Reviewed: Crysis 2

New York City gets the shit beaten out of it roughly every 18 months of average.  If it's not a catastrophic environmental event (tsunami, asteroid, earthquake) it's something else entirely (population-killing virus, Godzilla, that thing from Cloverfield, the 8th season of "24.").  You'd think by now, people would ease up on the old gray bitch, but no, EA and Crytek dusted the old punching bag off for another round with "Crysis 2."

There are a lot of great aspects of "Crysis 2 (C2 from here on in... one thing that's NOT great about the game is it's name... which never really gets explained.... maybe they say something in "Crysis 1" but I dunno... never played it.)" one of which, as just parenthetically mentioned, is you don't need to really know what happened in the first game to enjoy the full aspects of the sequel.  The game starts off with a long cut scene, a submarine, US Marines getting blown to hell, and a "super soldier" wearing a biologically-enhanced "nano-suit."  There's something about an alien invasion in the middle of Manhattan that looks like it borrowed heavily from the "Halo" franchise, and you soon take control over the nano-suit and go on a merry gun-blasting time throughout NYC.

Or do you?  The suit comes in three interchangeable flavors to "suit" your needs at any given time.  You can go "stealth mode" which is akin to what the Predator does before he swoops in a kills a former Governor, an "armor" mode which essentially allows you to "tank" around a level, taking and dolling out tons of damage, and a "power" mode which is more or less sentient, as you use it's "powers" at all times, whether you're jumping extra high to grab a ledge, sliding for cover, heaving heavy objects or doors open, etc.

But these powers come at a price.  You have an energy meter that will deplete based around your usage of a given commodity, ie, you can only stay "cloaked" or armored for so long (not very long at all, actually) and you can only sprint, run, slide for so long as well.  This feature is a nice "budgeting" aspect that goes beyond ammunition and explosives consumption you don't seen in many First Person Shooters.

Plot-wise, the game is long but too spread out.  The campaign mission runs a deep ten or so hours (unheard of in the modern FPS, with most shooters clocking in around the 6-8 hour mark).  Half-way thru the single-player I was shocked to learn that the game wasn't in it's closing stages, that I still had four or five more levels to play.

However, I cared little about the characters, as they all seemed one-dimensional and interchangeable.  A scientist, corporate billionaire, military contractor, military members and a secret agent round out the cast you interact with the most.  Again, nothing too crazy here, as I played the game mostly with the sound down.  I couldn't hear the dialog, and I didn't really care.

Given that the use of the suit's "powers" are what drive the game play, the developers silently urged players not to just run and gun thru the levels (quick side note: the levels do seem a bit linearly-designed; any jaunt down a side street will bring you face to face with rubble and debris making it impossible for exploration.  Kind of a let down for the game being set in such a fantastic locale), but instead to observe and plan out a tactical approach.  Usually, from a high ledge overlooking a plaza, you'll be prompted to switch to a "tactical" view and mark objectives and enemies before engaging.  By doing so, your marksmanship is greatly improved, as are your chances of survival.  As I found out more than once, dropping in without first assessing the given situation is typically folly.

Visually, the game is stunning, fast out-pacing anything that's currently available for FPSs.  The animation, set design and frame rates are all top notch.  The use of rich colors and graphics really stand out, and I only experienced a few glitches during the campaign pertaining to environments not displaying in time for my character or enemy NPCs walking thru walls.  Given the length of the campaign and the sheer beauty of the game itself, I can let these small instances slide.

However, there are more, detrimental glitches that should be noted: the enemy NPCs are suffering in the AI department.  Crytek made big promises regarding how advanced the enemy AI would be when the game rolled out.  I was disappointed to find that the enemy NPCs were essentially mindless zombies that would roll out in waves.  Yes, they'd take cover, retreat, advance and flank, but so do the enemy NPC in just about any FPS game made since 2007.  Often times I would simply cloak, move to the left or right, wait a few moments, and then slide in behind for a "stealth kill."

Also, I found that in later levels, enemy NPCs would be stuck in a "wall walk" that is, walking forever into a piece of scenery at the edge of a map, unable to navigate around it.

So-called "boss battles" were challenging however, as you experience your first major boss, a multi-legged, spider-looking tank turret called a "pinger" roughly a third the way thru the campaign.  The objective is to out-flank the pinger and attack it's rear, however, the bluddy thing can see you even when your under your cloak, making flanking nearly impossible.  You'll fight three of these monsters throughout the campaign, but strangely enough, not at the end.

No, the final "boss battle" involves your character systematically taking out four cloaked "cephs (the derogatory name of the enemy alien.  It made me think of the "Prawns" from "District 9")" of more elite training.  I found that if I simply stayed back far enough with a sniper rifle and explosives, these were of little threat to me.  As I stated above, the lack of intelligence shown by the NPCs, made picking them apart very little of a challenge.

As for the multiplayer, I was glad to notice how there seemed to be more emphasis on the single-player experience from the developers, especially in a day-and-age when the focus for developers and gamers is the online play.  Game types in C2's multiplayer are akin to any you'd find in any modern FPS, including Team Deathmatch, Free-for-All, Capture the Flag (called something different here) and a Domination-type game. 

What makes Crytek's take on FPS multiplayer is the level of customization one can play with.  For beyond just outfitting your customized character with a loadout of various weapons and equipment, the game will skew towards your style of play.  If you like to stay cloaked, you'll earn more "stealth" points than "power" or "armor" and vice versa.  These points can be spent on upgrades that are class specific (meaning, you can't use points you earned via stealth on armor upgrades, etc).  While there's an assortment of weapons and equipment that can be unlocked as you progress in level, the real treat is fine-tuning your character by how you play the game.

Altho, with the cloaking ability, I'm finding the Team Deathmatch and Free-for-All matches to be camper-friendly, as more players are inclined to hide in corners of the maps and snipe or wait for players to run by before shotgunning them to death from underneath their cloaks.

The maps come in two sizes, I'm finding: big and small, or what might be more accurate, too big and just right.  Maps like Pier 17, Skyline and Statue are really too big, with too much shit in the way to be fun playing a TDM or FFA match.  As you sprint out to battle, you'll likely be cut down by a well placed sniper across the map.  This rings familiar with my experience playing EA's other shooter from last year "Medal of Honor."

The smaller maps are just the right size, and both types offer multiple levels of engagements, from underwater to roof tops, the set design is very true to the campaign aspect of the game but not cookie-cutter, unlike other shooters where multiplayer maps are essentially just crudely cut chunks of actual levels you just played in (looking at you, COD.).

All in all, C2 is a breath of fresh air after spending 6 months grinding away at COD: Black Ops.  While there's an occasional sour note, "Crysis 2" is certainly an opus that makes up for EA's recent under-performing FPS offers.

The State of The Art

From Twitter: "@jcharles_ "Seems like a new big game is just another FPS that isn't as good as #cod"  -John Nup (@_jnup)

That's my friend John commenting on the lack of originality found in most of the "big games" that were due to come out this early 2011.  His point: games are trying hard to surpass the gold standards of gaming, but coming up way short.  Probably because they're trying to inject too much shit into games and not sticking to what makes gaming fun: simplistic, intuitive gameplay.

The "COD" he mentions is the long standing king of the hill in First Person Shooters (FPSs) the "Call of Duty" series.  Since the early 2000s, COD emerged as the go-to in shooter games.  Military in nature, players take over the roll of a grunt and are placed in harrowing and engaging missions.

Then you have the online multiplayer aspect.  The COD games have always made the online part of their games to be truly enjoyable experiences.  Experiences other game developers try desperately to emulate.

Case in point: Earlier this year, two new shooters were introduced: "Bulletstorm" and "Homefront" both slated to be "COD Killers." "Bulletstorm" is a crass, futuristic shooter that allows players to interact with the game beyond the normal "Aim Shoot Move" series found in most FPSs.  In it, you can lasso an enemy, kick him into a pile of cactus or rebar or hot lava, and then slide away into cover to take on the next wave of enemies.  While this all sounds cool, and it's game controls aren't that hard to master (going from mashing one series of buttons to another) it becomes tedious after a while.  Mix in the terrible voice acting and plot, and soon enough any player older than 21 is going to be reaching for his Black Ops disc (Black Ops being the latest in the COD franchise) for a more rounded out and polished game play experience.

I was most excited for "Homefront" when I first heard about it.  In it, a unified Korea (sometime in the future) invades the US and citizens become insurgents to fight back the oppressive invading army.  I watched a few videos of the online play, the story mode, etc.  I was pretty much hooked on the idea that I would plop down my 65 bucks and pick this guy up.

But then I started hearing from credible reviewers and people I know, saying that the single player campaign is woefully short (about 4 hours...) and that the multiplayer aspect wasn't all that deep.  Sure, they added a few nice touches (leveling up while in a match, opposed to waiting for a match to be over to reap the benefits) it really wasn't worth paying retail.

I mean, four and a half hours for the games primary story line?  For those of you who are not gamers, the average "single player" experience in most games usually runs around ten hours.  In recent years with shooters, this number of hours has been drastically cut, as developers want to spend more time and energy on what they think the gamer will be spending more time and energy on: multiplayer.  So the single player experience suffers.

I mean, seriously, four hours?  I'm supposed to believe that a home-grown insurgency repels a national army in just FOUR HOURS.  There is so much you can do with that story line!  I know you want to leave something for the sequels, but come on, seriously.  I buy the game after lunch and I've got it beaten before dinner.  That sucks.

And if the multiplayer isn't nearly as engaging as what your dev team thinks it is, I'm going to be returning the game for a full refund before the end of the week (thanks GameStop!).  It's shitty to think that gamers of any age or skill, are going to hang on to a game that has no redeemable replay value.

I'm looking at you "Medal of Honor."

Games are becoming more mainstream as time wears on, even being compared to an art form.  There are some really great games out there, as there are shitty ones, same as with movies and television programs.

But video games have the cards stacked against them, because like comic books, there's still a lot of people out there that assume video games are just mindless entertainment for kids.  If gaming wants to be considered a legitimate art form, they've really got to go in and hook a wider audience.

You're not going to do it with cookie-cutter shooters, or sophomoric sandbox games (Looking at you, Duke Nukem Forever).

At the same time, developers, stop trying to stuff as much shit as possible into a game.  Yeah, it's cool that I can do a little more than just riddle my enemy with bullets from a cache of assorted Cold War Era weaponry, but all the effort to go out of the way, all the time, becomes tiresome (looking at you Red Dead Redemption).

Instead of seeing how many freshman can fit into a phone booth, how about finding out if the phone booth works first? Take all that energy and refocus it on amazing game play, super intuitive controls and a story arch that lasts longer than lions fucking.

I was reading an article on the up-coming "Saints Row: The Third" game... a giant sandbox-style game that pits you against virtually a whole city, ala "Grand Theft Auto."  The interview with the lead developer went something like this:

Interviewer: So what can we expect from the new "Saints?"

Lead Dev: You're going to be able to sky dive naked and fall into a car being driven by a fucking tiger, and then you're going to be on a reality tv show where you do nothing but feed hotdogs to pornstars, and then you can go and gamble all of your winnings away at any of the cities nine-fucking-casinos, all while your buddies mod out your stolen car at any of the 173 chop-shops in the city.  Pretty much, if you can think it, you can do it in this game.

Which is all well an good if you're a spastic high school sophomore with ADD and a crippling energy drink dependency.

Hey Saint's Row developer, how about focusing on making a game that (first, isn't a crudely drawn GTA knock-off, second) won't drive me mad with just this laundry list of shit I feel like I have to do in order to experience your game in full?  It's cool and all that to have a game that will allow me to do anything, but what I really want to do is drive from point A to point B, murder some gangsters, go home and have a PB&J, nap, and then hit the gym.  If you can make a game that has all that ridiculous shit you mentioned, you can give me a game that is simplistic, easy on the eyes and above all else, fun.

Racist Gamers (Offensive NFSW-text Ahead)

(You were warned....)

Anyone who tells you that racism in America (or anywhere else, but mostly America) doesn't exist hasn't played online video games.

Let me set the scene for you:  It's early AM... wife's fast asleep in the bedroom across the house, you get up to let the dog piss in the yard and settle in in front of the tv, fire up the Xbox and log into your game (or my purposes, Call of Duty: Black Ops).

You enter a game lobby, this area where gamers congregate while we wait for the next match to start.  No one's saying anything.

The screen goes black, and then the load card... a screen that shows what map you and everyone else will be playing on while the game gets itself ready... comes up and that's when some ignorant asshole starts sputtering hateful shit.

"NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER NIGGER!"

Not exactly the most articulate thing, mind you, but it's affect is purposeful.  Otherwise, I wouldn't be here writing about it hours later.

This happens more often than you'd think.  See, these racist fuckfaces wait til this load screen to speak, because during this screen everyone's mic (a microphone one wears to communicate to other players in the game) is on, but no one can see anyone else's screen name, in order to give attribution to who's speaking.  It's like picking up a phone, dialing a random number and shouting into it.

As soon as the game starts, and people can see each other's screen names again, the racist goes quiet.  He's a coward who will not stand for his convictions and beliefs, because in his heart he knows they're wrong, he's wrong, and will be judge by others for it.

The reason why he does this is two fold: he wants to fuck with people (and he's largely successful, again, because here I am writing about this experience) and he wants to spread his racist agenda (again, successful) I only wish he would do it where I could see his screenname so I could put his mic on mute (an option) so I won't have to deal with his bullshit.

So if you're an ignorant, hate-filled son of a bitch with a high speed internet connection and a love of First Person Shooters, and you're not too busy finger-raping your little sister, please make your racist, inbred comments in the game lobby, so I know who to mute in advance.  Also, so I can track you down in game and make your playing experience a fucking misery.  I don't care if there's an objective to hold or defend or attack... I'm coming for you, every time I spawn until you Rage Quit.

I consider it my way of fighting racism where it exists in the digital world.