A pair of modern European PC classics are on sale at digital distributors, with The Witcher reduced by 50% and a grand 75% off S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl.

The coarse fantasy world of The Witcher can now be entered for $20 on Steam and Impulse. The discounts celebrate the worldwide digital availability of CD Projekt RED's fantastic fantasy RPG, which had previously been unavailable in many regions.

Those who fall for GSC Game World's S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl fall hard, so the open-world RPG-ish shooter is worth a punt for $5 on Steam. Should you be bitten by the radioactive bug, DirectX 11-enabled sequel S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat is due to hit North America in 2010, with gameplay closer to SoC than its prequel 'Clear Sky.'

Update: Adventurous fans can now download the 1935 build of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. from FileShack.

Original story: In an almost unheard-of move, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernboyl developer GSC Game World has released an early build of its 2007 post-apocalyptic shooter, allowing fans a peek at cut levels and unfinished features.

The playable build--dated October 18, 2004 and called the "xrCore build 1935"--is available from a number of sources linked from the GSC-created forum thread.

Several levels unused levels including Dead City, Swamp and Generators are explorable in the build.

First announced in 2001, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s development was infamously protracted, with GSC missing its original release window of 2003 by four years. A pre-alpha build of the title, labeled as build 1096, was leaked in late 2003.

In its latest weekend sale, Valve's digital distribution service Steam is offering GSC Game World's S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl for only $5--a savings of 75%. Published by THQ, the post-apocalyptic RPG-shooter was released initially released in 2007. A second entry in the series, a prequel subtitled Clear Sky, followed this year.

Subscription-based PC gaming service GameTap has agreed to bring a number of games published by THQ to the service, the company announced today.

The agreement will see the addition of such THQ-published PC titles as Relic Entertainment's Company of Heroes, Gas Powered Games' Supreme Commander, Iron Lore Entertainment's Titan Quest and GSC Gameworld's S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl to the service, among others.

Left, Company of Heroes. Right, Supreme Commander.

Those players who don't shell out the $9.95 per month for the "Gold"-level GameTap subscription can also expect a number of THQ titles to be available from the service's free-to-play catalog, which requires 15 second video advertisement to air before each play. GameTap did not specify which THQ titles will be free.

The games are expected to appear on GameTap before the end of the summer.

New patches are available for S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl, updating U.S. and Non-U.S. releases of the game to version 1.006. Weighing in at just a few megs, the update offers multiplayer fixes and a new anti-cheat system.... Read more

GSC Game World today announced that following the success of S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl, more games based on the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. universe are on the way. The company plans to announce these products at July's E3 Media & Business Summit.

"We are very happy of the players' positive reaction to S.T.A.L.K.E.R. all over the world. This fills us with confidence the team is on the right track and adds us strength to go for next exciting accomplishments. It will be very soon that we present our new interesting ideas and solutions," said GSC Game World CEO Sergiy Grygorovych.