Since the day before yesterday I know why by default I am running Windows and not ↑some predator, ↑or a penguin, and why I have got such an ↵ogre of a machine—“↑Crysis“ is the undisputable reason. Although I followed the game’s history since it was announced, I didn’t get around to download the free demo, which is available since 26 October 2007, earlier. So I was a tad late, nevertheless the impact was instantaneous … graphics, physics and gameplay blew me away—to me it’s the greatest computer game experience since “↑Half-Life 2“ (HL2).
 

Official US-release is today, for Europe it’s tomorrow, but I had heard it through the grapevine, that it might already be available in stores around Germany. Of course the game already hit the torrent realm, but for a game like that this is no option for me, you have to own it. So I ran into the store yesterday, sprinted to the back where the games are, and my eye caught a sales clerk who just opened a crate and was about to start to put “Crysis” into the shelves. The first box he unearthed from the crate I snatched from his hand. As soon as this blog-entry is online, I’ll jettison the demo and will install the real deal.
 

“Crysis” supports Microsoft’s application programming interface (API) Direct3D 10, which comes with Vista. For those who are not running Vista, like myself, it also supports Direct3D 9. Using the latter the engine of course can not take advantage of all the features of Redmond’s latest API—even ↑John Carmack ↑has positive words for it—, but the developers at ↑Crytek made the game tremendously tweakable. Word has it that with the right tweakage you can run “Crysis” on Direct3D 9 at the same glory as 10 offers. Please refer to the ↑Ultimate Tweak Guide by MadBoris. I will do so and show off screenshots then.
 

Now we have reached the central point of interest, technology and moddability :-) I won’t repeat details here, please go to the ↑technology section at Crytek and look around, then download and read the 19-page ↑CryENGINE2 Features Document. Finally have a look at the ↑technology demonstration videos. Only so much, both engine and editor are astounding, offering a lot of possibilities for ↑mods and ↑machinima. Speaking of mods, to my knowledge unprecedented within the industry, Crytek has given two modding teams a prerelease software development kit (SDK) to work with: ↑Obsidian Edge 2 and ↑Navy SEALs : Covert War. Word has it, that the mods will be released not long after “Crysis” itself.
 

Finally here is a quick’n’dirty roundup of the “Crysis” community’s website online infrastructure—not complete for sure:
 

Community portals: ↑incrysis | ↑crysis-online | ↑crysis sector | ↑crysis fever | ↑total crysis | ↑crysis-hq

 

Mod portals: ↑cryedit | ↑crysis-maps | ↑crymod
 

Crymod is the official modding portal for Crysis, run by Crytek itself—it houses the official ↑CryENGINE 2 Manual. Although helpful is the ↑Sandbox Editor User Manual v1.1 for the Sandbox of the predecessor engine.