Before buying you must know one: it’s game not classical RPG in open world like The Witcher 3 or Skyrim. It originated from an MMORPG project from which the online and MMO elements were removed. And since I’ve spent around 1,000 hours playing this studio’s game (Black Desert), I feel I should warn you about something.

This is a fantastic game with an open-world setting and a wealth of mechanics. You need to be prepared for the fact that progression in this game is more gradual and wide-ranging. If you’re just looking for a great action game with stunning graphics and an epic storyline, you’re likely to be disappointed when the game forces you to engage in typical MMORPG activities: grinding and gathering. Conversely, if you were expecting a laid-back, leisurely RPG sandbox, you too risk making the wrong choice, because, as the successor to Black Desert, Crimson Desert features a fairly dynamic and expansive combat system.

I wouldn’t expect the game to have a particularly engaging storyline either. I wouldn’t dare judge it until I’ve played through the game, but I know that in Korean games, the storyline usually scores around 6/10. I’d love to be proven wrong, but miracles are rare.

But if you’re looking for a deep game with a wealth of mechanics that you’ll want to get to grips with and immerse yourself in for hundreds of hours, then this is most likely the game for you.

I’d like to congratulate the developers on the release of their new project! And I very much hope that after a couple of dozen hours, I won’t change my mind.

I’m a huge fan of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. universe. The very first thing I played on my PC was the Valley of Whispers mod, and the first game I actually finished from start to end was S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat. Because of this universe, I met people I’ve now been friends with for more than 10 years. We used to discuss artifacts during university classes, and if someone brought a guitar to a party, they were basically doomed to play at least a couple of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. tracks.

Sadly, the current political situation has cracked the once united community that formed around the game over the years. But even now, the second game feels like a small camp at the edge of the world — a place where you can forget, at least for a moment, about the horror surrounding us in real life. Dear developers, if you’re reading this: I know it’s hard, but please try to keep the game the way it is. Don’t let art that was created to unite and build turn into a political tool.


Technical state.
Probably the most painful topic. But to be fair, over the past year the game has become much better. There are far fewer bugs, crashes are mostly gone, stutters are minimized, and controls feel more responsive. Yes, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 is demanding — you won’t be running around the Zone on a GTX 1060 anymore. But there’s one huge problem: SHADER COMPILATION. It’s a nightmare when instead of launching the game, every second startup you have to wait 2–5 minutes for it to “remember” what hardware it’s running on. I really hope this is a temporary issue and one day it will leave this project for good.

Visuals and atmosphere.
I wouldn’t say this is the most beautiful or technically advanced game in the world, but it's one of the most atmospheric — that’s a fact. Location design, weapons, gear, anomalies — all top tier. You can tell the devs earn their borscht. I often catch myself just slowly walking around locations, not running and not using fast travel, simply to enjoy the views and the sounds. The crackling of a campfire, guitar strings, the sliding bolt of a rifle. But there’s a catch… voice acting.

I totally understand why there’s no Russian VO, but the English one is often very flat and doesn’t even come close to conveying the atmosphere and mentality of people from the post-Soviet region living in the Zone. Maybe it would’ve been worth adding more language variety to the original version: Ukrainian as the main language, but with characters of different nationalities — German scientists, separate squads of stalkers from Russia, Kazakhstan, Poland, the US, and so on.

Story and quests.
I like that the developers continued the idea of a “Living Zone.” What I don’t like is that almost all key characters from previous games turned into unhinged psychos, and the ending drifts into straight-up fantasy. Scar basically becomes the Joker, Degtyarev develops some kind of Stockholm syndrome toward the Zone, and Strelok at one point starts channeling Eren Yeager with his obsession to “save” the Zone through total control and cleansing… and against all this epic drama we have Skif, who’s just running around with a piece of glass hoping to get compensation for property damage.
Side quests, though, are classic S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: a solid 4/5. Just good quests telling their own stories. Are they super memorable? Not really. Are they fun to play? Absolutely.

Subjective complaints.
These are things that will probably be fixed over time and aren’t that critical overall:

- Weapon variety. All the classics are here, but I’d love to see more sniper rifles and more modern NATO-caliber guns.
- Artifacts need more impact. Most of them are useless even on Veteran, and they sell for pennies.
-More “underground” areas. Locations with harsher conditions than standard quests, but with better rewards to match.

Final thoughts.
Can I recommend S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 to everyone? No. It’s a very specific project that offers a unique exploration experience, and it definitely won’t click with everyone. It’s more grounded. You can spend hours looting stashes and collecting sausage and bread, and you can finish the entire story with starting gear. But if you’re willing to give it a chance, dive into this world, and just play — you might not even notice how you end up spending several hundred hours in it.