Crysis 2 PS3 Review

Crysis 2 is the successor to the highly successful original Crysis game launched in 2007. Crysis 2 takes place three years after the first game with the player taking control of a soldier named “Alcatraz”, who is part of a group trying to extract Doctor Nathan Gould, a former Crynet employee. The Ceph invasion has encompassed New York City and a strange virus is infecting the populace. The infiltration group is attacked by the Ceph, with only Alcatraz barely surviving. A soldier wearing a nanosuit 2.0 named “Prophet” saves Alcatraz and gives him the suit plus instructions to finish the mission he started. Prophet is infected by the alien virus and ends up shooting himself to disengage the symbiosis that occurred between him and the nanosuit, so that Alcatraz can merge with it. The player goes on to complete Prophet’s and his own mission of acquiring Nathan Gould.

Crysis 2 is a visually stunning game on the PS3, the urban landscape of New York City in ruins is amazing to look at and traverse. The trade-off for the stunning visuals is that the environments are fairly enclosed and the game is practically on rails. The overall story is boring until the player reaches the final 25% of the game where it becomes very interesting. Unfortunately, slumming through 6 hours of a boring plot will detract almost all, but the most dedicated fans or players. The single player gameplay is very similar to Halo, with enemy Cephs that brought back memories of Halo’s Grunts, Elites, and Hunters in their gameplay style. Unfortunately, the enemy AI is absurdly horrid. Enemies would get stuck running into walls, somehow see the player over absurd distances, or completely ignore the player even with bullets whizzing by their heads. Hopefully, this is not the case with the XBOX 360 and PC versions.

Gameplay in the single player campaign of Crysis 2 is similar to most FPS games, with assault guns, sniper rifles, pistols, turrets and other heavy weapons. The player also has enhanced abilities from the nanosuit such as cloaking, increased armor, increased power and speed, etc. All of the abilities use up energy that constantly regenerates when the user is not using them. Health also regenerates as well when the player is not getting hit and immobile. Players can plan different strategies of attack such as flanking, sniping, or an all-out frontal assault.

Multiplayer is where Crysis 2 makes up for the dismal single player campaign. Multiplayer consists of the standard fare of Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, Control Points, Capture the Flag, and two other modes called Assault and Extraction. Assault is a game mode in which one player team attempts to upload data to terminals while the opposing team defends the terminals, but with only one life per round. Extraction is composed of players capturing Alien Bio-Ticks and delivering them to an extraction point with the opposing team in hot pursuit. In multiplayer, the player has a variety of weapons to choose from and the same abilities available from the single player campaign. Players can easily walk through a portion of a level cloaked and ambush the enemy as long as their energy level lasts. The multiplayer elements in Crysis 2 allow for gamers to plan out interesting strategies to out flank and outsmart their opponents, more so than any other FPS game on the market today.

Crysis 2 is an average run of the mill single player campaign that is visually stunning, but lacks a solid engaging story and intelligent AI. The multiplayer in Crysis 2 is its saving grace. This is definitely a rental, with the potential of being a purchase for the multiplayer alone. Hopefully in the next iteration, Crytek spends more time creating a compelling story.