, which also has a ton of interesting (and sad) history surrounding its creation.
1:03:30 It's been a LONG time since I played Clear Sky, but I don't remember having any issues with the machine gun section. IIRC you either were supposed to do it at night, or use rocks for cover. But it was definitely intended for you to get through the machine gunner.
Very well made video, you managed to fit 3 games in 2 hours without missing any important details or plot points. Good job man, cant wait to see you play GAMMA! Subscribed!
Listening to your narration in this video on the background and reading my zone-influenced fiction (I posted it in r/stalker a while back - "Stories from the Lost County" by mvmikehammer) gives me some new ideas and directions where to take my writing.
Im ngl i forgot you had a youtube, was not expecting to find you in my recommendations tho congrats on catching some steam in the algorithm man. Idk parker Fitzgerald or something
I would not say that STALKER is based on Stalker (movie) and Roadside Picnic. Those are for sure inspirations for the series, but the game world and story are way different to those stories. Themes too. In fact, the reason the NPCs mention Klondike so often is because the Klondike Gold Rush is another massive influence on the game world too. The AK is an AK 74 variant so it is 5.45, not 7.62. You missed a Stalker suit and Fast SHooting AK in Strelok's stash. For Clear SKy - use the Sky Reclamation Project bug fix mod. For the machinegun in Cordon - it is possible to get the high-end Clear Sky armour before going there. It is even better than the Berill. You need max Clear Sky reputation for it but it is a life saver. This makes it easier to pass the machinegun. Anti-Radiation artifacts in Clear Sky are super powerful. So you can ignore that damage type with 1-2 high to mid range ones. And stack lots of other ones for combat. I personally like CoP but the least out of the series. Its a good game but I dislike its map design. Call of Pripyat has the most mods.
19:17 Speaking of being left with your pants down, during my playthrough of SOC when i got right infront of the CNPP I went into my inventory, I looked at the stats of my exoskeleton (i was using it to get to and through the cnpp) and the stats were so low from durability loss that I had to ditch the exoskeleton outfront of the CNPP and foot it through the complex
1:53 I had no ammo in any guns but my pistol at this area, so i just sprinted ass-first into the controller and spammed right click with the knife and spammed F1 to heal
Good one as this as the one on anomaly, played them in eastern European classical pirated copy bought at the bazaar way in 2007 an so on, it straight caught me that well the zone, from a fence pole to concrete slabs and rail ways is just as were the post soviet slums most of us grew up roaming young and unaware of the approaching evils of the capitalist hellscape. Well done mr K, and a lil addition Strela means an arrow, so strelok is marksman or an archer, as well as shooter yes, jus a bit of protoslavic lingo fun fact so you dont bring a longbow to a gunfight one day, but the way you pronounce brittish language makes me think you are more familiar with guns than a brighton uk police officer. Peace.
Keeps recommending this video after every single S.T.A.L.K.E.R video I watch, this makes the 7th tike I'm watching this. It's a real banger, so I'm not mad at the algorithm.
There's also a huge standalone called 'True Stalker', released just a week ago which was a long time project done by indie team. And there is also upcoming major standalone with different story timeline by Gunslinger! That one is huge and maybe would still use the old engine. Man I hope that one will resolve the massive CTD issues when modding the game.
1:04:00 you can actually run pass the machine gun if you have ball big enough to zig zag between tree and rock and enough bandage to patch up few hole. My first time playing clear sky, I was too stubborn to go back and save scum brute force through and meet sidorovic right away. I swear they just summon grenade on your location instead of throwing sometime. But then in mid to late game I got the exo-suit, pimp it tf out and tank 3-6 grenade back to back until they throw the extra hurt grenade then my body flying out the window.
I would like to see your take on the Metro series. They're one of my personal favorite games. Stalker laid the foundation for them as well. With the story and gameplay progression through the series, I believe it would be good fun.
The modder for stalker is truly some of the best wizard I’ve seen I’m constantly in awe from what they manage to do from a 16 year old engine, truly putting some triple A company to shame.
huh, watching 17:09 made me remember how I delt with them every new game I make , I always find a grenade and throw it in some direction away from the checkpoint . They'll all wander over to the sound and I can walk right by
You can recruit Stridder even if you don't join any faction in CoP. But you need the Achivments "Diplomat" and "Mutant Hunter". The second one is easy, you just need to finish all the hunting quests (a bloodsucker lair and one chimera hunt in the two first maps). The first one is tricky as you need to complete the two Loner/Bandit related missions in Yanov without resorting to violence. So paying off Vanos's debt and paying the ransom for Mitay. These achievment will give you just enougth reputation with both faction (if you did not killed any of them in Yanov) to make them recruit Strider.
I've played the original stalker games + anomaly and gamma. I'd highly recommend both anomaly or gamma depending on how hardcore of an experience you want with your game but it'll be a pleasant surprise playing them. Anomaly by itself is a great experience that can still be enjoyed casually. Gamma is both beautiful and brutal. The amount of mods they have (I think current gamma is like 439 mods?) really brought a polish to the game you almost don't believe is possible. They've even added mantling to grab onto ledges in the most recent update. Whilst both anomaly and gamma I'd say are more hardcore versions of stalker they still have that sandbox aspect of them. Almost every option can be tuned ingame to find the perfect gameplay loop for you. By default they are pretty challenging to get good or serviceable loot but you can tweak it to be more fair for you. Gamma will never have the original games beat for the story since it's not it's focus but the overall experience of Gamma is something of beauty and I hope you get to experience it.
I slapped better drop conditions for more experienced stalkers with masters having mint gear, made the midgame flow less grindy to me and I think it fits well having serious stalkers taking care of their shit, and rookies trying their bestest with broken toz's
@@Lake_Claire the tacticool stuff is what I hate the most about gamma even though I like it a lot. I wish you could just outright disable BaS without breaking everything. And I started with shadow of chernobyl on my first gaming laptop sporting ati x600 graphics, managed to run that bad boy with surprisingly good settings but man was it rough. Then updated my computer and went down oblivion lost -> amk -> lurk pipelines and so on so forth, was hooked. No need to go all monolith and make stalker fans fight eachother
Quick thing: the idea of throwing nuts and bolts to detect anomalies is actually from the Roadside Picnic novel originally, not the film. Great video btw!
Not sure if anyone pointed that out yet, but that military checkpoint you gotta cross in the Clear Sky - that was completely intentional design. The idea was that you had to run from cover to cover while dodging the incoming enemy fire, but due to a mistake in the game code, the weapon has mismatched ammo type, I think it was the sniper one, which conveniently penetrates anything you can use as a cover. The guy manning the gun is named Вова Вист, who is pretty infamous in the community for just how ridiculously hard he makes it for the player to cross Cordon. And yes, it is still completely possible to run through, if you know what you're doing.
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>Stalker retrospective
>Isn't running 50000 mods
We will be watching
I hate it when people upload a Stalker video like "Stalker is the best game" or "Why i love stalker" and then show a Anomaly modded into oblivion to a point where it looks as colorful as Borderlands. Or just GAMMA people..
@@monolith4653 shameless self promo but I did a video on vanilla SoC m.th-cam.com/video/nXzQP1ijKYY/w-d-xo.html
@@monolith4653 Don't tell me you're that Fedora guy from Reddit
Otherwise you guys really have copy pasted opinions
Why do you "hate" when people like the same game as you do?
When two fans of Skyrim meet each other, do they wank each other on how unmodded their game is?
SMH...
@@monolith4653what’s wrong with gamma
@@monolith4653it's one thing if youve played the games. But the modding community has taken Stalker to new heights, and has kept it relative today. Anomaly and CoC to say a few, Gamma and EFP being mod packs for anomaly are great for your gunfighting style or zoner life. But if anything the modded stalkers are great and can almost be an entirely different game.
Yo we taking it to rostok with this one.
I have no idea who you are but I’m always happy to see someone doing a Stalker video. Keep up the good work dog man.
Same here. I find new quality niche essayists by checking almost every english speaking videos bout the stalker universe be it roadside pic, videogame or movie related content!
This man is based as hell doesnt mod the games to a point it changes the game great job going through all vanilla games
we making it out the red forest with this one
honestly, i was kinda upset when stalker won the instagram poles and not terraria, but while watching the video, i got so excited about the worldbuilding of this game, the kung never fails to deliver!
Who cares about Instagram polls?
@@mina7572 the owen kung community is mainly from his instagram page, so yea its relavent
@@mina7572the instagram poles decided what the topic of the video is, if terraria had won the video would be about terraria.
laugh at this nerd he likes terraria
@@rexross4847 oh yeah? how about uhhh the unmmmm yeah, your mom (i win the arguement)
1:44:06 10.00kg "The gas weighs ten pounds" peak America moment
I knew meters and yards were exactly the same, but kg and lbs too? What a coincidence
Let people make mistakes, help them instead of making crude remarks.
@@kcjcusbc5004 @owenkung5000 sorry if I came across as crude. Hope you keep learning the little things that are different between cultures, the big things that are the same, and of course, learn to laugh along the way.
@@benjaminnickerson3961Tbh, the US is literally the only true world superpower, so Americans don't really have a real necessity to "conform" to anything other people do outside the country. They're literally the New Romans, they dictate the terms of the world...not the other way around. I know Europeans especially like to cope and deny this, but it's true and everyone knows it even if they try to use anything they can to dump on Americans for this or that
@@jiaan100 meters and yards are not the same.
I’m like 100% sure you can zoom the map using the scroll wheel, it’s just the opposite direction of what you’d expect. It trips up everyone lol.
That was added into anomaly.. unusual but yeah
1:03:25
In regards to the Clear Sky MG nest at the entrance to The Cordon, it IS possible to get by the military outpost alive, but you have to keep jumping cover to cover behind rocks and trees before gunning it down the round, which can still leave you open to get shot up. Took me like 15 attempts, but it is in fact possible
Yeah, Clear Sky made me laugh my ass of @ being punished for having the gall to try & continue the game. Like “yeah I’ll go speak to Sidorovich. I miss my old..OMG WTF they have an MG42 now WTF?!?!”
Made me use my binoculars and plan my path before trying 2 more times, both of which were white knuckle, toe curling-ly terrifying.
Made the Zone feel like a forbidden place fr.
Oh, you played with a version, when GSC put back the option to kill the gunner. Originally it wasn't meant to be the way and even if you somehow managed to kill the gunner, the MG kept firing on it's own. Then they received a ton of complaints so they make it possible to silence the gun by killing the gunner. Then another patch came in, seemingly from some team working on other issues what overwrote the earlier patch concerning the gun. Then complaints arrived again and they put it back. Then another patch came in, some guy noticed that the design documents said the MG should not be silenced and "fixed" it, causing even more people to rip off their hair. Then it got fixed again.
I don't even know how it is in the final version, because most mods just give you the option to kill the gunner.
The idea behind this bullshit section was, that you were supposed to sneak from cover to cover, without the gunner noticing you. But sneaking in Stalker is broken as fuck and never worked (AI either can spot you through the other side of the map or never see you even if you stand next to them), so instead you have to run from cover to cover and run away. The dear fucking ret@rds at GSC even put up this fence running next to the tunnel, to make sure you can't just turn left and walk away, while making the stalkers at the bridge instantly hostile to you if you want to circle around using the way recommended by most youtube vloggers (best option is sprinting as fuck, jump under the fallen tree, wait until the gunner gets bored, then run to the hills until the gunner looses sight of you). As I said, originally you were not meant to be able to silence the gun, you were meant to run away. This is just one instance of Clear Sky design being an utter mess.
The "drone" sound in Shadow of Cernobyl during the doc cutscene is here because you didn't kill the controller during your first agroprom underground mission.
LMAO. Stalker moment
lmao i was wondering because when i backtracked the way to doc i remembered which manhole you leave the underground from so i could snipe the controller head-on
Roadside picnic is really one of the best books ive ever read and its pretty short so everyone should give it a read (or listen to an audiobook rip on youtube) . Its actually crazy how this book has inspired unique but still equally good pieces of media. like the book, the stalker movie, and these games are all some of my favorite works of art period.
Every STALKER fan must read that book.
The movie is also good
i really wanted so much more of roadside picnic the book was over too quickly :,( but a classic awesome book non the less
There is a whole series of official STALKER novels. Back when the games were new, GSC partnered up with a russian publisher to release dozens of novels based directly on the games. The quality varies, some are barely a step above fan fiction, while others are written by prominent russian & ukrainian sci-fi & combat fantasy writers and are thus quite good. None are canon, each author has their own separate "STALKER universe" (although there is some limited cross-referencing), and even the basics like how anomalies, mutants and artifacts work vary dramatically between authors.
Still, I inhaled these things as a kid, I read like one of those per week. Dad still has ~40 of those novels in the attic. My favorite is "Firing Line" by Vasiliy Orekhov, a story that follows a veteran stalker Hemul through a frantic chase through the Zone, set in the 2020s.
The only issue is - they are all in russian, with only a couple translated into german.
"Dutyer" is probably a janky translation quirk. "Duty" is called "Dolg" in russian, and a Duty member is called "dolgovez". The "-vez" suffix works exactly like "-er" in english, so whoever translated the game to english just followed the same process - "duty" + "er" = "dutyer".
24:20 "I could never get too far without getting spotted" -has headlamp on the whole time- gee I wonder why
I literally played through this couple days ago and it was the same for me but I didn't have my head lamp on. The stealth in SoC just sucks ass.
Nah I just don't ever try stealth in the Stalker games...shits jank man
@@jerbear938 Trying to be stealthy is only good for a jumpscare when you get one tapped
Lol yep. But it's a shit section to stealth through as well. You don't really have access to silenced weapons at that point and doing melee only is fucked. I managed to do it once, but once you reach the files I think it always triggers the alarm.
This is absolutely stellar my man! I'm not even halfway, and I'm very happy with it.
STALKER is such a interesting series, and I'm glad to see a review that's this long and isnt just basically restating the plot!
1:38:00
If you talk to the bandit leader, there's essentially a skill check, where if your equipment is good enough you'll intimidate him into not demanding interest (otherwise you just get attacked).
It's so moving and beautiful. It's like a snapshot of a time just passed.
glad i found this channel
this is the content i need
glad i found parker fitzgerald
this is the owen i kung
Just wanted to say this review was extremely well done, and I love your upbeat delivery. You've earned yourself a subscriber.
That was a really good video, going through the original games in great detail, super high quality, keep it up
I just found your channel by youtube algorithm and it’s been a while since it recommended me a channel so worthwhile, loved your cometary, loved your gameplay, thanks for such a great video
Stalker doesn’t stand for anything btw, it was literally just to avoid copyright with the film. The acronym was fan invented.
No
@@grrizzzy7 He's correct I'm afraid ... use your logic, it's a backronym. The studio DID come up with it but afteer the fact.
@@sci_ent_ificsui_neg9236why did you fake pretending to be another person when you clearly are the same person @shardell and hopped on an alt.
You literally hopped on an alt to pretend that you were someone else defending the original post 🤣🤣🫵🏾
@@micksenser2516 Firstly, you absolute coping mecchanism addled f*ckwit, ... If I have something to opine? I WILL do so ...I have ZERO concern whether you have the limited cognition to comprehend so.
Secondly, I use THIS account and have only done so since before your mother gave up injecting milk into your prebuscent sounding mouth.
Have you had your fill of less than heterosexual cope now? ....
I should I now take off tthe training gloves?
But didn't the movie maker die long before the game were made
Fr the most underrated TH-camr rn. Entertaining AND your vids are in depth/interesting? Yea, get this guy a million subs rn.
clearly you are not into the owen kung lore
Somewhat big news fellas: the 3 stalker games is now on console(PlayStation and Xbox) so now if you like stalker you can play it on console
Speaking of savescumming, back when i played CS (it was the first stalker game i had EVER played) I used to save after each individual kill in a fight so youd scroll through my saves and see:
swamps fight 1 kill
swamps fight 2 kills
swamps fight 3 kills
swamps fight 4 kills
swamps fight finished
How will this video affect Owen Kung’s legacy?
I appreciate you playing these with very minimal modding i see too many people get turned off from the game for being too hard and i find a lot of that comes from the mods they get recommended that are meant for vets to play with once the basegame isn't enough anymore
Also the persona plot joke got me good 😂
Great video man, love your Insta page and its cool seeing you do this longform content. Your scripts are getting better with each video, too!
I’m digging many of your videos. Your channel will become huge!!!
Definitely enjoyed watching this, it was well paced and had thorough coverage of each of the games. Hope you do a GAMMA review and one for STALKER 2 someday.
Phenomenal video friend!
Keep it up🔥 i love this type of content
This is a kung classic (the vids are really good keep posting them)
Thanks so much man! You're one of my main inspirations big dog
Ghost gum wtf 👋
Really nice vid. CoP is my favourite OG S. T. A. L. K. E. R game. I played SoC and CS when I was like 7-8 y/o and just couldn't understand wtf was going on. Then when I was maybe 11 I randomly bought CoP at some local games shop for like 150 rubles and fell in love with the game. After playing trough all vanilla games I can say that CoP has the most interesting side quests and side characters in the series. I also love attention to details and the world kinda reacting to your actions. Like how Topol's group becomes a cool science research group with top-tier armors if you keep all of them alive during ecologists' quests. Another example is how you can mention lots of things to Zulus when you're drinking with him(like how you've found the Oasis, cleared the bloodsucker nest and etc. Although some things in the game feel really undercooked(I really don't like that most of unique guns are just ordered from Nimble and aren't used as a reward for quests or loot from named NPCs).
I also love Anomaly and Anomaly modpacks because they can provide the "some random stalker living in the Zone and doing some chores for Sidorovich" experience (peak Anomaly for me is literally hunting mutants, cooking their meat and going on artifact hunts).
came from the ironic instagram account and didn't expect such a great video from it. Very nice stuff mr kungle keep it up
Love your style of commentating. Keep up the good work, brother.
The freeroam you mentioned Shadow of Chernobyl is only included with ZRP I think, because i dont recall it being in vanilla. Anyway great vid. Earned a sub.
yea vanilla sends you back to the main menu
Im glad that someone take a journey to Sralker series imo its one of most unique games u will ever play the atmosphere while of this game is topnotch , i watched the entire video and bring me memories of this golden serie u did amazing job explaing and editing through the video.
Btw u finished the whole series and not knowing that there is quick healing shortcut and peeking mechanic in the game which it will make ur engagement way easier by pressing "E" and "Q" .
Your video is very enjoyable. You talk about a good game in a clear and interesting manner. You deserve more subs :)
I want to thank you for this review. You got me to actually play the games and I can’t stop (I won’t lie Shadow of Chernobyls ending almost filtered me). I played them all back to back over these last two weeks and am currently installing Anomaly to give me more of the Zone. I have not been this inthralled by a game and it’s world since I played the og Dead Space on its release.
P.S fuck Rail Guns and fuck the wish granters dialogue looping LMAO.
Great video, wish NFL iceberg didn’t get nailed by TH-cam. I liked it a lot . Merry Christmas Kung!
Bless you for bringing up the popular myths about difficulty levels in Shadow of Chernobyl. As someone who personally dug around in config files for hours, I tried to convey this simple fact multiple times, but a lot of people just ignore the proof right there in the code.
Dude you made a very good video!
Thanks for this and I subscribed 😊
Love to see it keep up the great work kung ball!!!
The realization that there is a 2 hours long video of one of my favorites series from all time, and almost 230 k people had seen it before me, its part of what makes me hope about our world. cheers. Great Vid, seen it in three sits. Im jumpting right know to the oblivion video.
I ain’t even watched it but I know it’s gas, keep it up mr kung 👍👍
Playing the S.T.A.L.K.E.R for the first time because it came to the xbox, ive made it to the 3rd game and i just love this world so much! Good video!
Very fun and cool video. Good job ! liked and subbed
Love all 3 of these games, thanks for the video
Insanely good video man. You should play anomaly, and make a review of you want. ❤❤
Quite an enjoyable video, Mr Kung.
GLORY TO MONOLITH! Good video man, im subbin. Also I HIGHLY recommend playing GAMMA. Its basically an even more open world version of STALKER. Im currently running a Mercenary run and its just so fitting.
It’s still hilarious to me that I found your TH-cam channel as a 23 year old grown man completely independently of when I was like 17 shitting my pants laughing at your meme account (I haven’t had social media in years now)
brother for context I was older six years ago than you are now. You stop calling yourself grown man at some point and try to find the little things that bring you childlike joy and wonder, it's too easy to lose.
@@autismofinn3144 Too true
@@autismofinn3144 I’m not saying anything negative or anything, just distinguishing between the two very different points in my life I discovered and enjoyed his kungtent
Funfact about that stalker that saves your life after the death truck crash. He´s modeled after the Stalker from the original movie. Reddish hair, similiar face a calm and mellow saviour. There´s tons of therories about how he might be scar, or later on might´ve become Charon (the monolith leader in prypiat) due to his relatively rare VSS which only appears on like three people in the whole series.
Scar looks even more like the Stalker than the guy that saves you in the intro does
Scar is confirmed dead or turned monolith.
He looks more like Redrick Schuart from the original Roadside Picnic novel
Why would Scar save you tho? If he was alive he would just cap you again
Ill never forget when Shadow of Chernobyl came out. It was the answer to the itch left since the original Resident evil PSX Trilogy. It got me into hardcore FPS and Action RPGs. Its hard to believe its nearly been 20 years since then. Im still playing with my Steam Deck
Dude almost 200k views congratulations :D
Great video dude, as someone who likes to think themselves a stalker aficionado, this is very well edited and compiled. Enjoyed it greatly:) thanks
Also your sense of humors got me cracking up 😂😂 good shit dude 🤟
"... and review them the only way I know how
poorly"
This got me good 😂 No, bro, its quality! Keep it up
great video kung you gotta do a video anomaly/gamma next
Gread video! If you do play Anomaly, I highly recommend the Boomsticks and Sharpsticks mod, just adds a bunch of cool weapons, and weapon attachments.
This guys gonna be huge mark my words. Wish he had more content.
What a great video on the STALKER Series, Marked Two.
Keep up the good work. Gonna Subscribe to you to see another video from you.
Only a short while into the video, but as a Stalker veteran, thank you for actually explaining for new people how the difficulties work. Used to think that master made bullets do more damage, until I actually heard other people discussing it and realised for myself that it's total bullshit.
I feel you I fell for it too. After over 10 years of stalkers I found out it was just bullshit :D
absolutely play anomaly and then gamma, and deffinitally do a review, currently my favorite game of 2023 and has me more than hyped for stalker 2
Aaahhh you Cheeky Breeky! Well done with the highly entertaining reviews! I played the Stalkers first time this year, and they easily became one of my favorites! The setting is very interesting and unique, the gunplay / challenge is top-notch. I heard lot of praise for them back in the day, but missed them. Perhaps my PC was lacking etc. My other favorites include Fallout & Fallout 2, Disciples 2, Silent Storm games, Seven Kingdoms etc. When it comes to the gameworld / story / ending being reactive to player actions and choices, Fallout & Fallout 2 rank extremely high here. When it comes to gunplay, around those times F.E.A.R. was highly regarded and probably is today. Legends then, legends still i say. I haven't played it, though.
Ok, back to the review. I wonder is there mods to nerf the AI grenades and squish bugs for Clear Sky? I'd like to think so. Regarding Call of Pripyat; First time i remember "cheesing" through the sleeping bloodsuckers by standing behind my fellow buddy / corner / something and just throwing grenades like crazy at them and shooting like hell. Very tough, and very memorable! Regarding the room with 4 hooded big guys, same strategy there. Lots of grenades and shooting. In Pripryat, there was one certain big complex. Aften completing the game, i went there for some aftergoodies. The complex would be eather occupied, or soon to be. So it great strolling with my boys there, often they would end up there. If the complex was occupied, then clearing it and keeping the complex as ours was challenging. If it was empty, then holding the line and keeping the complex as ours was fun too.
great video man
After checking out these games myself like you did, I had an insatiable itch for more and Anomaly and Gamma definitely scratch that itch that I'm sure you're having right now.
Definitely do anomaly first, then gamma second. There are a LOT of changes to the gameplay made in Gamma which I and many other find to be enjoyable, but it's an experience in its own right. Make some videos on them, I'm happy to sub and wait for them!
I played all 3 of the stalker games the last year and I enjoyed all of them. Imo the best part about stalker was the exploration. Searching for items in an abandoned house while it's raining outside (in-game), was awesome. I am really excited for the new entry this year.
You CAN crouch down, go under the fallen tree (break the box if necessary), hug the fence on the left and sneak through to the rookie village in Clear Sky. Scamorovich will be very impressed once you've done so.
I got it first try when I played CS for the first time too. Didn't even think that I'm supposed to go through the other route.
hi there... old timer here. first off, good video, always love it when someone covers the genre.
some notes;
- difficulty, also affects loot found in crates
- it's "si-doro-wich" or "si-dro-wich", not "sido-rowich"
- S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - the acronym is widespread, but made up, it doesn't stand for anything
- the bridge in cordon; most common rookie mistake. fps trained us to "shoot first, ask never" - but in stalker there are some situations when talking to the enemy is totally an option
- probably a bit more, but i just started the video and don't wanna be too picky
if you want to explore the series further, i highly recommend the lost alpha from dezowave, it is a standalone game and tries to recreate the game as original intended with lots of cut content like the Sins faction or driving vehicles, another ending, etc.
Glad you finally gave these games a chance, if you're a fan of the first person shooter genre, or just gaming in general, the Stalker games will inevitably come up just like Half-life. CoP was my favorite of the 3, I've beaten it several times, and I also really love Anomaly. I've been playing through the True Stalker mod recently and it's another great addition to the series, as a standalone game.
Awesome vid. Thanks for all the time you put into this.
Also
Sid-oro-vich**
Gause pronounced G-ow-se***
and Magazine******, a clip is something a Kar98 would use. A magazine is, well a magazine...like what would go into a Glock.
01:03:38 It is possible to get past the military checkpoint without getting killed although, you have to be quick about it. You basically want to run towards the second rock down the hill and crouch until they stop shooting. Then, once they stop shooting, make sure that you fully regenerated your stamina and run to the left. There should be a gap between the barbed wire and a bush, once you make it past that, then you just run for it and hope you won't get killed. It took me a while but eventually made it past them.
Cool video. I played the games shortly after they came out and desite all of the bugs and glitches, it was still a great experience. Thhe bugs were fitting, a byproduct of the era, because the eastern bloc was struggling during that time. I'm from a Lithuanian family and during the late 90's, 2000's everything was chaos.
Please do a video about the Metro trilogy
let's goooo new owen kung video!!!
I just got this on my Xbox and it’s like far cry meets fallout and metro. That is the best way to describe how the game feels to play
Long one! So hyped
For anyone interested, both the book and the film are really great. Especially the film, which also has a ton of interesting (and sad) history surrounding its creation.
1:03:30
It's been a LONG time since I played Clear Sky, but I don't remember having any issues with the machine gun section. IIRC you either were supposed to do it at night, or use rocks for cover. But it was definitely intended for you to get through the machine gunner.
Besides the audio and video being desynced, this is a good video
Very well made video, you managed to fit 3 games in 2 hours without missing any important details or plot points. Good job man, cant wait to see you play GAMMA! Subscribed!
Great stuff, Keep it up
Great vid love the channel. Curry was unanimous MVP in 2016
I’ve been following you on instagram for a minute now and I just made the connection that this is you 😭
Good video seems like the algorithm is going to make this a one off million view video.
Listening to your narration in this video on the background and reading my zone-influenced fiction (I posted it in r/stalker a while back - "Stories from the Lost County" by mvmikehammer) gives me some new ideas and directions where to take my writing.
Im ngl i forgot you had a youtube, was not expecting to find you in my recommendations tho congrats on catching some steam in the algorithm man. Idk parker Fitzgerald or something
I would not say that STALKER is based on Stalker (movie) and Roadside Picnic. Those are for sure inspirations for the series, but the game world and story are way different to those stories. Themes too. In fact, the reason the NPCs mention Klondike so often is because the Klondike Gold Rush is another massive influence on the game world too.
The AK is an AK 74 variant so it is 5.45, not 7.62. You missed a Stalker suit and Fast SHooting AK in Strelok's stash.
For Clear SKy - use the Sky Reclamation Project bug fix mod.
For the machinegun in Cordon - it is possible to get the high-end Clear Sky armour before going there. It is even better than the Berill. You need max Clear Sky reputation for it but it is a life saver. This makes it easier to pass the machinegun. Anti-Radiation artifacts in Clear Sky are super powerful. So you can ignore that damage type with 1-2 high to mid range ones. And stack lots of other ones for combat.
I personally like CoP but the least out of the series. Its a good game but I dislike its map design. Call of Pripyat has the most mods.
thank you kung man, another win for america
19:17 Speaking of being left with your pants down, during my playthrough of SOC when i got right infront of the CNPP I went into my inventory, I looked at the stats of my exoskeleton (i was using it to get to and through the cnpp) and the stats were so low from durability loss that I had to ditch the exoskeleton outfront of the CNPP and foot it through the complex
1:53 I had no ammo in any guns but my pistol at this area, so i just sprinted ass-first into the controller and spammed right click with the knife and spammed F1 to heal
In 8:35 they all just say to you to holster your weapon if you want a humane talk except the second last guy who was saying at the moment something.
Good one as this as the one on anomaly, played them in eastern European classical pirated copy bought at the bazaar way in 2007 an so on, it straight caught me that well the zone, from a fence pole to concrete slabs and rail ways is just as were the post soviet slums most of us grew up roaming young and unaware of the approaching evils of the capitalist hellscape. Well done mr K, and a lil addition Strela means an arrow, so strelok is marksman or an archer, as well as shooter yes, jus a bit of protoslavic lingo fun fact so you dont bring a longbow to a gunfight one day, but the way you pronounce brittish language makes me think you are more familiar with guns than a brighton uk police officer. Peace.
i enjoy your yapping thank you Kung
Keeps recommending this video after every single S.T.A.L.K.E.R video I watch, this makes the 7th tike I'm watching this. It's a real banger, so I'm not mad at the algorithm.
There's also a huge standalone called 'True Stalker', released just a week ago which was a long time project done by indie team. And there is also upcoming major standalone with different story timeline by Gunslinger! That one is huge and maybe would still use the old engine. Man I hope that one will resolve the massive CTD issues when modding the game.
1:04:00 you can actually run pass the machine gun if you have ball big enough to zig zag between tree and rock and enough bandage to patch up few hole.
My first time playing clear sky, I was too stubborn to go back and save scum brute force through and meet sidorovic right away.
I swear they just summon grenade on your location instead of throwing sometime. But then in mid to late game I got the exo-suit, pimp it tf out and tank 3-6 grenade back to back until they throw the extra hurt grenade then my body flying out the window.
I would like to see your take on the Metro series. They're one of my personal favorite games. Stalker laid the foundation for them as well. With the story and gameplay progression through the series, I believe it would be good fun.
The modder for stalker is truly some of the best wizard I’ve seen I’m constantly in awe from what they manage to do from a 16 year old engine, truly putting some triple A company to shame.
huh, watching 17:09 made me remember how I delt with them every new game I make , I always find a grenade and throw it in some direction away from the checkpoint . They'll all wander over to the sound and I can walk right by
In shadow of chernobyl, i love climbing the roof of one of the houses in rookie village to get a merc suit from a breakable box
You can recruit Stridder even if you don't join any faction in CoP.
But you need the Achivments "Diplomat" and "Mutant Hunter".
The second one is easy, you just need to finish all the hunting quests (a bloodsucker lair and one chimera hunt in the two first maps).
The first one is tricky as you need to complete the two Loner/Bandit related missions in Yanov without resorting to violence. So paying off Vanos's debt and paying the ransom for Mitay.
These achievment will give you just enougth reputation with both faction (if you did not killed any of them in Yanov) to make them recruit Strider.
You also can enroll them to guard scientists' bunker after mercenaries desert it
I've played the original stalker games + anomaly and gamma. I'd highly recommend both anomaly or gamma depending on how hardcore of an experience you want with your game but it'll be a pleasant surprise playing them. Anomaly by itself is a great experience that can still be enjoyed casually. Gamma is both beautiful and brutal. The amount of mods they have (I think current gamma is like 439 mods?) really brought a polish to the game you almost don't believe is possible. They've even added mantling to grab onto ledges in the most recent update. Whilst both anomaly and gamma I'd say are more hardcore versions of stalker they still have that sandbox aspect of them. Almost every option can be tuned ingame to find the perfect gameplay loop for you. By default they are pretty challenging to get good or serviceable loot but you can tweak it to be more fair for you. Gamma will never have the original games beat for the story since it's not it's focus but the overall experience of Gamma is something of beauty and I hope you get to experience it.
and if you dont like the grindy aspect of gamma escape from pripyat aka EFP is your friend
Shadow Of Charnobyl is still the best game out of them all - best vibes and no tacti-cool cringe
I slapped better drop conditions for more experienced stalkers with masters having mint gear, made the midgame flow less grindy to me and I think it fits well having serious stalkers taking care of their shit, and rookies trying their bestest with broken toz's
@@Lake_Claire the tacticool stuff is what I hate the most about gamma even though I like it a lot. I wish you could just outright disable BaS without breaking everything. And I started with shadow of chernobyl on my first gaming laptop sporting ati x600 graphics, managed to run that bad boy with surprisingly good settings but man was it rough. Then updated my computer and went down oblivion lost -> amk -> lurk pipelines and so on so forth, was hooked. No need to go all monolith and make stalker fans fight eachother
Quick thing: the idea of throwing nuts and bolts to detect anomalies is actually from the Roadside Picnic novel originally, not the film.
Great video btw!
Not sure if anyone pointed that out yet, but that military checkpoint you gotta cross in the Clear Sky - that was completely intentional design. The idea was that you had to run from cover to cover while dodging the incoming enemy fire, but due to a mistake in the game code, the weapon has mismatched ammo type, I think it was the sniper one, which conveniently penetrates anything you can use as a cover. The guy manning the gun is named Вова Вист, who is pretty infamous in the community for just how ridiculously hard he makes it for the player to cross Cordon. And yes, it is still completely possible to run through, if you know what you're doing.
Well a M60 shooting cal .50 ammo is not unusual^^