Once upon a time someone got the idea that STALKER as an MMO would be pretty cool. And everyone agreed! Except that... nobody actually acted on it. Making games is hard, especially an MMO. So time passed, and passed, and passed, until a team of russians got fed up and decided to try making that idea a reality. Starting from humble beginnings as a Minecraft modpack, it eventually became a standalone game but was a Russian-only affair until December 2022 when the global client and its NA, EU and SEA servers went live.
What is it?
It's literally just the Ukrainian FPS STALKER but in MMO form. If you don't know what stalker is, then this is going to be a hard sell to be honest. You can probably stop reading here if you're not oriented or interested in the stalker series.
Why does it look like that?
Stalcraft started as a heavily altered Minecraft modpack. It eventually became a standalone game with its own assets but they decided to keep the blocky look for humans and geography. Does it look jarring to see a blocky minecraft man with 4k textures wielding a highpoly AK rifle? Yes, but you get used to it.
Pictured: graphics. Do I have to pay for anything?
Stalcraft is free to play but has optional premium status which you can buy (either with real money or from the in-game auction house) and grants you a slight advantage in that you get a bit more resources from events in the world, but not a gamechanging amount. So it'd be "pay to grind slightly less". There's also cosmetic crates you buy with real money that drop weapon/suit skins but these skins can be bought from the auction house as well. The Russian client is notoriously pay2win but the devs have been very receptive to feedback on Global regarding this.
So, is it fun?
I mean, I like it. It's more or less everything I ever wanted in the execution of a stalker mmo. Some things could be better, but I'm enjoying my time with the game. That said, be aware this game is PVP hell, and it only gets worse the further you progress. Players are divided into factions and there is no way to be neutral, but the worst of it happened during launch which is now a distant memory. It's better now. I swear.
So that's it! If you ever feel like playing sometime, I have both Bandit and Stalker characters available including one Stalker character I intentionally keep from progressing to further help newbies on. At the very least I might be able to mail you some resources and money to start with.
Edit: forgot to link to the game on steam
