To protect the Zone from intruders, the Cordon was built by the Ukraine Military Forces. Conversely, the Freedom fraction members believe the Zone should be freely accessible to all people. The Duty faction believes the Zone is a threat to humanity that must be destroyed.

Many of them are working on their own, though there are also several factions present. People, known as “stalkers”, are exploring the Zone to search for artifacts for personal enrichment. Īnomalies are creating the Artifacts, which are items with unique and extraordinary properties such as anti-gravity or radioactivity absorption. The Zone is rich in anomalies - inexplicable phenomena that don't obey the laws of physics and common sense (such as pillars of fire, lightning scatter, whirlwinds that tear everything that falls into them, etc). It caused physical and meteorological phenomena all over the Zone and mutation of local plant and animal life.

Due to the activity of several classified laboratories that had been conducting experiments with psionic abilities, a catastrophe occurred in 2006. The franchise's actions take place in the Zone, an alternate Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. Attendees of fan festival Stalker-Fest 2009

Stalker games in order