S.T.A.L.K.E.R. The Board Game Review
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. finally has a board game, and it’s absolutely killer.
One of the real achievements of tabletop crowdfunding has been the freedom to experiment with ambitious ideas. Instead of needing to target a mainstream audience with wider appeal, video-game-to-board game adaptations have been able to aim at more niche audiences whose hobby identity overlaps between both mediums. This has allowed a game like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. The Board Game to thrive, offering a full-blown analog experience that is enormously rich and full of life, just as the original franchise fully deserves.
This is a complex and expensive game chock-full of content. In it, up to four players take on the role of STALKERs, cooperating to achieve mission objectives such as rescuing a prisoner, retrieving an artifact, or hunting a massive beast in the irradiated environs of Chernobyl. Setting up the tiles, tokens, overlays, and cards can take a solid 20 minutes. Sneaking or fighting your way through the zone while handling all of the necessary aspects of play is another two or three hours. These estimates are for players who are familiar with the game and its rules as your first session is likely to stretch even longer. This experience is the inverse of the recent Mass Effect board game, instead seeking to offer an entire world to immerse yourself in at the cost of accessibility. Fortunately, all of this effort is absolutely worth it, for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. is a marvelous experience on the tabletop.
The default mode of play is a story-focused campaign that lasts three scenarios. This is a more modest and reasonable commitment than popular campaign board games such as Gloomhaven or Divinity: Original Sin the Board Game. Crucially, it means players are far more likely to actually finish the game.
It plays like a mashup of a traditional dungeon crawler with adventure game aspects. Each player controls a different STALKER outfitted with a variety of firearms, armor, and supplemental items. You then take turns performing one of several actions, including the expected moving and shooting, but also more unusual options like tossing bolts to distract enemies or interacting with terrain elements on the map.
The environment is dynamic and unpredictable. This is a key quality of the game, as it seeks to capture the danger and mystique of the Zone. You accumulate radiation moving through certain areas, hopefully possessing some kind of suit to offer protection. You also manipulate objects depending on the scenario and your goals. This may mean you have to locate a hidden trapdoor and pry it open, or choose between climbing a shaky ladder and descending into a drainpipe to enter a ruined building cut off from your approach. Often these environmental challenges are displayed on cards that are laid atop the map tiles. After spending an action to trigger or interact with their features, you flip the card over and reveal the outcome. There’s a strong sense of the unknown, particularly on your first playthrough of each scenario.
This core element of mystery is most strongly conveyed through anomalies. These swirling elemental entities are a significant detail of the video game’s setting, and they’re fundamental in establishing the character and personality of the post-apocalyptic surroundings. The board game adaptation of these oddities is spectacular. They’re represented by a standee and sit atop a translucent template on the board. The template contains various symbols spread across multiple map spaces, establishing a tense threat for any who would approach. 
Any figure that enters such a space must roll a die. If the symbol rolled matches one in the current space, it triggers the anomaly’s reaction. The effects depend on the specific type of anomaly, but often this means substantial damage with occasional detrimental status afflictions. To successfully navigate the area of threat, STALKERs must toss bolts to cover the face-up symbols and find a safe path through the chaos. This system is fantastic, as it captures the tone and atmosphere of the source material in a way that's not overly cumbersome. It also uses a unique set of components that is unusual in the board game space, which adds an esoteric quality and emphasizes its alien nature.
The enemy AI is also well implemented. After all of the STALKERs have activated, a card is flipped and a menu of actions is performed. Different enemy types, such as mutants and humans, behave somewhat differently, and they also take into consideration whether the protagonists were overly loud or acted with stealth. Players running and gunning like lunatics draw more attention and receive a higher degree of aggressive response. This system provides strong incentives to conduct stealthy operations, and the tools afforded as well as the construction of the scenarios themselves make this a satisfying strategic approach. Much like the anomalies and environment facets, the intersection of enemy behavior and player conduct is a well considered system that is surprisingly satisfying.
The story-focused campaign is interesting, with its own quirks worth exploring, but its lifespan is limited. The narrative offers two branches of missions you can embark on, which means you can replay the game to pursue the pathway you neglected. Each playthrough consists of only a few missions, but you may even find some joy in replaying scenarios you’ve already bested. Some terrain elements are randomized, and most scenarios offer multiple viable solutions to accomplishing the objective.
The campaign also offers some neat between-mission diversions. You can visit scavenger camps, interact with armorers, and unearth forgotten stashes. This is handled through an overland map of the nearby area, with newly discovered location nodes applied to the map via sticker. Two blank maps are included in the game as a fresh sheet is needed for each campaign you embark upon. These small location visits are executed fairly well, as they bring in a more macro view of the setting and help add context to the more zoomed-in missions.
If that’s all S.T.A.L.K.E.R. The Board Game was, it would still be a solid entry into the tabletop gaming space. Fortunately, there's more: the single best feature in this box is the Zone Survival module. This is a full-fledged scenario generator that combines several randomized components to create a unique procedurally crafted mission. The event deck is constructed from a random allotment of cards, and your objective is either randomized or chosen from a list. You select the map from one of 10 layouts, and various environmental details are created through card draw.
This system is bonkers. Nearly half the cards and tokens in the game are dedicated to this fully developed and robust system. The story-driven campaign could have been removed wholesale, and this mode alone would have established S.T.A.L.K.E.R. as one of the year’s best board games. Yes, the setup here is even more finicky and detailed, but the ensuing one-off scenario is full of surprises and drama. The degree of variability here is wild, and the game looks to support near endless play.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. The Board Game is a complete and hefty package, but it’s also one with an enormous amount of future potential. The core game comes with miniatures for the STALKERs, and cardboard standees for all foes and anomalies. Optional miniatures sets can be purchased, alongside several content expansions that add more detailed personal narratives to the characters, factions to interact with, and new narrative campaigns to embark upon. The commitment by the publisher is staggering, and this game looks to have long legs.
