GSC Game World has recently upped the ante a bit by suggesting through their social media account that your stamina along with energy drink consumption will both be powerfully upgraded with their new update, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, Update 1.7. In very few words, the tweet from GSC summed everything up as they are going to strengthen up and at the same time, pretty much warn, let the shooting turn out to be very difficult, maybe even tremorously hard.
Mainly, it was an effortless way to sum up the whole news: the energy drinks of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2’s 1.7 update will have the buff of a new stamina system and an altered energy drinks consumption debuff that will enable weapons sway to such a degree that firing may become quite impossible due to the “tremor” effect simulated. Players will have to think about their consumption as more strategy will be involved in playing.
Oops, did I say “forced”? That is what the developers are claiming, besides the fact that if you guzzle down a lot of those in-game energy drinks, then your character’s hands will be shaky. While you are trying to get a Bloodsucker, your screen will be shaking as if you had five espressos in a row? Yea, that is a situation that will soon get you accustomed to the quick reload screen and it is rather a fascinating twist of reality, albeit a little bit exaggerated. What about you, have you ever been in such a situation where you could not aim properly because you were jittery from an energy drink? Or some of you maybe have, but I am not quite aware of your case.
A lot of those who commented were pretty opinionated. Players’ first instinct was that of confusion when Henry on the message board shared his feelings about the matter with emojis. The user, @loinmin, simply stated “Tf 😂 over 1 can? How much caffeine is in this shit 😂 remember kids, drink WATER.” This is a legitimate concern indeed. Kids, the water is still the greatest and safest drink. Apparently, the stuff that they are selling in the Zone is super potent. Another user, @BeggarSoldier, stated the obvious, replying “I have never felt like this after drinking an energy drink. A very interesting change.” Thus, it is a gameplay-first mechanic, not necessarily hyper-realistic one.
Still, a lot of the discussion was criticism. A few users asked the reason behind it. @NegligentStdnt asked, pretty directly, the question “По какой такой логике вообще энергетик вызывает эффект ВОДКИ?” which translates as “By what logic does an energy drink cause the effect of VODKA?” And this is a good point, especially since actual vodka is probably an item in the game. It seems weird that a stimulant gives a depressant’s side effect. @NicolasReyoso had a suggestion to “localize the debuff more to the ‘shaky’ side and less to the ‘drunk’ side” which sounds very reasonable indeed. The jitters are different from being out of control drunk.
The comments were not that deeply concerned about the stamina issue, in fact they quickly shifted to other, bigger problems about the game. One of the main points of discourse was the impending withdrawal of the game from Xbox Game Pass. User @acetospades branded it a “kinda a stupid move,” and this opinion is very common among the customers. Another player, @LJ_2020 seemed to be very irate, connecting the energy-drink news to others, writing a lengthy piece about the shadow system and how “Hogwarts legacy has better light and shadow effects.” He concluded with the question “But let’s fix the game and take it off gamepass, yeah great idea.” Thus, it can be said that the community is not simple in its feelings.
Performance issues were mentioned as they always do. @Patierian expressed the wish, “I wish I could get stable 60fps without fsr on my 3080. I run the game on medium with and quality dlss. And it runs not great.” And @FachaKai was even more straightforward, labeling the engine the “garbage Unreal Stuttering Engine”. Thus, while the team is busy bringing new features like unsteady-handed drinking, some of the players just want a smooth overall experience first.
It’s also a little bit amusing that every update brings a set of challenges for the players. Some, @bettertimes2025 are like “Waiting for the patch 2.0 to finally play,” thinking that the current version is an extended early access. Others are saying goodbye to the game with @1900hama sent a touching message about how today was their “last day” with the game, at least for now, and thanking PlayStation
