Not that anyone cares, but I've paid full price on release for many games that I haven't even played yet. Just to help tilt the balance for publishers/developers, and let them know that I appreciate them choosing GOG. Heck, I own 274 + hidden titles on GOG alone!

STALKER 2 would've been another one, until the pre-order was announced a while ago.

Ultimate Edition? Deluxe Edition? Anti-Consumer feature split? Skins as a selling point? Single player skins separate from Multiplayer skins? And more?!

The studio could've made a video titled "halp! we need money" and I would've bought it full price. The hell am I supposed to do with skins? Feel good about myself?

Unless someone can change my mind, this is getting purchased at a garbage bin price in 3-5 years.

I don't know what the big wigs are smoking nowadays over at GSC, but there are way too many games to play now to spend anywhere near this amount of cash to support garbage industry practices.

Sometimes, most times this is down to the publisher and the Dev's can do sweet FA about it. In my opinion they have done well to get a day one release on GoG which is a win. Also if you have watch some of the vids of the games development you can see the publisher invested a great amount of cash into S2, so I guess they would like some of it if not all of it back.

The only thing is GSC is self-publishing everywhere except Japan and China, so pretty much all the decisions are theirs. However, this is also probably why there is a day-one GOG release of the game and no Denuvo and the game is prices at 60€/$ and not 70.

Also I don't really get the point of the OP. All I see in the different versions of the game are more or less important goodies (such as artbooks, skins, etc.) and the season pass. None of these are essential for the game, nor are there any real features hidden behind a paywall, like "multiplayer will be only available for the purchasers of the Ultimate Edition". It's just regular bait to make people buy the higher priced versions, and some will, but no one really needs the crap. And anyone that recognizes that they don't need that extra crap will buy the base game at launch price and get the DLCs later if they want to and if they are worth the money.

You are not entitled to the way you want to be treated.

You know what is a BIG fat waste of money? Collectors editions. You can pay hundreds of pounds for what is basically a cardboard box filled with 5 items of junk.
BUT, to a fan, to someone who loves video games, that box of krap is made of solid gold and laced with precious jewels.
If your a fan, if a games release excites you, it's your hobby buy the deluxe version for that digital hat, because it means something to you.
What I'm saying is having these 3 editions of the game is what most gamers want. The publishers are just offering a service.

They are the Publisher! See I can't stand this foolishness! When will y'all stop worshipping the developers as if they are children under Nazi rule. It's not 1999 anymore. The devs/publishers are on the same level these days and I'm most cases the devs are left alone to make business decisions. Developers aren't these poor fragile child laborers. They are grown adults that often have more power than you think. Bioware, Massive, 4A Games are some power house devs that are left alone to do whatever they want. In this case GSK is the devs and published. Anyways, the OP sentiment is why I refuse to buy this game. When day one release on GOG ain't gonna sway me either. This just comes off as Ubisoft release to me. Yep, I said the same thing in a post and was basically ridiculed. These are Ubisoft Garbage practices. They basically make way more money from the DLC than the base game. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw SKINS in Deluxe Edition. The entire pricing scheme turned me off from the game. I'll pick it up in bargain bin. At least by then it will be all patched up and more optimized experience. I'm 100% with you! All the gamers are doing is justifying this behavior with, "just buy the standard edition". These people will go to end meet in order to justify Fuqeray. Meanwhile, but asking themselves... "I wonder what they took out of the base game in order to make the expansion". I don't blame the studios no more, I blame the gamers. Because these kocksuqrs will defend the most aids ridden kock, in order to suck it dry. The gamers are why the industry is in shambles. You know the old saying, "you build it, they'll come".

Yes, we know the kock and the kocksuqr goes hand to hand. That's why I don't blame the studios anymore. It's the gamers I blame for why this industry has gone to feces. The kocksuqr will go to any ends to defend the most aids ridden kock, before they suck it. It's so hard being a part of a hobby that has the lowest IQ people on the planet.

This is a horribly boring game with sluggish performance on even higher end hardware (like on i7 13700KF/32GB 6400Mhz DDR5/RTX 4080 Super, i7 10700KF/32GB 3200Mhz DDR4/RX 7900XT, i9 10920X/32GB 3200Mhz DDR4/RTX 3080Ti in my case). I am just shocked how terrible it is compared to the original STALKER games; STALKER from 2007 is about 1000X more fun in the first 20 minutes than this heap is in 2 hours.

I think you may be doing something wrong, because i have a mid-range HW too (i7-13700kf, 64 GB RAM, RTX 4070 Super), but the game runs perfectly fine with Epic settings, at 1080p native (without upscaling) and 65-90 FPS without framegen.
RTX 4080 Super is able to run it on Epic settings at QHD resolution.
Even basic 4070 can run it at QHD if you use upscaling.
If i was in your situation, i would look for the problem somewhere in your system, but as usual, its easier to blame everybody else for your problems, right? :)

Man, this IS NOT "mid-range".

Besides, it is the dev's responsibility to optimize their games, so that they work well even if the gamer is not an optimization expert. And why should he be? A consumer buys a product THAT IS SUPPOSED TO WORK ON DAY 1. And if I buy a blender and it "works" in a half-assed way, am I to blame because I can't optimize a freshly bought blender? :)

I agree 100% with you. Gamers justifying this kind of behavior are utter numbskulls, worthy being @ss-loved by a rabid goat. I can't stand such morons. And you got a point - it is because of such gaymerz that the studios continue such practices - because gaymerz will buy their subpar, badly optimized, overpriced product anywayz. So why should they care?

If it would be a 4080 Ti, and something one or two notches above the i7, i would agree, but it is not.
4070S and i7-13700 IS mid-range.
You cannot expect it to run new modern good looking game on maxed settings at 1440p without heavy upscaling (unless you are fine with getting 20-30 FPS).

Maybe you missed the news, but Devs are working on patches.
Any PC gamer should be able AND IS EXPECTED TO configure game settings to fit their HW capabilities.
There is no excuse, it can hardly be any easier, unless the person is lazy.
Your blender analogy is a nonsense.

The point of my reply was to disprove those silly lies that the game doesn't run well enough on mid range HW like the 4070S or 4080, etc.
The game runs fine - i can freaking see that myself, again - shitty midrange like 4070S and i7-13700 can run it on almost all Epic settings at 1080p native with framerate higher than 60.
And with some upscaling i can run it at 1440p, even though the low VRAM on the 4070S can start getting saturated, so it may require lowering some settings a bit (but still keeping most on max).
Find me a similar game that performs better - you won't be able to.
Could it run a tad better? Probably yes, and hopefully it will after some patch(es).

Go buy some blender.

I've got just a slight edge upward from where you are, with a 13900KF/32 and a 4080/16. Are you going to also tell me that my system is midrange? In fact, you've got double my system ram, so it might be a tie. :-) Sorry, but your system is pretty high-end, even these days. I'd venture that most people playing this game don't have anything like what we have.

Aside from that though, I agree with you. This is a STALKER game. Anybody who imagined it would release in a completely finished state without bugs should have remembered how the original game was released in a similar state (admittedly with A-Life working much, much better).

And yes, I am going to give GSC a lot of benefit of the doubt here. It's a complex game with many parts. And they have shown years ago already that they will stick with it until the game is straightened out. I trust them to do that. If the game would have released totally ready to go, I would have been shocked. And yet I bought it anyway. Why? Not because I am a stupid simp. But because I know that it will be finished.

They earned my trust with the first 3 games, which are among the best games ever made.

For some people apparently, a rocky release means instant failure and no forgiveness. Patience, people.

Well ok, let's say 4080 might be at the edge where high end starts :)
From what i saw on my system, the 64 GB RAM make no difference in this game - it never ate more than 17 GB, so 32 GB should be enough, 24 might be getting close to the edge though depending on the OS and how much crap one leave running in the background.

I am not saying the game doesn't need fixing, we all know it does.
But i am tired of hearing everybody complaining about performance, while those ignoramuses run it in Borderless instead in Exclusive Full Screen, setting epic texture and shadows quality while having only 8 GB VRAM so they get stutters because the game can't fit everything it needs in there, etc.
Many of them being, of course, streamers or youtubers who often capture/record on the same machine, doing their very best to make sure they cannot get a good enough performance.
People who keep complaining about various shortcuts being weird, but not even trying to change them (Q/E not used for leaning? well, i guess i will now spend ranting about it for 30 minutes instead of going into the settings and change it).
...i could go on, but you get the idea.
When did we get that stupid?

The game needs fixing, but it is not as bad as many make it look.

Totally agree. I was so excited for the release but boy oh boy is it mediocre. Mediocre at best. Thankfully it was released here on GOG with its awesome refund policy and I was able to get my HARD EARNED money back.