GSC Game World

Lore & Background

The company was founded in 1995 by Sergiy Grygorovych, who became CEO. He came up with the company name and emblem in 1993, aged 15. 'GSC' are the initials of his name in the transliteration 'Grygorovych Sergiy Constantinovich'. In 2001, GSC released Cossacks: European Wars, its first financial success.

In 2002, after a company trip to the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, the concept for Oblivion Lost was revised to use the Chernobyl disaster as a foundation, becoming S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Oblivion Lost, later renamed S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl. The game was released on 20 March 2007. A sequel, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat, was released on 2 October 2009. In 2009, GSC began work on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, but development was discontinued on 9 December 2011 when the company dissolved.

At the end of 2014, GSC re-opened, and on 15 May 2018, re-announced S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl, released on 20 November 2024 for Windows and Xbox Series X/S.

Reader's Guide

The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series includes: S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl (released 20 March 2007), S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky (stand-alone expansion, released 22 August 2008), S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat (released 2 October 2009), and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl (released 20 November 2024). A mobile game, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Mobile, was created by Qplaze in conjunction with GSC on 5 December 2007. The X-Ray Engine was created for the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games series and uses the free physics engine Open Dynamics Engine elements.

Did You Know?

• S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl was the most successful project of GSC Game World, with 950 thousand copies sold in the CIS and 700 thousand elsewhere by 12 February 2008.
• After the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, part of the GSC team relocated to Prague to continue development on S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2.