Be careful : NO A-LIFE until December 2025

[Roch Silverfang]

Okay, I admit, I probably exaggerated JUST A LITTLE in the title, but the fact is, from the STALKER CEO on Discord :

"A-life will be the next focus following the main story being able to be played from start to finish with no/very minor issues."

"A-life has not been addressed in this patch but once the main story can be played without issue, a-life will likely be priority."

You know what that mean, right? You'll be able to finish an incomplete game without enjoying the most important feature of the STALKER series.

I hope you're ready to wait FOR MONTHS before the release of the A-Life update.

And, if you can't wait, try to enjoy your incomplete game tho.

[Zzabur]

The most important feature in SoC is certainly not A-Life.

[RawrKitteh]

You sound upset.

[theAlah]

I'll enjoy it, thanks for the wish.

[Roch Silverfang]

Originally posted by RawrKitteh:

You sound upset.

Yes I am.

[JohnMac]

Waiting until most people stop playing so they wont notice it wont really be a-life. A tactical decision, though pretty lame.

[Pain]

Originally posted by Zzabur:

The most important feature in SoC is certainly not A-Life.

In all honesty, you are not wrong. A game should be able to be played from start to finish without being gated by bugs.

A-Life is a huge part of STALKER but not a priority.

[Pain]

Originally posted by JohnMac:

Waiting until most people stop playing so they wont notice it wont really be a-life. A tactical decision, though pretty lame.

This is a disingenuous comment as the people most likely noticing the lack of A-Life and commenting on it, are the people most likely to play it more then just once. Aka, the OG fans, that actually played the original trilogy quite a bit.

[☻]

A-life 2.0 is the development team's simulation of NPC movements and how they spawn into the world. It's in the game but the community has asked that the spawn system be improved for greater immersion. The game is fun but we would like enemies and friendly NPC's to spawn in at a greater radius around the player and most importantly, not just behind the player but behind houses and rocks in front of the player so it seems seamless and more realistic.

Alife 2.0 and some shadows seem to be the areas that the community would most desire improvement in. The game is fun how it is and working well and fun to play. Which is why the majority have given it positive ratings. Making it seem like the game is trash and incomplete for the next year because the spawn system didn't live up to player expectations is childish. The development team has already mentioned that they are improving the Alife 2.0 implementation and would like to add ray traced shadows in the future. Sounds good to me.

[rustypup]

Babies crying everywhere....

Nobody cares, child. Move on.

[Kozzy]

There is A Life in the game, it just needs a lot of work. I am loving the game though, performance and AI need work but I am loving everything else.

[pillowcase]

There is a mod that increases the spawn radius of enemies. So while they may still randomly pop up they will pop up at 180 degrees rather than 360 where they may end up popping up behind you.

[rustypup]

Originally posted by Pain:

Aka, the OG fans, that actually played the original trilogy quite a bit.

Nonsense. I likely played the OG before you and all the rest and this A-life garbage held zero interest. Except for a sad subset of l00sers who were into NPCs in a weird way.

[Pain]

Originally posted by rustypup:

Originally posted by Pain:

Aka, the OG fans, that actually played the original trilogy quite a bit.

Nonsense. I likely played the OG before you and all the rest and this A-life garbage held zero interest. Except for a sad subset of l00sers who were into NPCs in a weird way.

I think you are an exception not the norm. Alot of people love the A-life system, it held alot of the charm of the originals.

[OGPG]

Originally posted by Roch Silverfang:

Okay, I admit, I probably exaggerated JUST A LITTLE in the title, but the fact is, from the STALKER CEO on Discord :

"A-life will be the next focus following the main story being able to be played from start to finish with no/very minor issues."

"A-life has not been addressed in this patch but once the main story can be played without issue, a-life will likely be priority."

You know what that mean, right? You'll be able to finish an incomplete game without enjoying the most important feature of the STALKER series.

I hope you're ready to wait FOR MONTHS before the release of the A-Life update.

And, if you can't wait, try to enjoy your incomplete game tho.

I think you are reading too much into what is being said.

I think what he means is that being able to play the game from start to finish without it breaking on the player is their main focus. Which I agree with.
A-Life comes secondary to being able to play through the game.

[Zzabur]

Originally posted by Pain:

In all honesty, you are not wrong. A game should be able to be played from start to finish without being gated by bugs.

A-Life is a huge part of STALKER but not a priority.

Agree 100%.

This release is far from perfect, but it's above my expectations according to the standard video game releases.

I liked A-Life in CS, actually it's the feature that made me appreciate this game because i didn't like the story of Scar at first.

But nobody talks about the hell with it too. How much times did you lost 2 hours finding an artifact for a mission a NPC gave you, then suddenly, when you bring it back "Mission failed. XXXXX has been killed by Chimera" while you were just zoning?

I ended to never grab any mission from a npc outside of an outpost, fearing the quest giver is killed by random mutants....

Also the challenge between a few squads/mutant packs on a small map, and taking in account ALL npcs over this 64km² area is really another scale.

Personally, as long as i get realistic spawn (spawns that i dont realize, unlike those bandits spawning on your back after you checked 3 times the surroundings....), A-Life is good enough.

I could never really end a conquer territories war on CS anyway due to bugs... CoP got it better, but it lost the faction wars system.

It's a great feature, but it's not the soul of the series. And it's not what made me like SoC back in 2007.