Hello Stalkers!
There are many factors that make someone a skilled gamer. For example, such a person can quickly adapt to a gradually increasing level of difficulty. You know what it looks like: first we are dealing with a summer walk. The closer to the end, the more obstacles, dangers, and things that can potentially cut our heads off.
What if we suddenly change the rules of the game? No gradual increase in difficulty - instead, the screw is bolted to the limit right from the start. “Insane” mode - the game's highest difficulty - was mentioned on the launch day of the Mega Patch and occasionally in some reports. But we never fully said what to expect from it. The time has finally come to show everyone how far away it is from a summer walk.
Base
Small, but significant differences can be noticed at the very beginning of the game, when choosing a mission. First, the background - it is clear that on the lowest difficulty level, there is peace and quiet outside the base window, while in the "Insane" mode, NAR troops are on high alert from the very beginning. This means that our first exit from the base will be very painful. But more on that in a moment.
When choosing a mission, it is also worth paying attention to what chances our companions have to complete them. Here's a little secret: on the lowest difficulty level, we increased the chances of successfully completing a mission for all characters by 20%. The higher the difficulty level, the lower the modifier. As you can imagine, it is -20% on the highest difficulty level. It is therefore necessary to arm your companions well and... pray for success. Because in case of failure, the punishment is extremely severe.
If the mission fails, our comrades' morale and health diminish - plain and simple rule. On the "Very Easy" level, the drops are small, while in "Insane" it hits our teammates four times as hard.
The fact that the influence of negative modifiers in the base (comfort, air quality, radiation, number of beds) has also increased dramatically doesn’t help. In other words, if we don’t prepare ourselves well for the trip to the zone, and we don’t properly take care of our base, then our team will start to drop like flies even after the first night!
Survival
Remember when you went to one of the levels, used PDAs and there was a lot of items and resources to collect around? Well, you can forget about it. In the highest mode we reduced the number of resources to just a quarter of what could be found on the easiest dificulty. So you will be tediously running through bushes and dingy corridors in search of all the things that will help your teammates (see paragraph above) and yourself to survive.
The radiation zone does not help in the search, as it covers up to 50% of the entire level instead of 10%. And, of course, there is a Black Stalker circulating here and there - we have halved the time of the Chernobylite storm announcing the arrival of a man in a mask. Time pressure and claustrophobia. What else may be missing? Well, there is one such thing.
Fight
As we mentioned, getting out of the base will be painful during the first mission. All levels are bristling with patrolling NAR soldiers. And that, in addition, with the top shelf ones. So, don’t be surprised if, while walking through the forest in Kopachi, you come across not two, but six Heavy Armored Soldiers at once. Then the real shambles begin.
If this is too chaotic, you can see on the gifs below what the fight with one soldier looks like and what is the difference between them.
Of course, you can try to avoid them, sneak up on them. But not only are they stronger, faster (also when it comes to aiming and firing a weapon), but they can also see us from a considerable distance. Probably the best tactic is to avoid a group of soldiers with a veeery wide berth and pray that they will not notice us.
Also, the monsters have been upgraded. Larger creatures attack faster and teleport much closer to the player. Duster, on the other hand, spits acid out 50% faster - there's no chance of dodging the projectile, unless you're bloody lucky. Oh, and don't count on additional loot after defeating your opponents - there may be even less of those.
There is nothing else for us to do but say: have fun!
That's it for today!
Take care, Stalkers!