Publisher: Crytek
Developer: EA
System: PC
Minimum requirements: 2.8 GHz processor for Windows XP or 3.2 GHz processor for Windows Vista; 1 GB RAM; 256 MB 3D video card; 12 GB hard drive space; DirectX 9.0c compatible sound card; Windows XP or Vista
Genre: First-person shooter
Release date: Available now
Review by: Jason Pitruzzello

While I would love to have said it first, it was Bob Mandel here at Avault who pointed out in November out how rich the holiday season was going to be for FPS titles. Just for the PC, we saw Timeshift and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, but if you add in cross platform games and console-only titles, you have Halo 3, Orange Box, Bioshock and Warhawk. The release of any one of these titles by itself would give any gamer a solid few months of first-person action, but the release of all of them within a few months of each other puts all of us players in a quandary. While most of us can afford some of these games, few of us can afford all of them at the same time. Choosing the right release is difficult, and it’s become even harder now that EA has released Crysis.

Crysis is a first-person shooter set in 2020, right here on our very own Earth. Archeologists, working on a remote island in the South China Sea, have discovered something strange. Before they can tell the world exactly what they’ve found, North Korea invades the island and occupies it, taking the scientists hostage. In response, the United States sends in a squad of Delta Force commandos (that’s you) armed with automatic weapons, bad attitudes and high tech nano-suits. Of course, nobody knows exactly what’s going on with the Koreans, the scientists, or anything else, so it’s no surprise that the CIA is involved, aliens start waking up by the thousands and at one point, you end up fighting inside a zero-gee environment while still on Earth.

While such a summary might cast some doubt on EA’s claims that this is an “epic story,” they know that what 99 percent of gamers are looking for in Crysis is the heady rush of fragging one’s enemies using a variety of lethal weapons and vehicles in conjunction with cool gadgets. In this respect, Crysis truly delivers almost everything for which a player could ask. There is a wide variety of weapons, ranging from the simple pistol to the TAC Cannon, with its miniature nuclear warhead. But the variety of weapons is effectively quadrupled thanks to the wide variety of customization options. Pistols and rifles can have silencers added to them for silent kills. For those who are challenged by short-range marksmanship, laser sights are available. Extra firepower can be added via the grenade launcher attachment. For those who feel that diplomacy is best conducted over long distances, there are sniper scopes. Players who feel exceptionally cruel can utilize incendiary ammunition and burn their opponents even as they shoot them. What all of these customization options mean for gamers is that there’s a weapon load out that will work for any style of play. In my own case, I put the sniper scope on the FY71, loaded it with incendiary ammunition and gave it a laser sight. After setting it to single shot, that weapon became my sniper rifle, as I preferred it to the precision rifle, whose primary task is long-range fire. Don’t ask me why; it just worked better with my play style. For close encounters, I generally went with the submachine gun with a laser sight. Silent kills, which were few and far between for me thanks to sniping, were accomplished with dual silenced pistols, also using the laser sight.

Of course, Crysis has science fiction elements, and what fun is a science fiction game without futuristic toys? The most futuristic toy in the game, aside from the horde of aliens you meet in the later portions of the game, is the nano-suit. Utilizing the wonders of nanotechnology, it gives you special abilities beyond those of mere mortals. It acts as body armor, SCUBA gear and a communication device. Furthermore, depending on how you set it up, it can grant specific boosts to your character: extra armor, strength, speed or even invisibility. Using any of these drains the suit’s energy, requiring only time to recharge. In addition to this, the suit also repairs your health. Just sitting around while you’re injured allows the suit to heal your wounds. This is quite handy, as there are no health packs to be found in the jungle.