More on the Subject of Crysis

Maria Ozawa

Finished it. Tried not to rush it because you can only play a game for the first time once. I played it on the default difficulty because unlike a lot of people, I don't treat SP campaigns as another way to demonstrate my elite gaming skills. I prefer to just play through and enjoy it without the frustrations that usually arise when you play a game that was essentially designed for the default difficulty and then made artificially difficult on the higher levels. Maximum difficulty in FPS's often ends up requiring you to exploit map or AI bugs to win, which really defeats the purpose.
But I digress. Visually Crysis is, of course, absolutely stunning. Even if no one on earth can run it maxed-out, there are plenty of regions where I just had to create a save game so that I could go back and admire them again later. The tank battle through the valley is a good example, as is the retreat from the island by land and air.
The story is, also of course, balls. North Vietnamese discover alien artifacts, chaos insues. Not really in the same league as The Witcher when it comes to labyrinthine plot twists.
Crysis follows the current trend for games being quite short, with the developers attempting to justify the lack of content by designing the game as the first part of a trilogy. Yawn. The most disappointing aspect is how the bulk of the action is squashed into perhaps the last third of the game, so just when you think it's shaping up to be impressively epic, it's all over in a flash.
In terms of gameplay it's simply Far Cry + nano suit. Some driving, some boats, some stealth, some big firefights. Nothing really new, but nothing to complain about either. Well, except the pointless and dull alien section. The novelty of zero-gravity wears off pretty quickly, and then it's just another alien corridor shooter which you push through as quickly as possible in order to return to the outdoor goodness.
Still, overall the game is very, very good looking and apart from (or maybe even despite) the impossible hardware requirements it really does deliver graphically.