Crysis 2: Why PC Gamers and Console Gamers Win

Crysis 2 could represent a revolutionary change in how multiplatform development is conducted...

[ShabzS]

seriously... i am super duper happy to get a chance to play their game ... thank you crytek ... this was really one of the best announcement of the week ... it was the first big one ... and it was awesome

[M337ING]

And the great thing is: they're committed to making an awesome game on all 3 platforms. :)

[MAR-TYR-DOM]

"The goal is to be the best looking game on PS3 [and] the best looking game on 360 in the entire market."

Making it look like the best 360 isnt hard, making it look like the best PS3 game is going to be, HOWEVER, IF**** they are developing the game bottom up for EACH INDIVIDUAL console, then it is not Impossible.

[Szarky]

Don't know why you got a disagree MAR-TYR-DOM, but you're right IMO.

[TheRealSpy02]

he has disagrees because he's a ps3 fanboy. and that statement is completely untrue in the sense that he believes ps3 games look better...which they don't.

i have every high profile game on ps3 and none of them are more impressive than the high end games on 360.

and neither look anywhere near as good as PC.

i fully expect to get disagrees but i really don't care anymore. the ppl on this site are completely biased fanboys and have no sense of reality.

calling Killzone 2 the best looking game ever made was the joke of the year.

as for the game... it would be impossible to match crysis on pc on this generation of consoles. i just hope they don't dumb down the quality on the next game for those of us who prefer FPS on PC.

[Szarky]

TheRealSpy02, what about calling Uncharted the best looking game on the year? (I'm talking about consoles here)

[Pandamobile]

TheRealSpy02 speaks the truth. It's been two years and the only game to have better visuals than Crysis has been it's expansion and now Crysis 2.

When my friend brought over his PS3, it was like comparing penis sizes. He was convinced that Killzone 2 had the best graphics around, so I went around and demonstrated (by looking up-close at textures, models and examining the shaders and physics) that KZ2 had nothing on Crysis' 1024 x 1024 pixel grass textures :)

This may sound fanboyish, but it's the truth. And don't complain and say "Oh, that's just a ground texture and no one looks up close at things like that in real games", because that's not true. That's what graphics are. Finite details that many people don't notice and just assume that theirs are better.

[SaberEdge]

It is the truth. I have both consoles as well and I own most of the best looking games on both consoles. Most of the PS3 exclusives people talk about (like Resistance, Ratchet & Clank, LittleBigPlanet,etc.) look completely average and there are literally dozens of games on the 360 that look equally as good. Then there are games like Uncharted and Killzone 2 that really are doing some fantastic things with the PS3 hardware. But they aren't any better looking than the better-looking 360 games.

Alan Wake and Mass Effect 2 are just as technically impressive as Uncharted 2 and God of War 3. Those games all look fantastic and they all excel in their particular ways.

[xwabbit]

How is he a fan boy? didnt u see all those articles about developers saying the ps3 was hard to developed for ? the 360 is like a computer, WAY Easier than the PS3

[SaberEdge]

How about reading some more specific explanations by actual developers, instead of vague comments by publishing execs about maxing out a particular console.
Read this, for example: http://www.gamedaily.com/ar...

And here is what John Carmack says about the two platforms: http://www.destructoid.com/...

After all, we have heard this nonsense before about maxing out one or the other of the consoles, and it never turns out to be true. I tend to trust developers that actually go into a little more specifics about the strengths and weaknesses of each console.

[caladbolg777]

I guess I'm just not all that jazzed about Crysis 2 on PC nor consoles. IMO, Crysis 1 was fairly lackluster, and because of that I just can't get interested in C2.

[evrfighter]

crysis had potential. Major potential. Their track record for post launch support can be considered in no better term...Crappy

They need to work on their online modes quite a bit before they can be considered a major fps developer.

[TheRealSpy02]

why are 'gamers' so quick to point out a game's flawed, secondary, multiplayer whenever it actually attempts to have one. but then shower praise on games that don't even attempt it? i never understood that.

the multiplayer in crysis is very ambitious. and the lack of PCs that can handle it, combined with the heavy, already established competition made it very difficult for them to compete. but not many games go for the scope they went for. and in a lot of ways, when the lag was good, the multiplayer was a blast.

also, you're short changing the best looking game ever made cuz you had issues with the online element? seems a little shallow.

[WildArmed]

because Crysis is an awesome franchise n every1 should be happy to be able to play it.
now only if they port Crysis warhead n Crysis over too :/

[Pandamobile]

Fantastic article!

I'm glad my Crysis 2 experience on PC won't be hindered by the lack of power the current gen consoles have.

I'm sure a lot of people that follow Crytek's news could see a console version of the franchise coming after they acquired renowned console-dev company Free Radical.

Can't wait for Crysis 2 :D

[Fishy Fingers]

I'd say it was pretty obvious after they announced Warhead and stated that will be their last PC exclusive.

But regarding the PC, Crytek will always continue to push the platform to the limits. I just prey the new engine is optimized better.

[rukia_chan]

crysis is boring.. :/

[Pandamobile]

If Crysis is boring, you're doing it wrong.

[M337ING]

Yup, its all up to the player's imagination.

Crysis is only as fun as the player is creative. Of course its going to be boring if you play it like a standard, corridor-shooter.

[Pandamobile]

For sure.

I loved every freaking minute of Crysis because it was so dynamic. It took me a full 24 hours of play time to beat it because I stealthed my way through the entire KPA parts.

I'd sneak out, assassinate a patrol, take his stuff, find cover, rinse and repeat and boy was it fun.

[potenquatro]

They will get the most out of every platform. But I hate how pc game devs always call conslole versions "dumbed down" or "distilled" like they say in the article. For known hardware reasons, consoles won't have the same grfx. And they tend to slow down the game a little for analog stick use. But overall it's the same thing. Same missions, same everything. COD4 was literally the same on consoles and pc. W/e. I just feel like some in the pc crowd still don't give consoles their credit. I really wanted this game for console, but I guess it's going to have to be on pc with low res again for me. :(

[free2game365]

The big debate is accessability and mass marketing vs focus and niche. Why can't anything seem to be made for specific markets now without people from other markets complaining about getting a watered down experience? Why should a racing simulation controls and physics be dumbed down so it plays better on a gamepad, why should a first person shooter slow down and makes the enemy movement/aggression slower so it plays better on a gamepad? When it comes down to it, there are already games that fit that gamepad niche. Today there are almost no PC centric, mouse and keyboard, and technologically innovative first person shooters because of the large outcry for everything to be on each platform. There's a place and a market for everything, if you want a dual analog 8-10 button FPS you have killzone 2, new halo games, resistance, gears of war, uncharted, ect. PC games don't have anything designed for their gameplay standard and hardware when it comes to shooters, that whole market somehow was completely abandoned in an almost instant period.

[Tehdaza]

Same with the aim-assist you get in a lot of console shooters.

Some of my friends don't understand how you can play an FPS with a mouse and keyboard.

I tell them the next time they're trying to aim at a 3px target that's a mile away and that little mini-aimbot kicks in and locks on to the body of that enemy to come back and tell me that needing AI assistance to kill an enemy is superior to my twitch reflexes and accuracy to within on freaking pixel.

Look at your monitor. Look at it REEEEEALLY closely. See that little square? We can hit that with a gun. Can you?

[DarkMeans]

...but will us console owners be getting a more than decent level creator/editor when this ships?

[Pandamobile]

I doubt it. If you want a mod community, that's what the PC is for.

[UltimateIdiot911]

It's possible with PS3 after all UT3 did it.

[DarkMeans]

i hope so. Most times it's more about the user levels... well for me anyway.

[Pandamobile]

Well, barely.

We got a lot more mods than the PS3 did. How did that system even work, anyways?

Was there like a marketplace for mods where the creator could upload them at will? Or did Epic have to like select them or something.

[poopsack]

thats nice pandamobile, that you're showing ur opinion as a fact and then show that you dont even know what ur talking about.

[Pandamobile]

How many UT3 mods do you know of on the PS3? All I know of are custom maps.

[UltimateIdiot911]

I don't own UT3 but people just simply upload the mods using a PC I believe and that's it. Of course there will always be more PC mods than console mods but it's definitely possible on the PS3.

[M337ING]

You do have to cook the mods for PS3, but its a relatively simple process.

[poopsack]

well now that uve asked nicely, there are those maps u speak of, over 30 custom character mods, custom vehicles from the Angels Fall First Mod and others, weapons and more. Pretty much 60% of the things done for PC are also cooked for PS3, so if Crysis 3 got mod support it would be around that, or maybe even better, u never know. But yeah the best mod experience is obviously gonna be on PC.

[MGOelite]

will the ps3 version be developed seperatly to the 360 version????

[M337ING]

PS3 and 360 are together, PC is seperate.

[MGOelite]

oh goody... btw how did i get a disagree lol

[360DownINflames]

I dont think the next one will do well.

[M337ING]

Crysis is only as fun as the player is creative. Of course its going to be boring if you play it like a standard, corridor-shooter.

[Pandamobile]

i.e, Halo 3.

That game bored the hell out of me. It's just linear and repetitive...

[Tehdaza]

Alt of Pandamobile here (comment limit)

My bad, I was unaware of that. I thought publishing mods for PS3 UT3 was a completely different process.

Also, in my opinion, the Cry Engine level editor is far too complex for a console - It's hard enough on PC. Unless they completely revamp it to be console friendly I don't expect to see an editor on the consoles. It's not like FarCry2's where everything is extremely simple, the Cry Engine editor is how Crytek actually makes the games (including AI programming, lipsyncing, shader architecture, etc)

[Dead_Cell]

PS3-mods are loaded onto a PC by the creator then stripped onto a USB stick and loaded onto downloaders PS3.

[free2game365]

What do you do when a custom map has too many enemies for a console version to support memory wise, what do you do when texture resolution of a custom model blows your memory load on consoles? That's why mods for console games is pointless. It just limits it for PC users and it's totally underutilized by actual people. It's more of a fanboy novelty (something for PS3 fanboys to point that Xbox ones don't have)

[STONEY4]

Actually I've played many custom maps on UT3 PS3 with 16 players, some custom weapon mods, all bots with custom models, and the Titan mod, and there can be a crapload of stuff going on on-screen and the framerate barely ever dips. If Epic could to it, I'm sure Crytek can.

[mistajeff]

I really hope they let you pause to select suit powers this time, a la bioshock. holding the middle mouse and pointing around the wheel while getting shot at just didn't feel natural to me. I have a feeling the console versions will have this, but the PC version won't.

[Tehdaza]

Pause the game to switch suit modes? That would slow down the gameplay so much. You can bind it to other buttons if you can't use the middle-mouse button so well.

It's become second-nature for me...

[free2game365]

Logic assumes that a formerly PC centric developer would stay pushing high end stuff on the PC, but all real world cases have shown this to not be true in the least bit. Valves games have all looked the same accross each platform and it really shows in many cases, despite TF2's great art style some of the textures look like something suited for a game from 2003 and no amounts of phong shading on models or HDR really hide it, same with Left 4 Dead, some of the textures look worse in that then they do in HL2. Monolith is another example, in 2006 the head of Monolith exclaimed that "to focus on quality, you need to focus on the PC". Quality I guess wasn't the focus of the company as they put out one game that didn't even come out on the PC and another who's PC version was a straight port that had almost no resources to patching and graphically looks worse in many cases (especially texture quality), along with the gameplay being drastically watered down. Epic games is another example. While UT3 was still designed as a game to be played on a mouse and keyboard first, it was largely delayed and ended up shipping with less content than the previous Unreal Tournament game. Along with their large exclusive support for the Xbox 360. This coming from a company who's biggest projects were on the PC years before. As of now it also seems they've abadoned new Unreal Engine support for the PC as new UE3 games still don't support DX10 for Anti-Aliasing capabilities. Infinity Ward as another example shifting support to the Xbox 360 instead of the PC. Call Of Duty 2 for example on the PC had 2-3x higher resolution textures than the Xbox 360 version, while in COD4's case it was pretty obvious it was totally lead on consoles as the PC version had the same blurry low resolution textures from the Xbox 360 release of the game. All of this remains to be proven about Crytek, but honestly after every other developer dropping support for the PC and dumbing down games technically for consoles I don't really have very high hopes about Crysis 2. When it comes down to it, it's likely to be more linear, less open, and less of a technological innovation. PC gamers lose in this.

[Tehdaza]

I'm about 75/25 on agreeing and disagreeing with your comment.

Team Fortress 2 has fantastic graphics despite its cartoony appearance. The textures are hand painted (traditional paint brush and paint) and scanned which is part of the game's visual esthetic. The model and texture detail really is top-notch, especially in the characters.
(picture: http://img196.imageshack.us...

But no matter how you spin it, a game will always look better on PC in some way. COD4 on the consoles didn't even run at an HD resolution. It ran at 600p (Source: http://www.ripten.com/2007/... My crappy computer at the time had no problem running it maxxed out at 1680 x 1050 - including 4x anti-aliasing, with a solid FPS.

And there's no way to tell how Crysis 2 will play out. All we've gotten so far is a teaser with no gameplay depicted. Less of a technical innovation, yes, but that's only because they've already pushed the bar so far already.

[Cacic]

Can't wait to buy this now I don't have to trick out my labtop.

[HDgamer]

More biased fanboys in the gamer zone speaking of games they have never played nor have any real interest in. It's just so funny. Comparing graphics and then making bold claims without any facts presented. In the end gamers are either discussing the gameplay and how fun that game was instead how they compared graphics by counting pixels all night as if they were constantly comparing each other penis length, width, and hardness next to each other.

[GamerPS360]

haha good one. While they compare their penis length, size or whatever I will be playing live :D