Crysis: Warhead

[2xSlick]

Gamers with $10,000 PCs rejoice! Crysis' expansion pack is out. Crytek really listened to players' comments on Crysis and did a great job improving the core game play. One of my biggest concerns with Crysis was that once the aliens appeared, you spent the rest of the game battling them while the North Koreans just sort of disappeared. The aliens were too strong and did too much damage to allow you to goof around with your nanosuit powers and were ultimately much less fun than stalking humans. Warhead rightly decides to reduce the number of aliens you encounter, and allowing you to continue to kill North Koreans well after the aliens show up.

The most glaring problem with the game is the complete lack of back story. For a stand-alone expansion, new players should have some idea of what's going on. There's nothing in the manual, no details in the opening cinematic. The only info offered is this blurb on the pack of the box, “Fight as the volatile Sgt. Sykes on a secret mission to stop the enemy from obtaining a weapon that threatens humanity.”

http://i247.photobucket.com/albums/gg124/doubleslick/Bad_Dudes_NES_ScreenShot3.gif
I thought we were past 8-bit story lines.

You never interact with Nomad or Prophet (the chief characters in Crysis), instead you wander the island as Psycho (voiced by Uncle Frank from Hellraiser). But if you can get past a weak story, there is a lot of fun to be had.

Anyone else played it yet?

I've also uploaded a video review, if anyone is interested.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BbVae-6trw

[warty goblin]

I have plans to pick this up over Fall Break most likely, as I loved the original Crysis, particularly the harbor and tank levels. I deny that there is a game after that, and there was nothing whatsoever to do with an aircraft carrier and a shoulder fired nuke gun.

[Myatar_Panwar]

I was thinking about picking this up, as I loved the first crysis, but I'm not sure if I really want to spend the full 30 bucks on it. The reviews haven't been great, and I heard they dumbed down some of the nano suit options, as well as make enemies significantly easier to kill? I know its more realistic, but I enjoyed having to go for those head shots to conserve ammo.

Hows the person to alien ratio? I'm not going to lie, I vastly enjoyed the first half more, probably exclusively because I was fighting people.

Also, is it still pretty free-form in its missions? In the original Crysis (at least in the first half) they told you your objective, but how you got there and completed it was completely up to you.

[warty goblin]

I was thinking about picking this up, as I loved the first crysis, but I'm not sure if I really want to spend the full 30 bucks on it. The reviews haven't been great, and I heard they dumbed down some of the nano suit options, as well as make enemies significantly easier to kill? I know its more realistic, but I enjoyed having to go for those head shots to conserve ammo.

Hows the person to alien ratio? I'm not going to lie, I vastly enjoyed the first half more, probably exclusively because I was fighting people.

Also, is it still pretty free-form in its missions? In the original Crysis (at least in the first half) they told you your objective, but how you got there and completed it was completely up to you.

Most of the reviews I've seen have been pretty good for the most part, and honestly having enemies be somewhat easier to kill would be, IMHO a good thing. It sometimes felt a bit rediculous in the original when I could hit somebody eight times and they still didn't go down. Seriously, I didn't take that kind of punishment.

I agree with you on the human/alien thing. Not because I object to killing aliens on principle or anything, but because Crysis aliens, even though they were refreshingly alien and not 'blue humaniod with different joints' *coughHALOcough*, but because they sucked.

[Myatar_Panwar]

I agree with you on the human/alien thing. Not because I object to killing aliens on principle or anything, but because Crysis aliens, even though they were refreshingly alien and not 'blue humaniod with different joints' *coughHALOcough*, but because they sucked.

They just weren't very fun to kill. Maybe if they had some sort of weak spot, where maybe pus or something would shoot out if shot, or SOMETHING, instead of just shooting at a pixel who doesn't really react at all, then it would have been better.

I don't know, it just didn't feel right. I've enjoyed shooters in the past where I had to take out robots and stuff, and its been fun, but crysis didnt do that for me. Probably because you can have robots explode or leak maybe, have something violent happen to them like limbs breaking off or whatever, but in Crysis all we got was a crappy blue static explosion after they die.

If you want us to fight robotic enemies, you could at least make it a little interesting.

[Holammer]

I loved the original to bits and replayed it with different approaches a few times. No silencers and just rampage through the content and tossing those wacky Koreans all over the place was bloody awesome!
Warhead however is incredibly shallow and disappointing. I raced through 85% or more of the content in one 3 hour sitting on hard difficulty and I'm having problems mustering the courage to give this tragic game the merciful coup de grace. AI is a disgrace and I found myself going to great pains *not* to exploit their suicidal charges by playing pillbox.

I was hoping that the story would be the same as the first game but from Psycho's perspective. But the storyline starts in the middle of the first one and it never intersects with Nomad's except maybe on the carrier later? Fans will be disappointed and everyone else will wonder what in blazes is happening.

[warty goblin]

They just weren't very fun to kill. Maybe if they had some sort of weak spot, where maybe pus or something would shoot out if shot, or SOMETHING, instead of just shooting at a pixel who doesn't really react at all, then it would have been better.

I don't know, it just didn't feel right. I've enjoyed shooters in the past where I had to take out robots and stuff, and its been fun, but crysis didnt do that for me. Probably because you can have robots explode or leak maybe, have something violent happen to them like limbs breaking off or whatever, but in Crysis all we got was a crappy blue static explosion after they die.

If you want us to fight robotic enemies, you could at least make it a little interesting.

Most of it I think was because they didn't react particularly well to being shot. One of the things I noticed my second playthrough of the only half of Crysis is that people really physically react to being shot- they fall over, they jerk backwards, they knock the people next to them over. It makes shooting feel fun and appropriately powerful,and adds a nice bit of tactics when you shoot the first guy in a column so he knocks the guys behind him over.

The aliens...don't. Some pieces might fall off, but they just don't feel as integrated into the physics as the KPA do. Also they move in annoying patterns, do too much damage, and, most annoyingly, at least the big ones move faster than the rockets. Is it too much to ask that the rocket laucher actually be able to hit something?

[2xSlick]

The reviews haven't been great, and I heard they dumbed down some of the nano suit options, as well as make enemies significantly easier to kill? I know its more realistic, but I enjoyed having to go for those head shots to conserve ammo.

The only difference I noticed with the nanosuit, is it seems cloak lasts slightly longer while walking and firing while cloaked drains all your energy (not 90%). While enemies die slightly faster (6 body shots instead of 8), they are still tougher than you so headshots are still the way to go for quick kills. There's no need to conserve ammo though. The micro machineguns that replace your pistols gives you an extra 500 rounds of silent death.



Hows the person to alien ratio? I'm not going to lie, I vastly enjoyed the first half more, probably exclusively because I was fighting people.
You run into the aliens half-way through again. But they take a back seat and let you continue killing people. I'd say human opponents outnumber them 6-to-1.



Also, is it still pretty free-form in its missions? In the original Crysis (at least in the first half) they told you your objective, but how you got there and completed it was completely up to you.

I always felt that the original was much less free-form than everyone gave it credit for. Several objectives do have a stealthy way to handle them, but when I'm playing the Predator, there are never survivors.


Warhead however is incredibly shallow and disappointing. I raced through 85% or more of the content in one 3 hour sitting on hard difficulty and I'm having problems mustering the courage to give this tragic game the merciful coup de grace. AI is a disgrace and I found myself going to great pains *not* to exploit their suicidal charges by playing pillbox.

Do you think the game play is shallow, or the story? The AI seemed identical to Crysis. I think Crytek had it with all the pillbox eploiting since the number of pillboxes+bunkers combo was heavily toned down.


I was hoping that the story would be the same as the first game but from Psycho's perspective. But the storyline starts in the middle of the first one and it never intersects with Nomad's except maybe on the carrier later? Fans will be disappointed and everyone else will wonder what in blazes is happening.

Just wanted to reiterate to everyone that the story is MIA (and Section 8). You will never run into anyone from the first game. No even acts surprised when aliens appear! Here's a tip for any game-makers out there: Do not base half the game's story line on the main character not being able to do a pull-up, especially when I can throw people 30 feet in the air!

[Traikan]

I haven't touched the singleplayer yet, but the multiplayer is a blast. It's HUGELY improved from the original Crysis and (Dare I say it?) actually playable. The addition of Team Instant Action is something that should've been done in the first game, but it's nice to have it regardless. The bullet damage in MP has been increased from the original, and it only takes about 10-15 bullets to drop someone in armor mode. (Significantly less otherwise) The weapon selection feels a bit bland, but overall they're fairly balanced. (Except the lousy super weapons which some servers have thankfully restricted)

Nanosuit use is what really makes the game fun though, using that last 35 energy to strength jump over a shed and land behind somebody is very satisfying to pull off. (Even if you get sniped shortly after that)

Anyway, don't discount the MP even if you didn't like it in the first one.

[warty goblin]

Just wanted to reiterate to everyone that the story is MIA (and Section 8). You will never run into anyone from the first game. No even acts surprised when aliens appear! Here's a tip for any game-makers out there: Do not base half the game's story line on the main character not being able to do a pull-up, especially when I can throw people 30 feet in the air!

Personally I found a direct corralation between Crysis' moments of story and Crysis' moments of suck, so I'll take the removal of any vestiges of story as an altogether good sign.

[Holammer]

Just gave the game the final nudge, had 30-45 minutes left of gameplay. Veteran players should seriously bump it up to the hardest difficulty setting, "hard" wasn't that hard and the only places I actually got stuck was in (mild spoilers.)

In the carrier mess hall where I couldn't find the hole in the celling and the closed box with the SuperGun for the boss fight.
I can imagine this being worth the money if it was bundled together with the original campaign for possible 360/PS3 versions. If they try this again with a similar rehash that tells Prophet's story, they can stick it where the sun doesn't shine.