Crysis 3 is a game that I really wanted to like. It looks amazing, the gunplay is great, and the new Predator Bow is insanely fun to use. But it does very little to make it an unique first person shooter. While it is certainly entertaining, Crysis 3 doesn’t do enough to stand out from the competitive crowd that is the first person shooter genre.
In the third game of the Crysis series, you play as Laurence “Prophet” Barnes, the first soldier to dawn the Nanosuit in the Crysis storyline. Prophet returns to New York City, and on arrival he learns that the private military corporation C.E.L.L. has enclosed parts of the city in a Nanodome. Prophet joins a group of rebels that are working to take down C.E.L.L. Along with the evil corporation, Prophet and the rebels will have to deal with the Ceph. The Ceph are the alien race that has featured in the previous Crysis games. During the five hour campaign, you’ll learn about all the shady business that C.E.L.L. operates in, and that the world is about to end. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?
It can not be said enough how gorgeous this game looks. It is by far the best looking game I have played. There are a lot of amazing effects that Crytek is able to get out of the CryEngine3. Crysis 3 also has some of the best facial animation I’ve seen in a game. The level of detail, the lip syncing, and facial expressions are all top notch. Everything about this game is very highly detailed. With New York City being a jungle now due to the greenhouse effect from the dome, the visuals of the overgrown buildings by the vegetation is very well done. Crytek is famous for setting the bar in terms of visuals in games, and they have done it again.
Crysis 3 plays like your typical first person shooter. Prophet has access to a bunch of weapons, manufactured by both human and Ceph. You have your standard pistols, machine guns, shotguns, grenades, sniper rifles, etc. One advantage that this game has over other first person shooters is the inclusion of a bow. The Predator Bow is the best thing about Crysis 3.
Like the previous Crysis games, Prophet’s nanosuit can provide him with certain powers for a short duration of time. One of these powers is active camo. The ability is disabled when Prophet starts shooting a weapon, except with the Predator Bow. It is quite satisfying when you are sneaking through an area with active camo on, taking down enemies with the bow and not giving away your position. It also helps that the bow is very powerful; most enemies will be taken down with one shot. You also have access to arrows with different tips. There is an electric tip, one that explodes on contact, and one that explodes after a few seconds. The first time you take down a helicopter with an explosive tipped arrow, you realize how awesome of a soldier Prophet is.
On the topic of the nanosuit powers, there are two different abilities that you can use at any time. One is to strengthen your armor, and the other is active camo. These abilities will drain energy, which recharges quickly when not being used. Prophet will also use energy for some other uses, like jumping extra high or delivering a powerful blow. In addition to the abilities, there are different perks that you can unlock to add modifiers to the suit. A few examples include reduced recoil, or to have the suit’s energy replenishes quicker. To unlock these perks, you must find upgrade packs throughout the levels. It should be noted that on my first playthrough, I found one upgrade pack, which was in the tutorial. I did not see another upgrade pack until the last level, and at that point it didn’t make much of a difference. Either the upgrade packs are hard to find, or I wasn’t looking hard enough.
Like your standard first person shooter, you’ll be navigating through many corridors, completing objective after objective until you reach the final cutscene. There are a few parts where the game changes pace, like driving in a large open area, or manning a gun during an on-rails shooting section. The enemies vary a little bit. The human enemies are all similar, the only thing that changes are the type of weapons they are armed with. The different Ceph aliens add some diversity to the different enemies that Prophet will have to take down. In Crysis 3 he can also use the alien weapons due to some added nano tech. Towards the end Prophet will have to deal with a few special Ceph enemies that serve as boss battles. Crysis 3 doesn’t do much to evolve the FPS genre, it just uses existing ideas and presents an average shooter.
That was the general feel I had during the game. It just felt average. This is the first Crysis game I have ever played, so I was excited to see what it had to offer that was different than the other shooters that have saturated the market. Unfortunately it felt like a game I have played multiple times before. While it does feature the best graphics I have seen in a video game, Crysis 3 just doesn’t do anything special to stand out. As stated previously, the campaign will take around five hours to complete. Fans of first person shooters will enjoy this game, but if you’re looking for a unique experience to spend $60 on, I would look elsewhere.
Score: 7.5 / 10
Crysis 3 was developed by Crytek and published by EA for Xbox 360, PS3, and PC on February 19th. A retail copy of the PC version was provided to us by EA for reviewing purposes.
