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Well the most hyped game of all time has come and gone in a few short days!!! Crysis, the proud creation of German Developers Crytek had promised to “Bring PC Gaming Home”. Flaunting “next-gen” graphics and an action packed story line….is this the PC game to rub in the faces of the console masses…..well the short answer is yes!! I have no doubt we will see Crysis on the consoles….but it just wont be the same
Plot
At this stage here I think if you were living on Mars you would probably know the plot for Crysis. You play through the game as the super hard “Nomad”, clad in a high tech Nano Suit. You are sent as along with some other Delta Force operators to a remote tropical island in the pacific to investigate an alien crash site. The problems for Nomad start very early, with the Island being completely overrun by the North Korean Army. The situation quickly develops into all out warfare with the Koreans…..before turning very “alieny”. To avoid spoilers….lets just say the aliens and the US forces recently arrived do not get on very well!!!!
I will say that half way through Crysis you kind of loose the freedom of choice that the earlier levels present…and you switch to a more Half Life 2 experience as you battle through a scripted story line. This was disappointing but unavoidable as at the end of the day Crytek are attempting to deliver a story of some sort! Allowing complete freedom to the player would never work. Might just mention that STALKER is the only game that came close to the delivering the above, other developers have a lot to learn from this buggy but excellent game.
Graphics + Sound
Next Generation…..Yes. To shoot from the hip I would say that on medium settings, Crysis looks far better than Bioshock (another graphics poster boy). Will it make smoke come out of you computer……Yes. I was getting blue screens as I tried to over clock my machine to play on “High”. I had to settle for most settings on high, with 1280 X 1024 resolution with 2x AA (Plus my computer is not even a year old!!!!). At this resolution the game still looks fabulous. Graphics however do not make a game good……they just make it pretty. Luckily for us Crytek also paid quite a lot of attention to the other elements of the game!!!
The sound is not found wanting. Some great ambient noise in the Alien Craft certainly raised a few hairs on my neck. The Nano suit voice is something you will come to hear quite often…as you frantically switch between stealth, strength and cloak!!!
Game Play
Crysis is an honest to god FPS. You can equip an array of weapons ranging from pistols to “a damn minigun”. The choice of weapon, or more to the point weapon modifications, greatly effect the game play. Remove your silencer to do maximum damage…but run the risk of alerting the whole island to your presence. Attach a silencer and go for the quiet kill? The weapon mods are an interesting feature of the game, but certainly not novel.
The nano suit on the other hand is the one item that effects how the game plays out for you most. You will find that using stealth early on is the way to go. As the story “narrows” your options you will find that you will use stealth less and less as you are forced to follow the story line.
Another great element of game play are the vehicles and the amazing physics engine that tie it altogether. It is really satisfying to smash a tank through a building and see it crumble….with the occupants crushed. Crysis is the first game to pull this off….and it gets my vote just for that!
Conclusion
I really enjoyed the story. It was well thought out and executed well . I like the freedom of the early levels, however felt a noticeable decline in the freedom after the aliens showed up. From that point on however the experience was so well delivered that I am willing to forgive Crytek…..as either way there is only so much sneaking around you can do in the jungle
My one complaint is this (POSSIBLE SPOILER), the last chapter “Last Stand” is buggy and confusing. Simply Google “Crysis Tac Launcher will not lock on” and you will see the utter confusion some gamers encountered at this late stage of the game. Having just secured the Tac Cannon I rushed out to see the Hunter crawling up the deck of the carrier.
I just “assumed” that I had to use the Tac Cannon on the Hunter, as after all I had just went to the trouble of getting it. It took me a while to figure out it was about 20 SCAR clips and a bunch of rockets I needed to use!!!!!
Tac Cannon “No Target Locked” Bug
That done I then suffered the “No Target Locked” bug (The solution BTW is: You can only lock the last baddie, not the hunter (spider like thing = hunter)…so stop trying. Shoot the 4 turrets off the last guy and then and ONLY then can you lock the two arms on the far left and far right!!! If this fails read on!!!)…..which was really annoying as it meant re-loading a save game. I hate when this happens as the sense of immersion is hopelessly smashed!!
That said one cannot ignore the achievement. Is this game better than Half Life 2, I think so. I know PC Gamer won’t think so as Valve are secretly bank rolling them
Crysis has to get 9 out of 10. I deduct one point for the debacle above. Great game….buy it…..but make sure you have at least a GeForce 8800 GT / GTS / GTX or one of the beefy Radeon cards….otherwise you will be seeing about half the frames you should be seeing!!!!