I've been keenly watching the development of the ambitious STALKER title since it was first announced in 2001. Originally, the game was titled as STALKER: Oblivion Lost, but was changed to Shadow of Chernobyl earlier this year.

Early screenshots and concept art for STALKER show Mesoamerican-looking ruins, robots and hovercars. It is possible that the publisher, GSC Gameworld, previously known for titles such as Cossacks, American Conquest and Codename: Outbreak, was still trying to decide what direction to take its powerful new engine called "X-Ray".

Screenshots from the engine have always looked great, but very few people had seen the game running until this year's Game Developer's Conference where I got a gander at the title myself. See the previous article about it. It obviously had a lot of the features that GSC had been bragging about: A day/night cycle, advanced physics, great lighting, etc. Nearly all the engine's eye candy was there, but what I didn't get to experience was the multiplayer aspects of the game.