S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl was released to PC in November 2024 and is based on Unreal Engine 5. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl features UE5’s Lumen and Nanite. Lumen is used for direct and indirect global illumination, realistic reflections and a detailed environment. Nanite is used for complex geometry and detailed terrain with high-quality props. High-poly models are also used, along with physically based materials. There are post-processing effects, including volumetric smoke and fog. The game supports NVIDIA DLSS, AMD FSR 3, and Intel XeSS as well as TAA. We will be using the game’s built-in graphics preset options and adjust Upscaling where needed. We perform a manual run-through in the open world of the Lesser Zone, in an outdoor environment in the daytime in a GPU-oriented run-through.
Stalker 2 is a demanding game at the highest quality setting, but here we are running at 1080p on the “Epic” quality setting with a native resolution, and the XFX Swift Radeon RX 9060 XT OC Gaming Edition 8GB just barely is near 60FPS. This, like Mafia, is better played with FSR Upscaling enabled on the XFX Swift Radeon RX 9060 XT OC Gaming Edition 8GB at 1080p Epic quality settings. Alternatively, lowering the in-game settings at 1080p will be preferred for native resolution gameplay. The XFX Swift Radeon RX 9060 XT OC Gaming Edition 8GB is 18% slower than the GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 8GB, which has a big leg up on performance. Overclocking the XFX Swift Radeon RX 9060 XT OC Gaming Edition 8GB improves performance by 6%.