Proto:S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky/Build 3120

This is a sub-page of Proto:S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky.

To do: Upload Hospital voice lines for comparison. The main menu states that the patch is based on SoC 1.0004, but Build 3116 (SOC 1.0004) was created on Aug 15 and Build 3120 — on Aug 19. Since the developers could not do it all in just a few days, better clarification and comparison for the base patch is required/needed. Compare the game with SoC resources and check what's been changed in scripts. Upload fixes for more stable work.

Build 3120 is a raw pre-alpha version of the game, featuring just one location and a few quests. It is known as an E3 demo, however, the build date (August, 19th) states that it's a post-E3 build, likely intended for the Leipzig game convention.

It was leaked accidentally a few months before the release by someone called Rex finding a strange .zip package on the UkrGame.net website. The package had a password on it, however, he could still view the contents. The next day the website deleted that package to prevent the leak, but a lot of people had already downloaded and reuploaded it. The same day someone called FreeBagS bruteforced the password.

Technically, it's something right between SoC and CS. It's got most of the original game's content removed and the new stuff not fully added yet. The atmosphere in the demo resembles SoC, as it is much darker than in the release version.

Build 3120	Final

Overview

General

There's only one location in the build, The Great Swamps, which is less than half done. In comparison to the 28 smart terrains (sublocations between which the NPCs can move) that you see in the final game, this build only has 10 - fishing hamlet, watch tower, old church, trailhead, burnt farmstead, boat bivouac, pump station, gravel pit, forked paths and bald island. In areas outside of where the demonstational plot leads you, one may find no buildings, no decorations, no reeds, nor even water.

Dialogues

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: Why does the smart terrain dialogue not work?

The demo already has some early drafts of the release version dialogues, but all of them have hardcoded Russian text instead of having it change according to the language preference (localization files). The only example of such dialogue is a random task from squad leaders, which is often considered a developer's joke due to how silly it sounds. The dialogue is scripted to check whether there is an enemy-captured sublocation nearby and to reply accordingly. Once the player orders to attack, they should receive a task message, but it never happens in this build.

Original:	Translated:
— Что я могу сделать для победы? — Захватить смарттеррейн! — В атаку. — Ничего!	— What can I do for victory? — Capture a smart terrain! — Attack! — Nothing.

However, apart from that, deep in the game's files, there are two other similar dialogues - taking a reward and taking a quest from the faction itself, which are not present in the release version.

The reward dialogue is pretty similar to the one you see in the final game. The game checks if you have any reward due and hands it out if you do.

Original:	Translated:
— Мне что нибудь причитается? — Ничего! — Держи!	— Am I owed something? — Nothing! — Here!

The faction dialogue offers you up to five different quests.

Original:	Translated:
— Что я могу сделать для вас? — Ничего! — Вот что я могу тебе предложить: — Беру задание 1 — Беру задание 2 — Беру задание 3 — Беру задание 4 — Беру задание 5	— What can I do for you? — Nothing! — Here's what I can offer: — I take task 1 — I take task 2 — I take task 3 — I take task 4 — I take task 5

The Demo's Plot

After launching the .bat file, instead of the CGI intro, three consecutive slides (which are in the final game but unused) are shown when a very early prototype of the Limansk theme is played in the background.

You start in the place where Ivan Trodnik sends you after joining Clear Sky in the release version of the game. Crossing the bridge gives you an ability to see these same fleshes, however, as soon as you get further away, a military helicopter appears. While it is hovering around, you may hear the conversation between the pilot and his HQ, when the pilot receives an order to attack you. Even though it is possible to damage the helicopter, the only way to actually get away is by hiding in the reeds. Then the pilot loses sight of you and flies away.

When you approach the fishing hamlet, you get a mayday signal — the place turns out to be under attack. There is a commander staying here (early Lebedev prototype), you'll see him as the only one not participating in the fight, but you won't be able to talk just yet — he's going to ask you to help fight back against the bandits. If you help the CS squad win the battle, you might talk to the commander and he will tell you that bandits have established control over marshes, cutting off Clear Sky from the rest of the Zone. To start establishing the control of the situation, you need to fight over the watchtower, and that a squad is already heading there.

Once sneaked up to the tower, the squad awaits your signal. When you initiate the attack, the squad leaves the smart covers and begins capturing the point. As soon as it is captured, you get a message that bandits might try to counterattack, and after a while you hear that they've been spotted advancing from the ruined church. The best way to deal with them is to get up on the tower and grab the SVDm-2 lying up there. It may help you eliminate the enemy before they get too close.

The commander congratulates you on the victory and says that the last point that has to be captured is the anomalous slime pumping factory which turns out to be the Pump station. But the squad needs to get the road cleared out before they can advance further, and there is a bunch of boars blocking their way. You need to kill them so that Clear Sky can get through. Then the last task is to kill the bandits and capture the station.

Graphical Differences

Even though CS-2 is missing in this build, CS-1 and CS-3a have designs that are different from those in the final version.

Build 3120	Final

Build 3120	Final

(Source: STRELOK1)

Sound Differences

A lot of sounds that were recorded specifically for shows and conventions were later rerecorded. Enjoy!

Music

Limansk's theme found in the game's files is very different from the final version, being something inbetween unused marsh_1 (present both in 3120 and release files) and release Limansk:

marsh_1	Limansk (Build 3120)	Limansk (Final)

(Source: Amsel)

Dialogues

A-Life

Build 3120 has the first set of A-Life related phrases — the ones squad leaders usually use when giving out orders. There is a very limited set of these phrases which were recorded only for Clear Sky (even though technically they belong to loners, there are no loners in this build, and the wording is very similar to the release CS phrases). The technical names are slightly different (begin instead of attack_begin, far instead of prepare_attack, near instead of wait_signal, sos instead of wait_help, arrive instead of actor_come, defended instead of end_defence and captured instead of smart_captured) but in terms of wording and context they are very similar to the release ones.

Interestingly enough, while the release phrases all have both clear voice and PDA versions, which are used depending on how far the player is from the speaker, in this build the voice files are usually just either. The phrases for beginning the attack and various movement orders are played in clear, undistorted voices, while the rest are the distorted PDA messages.

Beginning the attack:

Build 3120	Final
Squad, move out!	Squad, move out!
Get yourself ready!	The enemy never sleeps. Get ready!
Squad, follow me!	Squad, follow me!

Preparing the attack:

Build 3120	Final
Attacking on signal only.	Attack on my signal!
No attacking without signal.	Don't attack without my command!
Fire on signal only.	Shoot only on my command!

Waiting for player's signal:

Build 3120	Final
Excellent! We go attacking on mercenary's signal.	Merc! We're ready to join the action on your command.
Stand by! Mercenary, we're waiting your action.	Merc! We'll attack on your signal!
We start straight up to the mercenary.	Don't attack without my command!

Commands on movement type:

Build 3120	Final
Stick together!	Stick together!
Run!	Run!
Silence!	Silence!

Asking player for help:

Build 3120	Final
Everybody hearing us? We're under attack! Help!	Quick! We're getting slaughtered here!
Anybody around? Help us to fight back!	We can't hold them much longer! Hurry! Help us!
Mayday! We're under attack. Assistance needed!	Damn you! Where on earth are you!?

Thanking player for responding for SOS signal:

Build 3120	Final
Thanks for coming to our call. We'll kick their asses now!	That's it. Now we'll teach them a lesson.
Thanks for coming to help, stalker.	Nice of you to come! They ain't gonna get a warm welcome now.
—	Thanks for coming to our help. Let's show them who's boss!

Sighing after successful defence:

Build 3120	Final
Attack repelled!	We barely held them off!
Enemy eliminated!	Man, that was some fine defensive action!
Point secured!	Another attack repelled!

Reporting after successful attack:

Build 3120	Final
Center! We captured the point!	Base! We've captured the target location!
Enemy base captured!	Position captured. Over!
That's it! We got the base!	Base! We've dislodged the enemy.

(Source: Original TCRF research)

Storyline-Related

The build has phrases for Hospital, Generators and Great Swamps. All but Generators have test English voice acting, very different from the release version.

Despite the helicopter scene being cut from the final version, the VA was changed drastically.

Great Swamps — Helicopter Lines:

Build 3120	Final
Base, it's zero-one-two. Mercenary spotted on marshes, instructions?	Base! This is oh-two-one! I see a mercenary in the marsh, instructions? Over.
Zero-one-two, it's base. Eliminate him.	Oh-one-two, this is base. Terminate him.
Base, affirmative. I'm on it.	That's affirmative, base. Proceeding.
Damn! They hid in the reeds. I gotta burn it all out, or we'll catch freaking nothing.	Shit, the bastard hid in the reeds! Now unless we burn the whole thing, we ain't got a chance in hell of finding him.
Zero-one-two, it's base. Keep patrolling.	Oh-one-two, this is base. Keep patrolling.
Base, affirmative. Keep going.	Ten-four, base.

Same goes for demo plot-related phrases used in 3120. Notably enough, they were re-recorded with Lebedev's voice, which proves that the commander NPC at the Fishing Hamlet is an early Lebedev prototype.

Great Swamps — Storyline Lines:

Build 3120	Final
Task accomplished! The tower is under our control. Now we need to hold our ground.	Objective accomplished, the tower is under our control. Now we just need to hold it.
Mercenary! Rush to the tower and keep your eyes open!	Merc! Get to the tower and stay alert.
Enemy detected. Advancing from the ruined church. Get ready!	Enemy spotted advancing from the ruined church. Get ready.
The tower is ours. Now we can clear the path to factory. Open your PDA and act upon the situation.	We have the tower. Now we can start clearing the path to the factory. Open your PDA and play it by ear.
Excellent! The factory path clear. Moving forward!	Excellent! The road to the factory is clear. Moving out!
Well done, guys! The swamp plant is back under our control.	Well done, fellas! The swamp pump is back under our control.

Sounds

There are 25 unique weapon shooting sounds that are based on used versions but seem to be used for distant shots.

Content Not in the Demo

The build is not a prototype intended for internal use but rather a demo version. Thus, unfortunately, some content that was developed by then has been removed from the game in an attempt to save disk space. There is no static lighting, just one VA preset, barely one location and a lot of textures missing. Yet the remnants of their work — the scripts, the configs — can all still be found in various files. This gives us a better understanding of the progress made by GSC by that point.

General

• The build has a level changer icon, which remained unused until patch 1.5.03.

Generators

Generators were most likely finished a few weeks after the build was released. While the script, the sounds, the weather files, and the infoportions are identical to those in the final version of the game, there is still a lot of content unique to this build:

• The character profiles are different than those present in the release version:
  • Zombified stalkers, Scar and ISG scientists lack proper icons and use the same icon as every other NPC in the build — a loner with a cape.
  • Zombified stalkers' voice acting uses a different version, which is, nevertheless, the same as the first one.
  • Zombified stalkers have SGI-5k instead of TRs-301.
  • Scar and ISG scientists have a special version of SGI-5k that does not have a draw sound (this is done in order to prevent the simultaneous playback of several identical sounds once the cutscene begins).
  • Zombified stalkers, Scar and ISG scientists all have rank 400 instead of 100.
• Two unique models for ISG scientists are present. One is based on Monolith variant of «SEVA» suit and the other is based on a combination of the Monolith suit and Kitsenko's face model:

• 
• 

(Source: STRELOK1)

• There are spawn sections for Generators area — something that's not present in the release version of the game. They contain information about two zombified stalkers, seven snorks and three groups of ecologists with five members in each (and the main character being in two of them).
• There are also music files for Generators. According to them, the area was supposed to use e3_intro.ogg. This file is not present in the final version of the game, however, it's available as two separate mono files in the resources of Build 3120 (SoC and, apparently, Build 3120 only supported mono tracks). That's the way it sounds when you combine them. A part of it can be heard when starting a new game, replacing the intro video:

It seems to start with some prototype version of marsh_1.ogg (which itself is a prototype for limansk.ogg) with some added wind sounds, and then at some moment it transitions into dynamic music which sounds similar to one of the release CS combat tracks yet it's still different.

Great Swamps

• All sounds for boars appearing from reeds have already been recorded, even though that cannot be seen in-game and there is no script scheme for that.

Cordon

Cordon was cut early in development. There is not much info left about it:

• Raw code for various characters is present:
  • Valerian, Van and Shilov are told to stand in their respective places and not spawn generic stalker loot on death.
  • Minigun automatically shoots the player in the range of 150 meters.
  • The guy behind the minigun is told to stand in the same place and ignore any threats (so that he does not exchange his minigun for some AK). Besides, he always has sniper 7H1 ammo in the inventory and does not spawn generic stalker loot on death.
• There is a mention of sim_bandit_sniper or esc_bandit_sniper which is some experienced bandit sniper on Cordon.
• There is a mention of sim_default_stalker_2_sniper which is likely a sniper of the bridge on Cordon.

Agroprom

Not much is known apart from the fact that the work on it has already started (since the section of the level in game_levels.ltx exists).

Dark Valley

Not much is known apart from the fact that the work on it has already started (since the section of the level in game_levels.ltx exists).

Changes from SoC

Since 6 months have not even passed since the release of the original game, it is possible to compare how the build differs not just from release CS but also from SoC.

Sounds

Phrases

• All dialogs and spoken dialog files (apart from non-unique NPC idle phrases) have been removed.
• All NPC sound lines requesting the player to hide their weapon that used to mention a gun have been removed. That is due to the fact that the player may as well be wielding a knife.
• All NPC sound lines related to a stalker getting injured that used to mention being hit by a gun have been removed. That is due to the fact that a mutant could injure them.
• A controversial bandit battle phrase which said "Ща мы вам, арабы недоделанные!" ("We'll get ya soon, you half-assed arabs!") has been removed from the game.

Others

• All location-specific sounds have been removed.
• Every single CGI-related audio piece has been removed.