Is there really no A-life?

[Jesus Tyrone Christ]

I've seen many discussions here about it, but there's also a lot of confusion if the game just spawns stuff at trigger points. I was really looking forward to them expanding on the system, to make it deeper, even more dynamic, and actually tie more gameplay features and incentives around it. But if I understand, they low-key "scammed" people by removing the A-life 2.0 from the product description just before release?

Does the game have no radio chatter? Does it have no patrols? Does it have no faction dynamics? Does it not have a list of nearby stalkers and their ranks? Do you never stumble on an aftermath of a fight that you just missed? Do you never stumble into an ongoing fight? Can you not wait stalkers or mutants to move and attack one another?

Also, is RTX 3070 even enough to run this game 60 fps without looking like vaseline lmao?

[Draescan]

Messaggio originale di Fireserpent7:

I

Messaggio originale di Draescan:

There's all these claims that A-life "just isn't working properly" including by the devs themselves.

No, it is functionally nonexistent compared to its iteration in the trilogy before. NPCs do not have " tasks " like they did in the old games. They do not start in rostok, decide to go pick up some meds, buy them, change tasks to go find artifacts, go to a different zone, find one, go back to the bar or to the scientists, and sell the artifact. Things like THAT, do not exist in STALKER 2. Functionally there's NOTHING in the systems to even hint that they tried to implement something like it.

They call something in the game Alife in the scripts but that's not what it is. It's a generic event spawner script with a renamed variable for Unreal Engine. It's genuinely the same system games like Fallout use to cause " random events " to happen around the player. It doesn't make things happen when the player isn't around to witness them. Any implication that it was / is in the game currently is a lie.

There's a radius around the player ( though no exclusion radius to prevent spawns directly on top of you -_- ) in which random events are spawned in, to simulate the zone's activity, but none of these will take place without the presence of the player. You will never see another faction take over a POI unless it is a scripted event. Period.

Before anyone says " this didn't exist, you're playing mods " Shshsh. Hush, go play Clear Sky and stop avoiding it and pretending it doesn't exist. The base game " faction wars " system LITERALLY did this. Hush.

you are lying about what the code does, actual mod developers and people who know how the code works has said its in the game, you are just looking for an excuse to hate the devs.

That exact description is literally what is posted in one of the biggest modding discords for stalker. I simplified it a smidge so that the layman can understand it. Stop spreading misinformation. No one has to take me at face value though, if you don't believe it. Open up the pak files yourselves and look at it.

"
Grok — 11/23/2024 2:19 AM
Stalker 2 spam again sorry, but I receive this question daily in PM, so let’s make it clear:

This is how alife works in STALKER 2: NPCs and mutants are just spawned randomly around you in a 50-100m radius. If you see something afar, it’s likely scripted.

(link to the thread removed because steam probably won't be happy about it)
"

I don't hate the devs at all. I'm trying to love stalker 2, but facts are facts.

[Draescan]

Messaggio originale di Salt Engineer:

Messaggio originale di Draescan:

There's all these claims that A-life "just isn't working properly" including by the devs themselves.

No, it is functionally nonexistent
...
There's a radius around the player in which random events are spawned in, to simulate the zone's activity, but none of these will take place without the presence of the player. You will never see another faction take over a POI unless it is a scripted event. Period.

Before anyone says " this didn't exist, you're playing mods " Shshsh. Hush, go play Clear Sky and stop avoiding it and pretending it doesn't exist. The base game " faction wars " system LITERALLY did this. Hush.

A-Life: An Insight into Ambitious AI[blackshellmedia.com]

Messaggio originale di ALife 1.0 technical breakdown:

Offline and Online A-Life

There are two planes of existence in S.T.A.L.K.E.R., one that runs Online A-Life and the other in Offline A-Life. It sounds silly at first but it makes sense because S.T.A.L.K.E.R. does not consist of one single open world map but rather an assortment of locations based within the same geographical location.

Online A-Life Status can be linked to all AI within a certain radius from the player’s location. Everything outside of this radius is considered Offline. The radius around the player in the vanilla, unmodded game is roughly 150 meters. This radius can vary—it has varied in the later games in the series but also has been changed via community modding.

When people point to a radius-based spawn system as proof that ALife doesn't exist, they betray what the don't know about the original ALife. There were multiple components. Online, which is a radius based spawn system for events within range of the player, and the offline component which is simulated events and activities that are used to determine what the online radius/bubble is going to spit out at you.[/b]Pointing to the online component functioning doesn't prove anything.[/b]

Clearly, the persistence and background simulations (offline) aren't running properly and/or aren't feeding data into the online/spawning systems.

That being the case, there would naturally either be extremely screwed up spawns brought in by the online system, or additional code to account for a lack of offline feeding npcs and events.

I never implied there was only one component to A-life don't try to start an argument on a fabrication. This is the major component that is missing from STALKER 2, don't twist my words. There's no persistence or offline simulations at all. Period. I hope it is implemented ASAP but as of right now, anything that happens in the zone is either a scripted fight, or a " random encounter " because the RNG system decided to hit you with as you got near a POI. These guys spawn in visual radius of you. There's no subtlety to it at all.

[Morbid]

No ranking system on PDA. No faction rep or when you buy from traders you see no info in the trade window either and you can't see who is master or legendary stalker etc when looting bodies. Privates will have exos on. It's just bad.

[Armando Broncas]

There is no A-life and anyone saying other wise is a fanatic trying to gaslight you:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1643320/discussions/0/4626980689722587991/?ctp=2

[Morbid]

Messaggio originale di Salt Engineer:

Messaggio originale di Draescan:

There's all these claims that A-life "just isn't working properly" including by the devs themselves.

No, it is functionally nonexistent
...
There's a radius around the player in which random events are spawned in, to simulate the zone's activity, but none of these will take place without the presence of the player. You will never see another faction take over a POI unless it is a scripted event. Period.

Before anyone says " this didn't exist, you're playing mods " Shshsh. Hush, go play Clear Sky and stop avoiding it and pretending it doesn't exist. The base game " faction wars " system LITERALLY did this. Hush.

A-Life: An Insight into Ambitious AI[blackshellmedia.com]

Messaggio originale di ALife 1.0 technical breakdown:

Offline and Online A-Life

There are two planes of existence in S.T.A.L.K.E.R., one that runs Online A-Life and the other in Offline A-Life. It sounds silly at first but it makes sense because S.T.A.L.K.E.R. does not consist of one single open world map but rather an assortment of locations based within the same geographical location.

Online A-Life Status can be linked to all AI within a certain radius from the player’s location. Everything outside of this radius is considered Offline. The radius around the player in the vanilla, unmodded game is roughly 150 meters. This radius can vary—it has varied in the later games in the series but also has been changed via community modding.

When people point to a radius-based spawn system as proof that ALife doesn't exist, they betray what the don't know about the original ALife. There were multiple components. Online, which is a radius based spawn system for events within range of the player, and the offline component which is simulated events and activities that are used to determine what the online radius/bubble is going to spit out at you.[/b]Pointing to the online component functioning doesn't prove anything.[/b]

Clearly, the persistence and background simulations (offline) aren't running properly and/or aren't feeding data into the online/spawning systems.

That being the case, there would naturally either be extremely screwed up spawns brought in by the online system, or additional code to account for a lack of offline feeding npcs and events.

People who played at Gamescom were talking about enemies just spawning right behind you and the game feeling empty so I feel like this has been a thing forever and they know about it but just brushing it under the rug.

[Bullett00th]

OP: The A-life you know from the original trilogy isn't there and most likely will not ever be there.

The current version of A-Life 2.0 is not an improvement but supposedly a completely different thing both in how it operates and presents itself to the player. However we will not know the full extent of it until the devs fix it.

What can be said already is that you can't track multiple NPCs across the zone because they aren't there. Everything 'lives' within the player vicinity - and that's a tiny vicinity as-is.

There's no binoculars in the game so you can't look far, but even climbing a watchtower and looking around in the scope shows literally 0 life. Until you climb down that tower and have an event trigger ~20 meters away from you.

Messaggio originale di Fireserpent7:

I did find this mod that could work as a stopgap till the devs put out the patches fixing it https://www.nexusmods.com/stalker2heartofchornobyl/mods/210

There are a few interesting insights from the mod maker in the description:

How Did You Fix "A-Life"?

Duct-tape. The AI director in Stalker 2 is actually very complex internally, however its function is gimped because of severe bugs compounding each other.

There are a couple of other issues with the A-life system that is breaking it and causing not only janky behaviour but flat out non-existent a-life simulation.

Whats The Catch?

Performance. This mod will slaughter your frames on an already unoptimized game.
A top-of-the-line CPU is recommended.

Is "A-Life" Real? Did the developers lie to us?

*sigh*. This discussion is stupid because a-life has always been a smoke-and-mirrors marketing term for a complex npc control system, together with the dangling bells and whistles of intersecting mechanics.

A-Life does not exist in Stalker 2 in the sense that the system operates so vastly different that trying to use the old A-Life as a mental benchmark is pointless.
There is no A-Life in Stalker 2, there is only A-Life 2.0. But even this brings confusing associations with the old system, so I just call the system the AI Director.

This new AI Director is not by any means is watered down. In fact, the reason she is such a mess is that the ai system is in fact too ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ convoluted.
But rest assured, the Director can do all the things you expect out of Stalker. She is able to schedule faction conflicts and turf wars, and create the kind of gunfights in the old stalker games, the ones you hear in the distance and hope to avoid walking into.

[Blax]

The upcoming patch says it has A-Life bug fixes so hopefully that will sort it

[Goatmanpig]

Messaggio originale di Blax:

The upcoming patch says it has A-Life bug fixes so hopefully that will sort it

It says the opposite

[Blax]

Messaggio originale di Goatmanpig:

Messaggio originale di Blax:

The upcoming patch says it has A-Life bug fixes so hopefully that will sort it

It says the opposite

Noted to be addressed in future updates:
Analogue sticks dead zones bugfixes.
A-Life system bugfixes.

Bruv cannot read

[Rootbeer Safety Team]

Messaggio originale di Goatmanpig:

Messaggio originale di Blax:

The upcoming patch says it has A-Life bug fixes so hopefully that will sort it

It says the opposite

A-Life / AI fixes and improvements, and the Console controller stick drift / deadzone issue are slated as signifigant issues they will take some time to fully realize. So in response to the person you quoted, No, it isn't expected to see the fixes for those right away.

[Draescan]

Messaggio originale di Bullett00th:

Messaggio originale di Fireserpent7:

I did find this mod that could work as a stopgap till the devs put out the patches fixing it https://www.nexusmods.com/stalker2heartofchornobyl/mods/210

There are a few interesting insights from the mod maker in the description:

How Did You Fix "A-Life"?

Duct-tape. The AI director in Stalker 2 is actually very complex internally, however its function is gimped because of severe bugs compounding each other.

There are a couple of other issues with the A-life system that is breaking it and causing not only janky behaviour but flat out non-existent a-life simulation.

Whats The Catch?

Performance. This mod will slaughter your frames on an already unoptimized game.
A top-of-the-line CPU is recommended.

Is "A-Life" Real? Did the developers lie to us?

*sigh*. This discussion is stupid because a-life has always been a smoke-and-mirrors marketing term for a complex npc control system, together with the dangling bells and whistles of intersecting mechanics.

A-Life does not exist in Stalker 2 in the sense that the system operates so vastly different that trying to use the old A-Life as a mental benchmark is pointless.
There is no A-Life in Stalker 2, there is only A-Life 2.0. But even this brings confusing associations with the old system, so I just call the system the AI Director.

This new AI Director is not by any means is watered down. In fact, the reason she is such a mess is that the ai system is in fact too ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ convoluted.
But rest assured, the Director can do all the things you expect out of Stalker. She is able to schedule faction conflicts and turf wars, and create the kind of gunfights in the old stalker games, the ones you hear in the distance and hope to avoid walking into.

Indeed this is more in depth than what I gave. The implication here being that it's capable of doing what we see in previous games. However it currently does not. It sucks, and it is, as I stated in another thread, for performance reasons. Go to malachite's base and you'll see why XD

[Draescan]

Messaggio originale di Salt Engineer:

Messaggio originale di Draescan:

I never implied there was only one component to A-life don't try to start an argument on a fabrication. This is the major component that is missing from STALKER 2, don't twist my words. There's no persistence or offline simulations at all. Period.

Fair enough - you said functionally non-existent - which for all intents is accurate.... but then you turn around state

Messaggio originale di Draescan:

They call something in the game Alife in the scripts but that's not what it is.

Which implies that the radius spawn system is completely separate from ALife, inline with the current trend of trying to explain how there's clearly not been, or isn't, ALife in any form.

In reality, the radius has always been a part of it.

I 100% agree with you, with the offline system being non-functional (at least from the player perspective) it leads to an extremely simplified system. But the radius itself, or pop-in from too short of a radius, has nothing to do with it, and has always been a part of ALife.

I will own up to the functionally non-existent statement. I meant to say that the offline simulation bits of A-life that people are noticing aren't there are functionally non existent. My mistake for not being more clear but that genuinely was the intention.

My statement about it being a radius spawn system that's not really A-life was in line with my previous intent of " The way it worked in the original trilogy " I just didn't articulate that as clearly as I'd hoped.

[We'll Bang, Okay?]

Honestly this mess of a game might be playable in a year maybe two, but even then it might not feel like a Stalker game since its heavily neutered just so it can be played on consoles.

[Isundir Edelhert]

Previous stalker games had npc's who actually seemed to travel around the maps, you could find npc's (or corpses of npc's) that you encountered hours earlier, perhaps folks you helped out etc...

In S2 in my 16ish hours of play so far I have never ever seen npc's travel around the world or literally do ANYTHING at all in the world other then scripted main quest stuff or scripted location based encounters (side quests, events), other then that a preset group of the same bandits, military or mutants keeps spawning infront or behind me on occasion. Because of this the entire world feels extremely dead and empty compared to the previous stalker games.

I think this will be noticable to anybody who has played Shadow of Chernobyl, Clear Sky, Call of Pripyat or even Anomaly and other mods/modpacks in the past.

[Panther]

Messaggio originale di Jesus Tyrone Christ:

But if I understand, they low-key "scammed" people by removing the A-life 2.0 from the product description just before release?

They said they removed it for marketing purposes, to be more descriptive to new players and people unfamiliar with the term A Life.

That can be true (and most likely is, since there are references to A Life being called in game), at the same time as it not working as intended (as they have said), or even just potentially just being a downgrade overall.
But should wait until devs have delivered on the a patch and then be critical of the actual implementation.

Since devs can call what they like A Life, the idea that they removed it from product description to cover their asses seems ridiculous, as does the idea they are purposefully obfuscating function calls to trick the player base.