MAXIMUM REVIEW!

Crysis 2.

Being the budget gamer I am, I’m forced to play the shiny new PC games on a somewhat graphical lackluster rig. In this case my laptop. While I can game quite comfortably on my laptop, it is starting to show its age when processing the eye candy. Never the less Crysis was able to detect the ideal settings for my laptop and runs rather well on it. We all know Crysis 2 looks amazing.

Even though the graphics are scaled down for my laptop I was still really impressed with the visuals. Crytek did a really good job with creating a destroyed, occupied New York city and while the open world exploration is gone there is still a large amount of freedom for the player to navigate through levels. I found myself using different tactics where possible depending on the terrain of the level and the amount of bad guys in my sights.

Crysis 2 lets you know when you’ve reached a strategic moment which usually places you on some high perch looking down on the level that awaits. During this time you can go into binoculars mode and have a look around, highlight enemies and ammo dumps as well as think about how to get from your current position to the objective.

In all honesty though, there isn’t really much emphasis for you to be strategic. I found myself just having a quick glance at where the enemies were, where the ammo was and if there were any vehicles packing heavy weaponry. The problem is that your radar gives away too much information. It lets you know where enemies are and which way they’re looking. I know you’re in a high tech suit, but a little less of warfare information would have made things a little more difficult and surprisingly. Sorry soldier hiding around the corner, but I know your there! There have been moments though where I was caught by surprise but I think this was just orchestrated by the game itself. The AI aren’t that smart either, too many a time have I caught a soldier glitch walking into a wall only to die by an equally unimaginative and over reused melee kill.

The suit is the real star of the show though. The suit powers have been more mainstreamed since the original Crysis; powers can be activated and deactivated by a simple key press, though the command star is still there. I never did understand why sprint was a power though. Yes sprint is slightly faster in Crysis 2 than other FPS games but it’s not that fast. Maximum armor and cloak are probably the 2 “real” powers you use the most often. Sprint can be used in conjunction with cloak and maximum armor but it drains your suits energy at a higher rate. The same when you use the power jump. The suits power animations though are quite impressive. I especially liked going in and coming out of cloak mode. The animation on the weapons and abilities like grab and melee, while nothing new were all rendered very smoothly. You also have nano vision too which is basically thermal vision. It’s necessary to use in low light parts of the game and when tracking down foes, but really it’s just thermal vision. Why call it nano vision. I felt like there was a missed opportunity here for more suit powers.

Crysis 2 forces you to use the suits powers a lot, but as you progress through the game, you build your own method of combat style with the suits abilities. For the first part of the game I was being very covert and had some excellent moments where I would clear a whole level of enemies with melee kills or just sneak straight pass them. It’s enjoyable but time consuming and you soon find yourself combining powers as the situation evolves around you. Different enemy types require different approaches and mixing all these up kept me thinking throughout the game. I certainly didn’t feel I was on rails shooting non-stop, though there are boundaries and limitations to the freedom you have in levels now. The open world island of the past is gone, but there is still a level of choice to what you can do.

What I really liked about Crysis 2 was the on the fly customization of weapons and your suit. Each power tier can be upgraded to have a bonus trait. For example cloak can be upgraded to use less suit power and the time to activate cloak is substantially quicker. These upgrades cost nano points which you collect from the dead aliens in the game. Weapons can be modified to have different types of scopes, silencers, attached shotgun/grenade launchers, extended magazines, firing modes. I definitely appreciated being able to change the weapons in the game to meet my needs. Something I wish I could see in more FPS games.

The story in Crysis 2 is a lot more character involved. In the previous Crysis I felt there was more emphasis on just the suit, the island and the alien invasion. In crysis 2 there is a lot of dialogue and cut scenes between levels. Some might say too much but I didn’t feel like I was being pulled away from game play for too long and I did enjoy following along with the story.

There’s multiplayer too, but when it comes to FPS games there is only one FPS game I play online and that is the Battlefield series. I played a bit of the multiplayer but found myself just running around aimlessly with my team mates or cloaking up behind enemies etc. It’s fun for like an hour or two but nothing engaging or rewarding about it at all.

All in all a good shooter and an enjoyable single player. Use it to benchmark your gaming rigs.