To this day, Shadow of Chernobyl remains one of the best games I have ever played. It left such a deep and meaningful impression that I replay it every once in a while, just to see how it ages. But then, back in 2007, it was a garbled mess. Constant crashes, low frame rate, bugs that would embarass even the current bug-king, Battlefield 4, and there was no possible way anybody could play through it. And yet, the game collected a pretty decent fan base that kept the franchise alive for two more independant expansions and five more years. And for good reason. No other game (last gen, of course) could even hope of exploiting its resources as well as the original STALKER did. The engine, the setting, the story - it all fits in just perfect, and the atmosphere of the game is hugely immersive. Even though the vanilla game was so very much limited under the guise of freedom, it felt more real than anything else available at the time. The world was realised perfectly as well as the available weaponry, and ballistics are still way above any CoD game. And even though the weapons made you feel well equipped for whatever might get a drop on you it was scary as hell. No, terrifying is the better term. Ever since the first time you leave the bunker where the protagonist wakes up, the sense of dread and hopelessness is everywhere, and sure, while the Fallout series has that too, but not like this. Shadow Of Chernobyl isn't afraid of dropping everything it has on you: the game defaults with hell-on-earth difficulty and gets even harder with every step you take towards the Chernobyl Sarcophagus. And that's before you head into the God-forsaken laboratories where all kinds of terrible experiments took place. It's realistic, brutal and morbidly beautiful. And that's without all the brilliant mods that make it even better.
