STALKER 2 has had one of the most troubled development cycles of perhaps any game in history. The game was first announced back in 2010 and as of the time of writing it still hasn’t been released, but not through the fault of the developers. And now GSC Game World has suffered another devastating blow as its studio suffered a fire that has left a substantial amount of damage and it isn’t clear yet whether this will push STALKER 2’s release date back even further.
The fire broke out on September 7 and is said to have destroyed one of the three floors of the studio located in Prague. GSC Game World had previously moved from Ukraine to Prague in 2022 following the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine. Thankfully, no employees were hurt in the incident but it has caused significant structural damage that will reportedly cost 1.5 million crowns (Czech Koruna), approximately $66,000. The other two floors used by the developers were unaffected by the fire, but there are concerns that the fire may have gotten to their servers. This isn’t the first fire to happen at a studio this summer as the Phasmaphobia developers, Kinetic, suffered a fire in August 2023 which caused the console port to be delayed.
A GSC Game World employee who goes by the handle Mol1t confirmed on the studio’s official Discord the incident and the damage that was caused by the fire.
“It is true. Fortunately, none of the employees or office staff were injured in the accident.
A fire broke out in our office in Prague on Thursday. Even though the fire was successfully put out, one of the office floors now requires a full restoration. Further details of the accident are still being investigated.
We express our deepest appreciation for your questions and the words of support we have been receiving.
No anomaly, not even a “Burner”, will make us stop in our pursuit of our final goal. We’ve dealt with worse than that before. This is fine.”
STALKER 2 has been in development hell for over a decade now and through no fault of the developers, they just really can’t catch a break. The game was originally due to be released in 2012 before GSC Game World laid off 75% of its staff, eventually leading to the company being dissolved in 2011. A spiritual successor to STALKER began development following a successful Kickstarter campaign by West Games, a studio founded by former GSC Game World employees, but the campaign was shut down citing guideline violations.
GSC Game World would be brought back to life in 2014 to develop Cossacks 3 before officially announcing work on STALKER 2 had begun in 2018. Development of the game was kept under wraps until E3 2021 when the first new trailer for the game was revealed and a release date of April 28, 2022, was announced. Unfortunately, due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, the game was delayed despite developers continuing to work during the invasion. The studio suffered more setbacks after enduring cyberattacks for the next year as well as hackers leaking a test build of the game in June 2023.
STALKER 2 is currently scheduled to be released in Q1 2024 but there is no announcement yet as to whether the fire will delay things further.
