Crysis [2007]
Published by: Electronic Arts
Developed by: Crytek
Release date: 13th Nov 2007
Genre: FPS
Available on: Personal Computer
Our Score: 79
Game Review
Wonderful, stupendous, colossal, beautiful - and it's good too! At least that's what every other review on the net says! I've learned that in this world you're either original and stand out of the crowd or you go with the flock, so I thought why not write a bad review for Crysis, right?...
Joking aside now, you know I always try to be as fair as possible (lies!) when reviewing a game. I can honestly say Crysis is a decent First Person Shooter, with some good innovations and a vast open area with many possibilities for exploration and combat.
The game action takes place in a near future where a team of American archeologists is taken captive by the North Korean army just when they apparently found something really important on a tropical island somewhere in the South China Sea.
Your name is Lieutenant Jake Dunn, codename Nomad, and you were sent to search and rescue the missing archeologists, and investigate the strange findings of this team. Along with the other members of your Delta Force Team, codenames Aztec, Jester, Psycho, and the team leader Prophet, you parachute to the island when suddenly everything goes wrong. Some sort of jamming device briefly passes by and all hell breaks loose. Your chute doesn't open, and your team seems to be experiencing the same problems.
Luckily, your Nano Muscle Suit can absorb most of the fall impact, so everyone manages to make it out alive... for now. Unfortunately you, Aztec, Jester, Psycho and Prophet all "land" in different areas of the island, so first the team must reunite.
At this stage you learn a bit more about how the game and your Nano Suit work. Each US soldier in 2020 is equipped with a special Nano Suit that enhances his abilities. Suit "Powers" can be accessed by using the middle mouse click (default). This will open up a radial menu where you can select to boost your strength, speed, armor; cloak or modify your weapon "upgrades". Nomad has two stats: energy and life (hit points). Each Suit "Power" uses energy in its own way: armor absorbs hits while draining it, speed allows you to sprint as long as you have some energy left, strength allows you to perform power jumps, throw far and hit enemies hard with your fists, and cloak makes you invisible.
Conclusion
A decent game with very good looking graphics and decent multiplayer that has two major flaws: works bad on almost any hardware due to its pour engine optimization and was/is much overrated for everything and promoted as the new game messiah when it's just a regular 2007 FPS. I bet EA said: "Aliens and North Koreans, what could go wrong! Let's do it in 2 months!"
Gameplay: 75
Many possibilities to approach a combat situation: stealth, brute force... Weapon upgrades are a smart thing and the suit options offer the possibility of varied gameplay and high replayability in theory, but the way energy is limited and the pour engine optimization may prevent you from doing that. The really poor AI that everyone prays and the fact that you need 100 bullets to kill some targets makes Crysis even worse! The computer always ALWAYS knows where you are!
Graphics: 89
Very good looking graphics, but I wouldn't call it "photo realistic", and while I enjoyed most of the "inside alien ship" chapter because of the "tension in the air" there are moments where some things just look bad or unfinished. And how come just the palm trees fall when shot at?!
Crysis looks better than any soccer game on the market... but a bit worse than Unreal... (I know, that doesn't make any sense - it's not supposed to ;) )
Multiplayer: 86
Boosts the game a bit; it's dynamic enough to draw more players for it alone. Keep in mind that you need a powerful system and even Vista and DirectX 10 for some maps! And get Unreal! Why am I comparing it to Unreal all the time anyway?!
Sound: 77
You may notice I haven't talked to you about the sound and music at all until now in the article. That is *almost* for a reason... Nothing out of the ordinary! The music isn't too annoying but it really goes unnoticed, and the sounds can be repetitive but ok in general. It's cool that Koreans speak... in Korean... only on the hardest difficulty mode...
Hardware: 61
Don't get me started!!#$$%%@#11one Why even advertize for products in the intro if it doesn't even take full advantage of their capabilities. And passed that, even if it doesn't it should at least work decently! Not only Crysis slows down when passing through big areas, there are moments when everything freezes up for half a second or so. Every sound is loaded when "it happens": like gun fire; and that makes it even more annoying because it will freeze a bit on older systems
