GSC Game World announced on its website a major update to Zone Kit, a modding tool for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl. Along with the transition from Phase 1 to Phase 2, modders have been given access to even more tools that the studio itself used when creating the game.
Briefly about the main innovations:
- Create your own quests and storylines using visual scripting.
- Work freely with in-game text – edit, add or delete it.
- Add, change or remove sounds and SFX, including voiceovers.
- Save and load mod data.
- Test mods directly in Zone Kit Editor via Play In Editor, including .cfg-based mods.
From quests to your own stories: what Zone Kit Phase 2 allows
In Phase 2, modders have access to the same tools that GSC Game World used during the development of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2. The basis is Blueprint with visual scripting, thanks to which you can create your own quests and build entire storylines.
The possibilities here are not limited to simple tasks. For example, you can return the Brain Burner, set fire to Yaniv, or add new quests for bartenders in hubs. Need an NPC or item to develop the story? You can spawn it. And if you are familiar with Unreal Engine, you can place your own actors directly on the World Map and configure interaction with them.
Separately, the developers have added support for Wwise thanks to cooperation with AudioKinetic. Now modders can work with almost the entire sound part of the game: change or add music, SFX, and even full voiceover of dialogues. For this, there is also the opportunity to obtain a temporary Wwise license.
Another important innovation is the save system. Now you don’t need to look for complicated ways to save the positions of objects in the open world, the contents of your inventory, or the progress of your own plot. Zone Kit Phase 2 allows you to write this data to the game files so that players can continue playing the mod from their saves.
We haven’t forgotten about the situation when several modifications are installed at the same time. The dependency system allows authors to define and check the relationships between the files of different mods, thanks to which they can work together correctly.
Zone Kit opens up significantly more possibilities for modding
The Zone Kit Phase 2 features don’t end with creating quests or your own stories. The Quest Tool, Text Tool, Wwise, and other tools can be used far beyond their primary purpose — it all depends on the mod’s intent.
It’s now much easier to tinker with the internal mechanics of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 and create something truly massive. You can modify existing mechanics or invent your own, build new logical systems, and interact with Zone elements in a different way. Complex and large-scale modifications should now be more accessible.
Zone Kit works as an SDK with internal developer tools and uncompressed assets. At the same time, you don’t need to download the entire package — it’s been divided into separate parts, so you can install only what you need to work on the disk.
The developers also continue to refine the tool together with modders. Their feedback during closed testing and in the communities helped GSC Game World not only add new features, but also get rid of problems that prevented the creation of modifications.
You can find a full list of innovations on the GSC Game World website. And if you yourself want to get involved in creating content for S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, you should follow the updates – the developer periodically opens new vacancies.