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S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
Discover the vast Chornobyl Exclusion Zone full of dangerous enemies, deadly anomalies and powerful artifacts. Unveil your own epic story as you make your way to the Heart of Chornobyl. Make your choices wisely, as they will determine your fate in the end.
In short, Steam reviewers most often praise “satisfying gunplay and open-world exploration” (40 of 104 reviews) and “beautiful, immersive Zone environments” (22); the most common complaint is “crashes, broken quests, glitches” (23). What reviewers agree on ↓
What players say
Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Score via Steam as of 2026-09-29 · quoted reviews as of 2026-05-12.
What reviewers agree on
40 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“Stalker 2 is a good game, especially when it comes to shooting and gunplay. The Zone feels nicely polished and well put together now. The quests are solid, though nothing particularly extraordinary. I'm really hoping…”
“Pros *World is beautifully crafted and many locations from the older games are here *Guns and animations are awesome *Graphics are really nice Cons *AI is horribly balanced and hits 80-90% of the bullets they shoot…”
“After 100+ hours and finishing the story, I feel like I can finally give a proper review of the game. Overall, I’ve enjoyed it a lot, even without A-life being fully implemented. I’m not entirely sure how much it would…”
22 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“My PC Specs will be attached for reference I'm only about 3–4 days into my initial venture into the Zone, drawn in by CLIKRAD and his absolutely masterpiece-level immersive videos, whether its his Stalker 2 or GAMMA…”
“Beautiful game with beautiful enviroments, but with an engine so broken I doubt it'll ever be saved.”
“Pros *World is beautifully crafted and many locations from the older games are here *Guns and animations are awesome *Graphics are really nice Cons *AI is horribly balanced and hits 80-90% of the bullets they shoot…”
10 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“the story and writing are really good, the world itself is also very detailed. My only gripe with it are the awful ai and a-life and the occassional ue5 hiccups.”
“If you read no other review, read this one... Buy this game and enjoy a wonderful open world full of points of interest, lore, loot, and of course mutants to rip your face off. Spend many, many hours exploring every…”
“this is a basic, concise review on stalker 2 just after beating the game for the first time. - good, but buggy, often small visual glitches would happen and sometimes things would outright break, requiring a save reload…”
7 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“Runs pretty well. Enjoyed the easter egg in Loner Village (Look for where you can find the Stalker Suit in the first game). Combat is smooth, bloodsuckers are terrifying, died many times to just about everything…”
“just as hard and glitchy as the original if it is intentional or not it brings back memories to the OLD man.”
5 of the 104 reviews raise this.
“i played this on xbox gamepass and beat it twice...i decided to finally get it on steam so i could 1. own it 2. be able to mod it...the game is really good imo, and def worth a buy. Probably best to wait for a sale tho…”
“definitely a good stalker game. less scary than the originals, but that may be because i was a 10 year old kid back then heh. get this one on a sale and enjoy a fine survival shooter.”
“at the release i knew it will need some time but in the end this Triple A project is worth every dollar and even more , i say it now as a standard edition owner and i plan to upgrade it to delux or Ultimate just to…”
23 of the 104 reviews raise this · 16 of them still recommend the game.
“Giving a negative review to a Stalker game as a 17 year fan hurts like hell, yet still...Game was in a disastrous state at launch, yet somehow all the patches only made it completely unplayable. As of 1.8, the game is…”
“i played this on xbox gamepass and beat it twice...i decided to finally get it on steam so i could 1. own it 2. be able to mod it...the game is really good imo, and def worth a buy. Probably best to wait for a sale tho…”
“Beautiful game with beautiful enviroments, but with an engine so broken I doubt it'll ever be saved.”
22 of the 104 reviews raise this · 16 of them still recommend the game.
“Do not even think about getting this game. It is still very poorly optimized. I could have more fun playing Fallout and Metro rather than Stalker. takes a long time to load in, and freezes every minute you walk. It isnt…”
“Stalker 2 is a good game, especially when it comes to shooting and gunplay. The Zone feels nicely polished and well put together now. The quests are solid, though nothing particularly extraordinary. I'm really hoping…”
“I spent 4 hours trying to get it to run consistently. The Unreal Engine should not have been used for this game. If you're thinking of buying this game, wait until they at least update the engine. Performance mods can't…”
17 of the 104 reviews raise this · 11 of them still recommend the game.
“Mediocre game. They should be ashamed to put “Stalker” in the name. The image is constantly blurry because of TAA — it completely destroys any sharpness. The economy is a mess. Gunplay is ridiculous: weapons have no…”
“Do not even think about getting this game. It is still very poorly optimized. I could have more fun playing Fallout and Metro rather than Stalker. takes a long time to load in, and freezes every minute you walk. It isnt…”
“I spent 4 hours trying to get it to run consistently. The Unreal Engine should not have been used for this game. If you're thinking of buying this game, wait until they at least update the engine. Performance mods can't…”
11 of the 104 reviews raise this · 3 of them still recommend the game.
“Giving a negative review to a Stalker game as a 17 year fan hurts like hell, yet still...Game was in a disastrous state at launch, yet somehow all the patches only made it completely unplayable. As of 1.8, the game is…”
“Do not even think about getting this game. It is still very poorly optimized. I could have more fun playing Fallout and Metro rather than Stalker. takes a long time to load in, and freezes every minute you walk. It isnt…”
“i played this on xbox gamepass and beat it twice...i decided to finally get it on steam so i could 1. own it 2. be able to mod it...the game is really good imo, and def worth a buy. Probably best to wait for a sale tho…”
10 of the 104 reviews raise this · 7 of them still recommend the game.
“"S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl" was honestly a huge disappointment for me and sadly a game that in its current state barely feels enjoyable to play, so I will divide this review into a few stages because there is…”
“Later enemies become bullet sponges that take multiple headshots to take down whilst having perfect aim themselves and are able to take you out THROUGH cover within seconds.”
“Pros *World is beautifully crafted and many locations from the older games are here *Guns and animations are awesome *Graphics are really nice Cons *AI is horribly balanced and hits 80-90% of the bullets they shoot…”
Counted across 104 English reviews, sampled to match this game's 80.0% positive rating · as of 2026-05-12
“Overall a pretty awesome romp through the zone full of mysterious anomalies, strange beasts, and warring factions. Story mode was plenty of fun and it's even more interesting to simply go exploring through the map. The mutants and psi creatures will keep you on your toes and…”
— a player, Steam review · 31 hrs played“I’ve seen a lot of mixed opinions on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, and honestly, most of them make valid points. This is a game people waited over a decade for, so expectations were always going to be high. Starting with the negatives: The game is massive—both…”
— a player, Steam review · 72 hrs played“It's aight. It does feel repetitive to explore the same looking locations for 2 mags of ammo and a sausage all the time. The story is cool but it does feel off being forced to progress the main quest in order to unlock more exploration. It feels like the game doesn't know which…”
— a player, Steam review · 102 hrs playedPlayer activity
Monthly average concurrent players. Live data self-collected from the Steam API · history through 2026-06 via SteamCharts.
Achievement stats
Global completion rates across all Steam players — a data view of how far people actually get. Source: Steam official stats · as of 2026-10-24.
Price tracking
US-region pricing (USD), sampled twice daily by our own tracker since 2026-07-11. Steam prices vary by region — always confirm your local price on Steam.
Regional prices at last sample, in local currency — Steam sets each region's price independently.
Cheapest → most expensive, converted to USD at ECB reference rates (2026-10-26). Relative comparison only.
Latest official news
Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Welcome to The Zone Lookout
Welcome to The Zone Lookout, our first major update after the “Archmajor” 2.0, we fixed most of the annoying anomalies and could also work on bringing something new and exciting to the stalker’s daily
Steam Autumn Sale
There is almost never a chill moment in the Zone. Anomalies don’t wait, emissions give no warning, and new paths open when they feel like it. But in autumn, the Zone changes her rhythm a little. She d
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.2: Cost of Hope & 2.0 Update — Accolades Trailer
It’s been a month since the release of Cost of Hope — and we’re proud and delighted with the reception so far. Let this trailer serve as a reminder that you can jump into the new chapter of the S.T.A.
Stalkers! Patch 2.0.6 is ready to be downloaded.
Stalkers! Patch 2.0.6 is ready. This one is a minor crash fix patch that will help stalkers that experience annoying crashing anomalies too often, especially in the AMD region. Backported several fixe
Patch 2.0.5 Is Here — Over 200 Fixes ⚒
Stalkers! We’ve been working on Patch 2.0.5 and are ready to share it with the Zone. Patch 2.0.5 brings lots of fixes, over 200 of them. Let's take a look at what’s changed. Fixed the issue with the t
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Screenshots
Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.
Facts & details
From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-12.
| Genres | Action, Adventure, RPG |
| Player tags | Open World · FPS · Post-apocalyptic · Survival · Atmospheric · Singleplayer · Shooter · Exploration · RPG · Story Rich · First-Person · Action (SteamSpy community voting) |
| Features | Single-player · Steam Achievements · Steam Trading Cards · Steam Workshop · Partial Controller Support · Steam Cloud · HDR available · Family Sharing |
| Languages | English * , French, Italian, German, Spanish - Spain, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese - Brazil, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Ukrainian * , Arabic, Czech, Spanish - Latin America, Turkish, Serbia… |
| Achievements | 58 |
| Official site | https://www.stalker2.com/ |
Minimum system requirements (PC)
Minimum: OS: Windows 10 x64 / Windows 11 x64 Processor: Intel Core i7-7700K / AMD Ryzen 5 1600X Memory: 16 GB RAM Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB / AMD Radeon RX 580 8GB / Intel Arc A750 Storage: 160 GB available space Additional Notes: Graphics Preset: LOW / Resolution: 1080p / Target FPS: 30. 16 GB Dual Channel RAM. SSD required. The listed specifications were evaluated using TSR and comparable technologies.