Reviews - brutaldeluxe

It's affective -- More so than a lot of the games today claim to be.

The concept of a radically open remake of the original Stalker game is obviously intriguing. When the non-linear experience translates well this is as good as the original game if not better! But that happened only once in my playthrough. A non-linear world is a profound thing to consider from a design perspective,and properly implementing it even more so; The appreciable difficulty of Dezowave's undertaking has been considered -- but this game is deeply
and irreparably flawed.
The discerning player will perhaps have suspected from the comic-book style opening that radical changes have been implemented, and unfortunately the rest of the changes are in the same poor taste as the opening. First question to Dezowave: Why replace the opening cinematic which was a perfect introduction to Strelok's story, with an intro using a comic-book themed style that is totally distinct from every other cutscene in the game, and totally inferior to the original?. This is also an introduction to the technically skilled but generally overwrought style of the writer. If you want to know why this iteration of Stalker generally sounds 'Hollywood' or 'Westernised' , well presumably it's because they are westerners; Not that there is anything wrong with that but there are affectations and grammatical styles in the dialogue that contrast with the Russian language and it doesn't feel authentic as a result. It may also be attributed to the writer seemingly being unable to write brusque dialogue, leaving the characters sounding ironically and implausibly erudite for nomadic transients and brutish paramilitaries.

Stalker never had the standard story-driven FPS narrative. You were sent about to perform tasks and occasionally were sent on the main quest, usually into some abandoned lab or a paramilitary base, but the story was almost out of mind as you was too busy being immersed in the environment... pastebin.com/v0DT8msa

While it is 'moar stalker' this prequel does not have the same impact as the progressive pseudo-RPG that is SOC. The game retains it's artistic sensibilities: the soviet aesthetics; the bleak landscapes, but the(new)later levels feel uninspired and many areas present in SOC have been inexplicably cut from CS.
The liberal use of scripted shoot-outs in CS and especially in Limansk are just wrong; over-used and literally unavoidable, making the later levels linear and boring.
The levels in SOC rarely used scripted fire-fights and were structured in a way that didn't necessitate them; and that was what endeared gamers to Stalker : a restricted sandbox game with emergent AI.

The emergent A.I has been altered and there is now a paucity of mutants and too many human opponents, with something being lost in the process so the world no longer feels oppressive. In SOC every faction (apart from the stalker's) had an intimidating disposition and was introduced to the player in an intimidating way: In the case of the Merc' faction and the Freedom faction there were cool scripted sequences; the army was dehumanised entirely, being introduced when butchering the Stalkers at Agroprom, while the bandits were also dehumanised as volatile animals.
In CS, with one of the development paradigms being 'join any faction', there is now an overabundance of friendly NPCs which detracts from the loneliness of SOC -- in fact there are now entire territories that are almost entirely safe. In SOC NPC's didn't need to befriend the player -- as they were hostile! -- they were characterised by the A.I! by their mystery/hostility.

The ending of CS(several of the aforementioned protracted action sequences) compared to the slow build-up of SOC(The intense path through Red Forest, to x19, through Pripyat, punctuated with blazing gun-battles followed by periods of tense infiltration in an intimidating environment) are not matched by CS.

If you are expecting more SOC -- this will disappoint.

Score heavily weighted on obvious hard work. Next time hire a proper writer.

It's one of those mods that's been hyped up for months and has lots to live up to, does COF satisfy expectations?, yes and no.
The normal maps are used very well and the teams' mapper deserves a pat on the back, the game looks a lot better then half life. The film grain looks cool and is perhaps meant to give the game a look similar to old horror films?, as this basically is a big interactive horror film. The games atmospere is at first unsettling, proceeding through the game to become more and more disturbing; the team delivered everything they promised in that context.

The game is without doubt scary in SOME places; but that atmosphere begins to wane around chapter 4. The problem is that they have made a game that consists almost purely of jump scares and weird music to convey the horror, neglecting the most important element, that being psychological horror. In the first chapter where the player gets in the apartment there is a subplot that is, in this reviewers opinion, the most scary part of the whole game. Simon goes down stairs into the basement to retrieve a videotape, on the videotape a killer cuts off a mans head with some shears; and when a message pops up that says you must use the elevator to escape the apartments this reviewer assumed that the killer was still in the building I actually hurried to leave.
After a while though the game just gets predictable and turns into a horror shooter, the only psycological horror left being whether an enemy will pop out or when the chainsaw man will come back, so you basically stay pumped up with adrenaline and the player becomes fearless. The monsters while initially scary lose shock value after a while perhaps because they are low poly and some are fullbright, maybe a more modern engine could be used in future because better lighting would have done a lot for scare factor.
Despite these faults Cry Of Fear is not something to turn your nose up at, Team Psykskallar have built a top 10 hl mod.