izigame.me

Call of Pripyat is the sequel to Shadow of Chernobyl and Clear Sky, if you haven't played those games... Then it might not be necessary to play them cause i can easily recommend this game to first time players. Despite CoP being a sequel the story has barely any obvious relation to the previous games aside from the ending and the storytelling is not that interesting either so it's pretty much a self contained story. CoP is also the easiest and most refined game of the trilogy with lots of quality of life improvements and streamlined mechanics so it really is a safe starting point for newcomers to this series!
I played and finished the vanilla unmodded experience and it's overal a HUGE improvement over CS mainly because the shooting has been fixed, enemies are no longer bullet sponges and won't instantly kill you with a handgun. The A.I. has been fixed they no longer shoot at walls or the ground. NPC's are also not as hostile against you this time and it's actually better to stay neutral at all times but there are some instances where you can choose to fight or solve problems by giving money. NPC's actually hide when emissions occur which i really wanted in CS and they now actually compete against you searching for artifacts! Travel guides are now random stalkers in the zone who lead their own packs though it's only possible in Zaton from what i've seen. There are new drugs which you can use to temporarily boost the light RPG mechanics such as endurance and energy recovery which are absolutely necessary to save time while traveling back and forth because the sprinting and weight limit are bad in this game so you'll regularly need food, drinks and these new drugs to keep a nice balance. But the best part of Call of Pripyat are the sidequests, while they are still optional they are so varied and creative that each one of them is actually worth playing and they actually have an impact on the ending. They really made my playthrough so much more fun and memorable than the main story.
Now the game is short, probably 10 hours or less the shortest of the trilogy but that's only if you follow the main quest, the side missions might add many extra hours especially with the open ended sidequests but i just recommend using Google if you're stuck cause it saves you a lot of time. Dynamic music is back but it sucks, i really miss CS combat music so just turn this one off. While SoC has a deep story the narrative has never been this series' strong point. CoP tries to make the story more engaging by having the protaganist report his research during cutscenes but these are incredibly boring and i don't even remember what the guy says half of the time. The graphics aren't bad but definitely a downgrade from CS, character models look better but the weapons don't look as detailed, the enviremonts look very muddy and copy pasted.
The new regions Zaton and Jupiter aren't all that fun nor memorable to explore except when hunting for artifacts. These regions feel somewhat like the swamps from CS but boring. Call of Pripyat in general lacks the atmosphere i really enjoyed in the previous games. Caves, tunnels, labs, factories aren't creepy nor mysterious they're just dark and usually filled with the same mutants and zombies we've already seen a dozen times. Despite being the most polished game there still a couple of bugs and one crash that i've encountered. I couldn't finish this sidequest Shady Business because the engine just won't react to me obtaining two detectors or maybe i was missing something but either way i couldn't finish nor cancel the mission to try again. But the absolute worst flaw in CoP is not being able to draw your weapon in a base because obviously the NPC's are programmed to not attack you while in base but this doens't apply to bandits... And i've actually had bandits appear at the Yanov Station and they instantly lock the doors so either you can't enter or leave the place which means you can't progress the game and have to reload a previous save file losing hours of progress. I have no idea how the developers could've missed this one cause it's actually gamebreaking and almost made me quit playing!
In the end, it's a great game and worthy final chapter of the series.
Shadow of Chernobyl is still the best but Call of Pripyat second!