Stalker 2: Cost of Hope DLC review - The Zone beckons us ever deeper

Stalker 2: Cost of Hope restores the Zone to how us old-heads once knew it, with Duty and Freedom duking it out, and the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant open for visitors – what’s more, the 2.0 update, free for all players, is a huge leap forward from developers GSC Game World.

The new Iron Forest location is stunning, with its architecture becoming more twisted and otherworldly the closer you get to the Chornobyl NPP, a location sorely missed when Stalker 2 first launched.

Running between substations and electrical arrays as Snorks hunt you down is as exhilarating as ever, and lurking beneath the surface are some seriously spooky labs for ol’ Skif to rifle through.

As a Stalker who was there in 2007, it was a moving experience to look out on the Chornobyl NPP from across the water, like a siren in a radioactive sea beckoning me forth. Perhaps the Brain Scorcher turned me to Monolith all those years ago without realising…

Brainwashing or not, once the opening chapters of Cost of Hope are completed and the D4 treaty is in tatters, you will be able to continue after progressing through the main plot, if you haven’t already.

Central to Cost of Hope are Zulu and Mavka, a high-ranking Duty member and the Freedom-controlled Rostok arena announcer, respectively. Series veterans will know Zulu from Stalker: Call of Pripyat, who had a run-in with Major Degtyarev over his secret mission.

Much like the original release, what shines in Cost of Hope are the brilliant performances and cutscenes. One particular standout is the breakdown of the D4 treaty, featuring Duty and Freedom leaders General Voronin and Myklukha.

The two face each other in the Iron Forest after a squad of Freedom’s men are wiped out; fingers are pointed, rain pouring down. "That's the end of D4.", Veronin grunts through gritted teeth. A petty squabble between two old enemies seals the fates of countless inhabitants of the Zone. Though unlike their foot soldiers, Voronin and Myklukha can simply walk away from one another.

I’m not usually a fan of having control taken away from the player in first-person shooters, but GSC Game World are able to put on such cinema that it’s an absolute treat to watch unfold. The enormity of these moments is always so perfectly delivered, and there are few games that can compete.

A word of advice for those keen to try out the new DLC is to wait until you’ve got some good gear, as it can be brutally difficult for newcomers.

Concurrent with Cost of Hope is the huge 2.0 update, which goes a long way to improve the game. The engine has been upgraded to Unreal Engine 5.5.4, which brings a litany of performance improvements, as well as making the game look more coherent with better lighting indoors and outdoors.

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A-Life has also been updated, though it is still fairly easy to cheese certain enemies.

Sadly, anomalies with the game itself are still afoot. Perhaps the most egregious example is certain mutant attacks, especially those from leaping enemies such as Snorks, which are still a pain in my experience, with them able to cause damage from further away than seems reasonable.

One new mutant, the Amok, is genuinely just dreadful to deal with. Somehow, with its powerfirst-esq attacks, they are able to reach you from a significant distance, almost as if its punching and kicking attacks have an area of effect like a Pseudogiant stomp.

In your first encounter with one, there are columns in the room that I assumed I could put between myself and the Amok and try to get a shot at its weak spot. This worked, sort of, but the Amok was still able to damage me with punching attacks through the columns, or when I had already gotten out of its way.

It’s a real shame, but nevertheless, I persisted in spite of the horrors, because the rest of what’s on offer in Cost of Hope is so stellar and well worth picking up.

The difficult question is, if you haven’t already played Stalker 2, should you jump in now?

With another future DLC in the works and presumably further engine improvements to come, it’s tempting to just wait until then, but really, there is already so much on offer between the base game, Cost of Hope and the 2.0 update that you will no doubt have an incredible (and gratifyingly punishing) time, especially now that we can return to the Chornobyl NPP and retrace Strelok’s steps.

Stalker 2: Cost of Hope is available to purchase on 20 August.

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