Izlom

	This article or section is based on S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl cut content and may contain inaccurate information or speculation.

The Izlom also called Fracture (ru. Излом) is a mutated human that was supposed to appear in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl.

Description

A mutated human. Looks like a hobo or hunchbacked old man in tattered clothes, though it is actually nearly two meters tall. Izlom hides huge mutated left arm under his cloak. A strong blow to the back can paralyze a victim. Izlom wanders aimlessly around the Zone in search of food. Dwells near zombie, does not stray far from its habitat. Izlom wears the old uniforms of the Zone workers: a dirty green-brown robe (which may have once been white) with the Zone emblem, it's torn at the elbows due to the length of the mutant's arms^{[note 1]} and slightly over the hump, and dirty jeans, which are slightly torn at the bottom and at the knees. Izlon has no shoes, causing large calluses on the feet. There is a slight clubfoot.

There is little information about Izlom. It is assumed that Izloms are locals who lived in the area around the CEZ before the Second Catastrophe. There is also a theory that Izloms are the failed result of experiments on the Universal Soldier program. Izlom is intelligent and can speak (although it's not good at human language, it runs fast). This mutant's main weapon is his large, hypertrophied right arm. His arm can be sold for a lot of money. And if the conversation goes well, stalkers can get some useful information from Izlom.

Lifestyle

Can be aggressive, but can also help in exchange for food, for example. Izlom will only attack a stalker from the back, but it is usually not aggressive. Hides his arm under his clothes so it won't be attacked immediately. Smart. His main trick is to shout from behind the bushes "Help! I'm hurt!" (it can often memorize lines, short phrases, dialogues, and use them either as a trick or as useful information). Rookies fall for the trick and try to help, then receive a crushing blow with a hypertrophied limb. Izlom lives not far from stalkers, sometimes gets along with them. Mutant can help or tell useful information about the Zone in exchange for food. Sometimes gains trust of stalkers, follows them, scares away or kills mutants.

It was planned to give Izlom ability to knock down the player's sight (a special animation was made) and telepathic controll of zombies.

Appearances

Present in Army Warehouses in Build 1935 and Build 2205.

Development

Concept art

All sketches of the mutant belong to Victor Marchevsky.

Design Documents

2002

Izlom first mentioned in ideas.doc (March 14) as a "fractured mutant" (ru. изломанный мутант). Izlom's ability and habitat is mentioned in 'Assignments5.doc (September 29).
scenario_elements1.xls (October 7) mentions psi strike ability and extra-sensory perception. The document was updated with more detailed information about appearance, behavior, and abilities later (possibly, in 2003).
_story_.doc (October 14) mentions a battle with a mutant in Pripyat.
stalker.doc (October 9) has an expanded description of the mutant with specific abilities and locations.
weapon_probability.xls (October 28) tells that Izlom was planned as a mutant boss with a "super lethal" strike of his arm.

2003

monstry3.doc (March 29) has the fullest description of the mutant, it was later was added in the game.
story7.doc (June 3) tells about Izlom's pyrokinesis and an experiment which led to Izlom being created.

2004

General Plot Idea.doc (March 25) describes the role of the mutant in the story.
Guidelines for Completing Levels.doc (October 6) stated that Izlom was planned for Swamps and Generators ^{[note 2]}.
Three documents List_of_Monsters_onlevel.doc (December 27) (made for Army Warehouse ^{[note 3]}, Swamps and Generators) describes the appearance of the mutant at locations.

2005

Walkthrough.doc (January 10) describes the story scene in Yantar and the behavior in Army Warehouses, also specifies info for the PDA.
military_walkthrough.doc (January 28) also describes the behavior in Army Warehouses.
Monster Settings.doc (January 14) specifies the abilities of Izlom and its behavior in combat.
Monsters.doc (May 15) describes the final mechanics of Izlom, behavior problems, and suggestions for improvement.

Description in desdocs

2002

A single mutant who possessed parapsychological abilities^{[note 4]}. Possesses extra sensory perception, and can attack with a psi strike. Lived in Pripyat.
Possesses telekinesis, Izlom is able to create telekinetic blasts. It sends blows that cause flesh to turn black and decompose (i.e. necrosis)^{[note 5]} with his long arm. Lived in Unknown City. The player had to kill the mutant.

2003

A very clever monster. Disguises as a hunchbacked old man in a tattered raincoat. It gains the trust of stalkers, follows them, scares away mutants, helps to destroy the unafraid ones. When hungry, it asks for food, if it isn't given, then it attacks from the back of the stalker. Once hooked, it pursues until it dies. Sneaks up on the victim during sleep. Without camouflage it is a mutant under two meters with a mutated one and a half meter hook hand, which can kill with a single blow. Has some telepathy and telekinesis.
― Described in scenario_elements1.xls

Carried the PDA of killed stalkers.

1.9 m Unknown mutations. Either the result of experimentation or the Zone's effect on the remaining humans. Hypertrophy of a limb.

• Telepathy.
• Face is close to human.
• It's smart.
• Slouching and hiding its pseudolimb under its cloak. From a distance, it looks like a hunchbacked hobo.
• Tries to lure stalkers by talking or asking.
• When stalker turns his back, it straightens up and attacks with a hypertrophied limb.
• If you share food, you can learn interesting information about the Zone.
• Eats rats, dogs, flesh.
• With some probability can stalk the player. Sneaks up on him on sleep.
• Attacks:
  • Hypertrophic arm punch.
  • Telekinetic punch
  • Special skills and features:
  • Eats corpses
    

― Described in monstry3.doc (later appears in the game)

It is the result of Chernobyl Research Institute of Parapsychology experiments in pyrokinesis and psychic research ^{[note 6]}. Most likely, after the destruction of the CRIP, Izloms got out.

Code

• August 13, 2004 - Sergei Zhemeitsev created the mutant class and wrote the basic mutant AI code^{[note 7]}
• September 8, 2004 - Zhemeitsev registered the rest of the mutant's animations, plugged in the rest of A-Life's features.
• January 21, 2005 - Zhemeitsev registered the mutant class CFracture in LUA-space.
• March 16, 2005 - Zhemeitsev rewrote the list of animations for the actual animations made by Sergey Volchanov.
• June 2, 2005 - the animation system class was rewritten, its name was changed, Zhemeitsev rewrote the code of animation for the actual standard.
• June 13, 2005 - the function get_danger_type()^{[note 8]}, which previously contained 4 parameters eWeak, eNormal, eStrong, eVeryStrong, began to contain only eWeak and eStrong. Previously fearful of only very strong opponents Izlom became like everyone else, fearing any opponent who was simply stronger than him.

Scripts

Eugene wrote the first script, mizlom.script, on September 7, 2004, responsible for a scripted (most likely test) scene: the player enters a room, the door is blocked, after 20 seconds it opens and the player is attacked by a kink. In the file itself, Eugene wrote that the script failed:

Monster izlon. Script writing try, no fsm^{[note 9]}. The try failed
― Excerpt of mizlom.script in English

The script was changed 2 times: the first time, on September 21, 2 function explanations were added, and the second time, on December 8 (after a longer test), the word "not" was added before "strong". Also on September 21, a second script was written, mizlom_part2.script. It is responsible for the behavior of Izlom when attacking and taking damage.

Ruslan wrote his own script, del_izlom.script, on October 11, 2004, responsible for Izlom "grab", which started attacking the player for 10 seconds. Afterwards, the mutant would return to back to A-Life.

Trivia

• Izlom is the only mutant that supports the "use" parameter, and therefore dialogs, trading, etc. Obviously, the developers were trying to make it a really unique monster with NPC capabilities.
• Izlom had a behavior scheme and abilities invented, but developers couldn't implement them in time. The Izlom was planned to return in S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat, but, according to game designer Ruslan Didenko, "to leave it as it is would be irrational, and no one has been able to refine its behavior scheme to the level of design documents".

Gallery

Notes

Sources

1. ts_scenes_2003-2004\Scenes\arhive\ideas\ideas.doc (Google Docs)
2. ts_scenes_2003-2004\Scenes\Задания5.doc (Google Docs)
3. ts_scenes_2003-2004\Scenes\arhive\scenario_elements1.xls (Google Docs)
4. ts_scenes_2003-2004\Scenes\arhive\_story_.doc (Google Docs)
5. koan_podarok\1\stalker.doc (Google Docs)
6. [weapon_probability.xls]
7. ts_scenes_2003-2004\Scenes\arhive\story7.doc (Google Docs)
8. koan_podarok\monstry3.doc (Google Docs)
9. !Stalker_pack\Scenario\Общая идея сюжета.doc (Google Docs)
10. [План работ (Jim).doc] (Google Docs)
11. !Stalker_pack\GamePlay_Doc\Рекомендации по заполнению уровней.doc (Google Docs)
12. [List_of_Monsters_onlevel.doc] (Google Docs)
13. [Walkthrough.doc] (Google Docs)
14. [military_walkthrough.doc] (Google Docs)
15. [Настройки монстров.doc] (Google Docs)
16. !Stalker_pack\GamePlay_Doc\Монстры.doc (Google Docs)
17. string_table_enc_mutants.xml ('xrCore' build 1893, Sep 6 2004)
18. mizlom.script
19. mizlom_part2.script
20. del_izlom.script
21. \\x-ray\stalkerdata$\objects\actors\del\izlom.object (ревизия 27.12.2003)
22. \\x-ray\stalkerdata$\objects\monsters\izlom\final_izlom_ph.object (ревизия 19.01.2004)
23. \\x-ray\stalkerdata$\objects\monsters\izlom\final_izlom.object (ревизия 30.08.2004)
24. \\x-ray\stalkerdata$\objects\monsters\izlom\izlom.object ((7) ревизий 08/27.09.2004; 04.11.2004; 21.01.2005; 21.03.2005; 23.06.2005; 19.10.2005;

v · d · e Mutants
Mutated animals	Blind dog Boar Bayun/Cat Deer Flesh Pseudodog Lassie Tiger Psy dog Rodent
Humanoids	Bloodsucker Marsh creature Burer Controller Snork Zombified stalker
Poltergeists	Electrogeist Miasmageist Poltergeist Pyrogeist
Unknown	Chimera Illusionist Pseudogiant
Cut mutants	Counterpart Dwarf Izlom Karlik Morlock Mummy Phantasm Rat Rat wolf Tark Zombie