STALKER 2: Heart of Chornobyl is practically knocking on our doorstep! And every true Stalker knows that guns are the real meat of the survival experience in this franchise. Whereas its contemporaries settled for the usual assortment of M4s and whatnot, the classic STALKER games pushed a wonderfully eclectic set of guns to the forefront.

Featuring a host of European and Warsaw-pact guns you could scarcely find anywhere else, the three original STALKER games established themselves as the go-to option for those who wanted an entirely different experience than any other shooter at the time could offer. There were never that many different guns to be found here, with just over three dozen unique weapon models in the entire trilogy. Yet, various customization options, an advanced ballistics model, and unique sub-variants help differentiate these guns from anything else on the market.

The good news is that this is bound to continue in STALKER 2 as well! The bad news is that we're losing a bunch of franchise mainstays in the process. Here's the full list of guns found in Heart of Chornobyl.

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All Weapons in STALKER 2

Kudos to Redditor VisualVibrance for this delightful list of weapons! They've assembled a handy graphic showing them all off in reasonable detail, but if you need a compartmentalized list of all the confirmed STALKER 2 guns, we've got you covered:

Sidearms

Sub-Machine Guns

Carbines/Assault Rifles

Designated Marksman Rifles / Sniper Rifles

Machine Guns / Other

Shotguns

Broadly, then, we're replacing the old LR-300 with the more modern 416, the L85 with the Tavor, and the Abakan with the Carmel. The new choices generally rhyme with the old classics, though the selection of pistols is fairly modest. On the flip side of the coin, it's worth remembering that the old STALKER games only really had one SMG to speak of - the classic MP5/10 - while Heart of Chornobyl has a far more comprehensive set of these guns.

Classic STALKER Weapons Missing from STALKER 2

Sadly, not all of the old STALKER games' weapons have made it into Heart of Chornobyl, from the look of things. So far, we can confirm that none of the following armaments are in the game:

As STALKER veterans will have noticed by now, we're losing a whole host of classic, beloved franchise mainstays to make room for some newcomers. Things such as the Carmel and the Malyuk are obviously not nearly as iconic as the Abakan or the SG-550, but they'll have to make do.

And on that note, there's no real cause for concern as far as the weapon arsenal goes: GSC Game World has told us time and again that modding will be a huge consideration for the game. Throwing some fancy new assets into an Unreal 5 game isn't a huge problem, with that in mind, and we expect substantial weapon mods to be released in relatively short order after the game comes out.

Further still, it's worth remembering that weapon customization is a huge consideration in STALKER. This means all the weapons found in the game will have loads of tuning and fiddling one can do with them, adding extra utility to each and every one of them. Let's see how it pans out, eh?

Pre-order STALKER 2 for Steam right here at 2Game!

STALKER 2: Heart of Chornobyl is practically knocking on our doorstep! And every true Stalker knows that guns are the real meat of the survival experience in this franchise. Whereas its contemporaries settled for the usual assortment of M4s and whatnot, the classic STALKER games pushed a wonderfully eclectic set of guns to the forefront. […]