During the summer, Ukraine’s victories winning Olympic gold medals in Paris made me think about the country’s resilience in the face of overwhelming odds. And just as you can see this strong drive among the athletes in sports, you can also see the spirit of resistance in the games that Ukraine is making.
I just watched War Game: The Making of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, the Xbox documentary about the best-known Ukraine game company, GSC Game World, as it struggled to finish Stalker 2: The Heart of Chornobyl, a triple-A game that has been in development in various forms for a decade. The team’s resilience in the face of war and other obstacles showed through in the emotional film, which is a kind of microcosm for the toil thousands of people working in games in Ukraine or in the Ukrainian diaspora — under the shadow of war where all of the odds are against them.
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GSC Game World has been working on Stalker 2 for years, running into trouble through delays, cost issues, the pandemic and restarts. Then, in February 2022, the game was derailed again after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I saw the game in a behind-closed-doors demo for the press during Gamescom 2023, the big trade show in Germany. And this year, the game got its day in the limelight during Microsoft’s biggest showcase for games in a long time during the Summer Game Fest in Los Angeles.
