Crysis

[searanox]

Describe the gameplay elements please.

I already did. No other shooter is as visceral, interactive and cerebral as Crysis is.

 

[ReepNeep]

once again...NO you dont need the mind blowing graphics in order to enjoy the game. There are enough game play elements there to make the game enjoyable as it is. Just because it's known for it's graphics doesn't mean that's all the game is good for playing.

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

 

[searanox]

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

Do you just ignore every argument that you can't reasonably respond to?

 

[Aries_Split]

once again...NO you dont need the mind blowing graphics in order to enjoy the game. There are enough game play elements there to make the game enjoyable as it is. Just because it's known for it's graphics doesn't mean that's all the game is good for playing.

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

Hmm, I should rip on a game and say it is a terrible game without giving any reason for it.

Either explain, or shut up.

 

[ElArabDeMagnifico]

The community of crysis is so divided that I don't even bother talking about the game anymore. I'm just going to pick people up and throw them into shacks, or mod it to where I'm in Jurassic Park and enjoy myself.

 

[Flour]

No, I'd still call it open world. It's not like COD4 (which is still an excellent game) where even when you're surrounded by fields, magic fences block every route except one. There is one primary objective to focus on, but within that you have freedom to move around. It doesn't let you walk to the other side of the island, but would you even really want to do that when the objective is right there? The GTA series are open world games, but they've constrained the areas you explore based on a linear main story. It's not a sandbox game, but it's open.

If you run around in the open getting shot at, you will run out of energy quickly. Hint: don't do that. You need to control the tempo of battle using movement and cover to keep giving your energy a chance to recover. Once I started getting that down, I had plenty of energy unless I got suprised, but then I switched to speed and ran off (which still helps even without energy) to recover energy and was soon ready again. If cloak lasted any longer it would be way imbalanced, don't think of it as a magic wand to get you across an entire battlefield, use it as a method to move from one piece of cover to a different piece of cover undiscovered.

If it's an open world, then I expect to be able to walk to the other side of the island, if only to find an easter egg or something.
As it is right now, the game gives you the illusion of choice and punishes you for exploring.
The GTA games, after a point, give you a fairly big world to explore without punishing you for moving away from the objective.

Cloak is still a magic wand, making the enemy wonder where you are even though you cloaked in an alley with only one exit, and the exit being where the enemies are.
I usually had enough energy to do anything I wanted, but that doesn't mean the copies didn't out-perform the suit I was using.(once I found this out, I downloaded a trainer and used the unlimited energy option) I don't care if it was imbalanced, what I learned from the story implied that I was supposed to be a god in that suit.

 

[searanox]

Visceral - Condemned 1 is a lot more brutal than this.

Interactive - hmm i have no idea on what you mean by this...

Cereblar - OH come on! Rainbow Six, Stalker? I guarantee that those are a lot more cerebral than crysis, you know why? Because you're friggin weak compared to your opponents! Unlike crysis in which you're some kind of hybrid between batman and super-man fighting Korean adolescents with ww2 guns!

The only thing you could argue about Crysis is that you have a full 360º on how you're going to win the game, you can enter the bases from any point and either enter shooting it like a psychopath or being a stealthy bastard like solid snake...

First of all, I said "and" there, meaning all at once.

Condemned is a pretty brutal game, but its gunplay is really weak. Melee combat is nice but it's not the same thing. There is a real sense of power and weight to all of the weapons, and Crysis has the best-feeling shotgun of any game (behind Half-Life 2's).

By interactivity, I mean how the environment can be... interacted with. The game boasts the most complex physics of any shooter to date, with the possible exception of Mercenaries 2, and it lets you pick up nearly any object, destroy small buildings, shoot down trees to crush enemies, and other similar things which are more or less unseen in other games (the closest I can think of are Half-Life 2 and BioShock with the Gravity Gun/Telekinesis stuff, but even then that's nowhere near as extensive an application).

Crysis is a smart shooter in that it requires very quick thinking on your feet to truly excel at. Yes, you can get through it alright on the regular difficulty without that much trouble, but try playing on Delta and you'll quickly find that exploiting your suit's powers is absolutely critical to victory. With the ability to constantly change tactics through those suit powers, different weapons/ammo types/modifications, the aforementioned interactivity with the environment, and the best AI in a shooter (yes, I know the Koreans occasionally do silly things, but that is hardly the rule), combat can be incredibly diverse, changing pace, tone and even, in some ways, genre, depending on how you want to play.

If it's an open world, then I expect to be able to walk to the other side of the island, if only to find an easter egg or something.
As it is right now, the game gives you the illusion of choice and punishes you for exploring.
The GTA games, after a point, give you a fairly big world to explore without punishing you for moving away from the objective.

Huh? Punishes you for exploring? What the hell are you talking about? The game will send sharks to eat you if you swim too far out, and it has steep cliffs to stop you from going outside of the map, but those are purely technical sorts of barriers meant to mask the level boundaries. The game has tons of open-ended missions featuring little hamlets, towns, etc. that are completely disconnected from the main objectives and free for you to visit at your leisure. I'm pretty sure the game even spawns enemies out in the jungle depending on how you play, in order to give you something fun to do.

Cloak is still a magic wand, making the enemy wonder where you are even though you cloaked in an alley with only one exit, and the exit being where the enemies are.

Uh, again, what? Have you played Crysis at all? If you're at a distance then you're effectively invisible with cloak mode, but even on easy the enemies can still detect you quite often, especially in daylight and if you're near them.

 

[CmdrGoob]

Describe the gameplay elements please.

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

Oh great, I love comments that are already refuted before they were even posted. Yes, searanox and I already described the good gameplay elements in Crysis that make it an excellent tactical and fast paced game. Maybe if you think otherwise, you could form an argument with more depth that "Nuh uh!"?

 

[CmdrGoob]

No, I'd still call it open world. It's not like COD4 (which is still an excellent game) where even when you're surrounded by fields, magic fences block every route except one. There is one primary objective to focus on, but within that you have freedom to move around. It doesn't let you walk to the other side of the island, but would you even really want to do that when the objective is right there? The GTA series are open world games, but they've constrained the areas you explore based on a linear main story. It's not a sandbox game, but it's open.

If you run around in the open getting shot at, you will run out of energy quickly. Hint: don't do that. You need to control the tempo of battle using movement and cover to keep giving your energy a chance to recover. Once I started getting that down, I had plenty of energy unless I got suprised, but then I switched to speed and ran off (which still helps even without energy) to recover energy and was soon ready again. If cloak lasted any longer it would be way imbalanced, don't think of it as a magic wand to get you across an entire battlefield, use it as a method to move from one piece of cover to a different piece of cover undiscovered.

If it's an open world, then I expect to be able to walk to the other side of the island, if only to find an easter egg or something.
As it is right now, the game gives you the illusion of choice and punishes you for exploring.
The GTA games, after a point, give you a fairly big world to explore without punishing you for moving away from the objective.

Cloak is still a magic wand, making the enemy wonder where you are even though you cloaked in an alley with only one exit, and the exit being where the enemies are.
I usually had enough energy to do anything I wanted, but that doesn't mean the copies didn't out-perform the suit I was using.(once I found this out, I downloaded a trainer and used the unlimited energy option) I don't care if it was imbalanced, what I learned from the story implied that I was supposed to be a god in that suit.

Why on earth would you want to go easter egg hunting on the other side of the island when you're a soldier in the military and you have an objective nearby? ADD? You don't want to be 'punished' for ignoring the objective you've been assigned so you can go easter egg hunting? Was, say, GTA3 not an open world game, then? You couldn't walk across it, you had only a bit of it to play in until you opened up more by following the linear main quest.

And you played it by deliberately cheating and thus getting rid of the gameplay mechanic that made it intelligent and tactical, because you were disappointed you weren't god. Erm, what?!

 

[CmdrGoob]

Describe the gameplay elements please.

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

Oh great, I love comments that are already refuted before they were even posted. Yes, searanox and I already described the good gameplay elements in Crysis that make it an excellent tactical and fast paced game. Maybe if you think otherwise, you could form an argument with more depth that "Nuh uh!"?

Already did, but in extreme irony you missed it....
Guess you're as bad as i am now huh?

Umm, in no way did you post something that could be construed as an argument that Crysis did not have good gameplay elements. This is what you wrote pertaining to gameplay:

the gameplay has been seen before
(although the cloak function is an interesting way of giving our koreans friends a wedgie), and the veihcle section plain sucks
(driving the jet is the equivalent of driving a tractor where the wheels are squares.)

But this is what we call a 'statement' and not an 'argument' and is also somewhat self-refuting in that you also called the ivisibility interesting and weak in that 'seen before' does not mean bad. It is also wrong, because no FPS has ever combined an open-world approach to achieving objectives with a well designed and balanced system of abilities which allow fast tactical switches between stealthiness, combat and movement, which especially suits the openness. The VTOL vehicle part did suck, but it was also extremely brief. The tank vehicle part is good, and even better you can get out of the tank and go on foot, if you prefer.

 

[CmdrGoob]

Stalker: Great game and atmosphere, but also nothing like the suit abilities, so Crysis has a different sort of gameplay and tactics that comes from having the stealth or movement abilities you get in Crysis. Also, doesn't have Crysis's physics.

Rainbox six: ditto.

So neither of those support your contention that it's been done before.

Actually, Deus Ex would be the closest, which you didn't mention (how's your gaming history?), because it is somewhat open and has abilities, but the abilities aren't as well implemented and the open regions tend to be smaller.

If you like the tank then use it! It's only if you don't like it, then you can get out.

 

[TOGSolid]

Actuallly you pretty much nailed it with Stalker. Slap the Oblivion Lost mod on there, and it turns into a very engrossing game with a lot of tactical depth as to how you can approach situations.

The opening movie I think is to blame for a lot of people going 'wait what!?' when they finally got in game in Crysis. You practically need unlimited energy to keep going like they portray in that 'show off the powers' intro.
The first time I played it I ended up convinced in a hurry that it was all a gimmick and the game sucked because I tried to barrel through it. When I played the demo again to benchtest my new laptop I approached it differently. I played through the demo a bit more slowly and found that suddenly I was rarely out of energy and was now having a lot of 'oh shit did you see that?' moments. Now I was bounding around on rooftops, zipping around jeeps to blow up their fuel tanks and popping out of nowhere and throwing people into each other. I even took out a korean base with a few chickens.
As the review on this site for Warhead said, this game is definitely more "Predator than Terminator."
I played through the demo a few different times and I'm pretty much sold on buying the game when I get home.
I mean, come on, how can you not love beating people to death with chickens?

 

[ReepNeep]

once again...NO you dont need the mind blowing graphics in order to enjoy the game. There are enough game play elements there to make the game enjoyable as it is. Just because it's known for it's graphics doesn't mean that's all the game is good for playing.

Yes you do. The only thing exceptional about Crysis are its nearly photo-realistic graphics. Take those away and you have an average at best shooter with a cartload of bad design decisions. Like the PC doesn't have enough of those already. Crysis - Graphics = Bad Game.

Hmm, I should rip on a game and say it is a terrible game without giving any reason for it.

Either explain, or shut up.

I think I hit a nerve.

Do you just ignore every argument that you can't reasonably respond to?

You call down the thunder...

The AI is an amusing combination of omniscient and retarded. Deus Ex, which Crysis lifts liberally from, had poor AI and took some real shots for it. Crysis's is even worse despite it being talked up as being revolutionary.

The vehicle sections (which will readily admit to not liking on principle) are downright awful compared to the likes of Tribes, Halo, GTA and UT.

The rest of their big features are ripped directly from other, better games:
The suit powers are taken directly from Deus Ex's Augmentations without any modification. Whether they work better is debatable.
The much hyped custom physics are really no better than any Havok powered game out there and the only way they differ from HL2s is that there are more physics enabled objects in the levels. After playing around with first Max Payne 2 and then hours upon hours with the gravity gun, Crysis's don't stand out at all.

The raw gunplay is inferior in quality to FEAR, COD4, Shogo, Quake (pick one) or any number of other top-shelf PC FPS games released over the years.

The levels, despite being impressively large and outdoors, are strictly linear with no real choices as there are many wrong answers to the questions the game poses just like in Far Cry.

The story is standard sci-fi schlock with one dimensional characters and dialogue to match, even if it is somewhat convincingly delivered.

Crysis is bad enough that I can point to console FPSs that I enjoyed more. Even the much maligned PC port of Halo:CE was better on every possible criteria you could name except those tasty graphics.

 

[TOGSolid]

There was cloaking and super strength/super jumping/etc. in Deus Ex.

Come to think of it, my Deus Ex character had the same power set as the Crysis suit. I had built a ninja style character (mmm Dragon's Tooth Sword) with an emphasis on melee augs, mobility augs, and cloaking.

I still had fun in Crysis though.

The raw gunplay is inferior in quality to FEAR

Sorry mate, but FEAR's gunplay was absolutely terrible.

 

[CmdrGoob]

Stalker: Great game and atmosphere, but also nothing like the suit abilities, so Crysis has a different sort of gameplay and tactics that comes from having the stealth or movement abilities you get in Crysis. Also, doesn't have Crysis's physics.

Rainbox six: ditto.

So neither of those support your contention that it's been done before.

Actually, Deus Ex would be the closest, which you didn't mention (how's your gaming history?), because it is somewhat open and has abilities, but the abilities aren't as well implemented and the open regions tend to be smaller.

Played Deus Ex. Not it's not a open world, you're limited to levels. Just like Crysis. But you did say "somewhat" so i won't nitpick.

The concept has been done before just not in this fancy way!
If you're asking me if there was a game in the past that had a guy dressed in a nanosuit go invisible/jumping higher than a locust/running faster than cheetah than i would say "no".

If you would ask me if the concept was made before, well then i would say "yes".

Anyway out of curiosity how was Deus Ex the closest?
I don't remember anything about you getting invisibility or super strength...
Must be me old head rusting up :/

Yeah, it's definitely only somewhat open. Deus Ex didn't have the exact same abilities, but there was a speed one that also had high jumping, and there was definitely an invisibility one.

I mean, there are definitely a ton of games that combine stealth and shooting, but if that's your standard for 'seen it before' then there are really only a handful of games that can't be dismissed in that way. What's new in Crysis is how the stealth and shooting combination is enhanced by the different tactics you get from the suit and the different approaches you can take in the open levels.

Here's my take on this whole discussion. We've been comparing Crysis to a bunch of games, debating if it measures up to them. But all the games we've been talking about are masterpieces of the genre, no ones been comparing it to average or even just good games. Even if it doesn't quite measure up, that's high praise, far above average, and it's far above average that it combines elements from so many different excellent games. We're talking about the abilities from Deus Ex, physics from Half-Life 2, openness from Far Cry plus excellent gunplay. That's a bunch of sexy stuff right there.

 

[Flour]

Why on earth would you want to go easter egg hunting on the other side of the island when you're a soldier in the military and you have an objective nearby? ADD? You don't want to be 'punished' for ignoring the objective you've been assigned so you can go easter egg hunting? Was, say, GTA3 not an open world game, then? You couldn't walk across it, you had only a bit of it to play in until you opened up more by following the linear main quest.

And you played it by deliberately cheating and thus getting rid of the gameplay mechanic that made it intelligent and tactical, because you were disappointed you weren't god. Erm, what?!

Why would you NOT want to go easter egg hunting on the other side of the island? Or a bit less extreme, trying to swim/walk around something for a slightly longer, but safer way to an objective. I shouldn't get punished for trying to find R2D2 or a hidden enemy base.
Already said that I consider GTA to be an open world game.

I only used a trainer when I got annoyed by limitations that shouldn't exist. The limitations should be there for multiplayer, but it's just silly that in single player I'm not getting the suit that's shown in the intro.

 

[ReepNeep]

There was cloaking and super strength/super jumping/etc. in Deus Ex.

Come to think of it, my Deus Ex character had the same power set as the Crysis suit. I had built a ninja style character (mmm Dragon's Tooth Sword) with an emphasis on melee augs, mobility augs, and cloaking.

I still had fun in Crysis though.

The raw gunplay is inferior in quality to FEAR

Sorry mate, but FEAR's gunplay was absolutely terrible.

Believe me when I say that every single suit power in Crysis was also in Deus Ex. Two different augs were combined into the strength power and a couple of extra minor tweaks and functions were added across the board.

Different strokes, I suppose. FEAR had better gunplay than any other 'realistic' FPS I've ever played. Monolith games (almost) always get high marks from me in that category. I doubt they'll ever top Shogo in that regard, though.

Also, I compare to the best for three reasons:
Those games make Crysis look really bad.
Crysis is quite obviously borrowing liberally from Deus Ex.
I don't make a habit of playing bad games. These are the ones I know well and the ones that stand out in memory.

 

[TOGSolid]

Didn't I basically say that everything in Crysis was in Deus Ex?

Granted, I did kind of go off on a bit of a nostalgic tangent there. I really do need to give Deus Ex another play through just for laughs.

FEAR had better gunplay than any other 'realistic' FPS I've ever played.

The piss poor damage and lack of any sort of feeling of "oomf" behind the guns annoyed me. I guess I just have issues with any game that has headshots that don't drop people in one hit. Shogo was ace though, definitely no argument there.

I don't expect anything revolutionary out of Crysis. Crytek is a one trick pony and Crysis is just a dressed up Far Cry. As long as I can go and beat things to death with chickens in a wide variety of fun ways, I'll probably enjoy the full game.
Now Far Cry 2 on the other hand, had better blow my fucking mind with emergent gameplay, or Ubisoft is getting torch and pitchforked.

 

[CmdrGoob]

And Crysis makes many aspects of those games look bad. I mean, you're taking a game that does some aspect of something really well, and saying Crysis was worse at that aspect while ignoring all the things that Crysis does better than that game. Then you pick a completely different game and a completely different aspect and repeat. By the way you judge it, Crysis doesn't just have to be good, it has to be better at everything than every other game ever made. That's silly.

Take Deus Ex; it had abilities, but your energy doesn't regenerate at all, so you can't just have fun playing with your abilities. All your abilities can be on at once, so there's no real need to think quick tactical decisions about using different abilities because you can just jam them all on. Managing them individually only saves you small amounts of energy. You've got to be joking if you think Deus Ex's AI was better; they could be incredibly stupid, get caught on things, ignore cover. Crysis's AI is not perfect, but it's probably the least worst AI I've ever seen, especially considering it has to deal with those open areas and a guy who can become invisible. And there's no real physics, the levels are tiny in comparison, and the gunplay isn't that great.

Or COD4: Yes, I rank it as being a bit better and yes, it has only a bit better gunplay, but gunplay is COD4's real strength. But on the otherhand, try walking to things you can see that aren't strictly on the route you have to take. You can see fields and stuff out there in various levels, but if you think you might be able to go that way to avoid the enemy, you won't get 10 meters before a crappy wooden fence or something stops you, and you can't get over it, unless you're meant to. It is completely artificial in its linearity. And it really doesn't have much physics, there's a ton of immovable barrels and boxes and even lamps and stuff everywhere that don't ever move. In Crysis, even whole rickety buildings can collapse from a grenade explosion. And you don't have the extra tactical depth that comes from using the suit powers. And the COD4 AI is much worse.

 

[searanox]

The AI is an amusing combination of omniscient and retarded. Deus Ex, which Crysis lifts liberally from, had poor AI and took some real shots for it. Crysis's is even worse despite it being talked up as being revolutionary.

Really? I think it's some of the best AI in a shooter ever. They do an amazing job of working together to flank you. I've actually run into two groups of soldiers, seen one of those groups take cover in front of me and lay down suppressing fire and throw grenades, while the other group split into two and circled around me from different sides. This was definitely not coincidence, because I saw it happen twice. Furthermore, the AI is completely un-scripted, and firefights never play out the same way twice.

The vehicle sections (which will readily admit to not liking on principle) are downright awful compared to the likes of Tribes, Halo, GTA and UT.

The vehicle controls are a bit wonky but by no means bad. I'll admit they could have done the vehicles better, but it hardly ruins the game. They're still perfectly functional and usable.

The rest of their big features are ripped directly from other, better games:
The suit powers are taken directly from Deus Ex's Augmentations without any modification. Whether they work better is debatable.
The much hyped custom physics are really no better than any Havok powered game out there and the only way they differ from HL2s is that there are more physics enabled objects in the levels. After playing around with first Max Payne 2 and then hours upon hours with the gravity gun, Crysis's don't stand out at all.

Deus Ex is an RPG, not a shooter, and it takes a completely different approach to its powers; it's more a matter of resource management when using them, reaching new areas and whatnot, whereas in Crysis it's about exploiting them to their fullest potential whenever you have energy to spare. Even if it did lift some of its ideas from other games, so what? I think it does most of those things better than its predecessors.

The raw gunplay is inferior in quality to FEAR, COD4, Shogo, Quake (pick one) or any number of other top-shelf PC FPS games released over the years.

I disagree, but I'm not sure you can really quantify or qualify something like that.

The levels, despite being impressively large and outdoors, are strictly linear with no real choices as there are many wrong answers to the questions the game poses just like in Far Cry.

Guess what, buddy! Crysis isn't an RPG!

The story is standard sci-fi schlock with one dimensional characters and dialogue to match, even if it is somewhat convincingly delivered.

Point conceded. The story sucks, but I don't think anyone will argue otherwise. At the very least, its expansion pack is a bit better when it comes to the dialogue.

Crysis is bad enough that I can point to console FPSs that I enjoyed more. Even the much maligned PC port of Halo:CE was better on every possible criteria you could name except those tasty graphics.

Bahahaha...

In any case, my point is and has been that Crysis does so many things so well, all in one game. The fact that they have managed to implement so many fully-functional and even deep gameplay mechanics all into one whole experience deserves to be praised. The stealth gameplay is some of the best I've seen is a shooter. So are some of the vehicle sections (the tank specifically). The gunplay itself is fantastic, right up there with the best shooters in the genre; the close-quarters stuff is cool, sniping is awesome (though they don't give you enough ammo for that), and hell, even melee is satisfying and effective. Crysis may pull a few things from other games, but in which other shooter is this not true? Games are essentially constant iterations upon previous games, incorporating the best new features from the best titles to the point where they become standard. Crysis offers a glimpse at the future of the shooter, namely, large, open, highly interactive environments, with freedom in how you accomplish objectives, combined with different gameplay styles and mechanics that the player can change as he or she fits; this will become the standard. Far Cry 2 already seems to be taking Crysis' ideas and running with them, and it looks like it might even wind up being more successful in a lot of ways.