By Jim Rossignol on April 11th, 2009 at 8:57 am.
Via VG247: a GSC fansite is reporting that there’s a “new” expansion (the first presumably being standalone Clear Sky) as well as a full new game from the company in the works.
In an online conference earlier this week, [GSC president, Sergey] Grigorovitch was asked whether the April 2009 calendar featuring the words ‘Call of Pripyat’ in Russian was an April Fools’ joke.
He replied that this was not a joke and would be the name of the second expansion. He added that this new expansion will be released later this year. Furthermore, a full S.T.A.L.K.E.R. title is also in development, although there’s currently no information on when we will hear more about this.
11/04/2009 at 09:27 MultiVaC says:
Wooooooooo!
11/04/2009 at 09:31 Heliocentric says:
Well, if ifinity ward don’t want ‘call of’ i’d rather gsc use it than it go to waste.
11/04/2009 at 09:58 NuZZ says:
Need… More… Stalker…
11/04/2009 at 10:12 pi says:
I wonder we’ll get vehicles this time round.
Although I don’t believe the irradiated Ukrainian countryside has worn thin yet, it makes you wonder how much more they can add above the previous games.
11/04/2009 at 10:12 Spiny says:
Great, I just started “Clearski” :) I’d suggest anyone struggling with framerates takes a gander at tweakguides.com’s guide. I doubled my frame rate by turning sun rays to low!
11/04/2009 at 10:20 MetalCircus says:
Oh man, this is great news. A whole new game? Maybe this one won’t have too many bugs (not that that stopped me enjoying SoC ;))
11/04/2009 at 10:28 Stalins Ghost says:
I think I speak for us all when I start chanting “please don’t be like Clear Sky” over and over.
11/04/2009 at 10:29 NuZZ says:
I just hope it has better multiplayer, ya know? Like… Diablo2 on B.net type deal would do me fine. :). Outlands is supposed to be doing something similar, while it will be out before Diablo3! RaWr!
11/04/2009 at 10:58 Doctor Doc says:
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Call of Pripyat. These games have the silliest names.
11/04/2009 at 11:11 Gilly says:
I concur. Name-wise they seem to be running out as if their brains were dripping out of their ears.
11/04/2009 at 11:13 teo says:
Please optimize. Please cut the DRM. Please patch the damn thing after release
11/04/2009 at 11:15 Tony says:
GET OUT OF HERE STALKER
11/04/2009 at 11:19 Frye says:
I started playing Clear Sky about 3 weeks ago. I found the first game such a rare gem, that i resisted temptation and shelved the game for a few months waiting for patches. The game is still a too unforgiving at the start. Especially considering the load times, lack of bandages and the NEED for bandages while your main weapon is a pistol.
Once you pick you faction, though, the game comes to life. For a few levels i felt that total SoC freedom again. Also, the game plays very well, it has a proper fps ‘feel’ to it which is so rare. The aiming is right, movement is right, the ballistics are cool especially on sniper rifles. A lot of things are good about CS. The later city levels are a marvel of modelling. It was too bad i couldnt spend more time there because the script forced me forward. I could not even find the way back to my homebase to finally get rid of my 60 kg worth of hardware. Maybe it was possible, but i ended up giving up. The storyline and dialogs were so bad that i stopped reading them. But despite all this, I had at least a few hours of gameplay of good old Stalker, creeping in the dark, luring different factions to one another and enjoying the show as they fought. And even though i finished the game, i’ll replay the second half, joining Freedom, not Duty. I don’t regret buying this game for full price. At all.
11/04/2009 at 11:47 Clockwork Harlequin says:
I’m with Frye on his evaluation of Clear Sky. But while I really like both games (SoC more so) I hope they explore the exploration/artifact hunting more. Having enjoyed Tarkovsky’s film and the book Roadside Picnic by the Strugatsky brothers, I feel that it could be so much more atmospheric if you weren’t a combat monster, just a half-starved Ukranian guy in a leather jacket trying not to die. How would the game be if you never got to be as strong as (and stronger than) the military, and had to rely on running and hiding in more situations (kind of like the early parts of each game)?
Still, whining aside, I’m looking forward to it.
11/04/2009 at 11:49 Evangel says:
@Teo, my experience is GSC patches their games from near-alpha quality to near-perfection. I’ve been playing Clear Sky with the 1.5.0.7 patch and it’s damn near perfect. Contrast this with at release where I’d get a crash every 5 minutes or so.
They have better post-release support than most companies.
11/04/2009 at 11:55 Jim Rossignol says:
Has anyone tried the faction mod for Clear Sky? Apparently allows issuing of basic orders and so on.
I found Clear Sky disappointing on a number of levels, and I’m hoping I can mod it into shape.
11/04/2009 at 12:14 unique_identifier says:
GSC have made some some bloody excellent games and then partially undermined them by some really horrible parts. still, i’d probably be a sucker for more: i had a blast with the first 2/3rds of clearksi. the improvements to artifact hunting and gear upgrades were great. i have fond memories of times where i spent hours dying in the one anomaly trying to work out where the damn treasure was hidden, and how to get it out.
that said, the last 1/3 with its scripted linear wannabe call duty action can sod right off, and take its invulnerable-until-you-complete-the-quest snipers with it. and the finale wall-of-flame bossfight speedrun. please.
11/04/2009 at 12:16 Heliocentric says:
Still not getting clear sky with limited activations until i see it for £5, thats a decent price for a rental. Shame really, as i bloody love stalker.
11/04/2009 at 12:20 teo says:
@Evangel the Steam version took months to get patched
11/04/2009 at 12:25 Jason Moyer says:
Clear Sky was such a disappointment that GSC has lost ‘must buy’ status in my eyes. Hopefully these will be as great as SoC but I can’t say I’m counting on it.
11/04/2009 at 12:26 Jetsetlemming says:
Given how much worse Clear Sky was than SOC, I’m expecting Call of Pripyat to be like Boiling Point on release.
11/04/2009 at 12:26 kyrieee says:
Clear Sky did a lot of things right that SoC did wrong, and the other way around too unfortunately.
The open world parts of CS were way better than in SoC. Doing missions in SoC was totally pointless and mind numbing, and in CS you can actually get tangiable rewards plus it’s decent fun.
The setpiece moments and locations of CS aren’t nearly as good though. The ending is totally broken and throwaway
11/04/2009 at 12:47 Vasara says:
Call of Pripyat, despite being a somewhat uninspired name, sounds promising. Pripyat had loads of potential to be a very atmospheric and powerful locale, but the way it was handled in SoC was disappointing to say the least.
CS was somewhat disappointing, but I’m still very much looking forward to this expansion and sequel.
11/04/2009 at 12:49 Overwatch_UA says:
Grigorovitch didn’t say “full S.T.A.L.K.E.R. title is also in development”. His exact words: Second add-on will be out this year, fall. I can say that we will definitely be working on STALKER 2.
11/04/2009 at 12:56 SlappyBag says:
I didn’t like Clear Sky at all, felt very hashed. I loved Stalker and am really suprised that the publishers are still letting them produce from the let downs that both games in long run have been.
Really looking forward to a full title, a HL2 for the series.
11/04/2009 at 13:35 Barky says:
I loved Stalker, but I never played Clearsky.
11/04/2009 at 13:40 Nutterguy says:
Second this!
11/04/2009 at 15:17 Cooper says:
I’m keeping half an eye on the official forums where most of the mods are. Once a few have come to fruition, I shall be buying Clearsky…
I’m still playing Stalker through with the ‘Oblivion Lost’ mixed in with some amazing high-def textures. Someone’s also managed to get the game seasonal, as it was originally intended to be – you start out playing in the spring, and it eventually shifts to autumnal…
11/04/2009 at 15:43 xPress says:
“SC patches their games from near-alpha quality to near-perfection. ”
Did they ever fixed the issue with new ATi cards not being able to render camo nets and stuff like that (all become invisible)?
Or is there a circumvention?
That’s what is holding me to properly play the game so far.
11/04/2009 at 16:48 Justin says:
Cooper – what did you add to make the game seasonal? I’m playing Shadow of Chernobyl with the Oblivion Lost mod, but I don’t have that – and it would be fun.
It’s frustrating, because the mods for the original STALKER game make it go from good to great, but it’s hard to find them and get them working, especially since so much of it is in … Russian? Ukrainian? I wasn’t able to get the AMK mod or Priboi Story to work.
Hey, RPS! Someone play a significant chunk of one of those mods (especially Oblivion Lost) and write it up here! Everyone knows about Half-Life mods turning into real separate products, but this revision by mods into what is apparently the original STALKER game is worth talking about.
11/04/2009 at 16:56 Justin says:
See, now this is what I mean by missing out on a lot because of Russian->English barriers: STALKER social networking. (Googled to English)
11/04/2009 at 17:29 Ravenger says:
I loved STALKER, but I’m not very pleased with Clear Sky.
Twice now I’ve had to re-start the game due to serious gameplay and crash bugs. So I’ve done something I’ve not done in a long time – I’ve put the game aside until a decent patch is released that makes it stable enough to play.
11/04/2009 at 17:37 Jim Rossignol says:
I’m doing that at the moment with Clear Sky mods. Might take me a while to actually write it up though.
11/04/2009 at 18:16 redrain85 says:
Way, WAY more excited about this news than the constant dribble about Bioshock 2.
I’ll need to get Clear Sky out of the way now, if more STALKER titles are on the way. I held off on CS due to disappointing reviews and all the bugs, but guess I should finally get around to playing it. Even with less than stellar reviews, it will probably still be better than most FPS titles, anyway.
11/04/2009 at 18:48 PleasingFungus says:
I actually just started playing S.T.A.L.K.E.R. again the other day (look! I put in all the periods!), after tremendously mucking it up several months ago with some ill-advised attempts at modding. It’s even more fun than I remembered. So this news comes at an excellent time to get me excited. Yes for more STALKER! Yes for more bizarre supernatural/radioactive creepiness! Yes for full sequels!
11/04/2009 at 20:11 RealHorrorshow says:
Clear Sky sucked. Will wait for confirmation that these new games are polished (or at least working) before I spend another penny on GSC games.
11/04/2009 at 20:22 Erlam says:
I’m really surprised about how much people say they disliked Clear Sky.
While I liked the original more, I still absolutely loved Clear sky, and had a grand old time playing it. I am really psyched they’re adding another one, and I will definitely jump onboard when they release it.
I just finished Fallout 3, which I absolutely loved, but the whole time I kept thinking “man, I wish they’d also taken ‘x’ idea from STALKER…”
11/04/2009 at 21:01 Justin says:
I’m doing that at the moment with Clear Sky mods. Might take me a while to actually write it up though.
I have not tried any mods, since I played it right at release. A mod roundup wouldn’t make a bad article, either, given that most of them have to be found through searches of message boards and not-really-english websites.
11/04/2009 at 21:06 Satsuz says:
Trying to get a forum topic going on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. mods, if you’ve got questions or (hopefully) something to share, please join in.
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/forum/pc/stalker-mod-discussion/
11/04/2009 at 21:29 DigitalSignalX says:
Perhaps it’s time to revisit Clear Sky since I too played it near release and never finished due to bugs and script errors. A “must-have mod” round up would be cool. Wouldn’t mind seeing the same for Fallout3 or even Oblivion too.
11/04/2009 at 21:36 jt says:
maybe we will have woman this time.
11/04/2009 at 22:21 bhlaab says:
Clear Sky didn’t live up to the first, but it wasn’t as bad as people make it out to be.
Besides, STALKER and Crysis are the only places you can even get the hardcore-style FPS these days, what with the leaning and the no auto aim and such. To the person who said that STALKER games start out too unforgiving– having to play ultra-conservatively at the beginning is always the most fun part!
11/04/2009 at 22:29 dadioflex says:
“Oh man, this is great news. A whole new game? Maybe this one won’t have too many bugs (not that that stopped me enjoying SoC ;))”
Bugs? Those weren’t bugs, they were unscripted enjoyment moments.
I loved SOC and CS. They’re flawed but they share the most atmospheric setting I’ve seen in a game.
12/04/2009 at 00:10 Aftershock says:
I really. really. need to stop SoC bluescreening so i can finish it.
12/04/2009 at 00:41 Heliocentric says:
Turn down graphics to medium. It’ll stop bluescreening.
12/04/2009 at 00:57 IS THA' YOU PENNEH?! says:
You can’t go there!
Also if I see another rastafarian S.T.A.L.K.E.R. in these follow up games I’ll be very annoyed.
12/04/2009 at 10:09 Vasara says:
Yeah, SoC has a thing that causes it to bluescreen on certain cards when their video memory fills up. Turning down any options that use a lot of video memory, like AA, textures and dynamic lighting should fix it. In my case, just turning the textures setting to medium did the trick.
12/04/2009 at 10:36 Agrajag says:
I just finished Fallout 3 and throut the game I kep thinking “pripyat was so much more atmospheric then this”. I hope bethesda will take some lessons from this.
“Communism is a lie!”
12/04/2009 at 10:56 PC Monster says:
STALKER was the best FPS I’ve played in many a year. I’ve not got around to ‘Clearski’ yet (love the nickname!) but it’s at the top of the list of games I’ll be buying when I eventually get my new PC. The thought of brand new STALKER on the way makes me a very happy man indeed. Yes. If any of the future games have the massive free-roaming scale of the pre-alpha they showed us, I’d probably punt GSC an offer to bear their children.
12/04/2009 at 11:22 Zerotime says:
I’m hoping for more Roadside Picnic-esque survival horror in this one.
13/04/2009 at 02:20 Nahual says:
Well, I’m sold.
Even though Clear Sky was lacking in the underground areas, i still found it as oddly compelling as SoC, bugs and all.
Also, the Red Forrest at night was just as good as anything in SoC (after I was mangled by something i couldn’t identify deep within it, i just never went back in there after hours).
13/04/2009 at 20:03 Stelios says:
Well, considering that I have found SoC (with Oblivion Lost) to be a monumentally amazing game that I have played through several times already, I’d agree it feels like something is missing from CS. However I am on my first (completely mod-free) walk through so we’ll see once I finish it and stick some nice mods on it. OTOH it is weird being slaughtered by pseudodogs & the like in the Red Forest unlike in SoC where I had enough knowledge of the “tricks of the trade” to know how to dispatch those bastards.
Anyway, if this pack comes out for Clear Sky, I’d probably buy it assuming I don get irritated with the later stages of CS. At which point I’ll just go back to SoC, pick Freedom as a faction (with Oblivion Lost) and drive Duty crazy with random raids. And hunt boars. Mmm, Red Forest ham!
13/04/2009 at 22:21 ZeeKat says:
I’ve almost completed SoC with AMK mod. I mean, I didn’t mean to finish it, it was second playthtrough and most fun is from free roaming up to Pripyat and back. Anyway, AMK is surprisingly stable and fun (loved the “stalker chat” feature), though translation is sometimes horrible. Apparently 2.0 version of the mod is in the making, they plan to add alpha maps to the SoC, or something like this.