Stalker 2 is so popular in Ukraine, its launch strangled the whole country's internet for hours

Earlier than launch, Stalker 2 was hotly anticipated. So hotly anticipated, in reality, that we named it our primary most wished recreation—probably the most wished most wished—at our PC Gaming Present: Most Needed of 2023. Did you depend that? That is 4 repetitions of the phrases ‘most wished’ in a single sentence. That is how wished it was.

And but, regardless of how a lot we have been wanting ahead to the sport right here at PCG, our anticipation could not maintain a candle to the hype over in Stalker’s house nation, Ukraine. Ukrainian gamers have been so desirous to play the sport that the sheer quantity of downloading they have been doing on launch day triggered nationwide web issues for hours. Two web suppliers, Tenet and Triolan, confirmed (through ITC) that downloads of Stalker 2 have been accountable for overloading the nation’s community, inflicting sluggish web speeds.

“It was laborious for the entire nation and it is a unhealthy factor as a result of the web is vital,” GSC Sport World inventive director Mariia Gryogorovych instructed Eurogamer, “however on the similar time it is like whoa!”

Grygorovcych, after all, has combined emotions about slowing her homeland’s web to a crawl. The state of Ukraine’s web is little doubt all the way down to Russia’s ongoing invasion of the nation, and consuming up bandwidth at a vital time when Ukrainians are utilizing it for communication and coordination with the surface world should trigger an entire vary of ambivalent feelings for its devs. Nonetheless, it is a signal that their work is much-appreciated.

“For us and our group what’s most vital is, for some folks in Ukraine, they really feel a little bit bit happier than they have been earlier than launch,” stated Grygorovych, “We did one thing for our house nation, one thing good for them.”

And when you ask me, they pulled it off. Yep, Stalker 2 is buggy—though that is getting higher with each patch—and it was even worse after I was enjoying it for our Stalker 2 evaluate, earlier than that day-one patch. However regardless of all that it is simply my recreation of the 12 months: a superb, janky weirdo stuffed with coronary heart, and that completely refused to sacrifice something that makes Stalker what it’s in its transition to UE5—even A-Life, which GSC guarantees is simply busted, not gone.

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