Note shure if this has been posted yet or not, But a good read none the less!
Theres a fantastic 7 page preview in this months Edge (UK) magazine (very pompous and extremely critical magazine, where you really have to be a top top TOP game to get anywhere near 9 in the reviews) which ive tried to detail all the info below, some of which i think is new info.
The article begins by talking about last years Leipzig Game Convention where the level designer Bernd Diemer spoke to Edge and asked them if they would like to see (the well known) boss battle in which a 100 foot high alien machine throws a plane through an aircraft carrier or the procedural falling tree demo, tiring the designer 6 months klater says all people want to see now is guys getting chucked through buildings...
Next it talks about the move Crytek made from Coburg to their new offices in Frankfurt, a move which took 80 trucks carrying the gear and 110 staff in just 2 days.
Crytek is fast approaching a feature complete state ( i guess already known).
The third act, where the Aliens are unmasked, has combat which apparently "takes to the skies", this third act will not be made public until the game is released.
Edge did, however take an "exclusive" look behind the ice sphere, as it first appears. They talk about the 3 acts all having "unique physics systems and rule sets", the first which we already know plenty about, the second act sees the island around the alien craft frozen solid in a split second (by which time youve already seen the interior of the spacecraft).
Its unclear how the set piece will infold (with Crytek keeping close quarters on the info surrounding the largest enemies) but "the entire game will be transformed", snow falls in myriad sizes, banks of volumetric fog buffet your vision and thicken in the Mountains dips and troughs. Attack turns to retreat, the deformation of trees et al will turn to the objects shattering and your main enemies wil turn from naughty human North Koreans to machines with exoskeletons stronger than yours...
It mentions Matrix Sentinel toys sitting in the office and when a worried Edge journalist asks is reassured that they are there to tell the designers what they dont want.
Loading - Crysis streams within the levels so never breaks, but there is a gap in loading between levels. There will also (a little dissapointingly) be loading when entering or exiting the ice sphere - streaming would not be possible given the 'upheavel in physics, ai and video systems' without having 8 gb of ram.
From this point, VTOLs and helicopters wil be flown and gravity boots will be worn as gravity itself is taken out of the equation.
The recent CES demo was equivelent of an 'action bubble' the player will find spread throughout the levels, there will be many of these 'action bubbles' the player can enter, or ignore.
The nanosuit modes can be switched between its various functions by mouse OR by keyboard, the keyboard being an instantaneous change, no menu needed. The rifle modes can also be changed but this requires cycling of options.
Playing the game they say this is all things to all players, the strength mode is Crackdown, the camo gives you Metal Gear Solid, forget about the nano suit and get close an personal with the guns and vehicles gives you Halo...how you want to play a fps, Crysis delivers - its described as a genuine FPS sandbox experience. It "feels like play where other games feel like work".
There are NO plans for a singleplayer demo. Whiteboards in the Crytek offices mention 'mulitplayer demo'.
Crytek are heavily working on the clipping leaves atm, and will give an option to those with uber rigs to enable the entire scene to bend, rather than just the biggest ones - they are finding it difficult to enable this across the board due to framerate loss at the low end pcs.
They say its possible they may carry the optimisation through and beyond the release date, as with Far Cry (where they continued adding and optimising for 2.5 years after release).
They are cagey on hardware requirements in dx10 as the drivers still are in beta, but their standard machine consists of...
Vista
1xDual Core
1x8800
2gb RAM
Their rule of thumb for the R&D guys remain - High end Far Cry = Low end Crysis. But then adds something very intruiging...
"Whatever you have we will bring you down - If you have SLI DX10 with 4gb we'll bring your pc down; not because we want to, but because we are investing in the future". (Bernd Diemer) In response to you all at this moment saying WTF he continues "There are profiles which we are not exposing through the outer config which would otherwise make the high end systems run like mediums" In other words, there is hidden code which will enable, when the time is right, you to reinstall Crytek two years down the line and it will look even better.
"Games grow old, thats something i want to avoid". (Bernd Diemer)
So next time someone asks you what hardware do you need to run this game max, you can answer - its not invented yet. ;D
DX10 and Multiplayer
Diemer believes DX10 multiplayer gaming is going to be very very big - battle dust that hangs in the air after a battle and slowly dissapates, vegetation bending, shadows & dense grass synchronised across all pcs give the player extra gameplay tools to work with (lots of dust - battle has just happened, veg moving..enemy there etc etc).
He knows the initial numbers will be low, but he totally believes the new set of mechanics behind dx10 will convince people to upgrade to Vista and the min spec required to run it, "DX7 to DX9, multiplayer gaming hasnt changed" he thinks DX10 multiplayer gaming will be different.
There is currently talk of splitting up mulitplayer servers between DirectX versions (this answers a big problem i had which i posted previously on, regarding lower directX versions having some advantage).
Modding tools will be available alongside release of the game.
Crysis and Consoles
(All Diemer again)
"Its PC only. We're totally, absolutely focussed on PC. Its not that we havent thought about it, and its public knowledge that Cryengine runs on Xbox 360 and PS3. But until we're done with the PC version we don't even think about what to do next. That's where our competence comes from - we're a PC company. And with alll these initiatives by Microsoft that's the place i want to be; it's where it's happening at the moment".
Re any port carried out after completion of the pc project by a third party outsourced by EA...
(Physicaly recoiling) "We spent so long developing the IP that i think no matter what happens we'd be really closely involved with that. It's our baby that we've been working for the last 3 or 4 years, and we have big expectations for the whole franchise. It's why we went to all the trouble and put a lot of money into developing this; it's not just the one game"
Kinda mixed messages there if you ask me - "more than one game" and "franchise" seems to indicate they do have plans beyond the pc version (wether that be a port or Crysis 2 on pc) yet they say they are not thinking about it til pc Crysis is done.
A cutout from one of the screenies says the Power Mode pitches a team of nano suited Delta forces against the vehicle manufacturing North Koreans - i was under the impression both sides got the nanosuits but hey, thats what it says.
There are some simply stunning screenshots around the pages, some old, some new, but all of a very high quality (including the main image of the soldier in a nanosuit leaning over a chasm into the void of the bottom of the ship with snowflakes, fog and atmosphere aplenty).
Phew! glad to have finished this essay, i can now go out on the razz (like being back at university).
Hope the info is useful.
