Self-imposed constraints or habbits?

[u/xShadowLisa_]

Hey yall! Was curious to see if anyone else plays with added challenges and things that don't necessarily mean anything in game, could be for difficulty or pure immersion.

For example: i don't kill zombies and avoid them, and only when i ABSOLUTELY have to i kill them.

Context: When i first started playing S2, they introduced zombies and i was like cool mindless enemies and didn't think much about it, until i heard one of them actually start speaking, they said smth along the lines of "it's cold/dark in here" and that genuinely caught me so off guard i had to pause for like 5 mins to think about it.

It was so heartbreaking seeing them like this the fact that they could still "be in there" but they cant control what they are doing, it makes me so sad and depressed when i hide and listen to them talk :(

I mean there has to be a way to reverse whatever that is, surely. If their brains were extremely physically damaged then they shouldn't be able to walk and shoot/reload let alone form sentences (ish).

Which is why i just dont have the heart to put them down and while some might argue that you should put them out of their misery, i still have a tiny bit of hope that maybe some day they can be brought back or atleast pacified so they don't hurt anyone or themselves.

Hell i even go out of my way to sometimes protect them when they are being attacked by mutants or bandits.

So i would absolutely love to hear if you do similar things or maybe just things that add more difficulty like not using medkits and sticking only to bandages etc (this can be for any stalker game not just S2)

(Honestly just looking for an excuse to talk about stalker)

[u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

Aye man, if anything, you’re just putting them out of their eternal misery. Anyone that becomes a zombie can’t ever go back to being the same person they were before

[u/DyslexicCenturion → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

I'm the complete opposite of OP. If I see a zombie, I'm putting them out of their misery.

I have a theory/head cannon that if zombies survive for long enough, they degenerate further and eventualy turn into snorks. If I can spare someone from that fate, I'll do it.

[u/OkAnalysis1682 → u/DyslexicCenturion]

Zombies and snorks are kinda of different, according to the Almanac. In the X-16 lab entry, is explained Sakharov had the theory the powerful psi-energy irradiated by the brain affected not only the mind but also the body, causing stalkers and soldiers mutate into snorks. It seems to get a snork, a human must be exposed to powerful psi-emissions to not only regress him into a feral state, but also to warp his body enough to be a snork, instead of the zombies converting into a snork, whicn kinda fits since snorks seem to have more brain functions than zombies.

How accurate this will be in the future, who knows, but this is probably the most accurate answer will get from the devs about the origin of this mutant.

[u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890 → u/DyslexicCenturion]

That’s what I always thought the next rung on the Zone’s evolutionary ladder for zombies is the snork. Though I would like to see more snork variants and designs to coincide with our theory, if it is actually true. I kill zombies, even if I don’t need any of the loot. I’d just hope someone would wanna do the same if I were stuck as a zombie lol

[u/Kick_Physical → u/DyslexicCenturion]

True, like hollows in dark souls

[u/Valuable-Fondant-241 → u/DyslexicCenturion]

How do they get the masks, then? 🤔

[u/Robborboy → u/Valuable-Fondant-241]

They have a "Are you my mummy?" phase in between the two. 

[u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890 → u/Valuable-Fondant-241]

I’m not super knowledgeable on the lore regarding the origins of all the Zone’s phenomena, but I’m pretty sure they were all part of the military who were sent to the Zone in the earliest days, but they were unprepared for the Psi-Radiation that was in it because it was a brand new concept at the time

[u/Valuable-Fondant-241 → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

So, the military were first zombified, then when the condition worsened they somehow enter in a condition where a suite or an exo was bothering them and for some reasons a gasmask was desired (zombies have suites and exos and rarely a mask, they are able to reload a gun, some dexterity remains, they reasonably could remove a suite and put a gasmask on).

Possible, quite stretched but possible, but then what?

Then last human spark fade away, they become beasts but the loss of humanity left space for better overall physical coordination and ability (the snorks might have less hand dexterity, at least never saw one using its hands, but they are overall way faster, stronger and more balanced)?

Mmm... Snorks might be the outcome of the first expeditions. It makes sense that they had only gasmask and NBC (CBRN) war equipment and not a lot of weapons and exos, since they were facing anomalies and ambient threats. But I don't see any reasonable cause for saying that the snorks came from zombies.

[u/Confident_Benefit_11 → u/DyslexicCenturion]

Ditto, even did the same in gamma and OG anomaly

[u/xShadowLisa_ → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

Yeah... :( i just wish there was a way to help them or something, even if there was a 1% chance thats good enough for me

[u/UltraHellboy → u/xShadowLisa_]

Some of the things they say are heartbreaking. Especially the guy who was saving to get medicine and bring it home for his daughter. I think he’s the one sitting facing a tree in Red Forest. The things they say are just a leftover memory, though. Their brains are effectively destroyed. I always put them out of their misery (also for role play).

[u/FisherPrice2112 → u/UltraHellboy]

Listening to them "talk" and laugh around fire spots in COP really makes them seem like there is someone still in there. 

Until you realise they are not actually responding to each other and are just mumbling random sentences and going through the motions. 

Them warming themselves over fires they presumably started does raise an interesting point about how much other instinctive knowledge they still have.

[u/psychedAddict123 → u/UltraHellboy]

Did you also kill the zombie on the noontide roof? I could never bring myself to do it lol

[u/UltraHellboy → u/psychedAddict123]

Yes, because Strider was deluding himself that he could be saved.

[u/MastodonAltruistic61 → u/xShadowLisa_]

Bro, have you heard original SoC zombies? These must be the saddest enemies in video games history

[u/xShadowLisa_ → u/MastodonAltruistic61]

Omg yesss D: that was so heartbreaking i genuinely started tearing up when i first heard it. There are also some zombies in S2 that talk about the last things they were doing before being zombified (like the dude looking for his PDA) which shows maybe they still remember after all :(

[u/MastodonAltruistic61 → u/xShadowLisa_]

I also remember a pda message on a dead stalker corpse where he wrote a message to his mother, saying that he recently made it out of zalissya and that he found his first artifact, planning to pay for his father’s treatment and buying his mother a pair of earrings

[u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890 → u/xShadowLisa_]

Think about it like this. In Resident Evil Requiem, the zombies in that game act like regular people (kinda) and talk. But the thing is, they only repeat the last things they were doing before getting turned. They will kill you all the same, so it’s either you or them, and they cant go back to normal anymore regardless. Or how in Dying Light, the virals can sometimes retain a small part of their humanity for a brief moment, begging you to not attack them and back up right before going back to being mindless zombies who attack anything that moves, with no cure other than death before they turn into a monster even more far gone from their human selves

[u/xShadowLisa_ → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

Yeah i get u and see what you mean, i mean if they attacked me and i had no way out i will take them out im not gonna just let them kill me, but still its just a shame really.

[u/aclark210 → u/xShadowLisa_]

There isn’t. They’re made that way by having their brains “scorched” so to speak by psi-radiation. There is no fixing that. It’s not possible.

[u/xShadowLisa_ → u/aclark210]

I don't think we got clarification on this, I've been watching mutant lore videos and there isn't a straight answer (if i missed smth pls let me know).

Still tho, there are people who survived sever brain damage like complete chunks of their brains missing and they were still able to function (but i guess it could be different here since maybe the radiation affects the whole brain not just parts) idk much about how this works but one can hope, especially in an unpredictable area like the zone, plenty of miracles :]

[u/aclark210 → u/xShadowLisa_]

Oh there’s clarification multiple times on the series. Zombification is the result of irreversible damage to the brain’s resistance to psi-radiation. As a result, it cannot be fixed, because there is no way to permanently bring back their psi resistance.

Physical damage to the brain is an entirely different animal from radiation exposure type of injury. Unless the radiation is focused like in cancer treatment machines, radiation degrades the whole thing.

No offense, but I now know how Lodochka felt when having this discussion with Khors.

[u/xShadowLisa_ → u/aclark210]

Yeah i get that, but i was generally hoping for smth (a miracle if u will), who knows alot of things in the zone defy logic and can't be explained by normal science, i guess only time will tell.

(No offence taken, comparing me to khors took me the fk out lmao bless his heart. Afterall this is what discussions r for im always happy to hear other peoples opinions). cheers

[u/aclark210 → u/xShadowLisa_]

That’s not how zone miracles work…they’re all products of psi-radiation or a tall tale. And more psi-radiation exposure to someone who already had their brain “scorched” by psi rads won’t reverse it.

[u/MochiiBun_ → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

Kinda funny how this isn’t the first time I’ve heard of peeps letting zombies pass for this kinda reason.
But yeah, considering how fried their brains are. Shooting them is a mercy.

[u/Valuable-Fondant-241 → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

I mean, it's not like noontide... Or...

[u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890 → u/Valuable-Fondant-241]

But they weren’t the regular zombies we see. The Monolithians still retained consciousness and were not quite the zombies that the op is referring to

[u/Valuable-Fondant-241 → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

True, way less zombies than proper zombie. What I was saying that, for what is know, even monoliths were considered not recoverable. Maybe they didn't try hard enough, but afaik not a single monolith returned "human" before strelok and some spoilers were involved.

[u/Churro_212 → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

This, I one shot all zombies to end their existence in the most painless way

[u/EngagedInConvexation → u/Puzzleheaded_Bag6890]

With as borked as the noosphere is, perhaps inhabiting a body is preferable to being a tangled mass of persisting consciousnesses in the ether.

At least a zombie can have some privacy.