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Release Dates Out Now (North America) Out Now (Europe) |
Review
MULTPLAYER REVIEW
We'll be reviewing the single player shortly, once we've had the chance to plough through it some more, but one thing we can tell you is - it's nothing like multiplayer! We are having a great time playing the campaign, despite it being littered with bugs, but for now here are our initial impressions of our S.T.A.L.K.E.R multiplayer experience.
We've had a bit of a head start playing multiplayer. A month or so ago we jumped into the S.T.A.L.K.E.R Shadow of Chernobyl multiplayer beta test in the hope that the long wait had been worthwhile. But, because we'd been kept hanging on for so damn long, we expected something far more innovative. Yesterday, our full copy arrived and we spent last night and this morning playing death match, team death match and capture the artefact mode in the hope that it might have in someway been giving an overhaul since we played it last.
There's nothing particularly wrong with the actual game mechanics in multiplayer. Running around the open environment is smooth, changing weapons, re-loading works effectively, guns recoil and grenades can be thrown effectively, but it's just the same old crap, the game just feels dated, despite the pretty graphics.
When you begin a multiplayer match the initial set of guns at your disposal sound like a mixture between those spud guns that we used to use to terrorise old ladies at bus-stops when we were kids and the noise an air rifle makes when its lead pellet hits a brick wall. The lack of powerful weapons when you begin is made up somewhat once you progress through the rankings, which is done through capturing the artefact or killing the enemy. You can then purchase those higher powered weapons which, in all fairness, do have better recoil, fell more powerful and make a decent amount of noise...sort of.
All this buying weapons business and the way you go about it is quite frankly as dull as a PS3 launch event. We've played Counter Strike in the past until our fingers bled and it's clear that the whole idea is undoubtedly borrowed from the game and embedded, albeit with a few tweaks, to the STALKER system. Did you know that some of the development team on S.T.A.L.K.E.R were big Counter Strike players? No surprises there.
The most impressive thing about multiplayer is the atmosphere created by the mixture of weather conditions, anomalies - such as radiation where you can't stay in the same place for too long - and the day and night cycles which slower creep up on you. This environmental shift, as it buckets down with rain or gets so dark that you need to turn your night vision goggles on, does mean that you do have to change your style of gameplay to suit the situation.
There are also some well designed multiple level maps, which are littered with abandoned warehouses and areas to hide as well as plenty of static objects to poke your head around. You can also use a set of steps or a ladder to climb to a vantage point ideal for sniping or head for the confines of a warehouse; ideal for holding in team death matches. The design of the environment means that gameplay is tactical and therefore fairly slow paced, you won't encounter many frantic free for all shoot-out. Essentially though, it's like playing many of the standard FPS, but with new maps
In multiplayer, STALKER is a standard no thrills no spills FPS. Sure, there are some well designed, atmospheric and great looking maps, but take into account the grubby interface, the same old game modes, where capture the artefact mode is basically capture the flag,
(albeit it the artefact spawns in different locations) and you've got a fairly average first person shooter.
Even on the day of the game's release, Friday 23rd March, the official STALKER forums are 'closed due to maintenance'. Maybe they don't want people to see all the comments from the fans who've been waiting donkeys years for this lack lustre multiplayer, or possibly they've been inundated with complaints about the amount of bugs in single player mode (we hear it's not just us with problems) - a patch is desperately needed. For a game that's been so long in the making it's disappointing, but we still hold a lot of hope for the single player. Right, we're off to play some more. But, before you go rushing off and dismiss STALKER, don't. We haven't been positive about multiplayer, but single player is a whole different game!
More soon.
Review by Simon Sayers - 23rd March 2007
Scoreboard
| Gameplay: | 5 | ||
| Visuals: | 8 | ||
| Audio: | 6 | ||
| Presentation: | 4 | ||
| Lasting Appeal: | 2 | ||
| Overall Score: | 5 |
Awards
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