S.T.A.L.K.E.R's finally here.....

[Darren S]

Although this game was initially planned when 286's were on the drawing board - it appears that it will be released this Friday, the 23rd.

I'll be getting it and let you know what I think. Apparently it's not DX10 compliant (yet) but it should be more than enough to stress the latest hardware.

Hope it's not a turkey!

D.

 

[Griff]

It's sh*te.. I won't expand further than that

 

[Darren S]

LOL Griff - seriously?

D.

 

[thecremeegg]

I played the beta, was NOT impressed at all. the combats clunky and slow, the graphics look very dated, even though they supposedly need a good machine, and finally, its just dull. i have no intentions of buying it :dapprove:

a big shame cos i was looking forward to it a fair bit!!

 

[Darren S]

Oh dear......

D.

 

[thecremeegg]

If there was any way of renting it then i'd reccommend you do that, just in case you fall in love with it lol. Its got really mixed reviews, some people like myself feel no love for it, and just think its an average/poor FPS for this day and age, whereas others think its god's gift to gaming. Anyway you can get hold of the beta at all, get a feel for an admittedly unfinished version, but might help you decide

 

[Darren S]

If there was any way of renting it then i'd reccommend you do that, just in case you fall in love with it lol. Its got really mixed reviews, some people like myself feel no love for it, and just think its an average/poor FPS for this day and age, whereas others think its god's gift to gaming. Anyway you can get hold of the beta at all, get a feel for an admittedly unfinished version, but might help you decide

Sounds very similar to Supreme Commander. Some love it, some hate it. I'm somewhere in the middle. I can see bits of brilliance in it and at other times I just see a run-of-the-mill RTS game.

D.

 

[rich[182]]

PC Zone 85% and PC Gamer 87%
Both have 4+ page in depth reviews on final code
It's got some very good points and tbh the points it's been picked up for are minor imho
The only point that has made me not buy it now, ie wait until the 1st patch is released are ocasional glitches when loading between maps

Graphics look real-worldy, washed out, grainy and appropriate to me, prefer that to the cartoony looking UT3 stuff tbh

 

[Darren S]

^^^^^ - good, but not great then?

D.

 

[rich[182]]

Says it feels like it brings something new to the table, but although it doesn't actually say it I don't expect it to be as good as Farcry or HL2

 

[Griff]

LOL Griff - seriously?

D.

Yup. (Imo of course)

Oh and I not referring to any beta. The game has been "out" since Sunday morning.

 

[sargey]

LOL Griff - seriously?

D.

Yup. (Imo of course)

Oh and I not referring to any beta. The game has been "out" since Sunday morning.

Yup, its shite. The graphics are terrible. Played for about 10 mins last night and then uninstalled it.

 

[Rasclart]

LOL what machine are you running it on?

The graphics are far from crap with everything whacked right up at a decent res. It isnt no oblivion but still pretty good

 

[Darren S]

LOL what machine are you running it on?

The graphics are far from crap with everything whacked right up at a decent res. It isnt no oblivion but still pretty good

Tend to agree with you so far m8 - even though I've only tried it for a few minutes.

D.

 

[rich[182]]

Yup. (Imo of course)

Oh and I not referring to any beta. The game has been "out" since Sunday morning.

Yup, its s**te. The graphics are terrible. Played for about 10 mins last night and then uninstalled it.

Whats your processor, memory & graphics card ?
What resolution, AA/AF are you using ?
I'm intrigued

 

[Darren S]

Hmmmm - an hour in, and I'm actually quite liking it!

Nowhere near as polished or well presented as say Oblivion, but its a good attempt - even if it has taken donkey's years to come out.

I want to hear what The Munson has to say about it. He's had it on backorder since he was five years old....

D.

 

[sargey]

Yup, its s**te. The graphics are terrible. Played for about 10 mins last night and then uninstalled it.

Whats your processor, memory & graphics card ?
What resolution, AA/AF are you using ?
I'm intrigued

Pentuim 4 3.6 Ghz
2 Gig of ram
256mb ATI x9800 (I think)

Mind you, I didn't bother changing the resolution. Played it for 10 mins, thought it was shite and uninstalled.

 

[rich[182]]

I dont know too much about the engine but from your specs you surely should be ok to run at 1280x1024 with 2AA/2AF, If you also used ATI tray tools to fine tune other options it should look good
As for 10 mins into a story driven game and uninstalling it I dont understand, It was never going to be a "straight into fragging fest" like Quake4, FEAR or Doom3

 

[Darren S]

Hmmmm - patches are needed, developers!

Had another go last night. Bloody thing rebooted my PC - not even a crash to desktop - lol!

D.

 

[Lee]

I've just installed it so I'll have a quick blast at lunch see what it's like.

One of the lads here used to be the Producer on it......about 2 years ago. lol

Excellent collectors box even if the game is s**t.

 

[Darren S]

I think it's a grower. If you give it a 10 minute bash and decide then, I think you'll miss out. Imo, of course!

D.

 

[rich[182]]

I think it's a grower. If you give it a 10 minute bash and decide then, I think you'll miss out. Imo, of course!

D.

Was same with MOHacific Assault, first half hour was poor enough for most to go no further, against my will I stuck with it.............ended up being best MOH on PC imho, great game

 

[Darren S]

I think it's a grower. If you give it a 10 minute bash and decide then, I think you'll miss out. Imo, of course!

D.

Was same with MOHacific Assault, first half hour was poor enough for most to go no further, against my will I stuck with it.............ended up being best MOH on PC imho, great game

Was that the one that had that truly terrible flying bit in the middle? Aside from that, it was a brilliant game. They should have dropped the flying bit and just kept it FPS.

D.

 

[Lee]

I've just given it an hour. It's certainly not to be played like a standard FPS. I suppose it's a bit like Oblivion.

Graphically it's loads better than I was expecting. I really like the environment. I want to see Chernobyl now though. lol

 

[Griff]

I've just given it an hour. It's certainly not to be played like a standard FPS. I suppose it's a bit like Oblivion.

I think that's why I was disappointed. Initially, atleast, it was hyped as an FPS and I found it more like Oblivion (which I didn't like) as many people have stated.

 

[H182]

Looking forward to having a look at this. Makes a change from your standard shoot em up fps.

 

[Munson]

I want to hear what The Munson has to say about it. He's had it on backorder since he was five years old....

D.

Well, it's playing like a dog, technically, because I am having 7950GX2 issues with Vista where only one card is actually working. Also, the game wont load with any driver (desktop adjusted) AA/AF/Sync, and wont actually apply any of those with in-game settings either. So it runs ok but looks jaggy as fook and the frame-rates are mediocre @1680x1050.

If I can get those sorted then I will start getting into the game. I may just get a new DX10 card TBH

 

[Darren S]

^^^^^ - it is supposed to be chronic on Vista, Roy. From what I've heard, your problems are quite light compared to others.

It must be bad if the developers themselves are admitting that there's a problem with it & Vista.

D.

 

[Munson]

The actual code? If the code isn't compatible with Vista then I will pass it by.

 

[RSi Dave]

should be a patch out to sort it under vista at some point according to some reviews

 

[Munson]

I am now using beta Nvidia drivers under Vista and although the 7950GX2 is now installed correctly, I am still suspect of its performance compared to to how it ran under XP. Anti-aliasing is still a non-starter but this isnt such a huge problem at 1680x1050 (but still bad). Plus, are there actually any shodows in this game? I cant see any fron NPCs. Early days...

I am initially quite impressed with the scale and atmosphere of the game. It does seem to promise a huge sprawling environment. However, techincally, it has been resleased at a time when its potential tech issues could not have been more badly exploited by the switch from XP to Vista. I realise having a quasi-SLi card doesn't help. It's just unfortunate, and a thing that PC gamers have to put up with now and then.

I won't be playing this game for a while now. Although I quite like it (initial impressions), it has too many technical problems with my current hardware/vista configuration. It's been a long time coming but I fear it will never be as great as as it could have been. If I had to sum it up, I'd say "far too ambitious"

 

[Darren S]

Added some pics below......

^^^^ - spinning dogs in vortices? Dodgy goings on in Chenobyl.

D

 

[Munson]

^^The textures in this game are seriously high resolution. It looks good but there is something lacking that I can't put a finger on. The lighting just seems 'wrong'?

And - 4:3? Shame on you!

 

[Darren S]

^^The textures in this game are seriously high resolution. It looks good but there is something lacking that I can't put a finger on. The lighting just seems 'wrong'?

And - 4:3? Shame on you!

Widescreen? Ewwwwwwww!

Gimme 1280x1024 anyday.....

D.

 

[Munson]

1280x1024 is ok if you have a 9800Pro

 

[Rasclart]

I am loving this

Rinsed it for a few hours at the weekend. I like the open ended feeling to the game and the dark feeling.

Thumbs up from me

 

[Rasclart]

^^^^^ - it is supposed to be chronic on Vista, Roy. From what I've heard, your problems are quite light compared to others.

It must be bad if the developers themselves are admitting that there's a problem with it & Vista.

D.

I am running it on a GTX on XP at the moment and a friend is running a GTX on Vista

His runs Ok but does crash out from time to time. Runs fine though

 

[Lee]

I'm running it under Vista 64 and it's been 100% stable so far. Not a single crash.

I'm not usually into this style of FPS, but the location and atmousphere is really pulling me in.

I just want to see the sodding power station now. lol

 

[Darren S]

1280x1024 is ok if you have a 9800Pro

Quit your yacking or I'll biatch-slap you with a rusty keyboard and mouse.. :rasp:

It crashed on me on Saturday again. Probably becuase I hadn't closed down BF2142 in the background (don't ask). I was amazed that the gameplay didn't seem to suffer - I think it was a chronic lack of memory that tipped it over the edge!

Good to hear that it seems to be ok on some Vista machines - at least that's something. Surely a patch can't be long off now?

My only gripe with the game is that they could have made the multiplayer aspect a lot better, imo.

D.

 

[Munson]

A patch would be nice, but so would some decent Nividia drivers that actually work with this game, a 7950GX2, and Vista

My time will come...