S.T.A.L.K.E.R. (series)/YMMV

• Adaptation Displacement:
  • Most players are unaware of the novel and the film. The rest most likely bought it because of the novel and the film. The rest of us bought the novel and the film because of the game.
  • And even less people know, that the game is also partially based on another short story of the Strugatsky Brothers, The Forgotten Experiment (which features concepts of quasi-natural yet explained origin of the Zone and scientists working in the Zone).
• Demonic Spiders:
  • The Poltergeists in the Red Forest mine in Clear Sky are a subject of many angry message board rants. They basically toss metal water heaters at you which can kill you in one hit and are essentially undodgable.
  • Not to mention wild dogs. You could be a top-level Stalker outfitted with exoskeleton armor and the finest of guns, but you'd still have to make a frenzied dash past the pack of wild dogs in front of the Duty compound to get in. Alternately you could just shoot one or two. If you kill the pack alpha the rest of them run away.
  • The Poltergeists in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl aren't a bowl of cherries either. Sure, they can't one-hit-kill you, but you can't get rid of most of the stuff they throw, the damned things move FAST, and there are SEVEN OR EIGHT in X18, the first time you'll run into them. Aim for the center of the flying ball of sparks and be ready to heal. It also doesn't help that they can see through walls. Fortunately, The poltergeists were nerfed for Call of Pripyat. Except for one poltergeist towards the end (that has Shadow of Chernobyl's poltergeists see through walls abilities), Call of Pripyat poltergeists can only see you if your moving. So all you have to do is stand still, then they will lose sight of you (also works for pyrogeists in Call of Pripyat)
  • Call of Pripyat makes up for this by adding psychic dwarves who can telekinetically steal your weapon and then throw it halfway across the map. When they're not throwing gas tanks at you, that is. The burers are easy to deal with when you learn how they act: just use a knife. They can't pull the knife out the player's hands and the knife inflicts enough damage to kill it in 6-7 stabs. Just don't try it if there's a second burer nearby. Alternatively, use the RPG.
  • Any enemy packing an RPG in Shadow of Chernobyl. The blast radius is big enough that you will hardly have a chance to dodge, unless you know where they are and start moving the instant they fire. Even if you dodge, you'll still get knocked around by the blast, so good luck seeing clearly enough to return fire. And of course, the RPG is heavy enough and there's little enough ammo that you can't reasonably carry it with you. Your best bet is to quicksave and try to snipe them before they see you.
• Ear Worm: Several. The vocal bit for "Dirge for the Planet" is looped endlessly inside Sidorovich's bunker whilst the Bar used to have one of the stalker guitar songs play over and over, and once you hear the "Bandit Base Polka" in Clear Sky, it will never. Ever. Stop.
• Friendly Fandoms: Most fans of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games are also fans of Metro 2033.
• Game Breaker: When you do get one, usually mid-to-late game, the VSS Vintorez Sniper Rifle is one of the best guns in the game for any situation. Its scope lacks nothing compared to that of the two Dragunov variants', its ammo is really cheap by comparison while being every bit as powerful, it's light (more than 1,5kg lighter than an unloaded SVD) and compact enough that you have no penalties in turning speed and can even sprint with it on hand, and as long as you can reliably compensate for the bullet drop, it's deadly accurate. It helps that General Voronin showers you with high-quality armor-piercing SP-6 rounds for it in exchange for trivial missions in Shadow of Chernobyl, and there are a lot of stashes and stalkers using 9x39mm guns in Clear Sky and Call of Pripyat, so ammo is never at a premium if you know how and where to get it.
• Goddamned Bats:
  • Blind Dogs and Pseudodogs. Ridiculously hard to get a headshot on, drop near-worthless parts only one trader wants (Sakharov), and TRAVEL IN PACKS. Pack a shotgun and a bunch of medkits, or suffer a death of a thousand cuts.
  • The same goes for the rats.
• Good Bad Bugs: When Pseudodogs charge towards you and attack, there is a very small chance that the physics engine will glitch and you will be propelled several hundred meters straight up at high speed. This has never been fixed despite having been present since the game was released.
  • There's also the knife's secondary attack (see the One-Hit Kill entry in the main page). Sadly fixed in Call of Pripyat.
  • If you die just as you are transitioning from one area to the next, you will spawn in dead, unable to use your weapon or access your inventory or talk to people, but mobile and completely immortal.
  • The armour repairing trick with four battery artifacts (collecting at least 4 artifacts of the flame/electricity battery type, wearing them, then jumping into a fire/electrical surge will restore your HP, and more importantly and absolutely a bug and not a feature, repair your armor, otherwise impossible in the unmodded 'Shadow of Chernobyl).
• Hell Is That Noise: The distinctive wheeze-pant of Bloodsuckers, which due to their cloaking ability is the best (and often only) way to determine their location. Even hardened, seasoned players are easily unnerved by the sound, and the first time a player meets a Bloodsucker can lead to full-blown panic attacks. Also the voice of the Wish Granter, which continuously calls out to you in Chernobyl NPP.
  • Usually the first sign that there is a Controller around is a growl, followed by a tone which sounds like a tinnitus episode. Then comes the Interface Screw...
  • The low, rumbling sound that precedes any blowout in Call of Pripyat is always unsettling, and an indication that you have only a minute or two to get somewhere safe.
• Internet Backdraft: O sweet, merciful God. Never ever bring S.T.A.L.K.E.R. up in forums not dedicated to it. Especially the second game.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Get out of here, stalker."
  • "I said come in, don't stand there! I said come in, don't stand there! I said come in, don't stand there! I said come in, don't stand there! I said come in, don't stand there! I said come in, don't stand there! I said-"
  • "Blowout soon fellow stalker!" "Oh really? when?" "NOW."
  • "Buzz off, Stalker. We don't let every loser through." Less known than DON'T STAND THERE though.
• Narm: The English voice acting can get rather... enthusiastic. Fortunately, it's fairly easy to change all the non-essential spoken dialogue back to the (far better) Russian originals.
• Special Effects Failure: For some reason, the sound of choppers overhead can be interrupted by breaking crates. Also the glowing eyes of the mutants can look a bit weird up close, for some reason the same effect is used for actual lights.
• Spiritual Licensee There's no official connection to either Roadside Picnic or Stalker, but so much is clearly lifted from them, it's often assumed the game is licensed.
• Surprisingly Improved Sequel: Call of Pripyat is noticeably more polished than the previous two games, adding multiple UI improvements, removing Clear Sky's infamous homing grenades and bug-ridden Faction Wars, giving the player decent equipment from the beginning and (most importantly) making the game playable out of the box without the need for multiple patches and bug-fixing mods.
• That One Level: The second level of Clear Sky, where crossing into the new area by the only available route has you coming out behind a boulder, on the other side of which is a mounted machine gun in the possession of the military. Well at least they don't know I'm here... wrong; they know you're there and tell you so. Well I'll be safe behind this rock... wrong again; after a few quick bursts, they send a number of better-armed and better-armoured soldiers after you. If you manage to dispatch them, you then have to figure out which way you can safely leg it.
  • Once you realize that this is essentially a death-trap unless you've got at least a dozen spare medkits in your inventory (even after knocking off the squad of heavily-armored soldiers, that MG still has a ridiculous field of fire), your best bet is to just turn around, go back to the Swamps, and enter the Cordon from the northern entrance. Sure, you wind up next to a group of Loners that get pissy if you get too close, but it's the easier way in.
  • Shadow of Chernobyl has the Red Forest where nearly everything is radioactive, making it much harder to take cover properly. The vast majority of the trouble in that level can be bypassed if you don't follow the road and cut through the forest instead, because ninety percent of the Monolith or zombie enemies on that level are waiting for you on the road, and with the way it curves it's nearly impossible to get a shot off without taking loads of return fire. Cutting through the forest makes the level far easier, especially if you've packed a sniper rifle. Plus, once you've gotten to the other side, you can cut back and take all the Monolith troops from behind, netting yourself loads of equipment.
• That One Sidequest: In Call of Pripyat, babysitting a scientist as he takes readings of anomalies. A teeth-gnashingly difficult mission that comes out of nowhere in an otherwise well-balanced game. It takes the eggheads the better part of 5 minutes to do their science and throughout that time you are attacked by hordes of monsters coming in from all directions. The scientists are armed but tend to die pretty easily. And you have to do it twice. It's a case of Unstable Equilibrium in that the stalkers escorting you the first time come back for the second if they're still alive by the end of it. The only thing that makes it even vaguely easier is if you know the locations ahead of time and go there to clean out the mutants that are already there, leaving you to deal with the (relatively) smaller amount that spawn in while they're taking the measurements.
• Ugly Cute: Pseudodog puppies. Dawwww.