Poll: S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Linear or open world
- Thread starter wkim564
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I feel it's a hybrid, truly. There's scope for exploration, but the nature of it is more like a 'wide open corridor' than a wide open world. I mean, I remember trying to access caches in a train graveyard at 3am, just wandering about the world trying to scavenge un-noticed, which is not something you can do in a more conventional 'on rails' shooter. On the other hand, once you've done the series of side missions and get on with the plot, you just push forward. There's very much a sense of progressing through the story, whereas in the concept of an open world game, like say the X series of games, you can just drop it. Fly off into space, become a pirate or an industrialist, etc. You don't need to ever advance the plot, but you still get a fleshed out game. So yeah. Hybrid, for sures.
I'm only going off SOC here but I would have to say it has some elements of OW as in reality you can go to all the places in the game from the start, just some are harded to get through without "leveling first" (to prove my point i cleared the tunnels and did a run through of the Agropom Research Facility before I even saved Mole (his men finaly saved him by the time i had to go and get rid of a buttload of weapons and ammo) but yes it is meant to be played in a fairly linear fashion. I would say if they had of taken more time with it (aka done more in the 10 years it took to develop) I belive they could have had a nicer "sandbox" system going than they did.
The two fellows above me couldn't have put it any better.
On a side though, going by the original gameplay videos (im talking 2004 here) of Shadow of Chernobyl, you can see and were even told that they wanted something akin to Morrowind with guns and mutants and even cars. They never truly accomplished this. Whether that was because of certain restraints they later found they had to abide by, they felt they sorta needed a more linear path in order to tell their story successfully, or it just plain didn't work, no one knows (except for them of course).
Either way, I'd say going by their original plans for the game (SoC), that Call of Prypiat and maybe even a small portion of Clear Sky both came as close to open world as the series has to offer. Minus the cars.
Otherwise It's like Blueberryfactory and Serenegoose said; a nice combination of both.
On a side though, going by the original gameplay videos (im talking 2004 here) of Shadow of Chernobyl, you can see and were even told that they wanted something akin to Morrowind with guns and mutants and even cars. They never truly accomplished this. Whether that was because of certain restraints they later found they had to abide by, they felt they sorta needed a more linear path in order to tell their story successfully, or it just plain didn't work, no one knows (except for them of course).
Either way, I'd say going by their original plans for the game (SoC), that Call of Prypiat and maybe even a small portion of Clear Sky both came as close to open world as the series has to offer. Minus the cars.
Otherwise It's like Blueberryfactory and Serenegoose said; a nice combination of both.
Here are the original vids I mentioned, for those interested:
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3778
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3779
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3780
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3781
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3778
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3779
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3780
http://www.gametrailers.com/video/behind-game-s-t-a-l-k-e-r/3781
It makes me sad to see what SoC could've been instead of what it is now. I would gladly have waited another year for it's release if it meant we could get the uberawesome freeroaming FPS/RPG we were promised all that time.
For example, in the first vid of the bunch BlancoDiablo posted we see a real polished Pripyat in the intro, we see a great mutant alife (can't remember bloodsuckers being more around during night in the released version, or them fighting amongst each other )
The whole glorious alife that was supposed to make it uber free was also limited to prevent scripted events getting fuxed up. All the maps were borded with a chest-high fence. Still, it's a good idea and there is a bit of an open world, although you're kinda forced unto the waypoints.
So I voted for more linear than open. Although you can roam between the missions, you're still rather locked up in the amount of paths you can choose (mostly one), and when you reach Pripyat it's basicly all forward anyway in the Vanilla stalker.
Maybe you guys are interested in the Lost Alpha mod, a project intended to bring back most of the cut content from the SoC beta, including the cut maps and stuff
For example, in the first vid of the bunch BlancoDiablo posted we see a real polished Pripyat in the intro, we see a great mutant alife (can't remember bloodsuckers being more around during night in the released version, or them fighting amongst each other )
The whole glorious alife that was supposed to make it uber free was also limited to prevent scripted events getting fuxed up. All the maps were borded with a chest-high fence. Still, it's a good idea and there is a bit of an open world, although you're kinda forced unto the waypoints.
So I voted for more linear than open. Although you can roam between the missions, you're still rather locked up in the amount of paths you can choose (mostly one), and when you reach Pripyat it's basicly all forward anyway in the Vanilla stalker.
Maybe you guys are interested in the Lost Alpha mod, a project intended to bring back most of the cut content from the SoC beta, including the cut maps and stuff
I agree about the vehicles. I've used them in early mods for SoC and it was not pleasant.
Even still, vehicles in STALKER follow the same logic as vehicles in Fallout 3; they would kinda ruin the point of the both games, which is to spend time slowly exploring and immersing yourself in the atmosphere. Going from one point of the game to another at 90 miles an hour destroys that. Thankfully the use of fast travel (F3) and other stalkers (CoP) are there to balance things out and for the less patient, but it's still a double edged sword.
At any rate, damn you Dean Sharpe. -waves fist-
Even still, vehicles in STALKER follow the same logic as vehicles in Fallout 3; they would kinda ruin the point of the both games, which is to spend time slowly exploring and immersing yourself in the atmosphere. Going from one point of the game to another at 90 miles an hour destroys that. Thankfully the use of fast travel (F3) and other stalkers (CoP) are there to balance things out and for the less patient, but it's still a double edged sword.
At any rate, damn you Dean Sharpe. -waves fist-
it is quite open with there being lots of sidequest popping up everywhere but it is still linear in the fact that they wanted to have a decent story without to much deviation