Some PC gamers, wait, the majority of them, will remember Crysis as the game that screamed MORE POWER, as it menacingly laughed at our attempts of high resolution gaming. It became a sort of legend, some sort of test that hardcore gamers would pit there rigs against. Warhead, the second coming of Cryteks paradise, has been paraded as some sort of miracle child, that not only offers better performance, but injects crack cocaine into the already graphical addiction Crysis offers.
Crysis Warhead is the expansion, no that's not right... the sequel... no! Well basically it's Crysis, but on the other side of the island. Apparently, Nomad, our hero from the first installment, got an easy ride, as on the other side of this alien infested hell hole, Sergeant Micheal Sykes (aka Jason Statham) gets what looks like an unfair deal. The story runs parallel to Crysis 1 and will take the average gamer around 5 hours to complete.
This time around the action is still primarily catalyzed on by your way to tight nanosuit; which may explain Jas… sorry, Micheal Sykes' constant aggression. So on top of your God-like abilities you’re also given some weapons to play around with. As well as the inclusion of all the original weapons you’re also given two new bringers of death, duel wielding machine guns and, my favorite, the grenade launcher. Smashing!
This time around you not only battle your way through lush jungle environments but you also take the fight to ice encrusted landscapes as far as the eye can see. Warhead is possibly less expansive than the first game, although you do have your options on how to deal with the problem. I couldn’t help but notice that you’re limited in the routes you can take, in order to progress through the mission. But I think, as a result of this more linear gameplay, the development team has been able to change how you play the game.
Those who played the first game will recall how you’re eased into the original Crysis slowly, Koreans... Aliens... Big Ass Aliens. Catch my drift? However, due to the more controlled aspect, Crytek have chosen to shove the learning curve up Spores lower regions. This time you’ll find yourself fighting mechanical beasties, Micheal Bay style, from the get-go. The action is upped my fellow gamers, and it's good, oh so very good indeed!
As mentioned, Crysis isn't shy of being a pretty whore; in fact it's rather proud to be. The same applies to Warhead, except this time around she's offering more services for a lower price. Warhead comes in at the fantastic price of fifteen of your hard earned pounds, and you won't even need to use that spare money to upgrade your machine. Crytek have been true to their word on optimizations made, and the game runs like a dream... well, maybe I'm being a little too nice due to all the pretty HDR and Parallax Occlusion Mapping, but it does show an improvement has been made. I ran it on a fairly kick-ass machine and was able to run it at a good resolution, on the highest settings, whilst maintaining 30 frames a second. So not only can you run the game better, but it looks better. I'm pretty sure this slaps the law of physics our astute scientists have concocted; it really does. The new optimized engine boasts an upgraded lighting system, nicer particle effects and higher resolution textures for good measure.
Sadly, any form of anti analyzing I turned was simply laughed at. To put things in perspective though, the game is still awe-inspiringly beautiful. It's truly phenomenal to see how close we’re actually coming to photo realistic graphics these days.
So it's cheaper, it runs better, it looks better and most importantly it’s an incredible gaming experience. Crytek have listened to the gaming community and tackled the issues they needed to fix. In less than a year from the launch of the original, they have produced a stellar game that deserves to be in your disc drive. Pick it up.
Planet Notion has 3 copies of Crysis: Warhead to giveaway. CLICK HERE to visit our competitions page.
