Crysis

Crysis is a first-person shooter video game developed by Crytek in their headquarters in Frankfurt, Germany, published by Electronic Arts forMicrosoft Windows and released in November 2007. It is the first game of a trilogy. A separate game entitled Crysis Warhead was released on September 16, 2008, and follows similar events as Crysis but from a different narrative perspective.At the time Crysis was released, and years thereafter, it has been praised for its milestones in graphical design (commensurate with high hardware requirements). The game is based in a future where a massive ancient space alien-constructed structure has been discovered buried inside a mountain on an island in the fictional Lingshan Islands, near the coast of the East Philippines.The single-player campaign has the player assume the role of U.S. Army Delta Forcesoldier Jake Dunn, referred to in-game by his callsign, Nomad. Nomad is armed with various futuristic weapons and equipment, most notably a "Nanosuit" which was inspired by a real-life military concept.In Crysis, the player fights both North Korean and extraterrestrial enemies in various environments on and around the island.

As with Crytek's previous game Far Cry, Crysis is a first-person shooter game with many ways to meet objectives.

The player controls a Delta Force soldier codenamed Nomad. The player's weapons can be customized without pausing the flow of time, for example changing firing modes, changing scopes or adding sound suppressors. The player is also capable of selecting various modes in Nomad's military "Nanosuit" which draw power from the suit's energy. When the suit's energy is depleted, no modes can be used and the player is more vulnerable to damage before the suit recharges. One of four modes can be selected: Armor deflects damage and recharges the suit's energy faster; Strength allows stronger hand-to-hand combat, the ability to throw objects and enemies with deadly force, higher jumps, steadier aiming and reduced weapon recoil; Speed increases running and swimming speed, as well as other forms of motion such as reloading weapons; and Cloak, which renders Nomad almost completely invisible and suppresses movement noise.

The suit's integral facemask has its own HUD, displaying typical data including a tactical map, health, current energy levels, and weapons information. The view is electronic in nature, shown in-game through things such as a booting readout and visual distortion during abnormal operation. A particularly useful utility is the binocular function, which allows the player to zoom in and electronically tag enemies and vehicles from afar, thereby tracking their movement on the tactical display.

The player can engage enemies in a variety of ways; using stealth or aggression, bullets or non-lethal tranquilizers, ranged rifles or short-range weaponry, and so on. Enemy soldiers employ tactical maneuvers and work as squads. All soldiers will respond to noise caused by the player, including using signal flares to call for reinforcements. If the player has not been detected in the area, enemies will exhibit relaxed behaviour, but if aware of the player they will draw weapons and become combative.

GameSpot awarded Crysis "Best Shooter" in its "Best of 2007" awards, saying that "It was this open-ended, emergent gameplay--the ability to let us tackle our challenges in whatever way we wished." They also awarded it with "Best Graphics: Technical" and "Best PC Game" stating that "The firefights in the game are beautiful to look at, but extremely intense affairs that force you to think quickly--and reward you for doing so. It's a dynamic game, one that you can play several times to discover new things and to experiment with different approaches."

PC Gamer awarded Crysis its "Game of the Year" and "Action Game of the Year" in its March 2008, "Games of the Year Awards" issue. PC Gamer also remarked that "Crysis has pushed PC gaming to a new plateau, marrying the most advanced graphics engine ever created with phenomenal gameplay. From the cinematic opening to credits to its cliffhanger ending, Crysis is mesmerizing."

Gamereactor gave Crysis a perfect ten, and awarded it with its "Best Action Game of 2007", saying that "the action genre is forever changed."

IGN awarded Crysis its "Editor's Choice Award", saying that "the Halo 2-type ending... wasn't enough to deter me from heartily recommending action fans pick this one up."

Upon its release, Crysis was met with critical acclaim. Aggregating review websites GameRankings and Metacritic rated the PC version 90.23% and 91/100, the Xbox 360 version 83.98% and 81/100 and the PlayStation 3 version 80.90% and 81/100. The game was awarded a 98% in the PC Gamer U.S. Holiday 2007 issue, making it one of the highest rated games ever in PC Gamer, tying with Half-Life 2 andSid Meier's Alpha Centauri. GameSpot awarded Crysis a score of 9.5 out of 10, describing it as "easily one of the greatest shooters ever made." GameSpy gave it a 4.5 out of 5 stating that the suit powers were fun but also criticizing the multiplayer portion of the game for not having a team deathmatch.^[48] X-Play gave it a 3 out of 5 on its "Holiday Buyer's Guide" special episode, praising the graphics and physics, but criticized the steep hardware requirements as well as stating that the game is overhyped with average gameplay. GamePro honored Crysis with a score of 4.75 out of 5, saying it was "a great step forward for PC gaming," but criticized the steep hardware requirements.^[ IGN awarded it a 9.4 out of 10, hailing it as "one of the more entertaining ballistic showdowns in quite some time."^[17] A retrospective review for bit-tech.net in June 2010 criticized the game for failing to deliver on its pre-release promise, saying that the art direction was "boring and monotonous," that the nanosuit was underwhelming and that the plot could be summarized as "Rescue these people who look to be being held captive by Koreans. Oh no Aliens!" The review concluded by saying, "Crysis was the epitome of style over substance.