Crysis announced

[Varsity]

Oh, those Crytek boys kill me. Cryengine 2 will be powering Crysis, their new next-gen game for PC. Moving away from the awful puns though...well, see for yourself. If you don't read German, Lonely Rabbit has kindly translated the article's key points (http://www.evilavatar.com/forums/showpost.php?p=180829&postcount=5).

Article with screens (http://www.gamershell.com/pc/crysis/screenshots.html) (scanned, but presumably legit)
High-Def Tech demo (http://www.gamershell.com/download_12286.shtml) (same as at PDC, no audio)

[Okamura_Takashi]

Damn pretty. Nice to see a high-quality video of the tech demo. They're getting really good at making island games. Wonder if they can do anything else?

Actually, joking aside, the "advanced shader technology" looks really cool as people are finally realizing seeing the same silly guy in the game is a bad idea. Procedurally generated faces... although, the ones in that shot look a little TOO similar so wouldn't be too good in an FPS.

[SMES]

Inching closer to photo-realism day by day...

[mister_slim]

Crytek does sexy outdoor lighting. I look forword to non-scanned images.

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

German student here, not gonna sit here and translate it all but I'll rattle off a few interesting things I can pull from some of the pages. A lot of it is just the silly buzz words though and making normal stuff sound special.

The cry 2 engine supports dual core processors.
There are more effects (in terms of lighting I think) on a single tree than some other engines have for a whole game.
The aim/goal(?) of the cry2 engine is to have everything dynamically lit in real time, interactive and destroyable. The sun goes from east to west, clouds and gigantic rock formations throw their shadows properly over every piece of the jungle.
Amongst the cinematic tools there's a speed effect (motion blur?). Objects lose their contours in fast manouvres and only objects in the middle of the picture are focussed.
(Caption to picture of aircraft carrier with yellow vest guy) The cry 2 engine puts emphasis on details like the lettering on the rocket or the vest of the deck officer. The vertical jump jet in the background can navigate around all objects itself.
There are no perceptible level boundaries (mentioned in the context of aerial battles).
You can save freely.
Developers are guessing at only ten hours of playtime, the multiplayer component will be emphasised.
Beside normal deathmatch and team deathmatch is a mode that pits two teams tactically against each other. Artifacts from the middle of the map can be redeemed for new weapons, upgrades and vehicles at each team's base. Robbing the opposing team of an artifact makes them lose those skills.
In multiplayer mode human models are deployed - we looked for the aliens here to no avail. There will surely not be a co op mode, in which you save the world together with friends.
Crytek unsure of a release date at the moment but guessing at 4th quarter 2006.
(Caption with the sunset) We mounted a silencer for the night deployment. Our compass appears to be broken however; the sun is going down in the north.
Long section which I skimmed over concerning comrades/killing them off, a molecular accelerator weapon, alien enemies, some strange hot/cold/ice dynamic that links in with your nano suit, and using that in combat/shockwaves striking aliens within a 50 metre radius. If people really want that cleared up I'll translate it properly if you ask.
It seems to say there aren't bosses in the game, but some enemies are so huge that you actually have to climb them to defeat them (sounds like a boss to me). Boots with magnetic soles assist you, the aliens are studded with metal (?).
You cannot command team mates, yet they will work together with each other in sieging positions.
Again, skimmed, but it seems some large calibre weapons are tied to your nano suit power and just a couple of shots may drain it.
No cutscenes, they want the player to experience story progression in normal game mode.
Aliens require sub zero temperatures, have a giant ice machine/snow canon which has transformed part of the island to make it inhabitable.
Nano suit keeps Jake (protagonist) hot or cold depending on area of island.
Something about American and Korean troops, I'm not sure if they're working together or opposed or what. Maybe that damn Kim Jong Il sent troops to assist the aliens.
While you can't influence the main story outcome, there are many variables along the way, for example Jake might have a romance with a pretty female soldier, to try and give high replayability.
Trying to make everything destroyable, Level Designer Sten Huebler is quite proud; "The times when a pathetic branch will stop your jeep are gone." Branches can be snapped off trees, plants trodden underfoot etc.
Through an easy menu you can mount silencers/telescopic sights/laser pointers.
Ah now thinks make sense, I've been reading this article backwards... A flying object crashes on an island that doesn't seem like a meteor. The North Koreans send their fleet to investigate. So does USA. I think forces are at first opposed till you find the aliens and then you work with the Koreans. Aliens using a giant ice canon to freeze the island as the need sub zero conditions to live.
The level they saw, air insertion, and from the apparently endless sky to the jungle below and the corral filled ocean there were no distracting loading times.
Start off investigating the flying object, dealing with korean patrols, scanning matter from the found object similar to in Condemned.
Minimum requirements, Cevat Yerli, director of Crytek says is a Shader 2.0 Graphics card. They (article authors) are assuming that you'll also need at least a 2.0Ghz CPU and 512 MB ram top play the title ok. To play at maximum settings you'll need a lot more power and CPUs with two cores are taken advantage of in Crysis. The programmers use a sophisticated load distribution system from the hyper threading chips, dual core processors, but also hybrids like the pentium extreme edition 840 and 955, or to profit from the planned processors with 4 cores in 2007. It's possible that crysis will be one of the first titles to support the coming direct X 10 and shader model 4.0. Suitable cards should appear in the second half of the year.

Whew.
That's everything for now.
Sorry it's kinda unreadable.
As I said I read stuff in the wrong order and skimmed some parts.
Ask if you need a particular thing clarified and I'll check it out.

[Qoz]

wow! Look at that screenshot at page 31 with the soldiers outside a house.
I thought it was a photo at first.. the HDR really shows here with the bottom of the ceiling viewable from the outside. And all those soft shadows and excellent texture and modelling work. Truly brilliant stuff! Those guys from Epic better get their act together, because this is gonna rock the world.
A fully destructable world with this kinda detail is mind blowing. I hope they get it right!

[easi]

Did you know that Crytek is actually a front for a white-supremacist group? I heard it online, so you know.. it's probably true.

[Varsity]

It seems to say there aren't bosses in the game, but some enemies are so huge that you actually have to climb them to defeat them (sounds like a boss to me).Shadow of the Colossus.

Aliens require sub zero temperatures, have a giant ice machine/snow canon which has transformed part of the island to make it inhabitable.Hostile Waters.

Kim Jong Il sent troops to assist the aliens.Team America.

Sounds good. :)

[bboy]

CTF please!

[StoneGut]

Looks very nice... I'm a bit mixed on the "10 hours of gameplay" but that's all I have time for theses days anyway.
Who in the hell is going to have 4 processors in their computer to play this? Not me.

[bboy]

http://www.youtube.com/?v=apzUpNK1NqM

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

Holy crap, I only just watched that video (the HDEF one), that is indeed insane.

[AversionFX]

Graphics look nice.

Game looks stupid. Jungle warfare is so boring.

[Grath]

Did you know that Crytek is actually a front for a white-supremacist group? I heard it online, so you know.. it's probably true.


Yes, thats why the 3 owners of the group are turkish, and there are more than 10 nationalities among the developers...

(i know you were joking)

[YoungAlCapone]

Graphics look nice.

Game looks stupid. Jungle warfare is so boring.

I agree, except I will go as far as to say the graphics are absolutely amazing, but I disagree with your reasoning. Spoilers ahead for those who haven't played FarCry pc(and xbox).

I think that the jungle warfare was what made FarCry cool, but the trigens are what made it stupid. I love that game except for the trigens, the trigens were terrible. Now I imagine it is going to be the same scenario here, except with the damn aliens.

I will play through the entire game because there is always cool sections against humans but wont finish because of the damn emphasis on the aliens towards the end of the game.

They did the same shit with FarCry Instincts, which I was really enjoying. Fucking zombies, and Serious Sam screaming kamikaze rip offs, for shame.

I love sci-fi and fantasy more than the average guy, but don't fuck with it unless you plan to make those parts as good as the rest of the game.

[MasterKwan]

"Jungle warfare is so boring.". I'd argue that jungle warfare done right isn't boring. I really enjoyed it in Far Cry. If I was going to change anything in FC it would be the weapons. I'd prefer more "Raven Shieldy" type reality in my weapons.

Yes, I could have done without the trigens too.

[Wombat]

I agree about the trigens as well. However, I don't think Crytek were the main developers on Far Cry Instincts, so they can't be blamed for that.

[Liquidize105]

Well, a short SP with emphasis on MP to supplant development cost isn't a problem as long as those 10 hours are 10 meaningful hours. It looks damn realistic but it better play realistic too. Less enemies will make each encounter more meaningful (a la Predator), so let's hope for great A.I.

[AntB]

The Crytech guys are really good at technology, but desparately need new writers.

[aj1pso]

This looks really amazing. I'm glad the crytek guys are back in full swing. I've loved them from day one.

That aside, I'm sad that I wont be able to play this. I obviously cant afford the kind of monster machine this thing will need and guess what? 90% of the computers in the world wont either. Too bad.

Maybe there'll be a console version? 3 processors is close to 4 ^_^;

[Thenetcase]

Looks very nice... I'm a bit mixed on the "10 hours of gameplay" but that's all I have time for theses days anyway.
Who in the hell is going to have 4 processors in their computer to play this? Not me.

Well some of us have motherboards that support two Dual Core AMD X2 processors. :) That would make.. oh yeah.. four "processors" (cores).

It's nice to see someone has dragged their head out of their butts long enough to actually utilize technology.


-TNC-

[H.Bogard]

It's nice to see someone has dragged their head out of their butts long enough to actually utilize technology.

If it werent Crytek....it would be nobody...
I sure hope they utilize dx10 as much as farcry did dx9
and dont gimme that bullshit that it doesnt use that many dx9 shaders....because ive beaten the game on both generations of cards and i CAN TELL...

[earthworm48]

Dual cores = 2. They talk of 4 core chips supposedly (sp) coming in 2007. Guess how many processors a quad core would represent theoretically?

[Montgomery_Python]

10 hours gameplay = pass.

[AversionFX]

I agree, except I will go as far as to say the graphics are absolutely amazing, but I disagree with your reasoning. Spoilers ahead for those who haven't played FarCry pc(and xbox).



Okay, I'll agree with you there. I will admit, that towards the end of the opening area of the game, when I got all the way to the top, I couldn't help but look down at the jungle and admire what I saw. Not to mention how smoothly my computer was still running. Simply amazing eye-candy.

Jungles aren't stupid, but when it comes to foliage, I would really much rather fight in a forest. The jungle environment would've been a lot more fun had the games pace been a little slower. Although, at some points, crawling through foliage with the MP5SD, and then tagging people in the face over 500 yards away with precision accuracy (i was kind of weirded out by that), amazing fun.

The other 2/3rd of the game really bored me. I felt like I was in some stupified version of Jurassica Park or Dr. Moreau's Island. The weapons were also very cliche and very boring. I know a lot of people don't like it, but even if lots of weapons (by category) are similar in some aspects, the merrier to me. I love a plethora of weapons in a game.

[Salamande]

That video is outstanding. Just imagine: in 2 or 3 years, the hardware required to run a game like this at full quality will be about 150 bucks. Mind-blowing.

[Montolio]

Wow, very impressive. Thanks for the information Varsity.

[Pumped'Up]

FarCry on PC was great as a game and amazing as a tech demo. Too bad nothing else took advantage of the cryengine - what a complete waste.

Crysis will fall into the same categories as FarCry. What games come out using the new engine will matter most. Otherwise, this is nothing but a useless tech demo.

[rubek]

I loved the jackhammer in FarCry.
'twas fun to jam in people's faces.
Really looking forward to this,
glad someone is focusing on the PC for a change!

[Rirath]

That video is outstanding. Just imagine: in 2 or 3 years, the hardware required to run a game like this at full quality will be about 150 bucks. Mind-blowing.

I'm doubtful of this. That would be true when that sort of technology launched at a reasonable price, but PC prices are just going insane anymore. The "enthusiast" line is just driving things through the roof. Single cards costing the price of entire desktops will merely be at a normal launch price by that timeline, it'll take even longer for them to become bargains.

I'm perfectly happy with my AMD64 3200+, Geforce 6600GT built earlier this year, but I can't see myself upgrading again anytime soon. Not for this game, or any other. It's insane "max" specs like this that'll make me jump ship back to systems like the Xbox 360, until the next or next-next gen of PC gaming does indeed become bargain bin again. At least I can run this gen and should be able to run Oblivion and it's gen fairly well. From the sounds of things, maybe even this game will run.

As for the graphics, one thing disappoints me: the sun. They show rays through a leaf and such, but come on... who could look right at the sun like that? It kinda blows the realism, no matter how pretty you make it. That, and I still long for the day when we see actual fully destructible environments. Brushing past that plant is ok, but give me every single tree that cuts, falls, and splinters realistically. Give me ground that can be blown up. It'll impress me much more, even if the graphical shine has to be scaled back. It looks like they have a start, but it would be my highest priority.

[PixelSamurai]

Aside from the trigens, the worst part about Far Cry was its multiplayer. It was so laggy and half-baked. If they are focusing on the MP aspect this time, I hope they drastically improve their netcode.

Honestly, just give us some offically supported co-op. For fuck's sake!

[Captain Awesome]

10 hours of gameplay? They better have some rather impressive MP

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

Honestly, just give us some offically supported co-op. For fuck's sake!


Sorry, forgot to mention this bit which was said after the multiplayer modes. Dunno why I left it out.

"In multiplayer mode human models are deployed - we looked for the aliens here to no avail. There will surely not be a co op mode, in which you save the world together with friends."

I'll stick it in the main post.

[KarmaGhost]

Video was beautiful, but I'd be interested to know how it was captured because there seemed to be some blur. The face at the end still looks completely real to me.

[Spiffae]

I'll count myself in that odd 10 percent who really didn't like far cry at all. The tech was superb, there's no doubt, but I found the combat (all of it) to be extremely unsatisfying. It was impossible to take seriously because of the ridiculous voices of the mercs repeating the same tired crap over and over ("I'm gonna shoot you in the FACE!"), the weapons were all over the place (a silenced mp5 can snipe?) and the combat just never felt right. When you die over and over, and it takes you three reloads just to figure out where the shots are coming from, that's not good AI, that's poor game design.

I read so many 95% reviews that I forced myself through it, telling myself that the good part must be right around the corner, but the truth was when the credits rolled, I still hadn't found the good part. I hope they do something to the core gameplay and don't just make this a dressed-up far cry, because the tech looks amazing. It deserves great gameplay.

[F3nyx]

Far Cry was great except for the voice acting and the combat against trigens (their swipes could kill you through a wall, and they just weren't as fun to fight as human opponents). The implementation of jungle warfare was incredibly fun -- the human opponents acted with extreme realism, homing in on your footsteps, and you had to use visual cover and move stealthily to turn the tables on them. Nothing more nerve-wracking than crouching in a bush, watching an enemy walk up beside you and hoping that they won't bump into you. Or, of course, you could hijack a Humvee or patrol boat and blast your opponents apart with rockets, or acquire targets from half a kilometer away with the binocs and pick them off with the sniper rifle. God, what a game.

[Royal Fool]

Yes... FarCry was really cool, looked great and full of potential. But I really hated the AI and throwing in those trigen enemies was probably the worst decision those guys at Crytek made.

Crysis looks cool as hell, and I'm already drooling over the cool air combat and other neat stuff, but I'm having doubts about the final quality of it all...

[Booboo]

I still long for the day when we see actual fully destructible environments. Brushing past that plant is ok, but give me every single tree that cuts, falls, and splinters realistically. Give me ground that can be blown up. It'll impress me much more, even if the graphical shine has to be scaled back.
Actually, in a better translation of the article they talk about the fact that the trees are fully destructable. You can use them to block roads (and the A.I. responds accordingly), get over ravines, or knock down and get over walls.
As for the trigon thing, multiplayer had none of that and some of the mods, like http://www.obsidianedge.net/index.php , put in a lot more and relastic weapons in, (which is going to be a new feature in Crysis, according to other translations). Obsidianedge is an awsome mod, and a patch about to come out will add even more weapons, just check out thier front page.

[Lon Lon Rabbit]

Oi! I said I skimmed over it!
8(