"There are dozens of first-person shooters vying for your attention in 2025, from competitive live service titles to violent power fantasies that harken back to the genre's earliest days, but few hit quite like GSC Game World's flawed masterpiece, Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl. It takes aspects common to modern open-world games, like exploration and tense firefights, then turns the intensity all the way up, creating the bleak but compelling feeling that you're surviving by the skin of your teeth."
"As the name suggests, Stalker 2 is a sequel to the 2007 cult classic Stalker: Shadow of Chornobyl. Loosely based on Arkady and Boris Strugatsky's science fiction novel Roadside Picnic (and the 1979 Andre Tarkovsky film adaptation, ), these games are about surviving the harsh aftermath of a second, fictional Chornobyl crisis. You play as a Stalker, someone who explores the deadly Exclusion Zone in the hope of finding monetary gain."
"What makes the Zone so terrifying isn't just the competition of other lawless glory-seekers, but the many resilient, radioactive creatures that roam these forgotten lands, and the nuclear anomalies that seem to break the fabric of reality. Everything in the Exclusion Zone is trying to take your life, and it's up to you to ensure that doesn't happen. Players improve their odds by scavenging for weapons and ammunition to defend themselves, and food and water for sustenance."
Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl is a sequel to the 2007 cult classic Stalker: Shadow of Chornobyl, rooted in Roadside Picnic and Tarkovsky's film. The game places the player in a deadly Exclusion Zone after a second fictional Chornobyl crisis, where lawless scavengers, resilient radioactive creatures, and reality-warping anomalies threaten every expedition. Survival depends on scavenging weapons, ammunition, food, and water, maintaining equipment, and treating injuries. An incremental loop of self-improvement drives progression. The design emphasizes vulnerability and tension over empowerment, delivering bleak, high-stakes exploration and tense firefights, now available on PlayStation 5.
Read at Inverse
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