After some confusion as to whether the storied "A-Life" simulation system was still present in Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl, GSC Game World has confirmed that it is—and also that, yes, it's got some issues, and also yes, they're working on it.
For those new to the world of Stalker, A-Life is essentially the underlying system of simulations that governs the behaviors and interactions of NPCs and monsters in the game. "The gist of the A-Life is that the characters in the game live their own lives and exist all the time, not only when they are in the player’s field of view," OG Stalker programmer Dmitriy Iassenev said in a 2008 interview about the original Stalker with AIGameDev (via the Wayback Machine).
