You seem to be gloryfying stalker a lot. You speak of this exquisite land of difficult enemies, lifelike AI, and endless immersion.
And it is a damn fine game. But it is not THAT good.
The AI is probably the best ever made in an shooter, but it is not pin point accurate like you give to believe. That would be cheating.
The mutants are dangerous, but there is no reason to follow one through an entire night before killing it other than the pleasure of stalking the prey. It is just easier to fill it with bullets and be done with it.
I like open-ended game worlds, like TES, fallout or stalker. But a linear game like RAGE, filled with dozens of enemies just for your killing pleasure is a much better way to let off steam then following a virtual monster throughout the reality breaking wedgie-filled countryside.

And back to an earlier point, I, myself advocate markers and comprehensive worldmaps. Because, while being lost inside the reality breaking wedgie-filled countryside may be fun a couple of times, it can become frustrating quickly.
I merely have to remember morrowind′s worldmap to bring this up. I′d rather have the game hold my hand for a minute and tell me where i should go rather then make me wander aimlessly for an hour. If i wanted to do that, I would do it for fun once or twice. not always.

Oh I did not kill the Chimera. I only defend myself against beasts unless I need a part for some reason. I just let em' roam.

I've been playing shooters since Doom. I've killed many thousands of opponents, beasts etc etc. It does not thrill me to kill so I don't unless I need to.

Indeed the Stalker AI is that tough. You don't run across expert Stakers till near the end when you are very tough. Apart from the vanilla games, which i have not played for ages, the mods range from tough to damn near impossible. I remember when I first played Narodnaya Solyanka I commented it was like starting Stalker again it was so hard. I compared my self to a frightened little girl as it was so amazingly difficult. I had to scam my way past enemies I could easily take on in the regular game and I did one important mission almost entirely by stealth as there was no way I could win against a base full of mercs.

Amazing fun and if I did not know the game well, pretty well impossible.

I get no fun at all from just smoking through Rage, It's stupid easy and because of that boring. Fighting a Dragon in Skyrim is at least challenging. Done right and for a hard core crowd instead of console babies Rage could be fun. It's a great engine and I'd like to see a good game made on it.

Heh, I'll just have to try out the game then
Rage has believable AI, and FEAR was the only other game that really got to me with it's AI (in some ways)... I'd better see more in Stalker than just the usual AI with aim precision turned up and high damage values.

After that I'll be happy to give my two cents on it

The stalker ai is by far, the best in any shooter game. I heard they turned down some ai values pre-release to prevent them from being to difficult.
Still, like all shooters I played so far, it tends to get easier towards the end, once you get decent equipment. Clear Sky was only really difficult up until I got a modded AN-94.
With good equipment and preparation, you can tear through any opponent with ease.

Sometimes effortlessly tearing through ranks of enemies and watching body parts fly away can be as amusing as fighting a competent, dangerous enemy.
Only thing better than these is effortlessly tearing through a competent, dangerous enemy once you have good weapons.

Oh I hate dragons in skyrim. They are fun to fight, but they always come at the least oportunate time, and i get stuck with playing "babysit the helpless villagers".

And by the way, Where did you got narodnaya solyanka? I heard about these russian supermods, but i do not think i founda translated version.

The latest narodnaya solyanka +DMX is here, there is a translation included:

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showpost.php?p=33947849&postcount=1502

And the Soup, a managed version for westerners:

http://tecnobacon.com/

Soup is somewhat less challenging but not by a whole lot.

I wonder how many reviews i would have had to read before i found out they ACTUALLY HAD A LINEAR LEVEL WHERE THE PATH YOU TAKE SIMPLY RAN BACKWARDS THROUGH EXACTLY THE SAME LINEAR LEVEL YOU PLAYED THROUGH BEFORE LMAO? AND THAT THAT WAS ONE OF THE BETTER PARTS OF THE GAME? I just simply didn't expect it to be so incredibly rough around the edges and just plain

Doom 1 - 3 had believable environments and were realistic. You sound like were talking about Prey or Bioshock. The Dooms and Quakes were dead real, and very immersive. Doom 3, which i played through almost 4 times and enjoyed the hell out of didn't have much dialogue, but the dialogue was at least believable because you were a soldier and on your way to your assigned quarters or whatever. Soldiers take orders and they carry them out, so no big deal that the dialogue was sparce in the beginning. Plus, there were no people around and your mission was clear from the outset.

Done and done. No joke, i will be very careful about buying future id games and i'd like to make my money back for Rage in the future. I worked hard to earn that money i gave to id.

Doom 3? Yeah. Doom 1-2-Final Doom-Master Levels? Get real, they don't even attempt to resemble anything real.

Yeah... the fact you find Doom1 and 2 realistic and believable is flat out silly. Why even say that at all?

Sure Doom3 actually attempted something a bit "realistic" but get real yourself. That was a few hundred times more linear than Rage, and I personally find less replay value in Doom3. Mods are the only thing that kept Doom3 alive. After beating Doom3 once the whole game is just meh, and there are 3 levels max that I actually enjoy playing through again. Hell, "Hellhole" and Caverns

Not that it didn't have it's own "betters." It did at least have good storytelling with cinematics, which Rage has none of, unfortunately. Rage's story is executed very poorly I'd say.

Oops, yeah, i was thinking of the quake series when i said Doom 1 - 3.

Yes, well, Quake1 was the opposite of realistic, and Quake3 was nothing more than a deathmatch game (and completely non-realistic)

I'll give you props for Q2 and Q4 though, those did set the stage for a more serious aka "believable" world.

And hey, it's not like I don't wish Rage had a whole lot more to it. At the moment at least we've got mod tools to work with and all it takes to better the game is gathering a team and making something awesome.

i just finished RAGE anarchy version for PS3 (first time i've gotten an ID game for console). played through normal, then activated the DLC codes for nightmare. there's multiplayer missions i'd like to complete, but it's rare to find anyone online... the game is 6 years old now!?

RAGE looks like mad max, but feels a LOT like the show firefly; movie serenity... all the way from wellspring to the authority experimenting on muties!

aside from perhaps heretic and hexen, this is the first time i've seen ID put some effort into inventory & item crafting, or allow you to even choose your character type for that matter: wastelander / roughneck / fabricator / DLC crimson elite. that in itself is a huge step for them, since normally they're always pushing the graphic envelope: like that immersive 3D headset for DOOM3 BFG edition! RAGE says 20 awards on the box, and i believe it. it prolly isn't easy to mash up 2 games/genres like motorstorm and fallout... and the gameplay is solid in vehicle or on foot; only a couple franchises have done this well, like rockstar's GTA, or EA's battlefield...

i agree the environment on foot feels static like walking around on mars in doom3 + oxygen, but they did great meshing/texturing where you can just stare and pan the landscape... although the texture does seem sub-par in areas and mip-mapping refreshes slowly (maybe i should get it for PC so i can edit the .cfg)

the characters are especially detailed, fashionable attire (http://rage.wikia.com/wiki/Jacob) and unique characteristics, some have robotic limbs even... i have no problems with the voice acting, although i notice lip-syncing is off sometimes during dialogue (might be a ps3 or hdmi problem)

creatures will climb and jump off the environment in any way shape or form to get at you, they programmed the collision and scripted the AI perfect for that.

sure the ending was disappointing, but you knew it was coming when you released the arks. it's not as bad the sewers because they kept saying there was awesome gear down there but it was all just scraps. and after ALL that my only REAL gripe is that it would have been nice to have flashlight or torch, even though the game is already mostly illuminated... i kinda have a feeling this game was practice to exercise their environment skills outside of corridors, for DOOM4: hell on earth.

anyone have RAGE on PS3 who want to play wasteland legends?