Get out of here, S.T.A.L.K.E.R! (RIP GSC Gameworld?)

[Maniacal]

GSC Gameworld, the Ukranian developer of the Cossacks, American Conquest and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series was apparently shut down today by the owner. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 is canceled and the studio is closing (probably for good). A 1C (major East European publisher) employee who formerly worked at GSC Gameworld announced the closure on his blog and twitter, and there has been no official reply from GSC Gameworld except a tweet denying the closure which was soon taken down.

LATEST UPDATE: 1c Ukraine’s Sergey Galenkin has blogged about the closure of GSC. He states: “GSC is closed, a fact confirmed by all. The team is almost completely dissolved, the state has only a few people.” Galenkin blames the cost of developing a PC only shooter for a European audience, and a failed console publishing deal, for the collapse of the developer.

The rest of the story, as it happened, below.

FOURTH UPDATE: GSC’s social media manager announces he is looking for a new job here.

THIRD UPDATE: GSC have got back to me with “Sorry, no comments at this point.” That does not sound promising.

SECOND UPDATE: The denial tweet has now been deleted. Hmm. Still trying to get confirmation on this, but it’s looking like GSC is down. Dmitri Bourkovski (apparently not a GSC employee) has just tweeted “Not PR. GSC closed.”

FIRST UPDATE: GSC deny the report on their twitter here. We’ve contacted them for a comment.

ORIGINAL: According to this report from Ukrainian news site UkraNews, GSC has been shut down by owner Sergei Grigorovich. The closure was apparently announced to the workforce earlier today. The autotranslation is messy, so if anyone can explain the sixth paragraph – which tries to speculate on what was going on – accurately, that would be great.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/12/09/wuh-oh-gsc-stalker-2-dead/#more-85429

This is sad news, although GSC Gameworld had announced they would be requiring S2 to require you to always be online in order to play (and have parts of the game streamed to you from their servers) so perhaps it was inevitable.

RIP S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

Some leaked concept art of S2:

Spoiler :

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[mechaerik]

It would be called S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 even though it would've been the fourth game?

 

[Maniacal]

Shadow of Chernobyl involves you searching for Strelok, Clear Sky is a prequel to SoC where you are a merc hunting down Strelok, and Call of Pripyat takes place after SoC where you are sent in by the military to investigate missing helicopters and they are kind of a trilogy. STALKER 2 was going to take place sometime later and not be directly related.

 

[mechaerik]

So S.T.A.L.K.E.R 2 wouldn't have been related to the previous ones? That just makes it even more confusing!

 

[Maniacal]

No, it just would have started a new storyline.

 

[Rulle_Kebab]

Sad. I enjoyed the Stalker series. Got me to read the book, Roadside Picnic I think it was called and I went out and see the movie.
Well I still have Stalker: shadow of chernobyl with a mod called Complete installed I see now, hehe.

 

[Adam7Eight]

Well, that sucks. I quite liked the STALKER games.

 

[mechaerik]

In all seriousness, I've only played Shadow of Chernobyl, but I rather enjoyed it.

 

[Maniacal]

RPS has a short but very interesting article about what made the series so great.

 

[Maniacal]

It turns out that GSC Gameworld is not closing down, yet, although it may still do so.

http://twitter.com/gscstalker

gscstalker S.T.A.L.K.E.R.
Our website will continue, with the forum & tech support. The shop will continue until the nearest planned items sell out. (uploaded now)
6 hours ago

gscstalker S.T.A.L.K.E.R.
We will do our best to continue. However, at this moment, nothing is certain.
7 hours ago

 

[Maniacal]

http://twitter.com/#!/gscstalker/status/150324514121719808

They are still working on the game, so it isn't cancelled yet.

 

[Ruler]

I played one Stalker game and honestly liked it.

 

[scheva007]

I really like dthe first one. the second one was good. i could never get into the third. Its a shame though

 

[Rub'Rum]

Aaaaand now it sort of dies again (at least for a very long time)... To be replaced by a MMOFPS of some sort. Still set in post-apoc at least. http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/04/25/stalker-2-dead-again-but-now-theres-survarium/

 

[Maniacal]

Dammit all to hell. That's one less game on my too look forward to list. According to the English translation of this page Bethesda has purchased the rights, I think that might be even worse than just letting the IP die. I can't see Bethesda doing a good job of making a S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game.

EDIT: That page is apparently false.

 

[Mosher]

Well, there is always STALKER Soup to play if you get bored whilst waiting