STALKER Theft Auto mod for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl

Here is a new Q&A submitted by various members of the filefront community about STA. With this Q&A is a couple answers by GSC's staff team.

Enjoy :D

1) How far is progress on Stalker Theft Auto as of now?
-Right now, i'd give a rough percent estimate of about 40% out of 100% from making sure all work is satisfactory for ingame needs. Still much skinning, level building, and photo-textures from photography trips are still to be done. As the animations will come later, because I still need to set a time for Motion-Capture at our Campus's studio.

2) Looking at some of the models that the STA team has created, they're incredibly detailed. On average, how long does it take to make one?
- Since I have been making the weapons, and redoing them over small amounts of time. It takes about 45 minutes, to 2 hours maximum.

3) In the game, there are massive levels for the character to play in. Will there be a huge environment in STA as well?
- Depends on game type. "Free Roam & Team Roam" will be set on large scaled maps. Perfectly fit for vehicle transportation ect,..
Team deathmatch and CTW (Capture the Whatever) will be set on small to medium/semi-large scaled maps. Gameplay modes such as S&E and TW are being decided on how they will work best.

4) Can users custom paint their vehicles in the game?
- Maybe, this feature is still under discussion with GSC.

5) Has the STA team thought about a Single Player campaign? If so, have you thought of a possibly storyline?
- Thought about it sure, but simply STALKER has a great single player campaign coming around. Our main focus is to have something really great to play when those get a bit tired of playing Single player, and feel like playing some fun/real multiplayer action.

6) In earlier Grand Theft Auto's, there was a bird's eye view. In more recent ones (3, Vice City, San Andreas...) the view was almost all third person. Will STA be third or first person (or both)?
- Stalker Theft Auto will be only in First Person view mode. 3rd person view will be available for spectators or "free fly mode". Afterall, we don't want the player to get the full view of whats around him, but if your dead, you can watch ones back like a gaurdian angel while again, spectating

7) Can players create their own factions, or gangs, and recruit members?
- No, but if this question is related to gamers who enjoy the mod create their own clans/gangs. Sure, that's fine by all means.

Can everyone have a different radio station in their car? If so, what are the genres of the radio stations?
- It is something I am working on with figuring out how the X-ray engine works. There are a few ideas as to how this will work, but official news of this will come at a later time.

9. Will there be various hidden items u can find? Such as the "Hidden Packages"
- Maps will have items that idle in random areas of the maps themselves. i.e (weapons, food, drugs,ect.).

10. About what year/time will STA be set in?
- Most of the mod is based in the modern day of today which we live, as it could be viewed if visited by anyone of this area, or tourists of the outside.

11. Are there going to be any other vehicles besides land vehicles? Maybe Boats and planes?
- Maybe, land vehicles are genuine to the games concept as well as the roll of physics that will be placed about them. Helicopters are still being discussed with GSC for the moment.

12. Will there be destructable enviroments?
- There will be, but entire buildings themselves will not, because of the netcode, number of players colliding in one scene, ect...

13. Will there be normal citizens just walking around towns doing there own business? Or will the world of STA be torn and driven by gangs?
- As soon as Co-Op is established in X-Ray, you can count on having a living breathing world flow around the players on any given server with settings set for the game.

14. Will your character be customizable?
- First release, is to allow players to select a few given models, after a few months we will release new models, and new colthing, skins ect. So gamers will have some variety set for their player on the server.

15. Will STA be planned to come out once S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is out? Or will we might have to wait another month or so?
- Honestly, there is no telling when, due to this being a new engine, and still most of the code isn't present to our knowledge, so until GSC is done with Stalker, we will see where we go with working together from there..

16. Will there be some RPG elements in STA? Such as eating every once in a while and working out? Sort of like GTA:SA.
- It will be optional, mostly in a sense when a player is playing on a map such as STA_PleasantBart. There will be items around that the player may use for himself to regain health, or to stop bleeding. So the player can select a certain amount of random items that he can use before he/she is shot by another player, who can as well pick up his/her stuff.

17. Is STA a MP based game or SP?
- First builds will be strictly Multiplayer based. Single player is not any part of our concerns as of this point in time.

18. About how many different weapons will be in the game?
- In the first release, there should be about 50+ weapons, counting those used in Stalker just so some variety is there. Incase if players enjoy those more from Stalker than those made newly for the mod itself.

19. Will your weapons be custimizable with addons? Like in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.?
-They will have addon support I.e (Suppressors, grenade launchers, scopes, Extended mags, ect.). But most will come from the second build and so on...

20. Will there be different buildings in the game that you can enter? Such as a resturaunt, a gym, a motel, ect.?
- Every building, structure will be made in some way enterable. All buildings will be made according to real world measurements by default (metric system), so the world seems life like apart from the photo-textures that will be seen.

21. Will the player be able to enter all buildings?
- All buildings yes, though not every room. Because we don't want to make the player have to nessasarly search all grounds for 1 or 2 random players. We want to make sure the action is well provided by all means, than a holy snipe out war.

22. Will STA be split apart into different towns/cities?
- There will be sections of real cities brought into the mapping, and towns as well.

23) Can players communicate with one another via a microphone or headset?
(Oleg) - as for the voice support, yes, that's planned.
(SNIPER-X) - It will be a feature, but adjustments will be worked on so it's a feature only certian people can use to each other as a whole.

24. How long has STA been in devolpment?
- Roughly with solid work, about a good year and half. Though there have been about 5 incidents due to hard drives breaking down, losing massive amounts of work done over hard stressed months of perfection.

25. How enthusiastic is GSC (seeing as you talk to them more than anyone) about your mod? Have they been helping you? and do you like pie?
(GSC) - We're extremely happy and proud of our S.T.A.L.K.E.R. community worldwide. And it is even more pleasing to realize that on top of active literary and monster design activity, there is a huge interest in S.T.A.L.K.E.R. modding within the community. STA is a pioneer community-driven mod to the game, and we are all looking forward to playing it.
(SNIPER-X)
- For help, one of the gameplay programmers of GSC's Stalker team has offered his help for programming to see that this mod can achieve it's goals.
- For pie?, not really XD. I got tired of it, and went back to the cake and icing'