Crysis 2The events take place in New York City in the year 2023, three years after the events of the original Crysis, and we begin with reported leaks of an alien virus taking over the city. Put into quarantine there is no escape. Then we go onto a ship, where our protagonist: Alcatraz, and his Force Recon team have been given a 'simple' operation to perform. They must infiltrate the area and rescue nanotechnologist Dr Nathan Gould and bring him back alive. Things don't go as planned though, and when the ship sinks, almost drowned , Alcatraz gets pulled out by a man called Laurence "Prophet" Barnes. After passing out, Alcatraz wakes up with a Nanosuit on, and Prophet is in the corner: he won't need the suit anymore. Your objective still stands though: you still need to rescue Gould.
This ‘basic’ extraction mission though turns into a much higher profile story as the alien Ceph land and begin their attack. It’s in some ways your standard sci-fi story, with lots of alien tech being in tow and the discussion of conspiracy mixed in, but for some reason I did not find the story as memorable, few things in here to really distinguish it from the crowd of other games in the sci-fi genre. There are some great inclusions such as the interesting ending and some good bluffs and moments of good story telling, but given this was written by author Richard Morgan one may have expected a little more. I found the story itself take a little time to actually get going, with the first little bit of the campaign being ever so slightly dull at times. Once the Ceph get in on the action though it gets more interesting; but far from being spectacular at times. Another small gripe I had with the story is the silent hero; something which, considering some recent games is getting a little wearing: although I’m someone who wants to relate to the character I’m controlling more.
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| He was 2 days from retirement |
The graphics themselves are what you would’ve expected from the sequel to Crysis: it looks stunning. The crispness is one thing, but when the story unfolds and things start to move as more happens to the city is enough for the jaw to say good day to the floor. Note that this is me playing without HD, I think with HD my mind might not be able to take it. The actual game world itself sets itself out as a sandbox game, but is slightly linear: you have large areas to traverse, but the basic structure of the mission being ‘go here, fetch this’ type of thing. You have a large area, but the freedom you get is down to how you decide to get to your objective. The use of tactical awareness: tagging enemies in an area and planning a way around them, or using heat vision to do the same style of thing make for a nice way to play.
Now this leads us into the best thing about the gameplay: the Nanosuit. This is a piece of equipment which turns you into a supersoldier. This itself adds to the strategic elements the game offers to progress through the story. You have the choice of power: faster running and jump like a superhero on steroids, passing over the ground troops and dealing with the rooftops, stealth: cloak yourself and either sneak around the enemies, or kill them one by one or the basic super shield: making frontal assaults another viable option to cause chaos. This is a great concept which allows for many different ways to play, and experimentation works a treat. However this does have one downfall: it is possible to complete the majority of the game with little combat if you use the stealth well enough. This is a possible outcome, but I know little about who would choose that and that alone for their play through of the game first time as it would take out most of the fun. These three are linked to the same meter, balancing your use of the ability is key, as you don’t want to be in the middle of a group of enemies and having your suit run out of power: leaving you defenceless and at the mercy of your enemies- who as usual have no meaning of the word mercy in their vocabulary. As the game progresses you can upgrade your suit in areas to suit how you play the game, and gain weapon attachments to mean you play your own way: want to play stealth? How about faster launching of the cloak, capped with a silencer? This helps make this game feel great in the gameplay area of things.
The campaign is around 8-10 hours long, good for a first person shooter these days; cap that with an excellent musical score, with the only quibble with the graphics being the ragdoll physics: but aside from that is the best looking console game at this moment in time. The atmosphere of the game is good, but the disappearing bodies lessens the immersion at times and late on checkpoints get a little annoying and you wonder as you move on when the next one is going to pop up.
| We were in here first man! |
Now we move on to the multiplayer. In this it is the basic multiplayer setup, six game modes to play, 12 maps, and little to set the basic multiplayer groundwork alight. The fact most of the game modes are locked, having to get to level 25 (about half the ranks) to unlock all the modes is annoying, meaning if your someone who finds deathmatch and team deathmatch boring you’ll have to get used to it whilst you work your way through the levels to get that mode you want. These modes are similar to what you’ll find in most other games: capture the relay, assault, the Crysis version of Search and Destroy etc. The other thing I found is that the weapons set ups and unlocks are quite poor, with only assault class being unlocked to begin with, and at certain level points you are given one unlock to pick another. It takes time before you get to create your own class, with requires even more unlocks so you can customise your Nanosuit and attempt to crush your enemies. It leads to at times an unfair advantage to those new to the game. One of the other problems I found is the somewhat lack of variety in map choices. After playing online for half an hour I only knew what the map Skyline was like: it came up far too often, and others not enough. I hit the 6 hours online mark before the Mall level came up, and I’m still waiting to see what the Downed Bird level is like, and this is playing across the majority of the game types.
On the plus side the xp system works well here, with there being four areas to level up. One is based on your overall performance, and three subsections for your use of the three Nanosuit functions. It means it basically tracks your general playing style, showing you which you use most online. It’s nice to see this type of approach and a nice change from other online shooters. The experience is a fun one if you give it time, but sadly you do get the odd person sitting in the corner of a room, Stealth module on waiting for their prey, but that’s something which I’m unsure whether it will be possible to sort that out in any online game.
The achievements are pretty basic stuff sadly, complete such and such missions, play online for a long time, but there are sparks of brilliance such as killing an enemy with a donut sign, or search a library for a certain book. Other than that there could have been some more imagination, especially with the goldmine the Nanosuit holds for achievements.
This is a game with a story which could have been better, but the gameplay is superb and the freedom of how to complete the game is nice and fresh. The online is enjoyable stuff given the patience, but overall this is a good game and worthy of some of your time.
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