The Best Crysis Game

 

 

The name ‘Crysis’ has become sort of a symbol for intensive graphical benchmark, a behemoth of visual supremacy that has echoed throughout vastly different timelines (from 2007 to post 2020 with it’s Remastered releases) with an almost nail-biting, ‘Can-it-run-Crysis?’ frenzy. But this excessive focus on it’s graphical fidelity also obscures the fact that the Crysis games are indeed some of the most innovative shooters in the history of Videogames in general, by offering a massive amount of freedom and creative gameplay expressions that you just won’t get in the majority of shooters the genre has seen. When you take into account all of it’s facets and not just the ahead-of-it’s-time visuals, Crysis is truly a franchise that excelled in all the yardsticks of it’s genre, more so than most others could ever come close, even to this day.

And to celebrate this truly ahead of it’s time (both in terms of Graphics and Gameplay) series of games, this article will be an in-depth analysis of what the series really meant in terms of gameplay expressions and what’s the best title in the series, which is also a question that’s been asked a lot of times on the internet.

The first Crysis is almost universally lauded for it’s non-linear, sandboxy approach to the traditional FPS formula thanks to it’s massive open-ended level design and the ever versatile Nanosuit. And this is also where most of the criticisms stem from when it comes to it’s sequels which had ‘seemingly’ abandoned the key design elements of the first game and instead opted for narrower, tight combat sections. But even though the levels got significantly smaller in the sequels, they still offered multiple approaches in the gameplay cause of their layered and vertical design elements.

In fact, Crysis 2, the game which most of these criticisms are directed at, still had at least 2-3 different approaches to the gameplay in each of it’s levels. But what Crysis 2 and 3 did differently than the first game is deliver most the non-linear experience through the Nanosuit itself, by integrating it with a wide range of modules that alters the gameplay significantly depending on how you use them. So yes, the core gameplay theme of non-linearity was still there, but instead of having massive levels that featured multiple pathways, it’s mostly achieved through the newer and much-improved Nanosuit.

This is a key distinction that needs to be addressed when discussing the Crysis games where it’s pretty easy to conclude that the later titles just completely abandoned the non-linear approach of the first one, when in fact they still offered tons of open-ended gameplay, only they used much different means of achieving it than the first one. The non-linearity in the first Crysis came from both it’s wide levels and the suit functionalities, and this was still very much the case in the later 2 games where the mix of level designs and the suit abilities are what laid the groundwork for the non-linear, emergent gameplay to take off. But the emphasis was far more on the versatility of the Nanosuit 2 than the levels themselves. And though the levels were much smaller and shorter, the suit abilities had far more depth and variety, which did balance out the core gameplay and still provided lots of emergent gameplay expressions. 

 

 

Crysis 3 still looks absolutely phenomenal...

 

The revamped Nanosuit 2 took much of the center stage in the sequels cause most of the gameplay variations came directly from the suit abilities rather than the levels. And the suit also offered a far more balanced experience than the first Nanosuit in Crysis 1 where stealthing the game was the only option most of the times cause of the severely underpowered ‘Armor’ mode which most players would agree. And while the ‘Speed’ and ‘Strength’ mode provided some truly unique gameplay opportunities, they were more of auxiliary in nature than anything more. So streamlining the new Nanosuit into just Armor and Stealth modes actually ended up adding a lot more depth to these two gameplay expressions which was easily the defining parts of both Crysis 2 and 3.

And in case of Crysis 2, both gameplay features were slightly uneven where the Stealth mode was far more powerful (with the Stealth Enhance module) than Armor but overall it still provided a much more empowering and balanced experience than the first game. However, the only thing that marred the gameplay more than anything else was the A.I which glitched out on most occasions and ended up breaking the immersion in many cases. Had the A.I been more consistent, Crysis 2 would’ve easily been a much greater experience than it is. Nonetheless, it’s still a great shooter and a worthy successor of the first game.

And this is exactly where Crysis 3 shines as it takes everything that was broken or underdeveloped in Crysis 2 and fixes it completely, all while making significant strides in the core gameplay. The A.I is re-worked and doesn’t glitch at all, and both Suit functionalities (Armor and Stealth) have been taken to new heights altogether. Stealth with the Bow truly makes you feel like a Hunter and honestly I’ve never had a better first person stealth experience than Crysis 3, that’s how great it is. And the Armor functionality is farther improved with the Heavy Armor module (and it’s upgraded version) as now you can fully tank pretty much anything the game throws at you. In a nutshell, both Armor and Stealth are far more empowering and provided a massively replay-able experience.  

The Cryengine is second to none when it comes to depicting natural environments

But the Achilles Heel of Crysis 3 was it’s awfully short length, which resulted in pretty much about 5 hours of gameplay time. Had it featured just one more level, the choice of the best Crysis game would’ve been way more easier. Also, it doesn’t help that despite the much larger levels in Crysis 3, most of them were actually empty and doesn’t really offer much non-linearity in terms of different pathways or such. Most (if not all) of the non-linear experience comes only from the suit abilities, which is not exactly a bad thing considering that the Nanosuit had been made the most powerful it has ever been.

When I had first started the game, I couldn’t believe how quickly the energy meter started to drop whenever Cloak was activated, especially after coming from Crysis 2 which had a significantly longer and far more satisfying Cloak time. But the shorter cloak duration was fairly balanced out by the Bow which doesn't require you to move around that much anyway for taking down the AI. These are some of the ways that Crysis 3 improves upon it’s predecessors and really makes for a more memorable gameplay experience.

So in terms of core gameplay, I think Crysis 3 does edge out it’s brethren and is actually the best title in the series. But that’s just me, so let me know your thoughts in the comments.