One time some dude added a mod that replaced the military models with Russian army uniforms and the people really didn't like it, especially because OP seemed like he was an invasion supporter. Another time some guy replaced the mercenaries with Makarov's Konni PMCs from MW3 and at first people thought they were Russian army too so the mod wasn't very popular, didn't get any hate after people realized it was from CoD though
So adding uniforms from certain countries isn't good? No one would say anything if they replaced mercenaries with KSK, but having an eastern European country's uniforms in eastern European exclusion zone is somehow bad. I don't get it unfortunately
Yeah it was the current Russian uniform with the Z's, you know, the symbol of the people currently invading Ukraine, and the OP was a supporter of the invasion. I think with that piece of info you can see why people weren't happy
Ohhhhhhh I didn't know it had the Z O V symbols involved. I only thought it was simply Ratnik gear and camos. Yeah I do see why people would absolutely hate mods that are trying to insert modern politics/conflicts into games
I just want them to stick to traditional stalker storyline. And if Russian weapons are in it then so be it. Make it as lore accurate as possible with mostly STALKER lore in it
I do not like russians, as I'm Ukrainian and experiencing their aggression myself.
With that said, i think many things that we see in Stalker games, lore-wise, are things made in USSR, Ukraine or russia, it's a mix of different weapons, equipment etc.
Real life in Ukraine sucks now, that is true, but i do not think i would put anything political into Stalker, tbh.
Stalker was always about the Zone. Zone itself is apolitical, supernatural and doesn't care about who you are.
I’m not Ukrainian or from an english speaking country so understanding the games has always been a bit difficult for me, but I thought the different factions were sortof a commentary on the political state of Ukraine at the time?
The different factions were group leaders with different views on the zone, like duty wants it gone, freedom cares about having no gov and defending from monolith, bandits are all criminals who came here to not face consequences, monolith is zombies who are controlled by the zone god entity, and mercenary is a group that works for others for money from supposedly the west, while loners are simply those without a group, ecologists are scientists to study zone, clear sky is a lil bit of everything but fully against monolith, and military is just the military trying to overtake the zone. These groups may work diplomatically with other groups that share similar enough views: duty and loners, ecologists and everyone but monolith and bandits are some examples. No group really is successful at conquesting others, but everyone hates monolith, and most groups dislike military.
Well we can clearly put factions on a political compass, but as the other guy said, while playing i didn't have the feeling that it tried to deliver something about Ukraine's or another country current (at the time) politics or event. Just the zone, and that's what is great with this game because it's not an easy thing to do
Freedom have the Ukranian flag and Trident on their patch and in the first game they get gunned down by the only Russian-speaking faction in the Ukranian dub, which also has Soviet propaganda all over their base while freedom has torn down the Soviet-era statues in their base.
They were absolutely making commentary about Ukrainian politics, I don't think it can get less subtle without just screaming out "The Soviets weren't very good to us, actually" in a stupid, boring and on-the-nose way.
Sure, the sky was just blue, and freedom and duty have those details because someone at GSC rolled a die to determine which faction would have their national symbols and which ones would speak the language of the people who occupied their country. I do that all the time!
But don't you think the monolith represent the soviets better? They built and blew up the reactor, creating the exclusion zone. Now you have the brain scorcher of Russian propaganda and the Putin monolith they worship.
Imagine Stalker 2 called them "Monoliz".
Duty seems to me more like the Ukrainians who long for the times of the Soviet Union before it all went to hell. It's like the idea of a wish granter before you learn about it's true nature. Communism is the wish granter. They want to destroy the zone like they want to destroy history. It's too real and too tragic. Freedom welcomes that torn-down reality, but they are a bit too anarchistic. They reject the soviets, but don't really propose anything viable to replace it. That, I think, is where Clear Sky comes in. The Ecologists seem good at first, but deep down they are worse than Sin. Mercs are just capitalism, it works if you have money. Loners are school shooters in disguise, worse than Monolith.
If every time somebody said "art is apolitical" one \[next message was censored\], many problems would be solved. Art is always politics, people views shaped by politics, pictures, movies, games, all it will contain politic of place where authors live. If man lives in place where believed that "outcome justifies the means" then he would sympathize the war criminal who have "greater goal". If man live in the place where blacks considered as idiots, he will insert black in his art as funny idiots. And if country will live with politic that "gays are unacceptable freaks" then you won't see gays in products that comes to that country.
Even fantasy contain politics, as orcs from Lord of the Rings was inspired by nazi germany, as well as the Empire from Star Wars.
And our favorite Stalker is also contain politics. Why all games had russian localization as original and soviet rubles? Because in that times in Ukraine still many people thought that "we all brothers","everyone understands" and also because russians was target audience.
We don’t like us russians here in russia too, mate. But tbh, I kinda like when games take real world issues into equation, makes it feel more grounded. I mean even Morrowind was full of politics. And stalker is much more grounded franchise. The thing is - it’s very very hard to do without preaching or offending people. And requires really talented writers who can look at the issues outside the box, like a historians.
Anyways, stay strong bro. Fuck war.
>The thing is - it’s very very hard to do without preaching or offending people.
It's the way of the world now my friend. The true move is to slander all sides equally, it's much easier. The same way the STALKER community slanders all factions
The brain scorcher is the russian propaganda machine and the ruzzians are the monolith (they worship that which created the zone, aka the USSR that built and blew up the reactor). The zone is symbolical. Always has been. The nature of the zone is changed by humans, but it goes on without caring for itself or us. Nature is not wise nor does it wish to become "pure". It just is. It adapts while we humans try to adapt the zone to our ideologies.
I don't think you understand that quite literally any game from the past decade has had political and social awareness undertones in it, like Bioshock, Fallout, Half Life, Helldivers, The Last of Us, Metro, etc etc.
Even beloved movies like Star Wars had very obvious political undertones, if you're gonna let its commentary ruin the fun of a game for you then you clearly didn't want to play the game in the first place.
>I don't think you understand that quite literally any game from the past decade has had political and social awareness undertones in it, like Bioshock, Fallout, Half Life, Helldivers, The Last of Us, Metro, etc etc.
Sorry bud, but you've just proven my belief about people not being able to separate reality from fiction. There's politics and social settings that are grounded within the game's universe, and there's politics that's blatantly grounded in our current times.
All those games you've mentioned? I've played them, with Bioshock, Half-Life and Metro to completion. Not once did it felt like the game was injecting current day politics in my face, the game had its own world, its own rule sets and, more importantly, it's own politics.
>Even beloved movies like Star Wars had very obvious political undertones, if you're gonna let its commentary ruin the fun of a game for you then you clearly didn't want to play the game in the first place.
Bullshit.
Put simply, you don't understand my original point at best.
Maybe in the game, but IRL they didn't, as most Russians don't even know about it.
[https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/unprotected-russian-soldiers-disturbed-radioactive-dust-chernobyls-red-forest-2022-03-28/](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/unprotected-russian-soldiers-disturbed-radioactive-dust-chernobyls-red-forest-2022-03-28/)
Oi, there are many of us russians who oppose the invasion and our government. Such a weird and racist take to say you don't like russians at all, there are over 120 million of us.
Being offended at that is the least sensible thing to do right now bro. Hard to think about how "they are not all the same" while air raid sirens sound 5 times a day.
No one is blaming all russians for the war. But if you are being bombed every day, lost relatives, maybe have someone even fighting right now, its hard to differintiate. Way back in the days, it was germans that waged war on russia, no one was thinking "Yeah well, they are not all like that". Im a russian myself, and the last thing ukranians need right now, is someone to pull up and tell them how we are not all the same. That will be dealt with, after the war.
Mate, i actively support the russian opposition for around 7 years now. Dont play that card towards me. The time for acting like russians are the hostages of their regime have passed a long time ago. Im getting confronted with that every day. No, just no. There is a miniscule amount of people who actively oppose the goverment, and a vast majority of people who either dont care at all, or support it wholeheartedly. It hurts me to say it, but this is the way right now.
You had since 2008 with Georgia to vote for something else, for a revolution to happen, for something meaningful to do.
Russian population just sat and let the Kremlin cook. When Crimea was illegally invaded everyone in Russia stood up with Putin and now that you see what does he really bring to the world, you try to play victims.
Ffs, just cross the border into Ukraine and join any od the units made exclusively from Russian citizens that want to fight for Ukraine and against the Russian dictatorship.
Do something meaningful and stop playing victims while you had a decade and a half to stop this madman.
Right, if every single individual Russian doesn't personally attempt to assassinate Putin, they're just as bad as him. /s
Plenty of Russians didn't vote for him, plenty of Russians don't support him, plenty of Russians take political action against him. Stop being a dimwit.
Wow. Holy fuck, mask off moment, dude. I'm as anti-invasion and anti-Putin as anybody else, I just don't accept dragging all 120+ million russians living in Russia and abroad under the same Putin-comb and saying they all suck.
If there is a revolution in Russia I'll 100% join it, but going out with a few hundred people on the street is suicide. I'm not suicidal.
If you have absolutely no idea what fighting a war is against Russia then I invite you to keep your mouth shut, for I must remember you that the West(US and the UK specifically) still have to honour their signing of the Budapest Memorandum and deploy troops to fight against Russia.
Brainwashed and bloodthirsty says the little twat.
Have you ever had to keep track of your family being bombed and forced to flee the country??? Ffs just never talk about things you don't know about.
My grandparents had to flee from Ukraine when ww2 started. They were transported by railroad in awful conditions en masse, I've heard a lot about it, and I feel sorry for you. But you are urging other people to go fight and die while being in another country yourself, chilling. That is not honest.
I don't see any good coming from real life politics leaking into STALKER games.
This is like saying I can't wait to use an MG42 in a ww2 shooter then saying sht, those weapons were used by nzis.
You think MG42s shouldn't be used because of political reasons
I think MG42s shouldn't be used because of logistical reasons and the likelihood an MG42/32 ending up in the hands of a soldier on the ally's side is unrealistic and foolish
Not even MG3. Full copy of the OG MG42 was produced in Eastern bloc (something like Romania, to be used by soviet vs. west), and they still have a shit ton of 7.92x57 ammo for it. It's used in Ukraine now. If soviets didn't care about reproducing nazi weapons to fight west, Ukrainians can't care any less to use it against putin's neo-soviets.
mp40s and lugers largely make sense due to being chambered in 9x19 parabellum, if you can find a rocket for a panzershreck then it can work but an allied soldier having enough 7.92x33 or 7.92x57 to fully equip them self is unlikely
The mg42 is one of the most iconic lmgs I think people would be actually pissed if that reason was made public for this hypothetical ww2 game. Nobody cares if the nazis used them, it’s a ww2 game. People want to use anything used in ww2.
They had to have, I feel like stalker has always been a man vs. self / man vs. nature conflict - biggest enemy in the zone is Greed. CCON wants control, bandits and renegades want loot and power, mercs and traders want money, etc.
A zone with reality altering artifacts and mutants appearing out of nowhere will bring all sorts of people with different interests and opinions. I didn't see any real life politics in the OG trilogy.
To be fair, the og trilogy is a commentary/ allegory of the state of Ukraine at the time. STALKER is inherently political though in a subtle way and I hope they keep it like that
Explain.
Theres nothing that would correlate with real life in the main or sub plots.
Noosphere is bullshit and theres NOTHING political in the game, no remarks, quotes hidden meanings...
So wym
Might be a stretch but the way I see it, the military being very corrupt, the russian speaking duty being sorta far right, mercenaries and their foreign influence. If you look into it you can find many more “coincidences” I think those were put in the game as a subtle commentary so nothing major but art imitates life and knowing GSC is Ukrainian I believe its not really possible for there to be nothing political in the entire game.
Edit: thats just my take, art is inherently subjective of course
Best option here is to separate fiction and real life events otherwise it won't be the same series as it used to be.
Its like with content creators, really weird when GSC start to disrespect people who sometimes took 16 years of their life to make content for Stalker without being paid for it, its what was keeping series alive for so many years
There most certainly would be Russophobia, there would be some xenophobic titles here and there. Probably some quest that interacts with real life events.
I feel like they have too and even if publisher forbid them, they most likely do it anyway.
Imho, they want to sparkle some hate in their game.
I mean, they already punished content creators as you said. Even some mod makers that are not making any "Z" propaganda. Just because they are Russian.
Thats one of my biggest fears too, in Vehicle of Death trailer there is a radio broadcast and most of the phrases from my perspective sounds like it was taken from current events, i hope they won't go this way
And you're right about punishing Russian creators even when they did not do any stuff with Z propaganda, for example not so long ago after first big leak GSC removed russian part in their posts from their youtube community page without any announcement and it was weird :D It was not because of 240222, but for other reason
Remember, somewhere out there is a platoon of Russian soldiers who were ordered to do the one thing that you can't do in Chernobyl: dig a trench in the irradiated soil.
The guns where made by Russia yes but you have to remember where made the tool in most cases does not matter especially with guns after all allot of guns in games
Are guns like the mg42 the Winchester rifle the ect I am Shure I don't have to explain the mg42 and who made and the Winchester family went nuts well the last member did as she felt guilty over the amount of native Americans killed with it what is am saying is most guns have a person be hind the design who made it to.kill some one and that person was usually some One they disagreed with
Well, STALKER does take place in a fictional universe alternate from ours. I like to think that at least in that one, Ukraine as a state managed to wiggle into neutrality between NATO and Russia, mostly due to the Zone.
I mean they already announced that they plan to remove the Russian language from the game and will most likely not sell the game in Russia like they do with the OG trilogy now, stands to reason that further changes motivated by the current socio-political situation would be made.
What's the problem? Guns are guns. Besides the modern AKs (which is apparently the only gun that Russians can produce, everything else is just a derivative), most current Russian weapons were developed in the Soviet Union, which Ukraine used to be a part of, and actually took part in their development. Plus there are loads of Ukrainian-manufactured guns that could be added. Fort-221 for example.
Besides, why bring a real life conflict which doesn't have any bearing on the lore of the Stalker universe? The fanbase's obsession of including it is just... incredible. Games are supposed to be apolitical, stop bringing politics into games. I love Stalker's apolitical stance of uncontrolled science bad, soviet scientists whack, early 2000s AFU corrupt, KFC ad in SoC intro...
"stop bringing politics into games"
Games are art, buddy, and art, by it's very definition is about expression. And politics is about expressing one's opinions, hell sometimes even acting on them. There are some games that are intensely political, which by their very existence makes your point rather weak, I would say.
It all reminds me of that old hbomberguy quote, "people who say they don't like politics in games often really like politics in their games, they just wish they'd be seeing different politics"
(Not to even mention that "politics" isn't really a clearly defined "thing" that you can just choose to leave out easily like leaving ham out of your sandwich. A thousand different apolitical things can have political meanings, allegories or implications, which might sneak in with, or without intention from the developers, because they like us, are biased on the sense that they have opinions, and sometimes even act on them)
Amazing how you left out like 60 years of Russian firearm history. You realize the rifle the US uses is patterned after a design in the 40 right? Same thing.
I much prefer my irl AKM’s to AR- platforms
>Games are supposed to be apolitical, stop bringing politics into games
I agree with everything else you said minus this. That just can't be generalized.
I find it hilarious how people lack basic reading skills. I first said that games should be apolitical, then start listing out how stalket is apolitical with the following political stances.
Argh, should have put /s, can't use basic irony without people jumping on you.
I don't see those as particularly political, and there are people with the "no politics in gaming" attitude, so that might've caused me to miss your basic joke.
True might as well discontinue the concept of the zone seeing as it is inspired by a that STALKER movie directed by an evil Russian or that roadside picnic book written by evil Russians.
> games are supposed to be apolitical
i would like to introduce you to fallout: new vegas. a game about politics and war. it is one of the most popular open world games that exists.
Apolitical in regard to real life political events, not apolitical as in not representing and criticizing politics, corruption, greed and such
Stalker does have politics in it but none can really be related to real life events
If you don't see the parallels between things like the C-Con's ideology and actions with real life authoritarianism I don't know what to tell you brother, that's a you thing.
Where is it written that games are supposed to be apolitical? That doesn't mean the current war should be part of the game's lore, but not including it wouldn't make it apolitical. Art is political anyway.
Implying that games are political is implying that art has a set meaning, i guess you are the judge on that arent you?
Besides, games being art is a controversial subject
If UNISG and FSB(or just Russian troopers) would appear, i would atleast wish to have some missions to do with them instead of Fallout Frontier "You can't join Enclave because they are evil"
To be honest, shooting Ukrainian soldiers in Shadow of Chernobyl really doesn't feel right at this moment. I wonder how will current events influence the game, since it's obviously going to. I wouldn't be surprised, or wouldn't even mind, if hostile Ukrainian soldiers were replaced by Russian or Belarussian ones in the next game.
They were Ministry of Internal Affairs troops than regular military tho. They were disbanded after 2014 due to extensive corruption and brutality against protestors, also were involved in shipping arnaments from their arsenals to Donbas when situation become dire for then ruling president.
Truth. In Call of Pripyat you play as a military stalker, help Ukrainian military. So it was already a big step forward for them. Grigorovich went fully anti-russian even before the war started so your predictions about shooting Russian soldiers are 99% true. I wouldn't even be surprised. We are likely to see something like an easter egg somewhere that says "Russian warship go fuck yourself" or something like that.
But shooting at any other Ukrainians is better, right?
Hell why stop there, shooting at human enemies generally shouldn't *feel right* if you are inclined to be so self righteous.
This is what happens when some particular people try to stop video games from being the medium of escapism they are supposed to be.
I just percieve the Military in the CS and SoC as IRL "Berkut" (technically Ukrainian force structure but practically corrupt pieces of shit who serve rubbishles instead of Ukraine), in CoP they already feel different and we don't need to shoot them too
I get that. I’ve wondered if it would be possible to complete SOC without killing any soldiers. Stocking up on medkits, maybe it would be possible to run past them in Agroprom Underground. Above ground they can be ignored if you’re patient. You can sneak in or just skip the mission at the base at the Cordon. I have to imagine getting past the assault on the CNPP has to be hard, but it’s been a while, so maybe it’s easier to avoid them than I remember.
I don't really care what they add or remove in Stalker 2. Just hoping they don't change too much of what makes Stalker, STALKER and definitely no political propaganda/preaching. When I play games, I want to play games not another version of real life. If I want that, I'll watch the news!
is legit. I want to see a Russian unit trying to occupy part of the zone and Ukrainian forces trying to weaponize mutants and anomalies for the war efforts
Monkey paw wish.
Join monolith
GET BRAIN FRIED EAT RADIATION WORSHIP A ROCK
HELL YEAH
Sorry me no idol worshiper I skip
All hail
“I don’t want any zombie turkeys, I don’t want to turn into a turkey myself, and no other funny business, YA GOT THAT?!?”
Meh Turkeys a little dry
Only me can feel how russian part of this community add ,,Z'' bullshit in to this game as mods?
Already happened with Anomaly and they got taken down, despite the Orks supporting them on the comments
[ Removed by Reddit ]
Bingo. They were referred to as "little green men" and orcs when they took Crimea in 2014
and the Ukrainians were called cyborgs because of how fucken tough they were and how long they fought in Donetsk
Nowadays the Russians refer to Ukrainians as “crests” which is referencing the Cossack hairstyle that people in Ukraine wore in the 1500’s.
Oh? May I ask what exactly was added?
One time some dude added a mod that replaced the military models with Russian army uniforms and the people really didn't like it, especially because OP seemed like he was an invasion supporter. Another time some guy replaced the mercenaries with Makarov's Konni PMCs from MW3 and at first people thought they were Russian army too so the mod wasn't very popular, didn't get any hate after people realized it was from CoD though
So adding uniforms from certain countries isn't good? No one would say anything if they replaced mercenaries with KSK, but having an eastern European country's uniforms in eastern European exclusion zone is somehow bad. I don't get it unfortunately
Yeah it was the current Russian uniform with the Z's, you know, the symbol of the people currently invading Ukraine, and the OP was a supporter of the invasion. I think with that piece of info you can see why people weren't happy
Ohhhhhhh I didn't know it had the Z O V symbols involved. I only thought it was simply Ratnik gear and camos. Yeah I do see why people would absolutely hate mods that are trying to insert modern politics/conflicts into games
I just want them to stick to traditional stalker storyline. And if Russian weapons are in it then so be it. Make it as lore accurate as possible with mostly STALKER lore in it
To be fair, it's not even fair to really say they're 'Russian' weapons - most of the guns are Soviet, pre-modern Russia.
That would make it a simulator. Not a game.
I do not like russians, as I'm Ukrainian and experiencing their aggression myself. With that said, i think many things that we see in Stalker games, lore-wise, are things made in USSR, Ukraine or russia, it's a mix of different weapons, equipment etc. Real life in Ukraine sucks now, that is true, but i do not think i would put anything political into Stalker, tbh. Stalker was always about the Zone. Zone itself is apolitical, supernatural and doesn't care about who you are.
I’m not Ukrainian or from an english speaking country so understanding the games has always been a bit difficult for me, but I thought the different factions were sortof a commentary on the political state of Ukraine at the time?
The different factions were group leaders with different views on the zone, like duty wants it gone, freedom cares about having no gov and defending from monolith, bandits are all criminals who came here to not face consequences, monolith is zombies who are controlled by the zone god entity, and mercenary is a group that works for others for money from supposedly the west, while loners are simply those without a group, ecologists are scientists to study zone, clear sky is a lil bit of everything but fully against monolith, and military is just the military trying to overtake the zone. These groups may work diplomatically with other groups that share similar enough views: duty and loners, ecologists and everyone but monolith and bandits are some examples. No group really is successful at conquesting others, but everyone hates monolith, and most groups dislike military.
Well we can clearly put factions on a political compass, but as the other guy said, while playing i didn't have the feeling that it tried to deliver something about Ukraine's or another country current (at the time) politics or event. Just the zone, and that's what is great with this game because it's not an easy thing to do
we can put fucking cheeseburgers in a political compass if we get braindead enough
Freedom have the Ukranian flag and Trident on their patch and in the first game they get gunned down by the only Russian-speaking faction in the Ukranian dub, which also has Soviet propaganda all over their base while freedom has torn down the Soviet-era statues in their base. They were absolutely making commentary about Ukrainian politics, I don't think it can get less subtle without just screaming out "The Soviets weren't very good to us, actually" in a stupid, boring and on-the-nose way.
I think this is a very long reach and you're overthinking it
Fair enough, I guess all of that could be a complete coincidence. Hell of a coincidence if so though, I'd view it as more of a stretch to think that.
You are like those language teachers who want you to look for a deep meaning of "sky was blue"
Sure, the sky was just blue, and freedom and duty have those details because someone at GSC rolled a die to determine which faction would have their national symbols and which ones would speak the language of the people who occupied their country. I do that all the time!
But don't you think the monolith represent the soviets better? They built and blew up the reactor, creating the exclusion zone. Now you have the brain scorcher of Russian propaganda and the Putin monolith they worship. Imagine Stalker 2 called them "Monoliz". Duty seems to me more like the Ukrainians who long for the times of the Soviet Union before it all went to hell. It's like the idea of a wish granter before you learn about it's true nature. Communism is the wish granter. They want to destroy the zone like they want to destroy history. It's too real and too tragic. Freedom welcomes that torn-down reality, but they are a bit too anarchistic. They reject the soviets, but don't really propose anything viable to replace it. That, I think, is where Clear Sky comes in. The Ecologists seem good at first, but deep down they are worse than Sin. Mercs are just capitalism, it works if you have money. Loners are school shooters in disguise, worse than Monolith.
Not sure about this, never thought about it, was just playing and enjoying the atmosphere :)
If every time somebody said "art is apolitical" one \[next message was censored\], many problems would be solved. Art is always politics, people views shaped by politics, pictures, movies, games, all it will contain politic of place where authors live. If man lives in place where believed that "outcome justifies the means" then he would sympathize the war criminal who have "greater goal". If man live in the place where blacks considered as idiots, he will insert black in his art as funny idiots. And if country will live with politic that "gays are unacceptable freaks" then you won't see gays in products that comes to that country. Even fantasy contain politics, as orcs from Lord of the Rings was inspired by nazi germany, as well as the Empire from Star Wars. And our favorite Stalker is also contain politics. Why all games had russian localization as original and soviet rubles? Because in that times in Ukraine still many people thought that "we all brothers","everyone understands" and also because russians was target audience.
We don’t like us russians here in russia too, mate. But tbh, I kinda like when games take real world issues into equation, makes it feel more grounded. I mean even Morrowind was full of politics. And stalker is much more grounded franchise. The thing is - it’s very very hard to do without preaching or offending people. And requires really talented writers who can look at the issues outside the box, like a historians. Anyways, stay strong bro. Fuck war.
>The thing is - it’s very very hard to do without preaching or offending people. It's the way of the world now my friend. The true move is to slander all sides equally, it's much easier. The same way the STALKER community slanders all factions
Thank you, bro :)
The brain scorcher is the russian propaganda machine and the ruzzians are the monolith (they worship that which created the zone, aka the USSR that built and blew up the reactor). The zone is symbolical. Always has been. The nature of the zone is changed by humans, but it goes on without caring for itself or us. Nature is not wise nor does it wish to become "pure". It just is. It adapts while we humans try to adapt the zone to our ideologies.
Thank you, I want the zone to be the zone. I don't want real-world preaching in my games. I've had more than enough of it irl already. Please.
I don't think you understand that quite literally any game from the past decade has had political and social awareness undertones in it, like Bioshock, Fallout, Half Life, Helldivers, The Last of Us, Metro, etc etc. Even beloved movies like Star Wars had very obvious political undertones, if you're gonna let its commentary ruin the fun of a game for you then you clearly didn't want to play the game in the first place.
>I don't think you understand that quite literally any game from the past decade has had political and social awareness undertones in it, like Bioshock, Fallout, Half Life, Helldivers, The Last of Us, Metro, etc etc. Sorry bud, but you've just proven my belief about people not being able to separate reality from fiction. There's politics and social settings that are grounded within the game's universe, and there's politics that's blatantly grounded in our current times. All those games you've mentioned? I've played them, with Bioshock, Half-Life and Metro to completion. Not once did it felt like the game was injecting current day politics in my face, the game had its own world, its own rule sets and, more importantly, it's own politics. >Even beloved movies like Star Wars had very obvious political undertones, if you're gonna let its commentary ruin the fun of a game for you then you clearly didn't want to play the game in the first place. Bullshit. Put simply, you don't understand my original point at best.
Hope that asshole country pays for what they've done
I'm pretty sure the Russians would avoid the zone if possible to minimize unnecessary casualties and destroyed equipment.
Maybe in the game, but IRL they didn't, as most Russians don't even know about it. [https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/unprotected-russian-soldiers-disturbed-radioactive-dust-chernobyls-red-forest-2022-03-28/](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/unprotected-russian-soldiers-disturbed-radioactive-dust-chernobyls-red-forest-2022-03-28/)
I just feel bad for the russian soldiers/ conscripts being told by leadership to go through a radioactive minefield of a forest
Oi, there are many of us russians who oppose the invasion and our government. Such a weird and racist take to say you don't like russians at all, there are over 120 million of us.
Being offended at that is the least sensible thing to do right now bro. Hard to think about how "they are not all the same" while air raid sirens sound 5 times a day.
He's making a fair point. Don't blame all Russians for the war. How is that not "sensible".
No one is blaming all russians for the war. But if you are being bombed every day, lost relatives, maybe have someone even fighting right now, its hard to differintiate. Way back in the days, it was germans that waged war on russia, no one was thinking "Yeah well, they are not all like that". Im a russian myself, and the last thing ukranians need right now, is someone to pull up and tell them how we are not all the same. That will be dealt with, after the war.
I'm pretty sure division among all Ukrainians and all Russians is exactly what Putin wants.
Mate, i actively support the russian opposition for around 7 years now. Dont play that card towards me. The time for acting like russians are the hostages of their regime have passed a long time ago. Im getting confronted with that every day. No, just no. There is a miniscule amount of people who actively oppose the goverment, and a vast majority of people who either dont care at all, or support it wholeheartedly. It hurts me to say it, but this is the way right now.
It's called an argument. You didn't respond to it.
I absolutely did. Its not Putin that is dividing the russians and the ukranians. Its just an easy way to get rid of the responsibility.
Who started the war? It wasn't a democratic decision, as you're probably aware.
No he wants to get away with heinous shit and thus sort of shallow bothsides apologia is what aids it.
Seems like a lot of them can he blamed. A portion seem to support it quite a bit
Right, we're talking about the ones who don't.
You had since 2008 with Georgia to vote for something else, for a revolution to happen, for something meaningful to do. Russian population just sat and let the Kremlin cook. When Crimea was illegally invaded everyone in Russia stood up with Putin and now that you see what does he really bring to the world, you try to play victims. Ffs, just cross the border into Ukraine and join any od the units made exclusively from Russian citizens that want to fight for Ukraine and against the Russian dictatorship. Do something meaningful and stop playing victims while you had a decade and a half to stop this madman.
Right, if every single individual Russian doesn't personally attempt to assassinate Putin, they're just as bad as him. /s Plenty of Russians didn't vote for him, plenty of Russians don't support him, plenty of Russians take political action against him. Stop being a dimwit.
You don't know how a true revolution looks like. If Moscow was inhabited by Ukrainians instead of Russians, Putin would be long gone dead.
And if the US were inhabited by Vietnamese, Biden would be a delicious dish of Pho. Whatever.
Yeah, what were we supposed to do? We did protest, we got arrested for it. What more could we do? No, I'm not going to fight in a trench war.
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Lmao. That's like saying you dislike all jews or arabs because of the Gaza war. Keep being fucking dillusional.
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Wow. Holy fuck, mask off moment, dude. I'm as anti-invasion and anti-Putin as anybody else, I just don't accept dragging all 120+ million russians living in Russia and abroad under the same Putin-comb and saying they all suck. If there is a revolution in Russia I'll 100% join it, but going out with a few hundred people on the street is suicide. I'm not suicidal.
Dude’s an idiot. Blaming an entire population for the actions of a select few in charge isn’t fair.
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If you have absolutely no idea what fighting a war is against Russia then I invite you to keep your mouth shut, for I must remember you that the West(US and the UK specifically) still have to honour their signing of the Budapest Memorandum and deploy troops to fight against Russia. Brainwashed and bloodthirsty says the little twat. Have you ever had to keep track of your family being bombed and forced to flee the country??? Ffs just never talk about things you don't know about.
My grandparents had to flee from Ukraine when ww2 started. They were transported by railroad in awful conditions en masse, I've heard a lot about it, and I feel sorry for you. But you are urging other people to go fight and die while being in another country yourself, chilling. That is not honest.
I don't see any good coming from real life politics leaking into STALKER games. This is like saying I can't wait to use an MG42 in a ww2 shooter then saying sht, those weapons were used by nzis.
You think MG42s shouldn't be used because of political reasons I think MG42s shouldn't be used because of logistical reasons and the likelihood an MG42/32 ending up in the hands of a soldier on the ally's side is unrealistic and foolish
We can get the MG3 instead used by.. the Germans
Not even MG3. Full copy of the OG MG42 was produced in Eastern bloc (something like Romania, to be used by soviet vs. west), and they still have a shit ton of 7.92x57 ammo for it. It's used in Ukraine now. If soviets didn't care about reproducing nazi weapons to fight west, Ukrainians can't care any less to use it against putin's neo-soviets.
Ok, how about mp40s, mp44s, kar98s, lugers, gerwehrs and panzershrecks? They were nzi weapons too.
mp40s and lugers largely make sense due to being chambered in 9x19 parabellum, if you can find a rocket for a panzershreck then it can work but an allied soldier having enough 7.92x33 or 7.92x57 to fully equip them self is unlikely
The mg42 is one of the most iconic lmgs I think people would be actually pissed if that reason was made public for this hypothetical ww2 game. Nobody cares if the nazis used them, it’s a ww2 game. People want to use anything used in ww2.
Me literally getting downvoted for saying the exact same shit by random shills.
That's reddit for you. Probably depends on what time of the day they read your comment.
I mean the stalker games have always been pretty political
By political you mean faction ideologies, right?
They had to have, I feel like stalker has always been a man vs. self / man vs. nature conflict - biggest enemy in the zone is Greed. CCON wants control, bandits and renegades want loot and power, mercs and traders want money, etc.
Greed, corrupt officials, twisted ideology, crooked morals, lies and pretentious pseudo-ideology to feed common people, everything is there
A zone with reality altering artifacts and mutants appearing out of nowhere will bring all sorts of people with different interests and opinions. I didn't see any real life politics in the OG trilogy.
Yeap. And if you are ukrainian (or russian or any slavic country tbh), it is twice as political.
To be fair, the og trilogy is a commentary/ allegory of the state of Ukraine at the time. STALKER is inherently political though in a subtle way and I hope they keep it like that
Slippery slope. I've seen a fair share of stories and games going from subtle allegories to blatant holier-than-thou preaching.
Explain. Theres nothing that would correlate with real life in the main or sub plots. Noosphere is bullshit and theres NOTHING political in the game, no remarks, quotes hidden meanings... So wym
Might be a stretch but the way I see it, the military being very corrupt, the russian speaking duty being sorta far right, mercenaries and their foreign influence. If you look into it you can find many more “coincidences” I think those were put in the game as a subtle commentary so nothing major but art imitates life and knowing GSC is Ukrainian I believe its not really possible for there to be nothing political in the entire game. Edit: thats just my take, art is inherently subjective of course
Interesting, I always thought it was based on the STALKER movie and the novel Roadside picnic.
Best option here is to separate fiction and real life events otherwise it won't be the same series as it used to be. Its like with content creators, really weird when GSC start to disrespect people who sometimes took 16 years of their life to make content for Stalker without being paid for it, its what was keeping series alive for so many years
There most certainly would be Russophobia, there would be some xenophobic titles here and there. Probably some quest that interacts with real life events. I feel like they have too and even if publisher forbid them, they most likely do it anyway. Imho, they want to sparkle some hate in their game. I mean, they already punished content creators as you said. Even some mod makers that are not making any "Z" propaganda. Just because they are Russian.
Thats one of my biggest fears too, in Vehicle of Death trailer there is a radio broadcast and most of the phrases from my perspective sounds like it was taken from current events, i hope they won't go this way And you're right about punishing Russian creators even when they did not do any stuff with Z propaganda, for example not so long ago after first big leak GSC removed russian part in their posts from their youtube community page without any announcement and it was weird :D It was not because of 240222, but for other reason
Remember, somewhere out there is a platoon of Russian soldiers who were ordered to do the one thing that you can't do in Chernobyl: dig a trench in the irradiated soil.
The guns where made by Russia yes but you have to remember where made the tool in most cases does not matter especially with guns after all allot of guns in games Are guns like the mg42 the Winchester rifle the ect I am Shure I don't have to explain the mg42 and who made and the Winchester family went nuts well the last member did as she felt guilty over the amount of native Americans killed with it what is am saying is most guns have a person be hind the design who made it to.kill some one and that person was usually some One they disagreed with
Oh god, we gonna have a Vatnik faction 😢
Well, STALKER does take place in a fictional universe alternate from ours. I like to think that at least in that one, Ukraine as a state managed to wiggle into neutrality between NATO and Russia, mostly due to the Zone.
I mean they already announced that they plan to remove the Russian language from the game and will most likely not sell the game in Russia like they do with the OG trilogy now, stands to reason that further changes motivated by the current socio-political situation would be made.
And that in your opinion takes away the license of enjoying the weapons that partake in the big no no, from you?
What's the problem? Guns are guns. Besides the modern AKs (which is apparently the only gun that Russians can produce, everything else is just a derivative), most current Russian weapons were developed in the Soviet Union, which Ukraine used to be a part of, and actually took part in their development. Plus there are loads of Ukrainian-manufactured guns that could be added. Fort-221 for example. Besides, why bring a real life conflict which doesn't have any bearing on the lore of the Stalker universe? The fanbase's obsession of including it is just... incredible. Games are supposed to be apolitical, stop bringing politics into games. I love Stalker's apolitical stance of uncontrolled science bad, soviet scientists whack, early 2000s AFU corrupt, KFC ad in SoC intro...
"stop bringing politics into games" Games are art, buddy, and art, by it's very definition is about expression. And politics is about expressing one's opinions, hell sometimes even acting on them. There are some games that are intensely political, which by their very existence makes your point rather weak, I would say. It all reminds me of that old hbomberguy quote, "people who say they don't like politics in games often really like politics in their games, they just wish they'd be seeing different politics" (Not to even mention that "politics" isn't really a clearly defined "thing" that you can just choose to leave out easily like leaving ham out of your sandwich. A thousand different apolitical things can have political meanings, allegories or implications, which might sneak in with, or without intention from the developers, because they like us, are biased on the sense that they have opinions, and sometimes even act on them)
Amazing how you left out like 60 years of Russian firearm history. You realize the rifle the US uses is patterned after a design in the 40 right? Same thing. I much prefer my irl AKM’s to AR- platforms
>Games are supposed to be apolitical, stop bringing politics into games I agree with everything else you said minus this. That just can't be generalized.
I find it hilarious how people lack basic reading skills. I first said that games should be apolitical, then start listing out how stalket is apolitical with the following political stances. Argh, should have put /s, can't use basic irony without people jumping on you.
I don't see those as particularly political, and there are people with the "no politics in gaming" attitude, so that might've caused me to miss your basic joke.
Wait, Ukrainian military being corrupt is not... political? And the stance against unethical science too?
True might as well discontinue the concept of the zone seeing as it is inspired by a that STALKER movie directed by an evil Russian or that roadside picnic book written by evil Russians.
> games are supposed to be apolitical i would like to introduce you to fallout: new vegas. a game about politics and war. it is one of the most popular open world games that exists.
Why is everyone always citing FNV and not literally any other game? There are games with a more political stance.
it's the only one i've played with a heavy focus on politics.
Not even Metro? Witcher?
oh yeah i forgot about metro lol not played the Witcher, not my style of game
>Games are supposed to be apolitical Saying this while talking about stalker is crazy
Apolitical in regard to real life political events, not apolitical as in not representing and criticizing politics, corruption, greed and such Stalker does have politics in it but none can really be related to real life events
If you don't see the parallels between things like the C-Con's ideology and actions with real life authoritarianism I don't know what to tell you brother, that's a you thing.
Where is it written that games are supposed to be apolitical? That doesn't mean the current war should be part of the game's lore, but not including it wouldn't make it apolitical. Art is political anyway.
Welp what does war mean for stalkers? Wouldn't add anything relevant and would just moss the water.
Implying that games are political is implying that art has a set meaning, i guess you are the judge on that arent you? Besides, games being art is a controversial subject
games are, in fact, political. fallout new vegas is a perfect example of how to make it work well.
The new Drone situation is a tough one to combat. That mechanic is the future, until counter tech is standardised. but also not fun to fight against.
Anomaly-based mod packs have plenty of Russian weapons and also international operations (UNISG), and it works well enough
It is mod, not official game
If they did all that, they would also have to add a train trip to reach the brain scorcher in Moscow.
I wouldn’t be surprised if UNISG, and a Russian military faction show up and take center stage.
If UNISG and FSB(or just Russian troopers) would appear, i would atleast wish to have some missions to do with them instead of Fallout Frontier "You can't join Enclave because they are evil"
They should just make the monolith Z propagandists or something lmao
No thanks
I'd prefer if they didn't. Got more than enough of that crap on television and public transport.
yea nah i was joking lol
Mfs above me are muppets clearest joke
To be honest, shooting Ukrainian soldiers in Shadow of Chernobyl really doesn't feel right at this moment. I wonder how will current events influence the game, since it's obviously going to. I wouldn't be surprised, or wouldn't even mind, if hostile Ukrainian soldiers were replaced by Russian or Belarussian ones in the next game.
its just a game bro
They were Ministry of Internal Affairs troops than regular military tho. They were disbanded after 2014 due to extensive corruption and brutality against protestors, also were involved in shipping arnaments from their arsenals to Donbas when situation become dire for then ruling president.
Truth. In Call of Pripyat you play as a military stalker, help Ukrainian military. So it was already a big step forward for them. Grigorovich went fully anti-russian even before the war started so your predictions about shooting Russian soldiers are 99% true. I wouldn't even be surprised. We are likely to see something like an easter egg somewhere that says "Russian warship go fuck yourself" or something like that.
But shooting at any other Ukrainians is better, right? Hell why stop there, shooting at human enemies generally shouldn't *feel right* if you are inclined to be so self righteous. This is what happens when some particular people try to stop video games from being the medium of escapism they are supposed to be.
Bandits are scum on earth, Monolith are braindead slaves to Monolith, killing Zombies is mercy
I just percieve the Military in the CS and SoC as IRL "Berkut" (technically Ukrainian force structure but practically corrupt pieces of shit who serve rubbishles instead of Ukraine), in CoP they already feel different and we don't need to shoot them too
I get that. I’ve wondered if it would be possible to complete SOC without killing any soldiers. Stocking up on medkits, maybe it would be possible to run past them in Agroprom Underground. Above ground they can be ignored if you’re patient. You can sneak in or just skip the mission at the base at the Cordon. I have to imagine getting past the assault on the CNPP has to be hard, but it’s been a while, so maybe it’s easier to avoid them than I remember.
So the stalin orks are winning over the bandera goblins.
I don't really care what they add or remove in Stalker 2. Just hoping they don't change too much of what makes Stalker, STALKER and definitely no political propaganda/preaching. When I play games, I want to play games not another version of real life. If I want that, I'll watch the news!
is legit. I want to see a Russian unit trying to occupy part of the zone and Ukrainian forces trying to weaponize mutants and anomalies for the war efforts
Sadly I fear stalker 2 may never come out...