Crysis and UT3 tank

[the_carrot]

Sorry this is culled from another newssource...but I thought it was interesting and worth discussing.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,140623/article.html

-----------------------------------------------

PC Games Crysis and UT3 Flop

Neither Crysis or UT3 sold more than 100,000 units in their November debut--sign of a PC gaming trend?


The simExchange reports that neither Crysis or UT3 managed to sell more than 100,000 units in their debut last month.

Crysis, which requires an unprecedented US$1500-$2500 in PC upgrades to play, sold 86,633 copies in the U.S., while Unreal Tournament 3 sold just 33,995 copies.

In January 2005, Vivendi said it sold 1.7 million copies of Half-Life 2 in just two months; much more than either Crysis or Unreal 3 for a similar period.

Though both games were released in the middle of the month, their numbers are clearly less than what EA and Midway had hoped for.

Are gamers abandoning the PC? Without jumping the gun, some believe the PC market is shrinking with exception to a few specific genres like the massively popular World of Warcraft MMO.

Indeed, both Xbox 360 and PS3 offer comparable, if not equal, graphics technology in most cases at a fraction of the cost. What was once the platform for hardcore shooters has seemingly been relegated to second place.

------------------------------

I'm not sure I agree with the analysis, I think PC gaming is experiencing something of a small heyday. At least my contact with other builders leads me to believe that people are building and upgrading all the time. Though I may be seeing the contents of a small pond rather than the whole sea.

I guess I'm more inclined to believe PC gamers have wizened up and decided Crysis, with every review bleating about it's graphics, is probably little more than a tech demo. And UT a shallow little FPS. But I'm interested in other views and thoughts on the matter. I would like to think PC gamers have realized that it doesn't take $6000.00 dollars worth of hardware to be cool, That it has to be fun...But I'd like to hear your opinions.

 

[shadow skill]

Why did people think Crysis would sell? It seemed like every other review mentioned how the game lagged their uber machines. The reason no one has bought Crysis is because no one can play Crysis because they would all need machines from one and a half years into the future! Keep in mind that Call of Duty 4 is still fresh in peoples minds, UT3 seems to be getting flak for not being UT2k4 and the playstation 3 version supports mouse and keyboard and supports mods. There really isn't a reason to buy the PC version of the game unless you want to make mods yourself. Epic should do the smart thing and not try to bundle the modding tools with the PC version of the game just so they can sell you the game twice. They also ought to stop wasting their time with a 360 port which at this rate will suck major ass, and just devote thier resources to the next Gears of Shit game.

 

[KaynSlamdyke]

(Completely uninformed opinion. Feel free to ignore)

Crysis represents everything I loathe with the gaming industry. As you said carrot, it's a techdemo. Speaking as a gamer who doesn't consider himself hardcore (is less than an hour of GH3 and GunpeyDS a day Hardcore?), I can't see the appeal.

We had terms for these things back in the nineties. Doom Clones.

Crysis is a Doom Clone. Oh sure it's a Doom Clone where I can run through a forest and see which way I came, but in all honesty does that actually come up as a game mechanic? Maybe if I wasn't playing a cyborg who can soak up bullets like a sponge does water, or if I was a guerilla veteran ala-Rambo style sneaking up on people trying to avoid stepping on dry twigs...

Actually that'd be a good use of Valve and Crytek's engines. Imagine a game where you have to survive by jungle fighting your way into an enemy base, digging pit traps and laying snares (using physics engines for a think other than see-saw puzzles), scrounging up ammunition, covering your tracks. Where you're vastly outnumbered and a single shot against you has a good chance of ending your guerilla existance.

I'd pay for a computer upgrade to get that. Someone! Make FarCry 2 like that and I swear I'd buy it!

 

[eggdog14]

Half Life 2 sold very well for a number of reasons. The obvious one is the fact that it's Half Life; the sequel to the most innovative shooter of all time. It had also been about 7 years in the making, so it HAS to be good, right?

Also, hardware. Despite having the best graphics of the time, the Source engine is the most scalable. Even on meager hardware, with the settings turned down a bit, it runs fabulously. Maybe the draw distance is decreased, but the gameplay is fully intact, and even if HL2 had mediocre graphics it'd stand well on its own.


Crysis, on the otherhand, has insanely good graphics. However, no computer that any reasonably consumer could acquire will run it. Also, once the graphics are stripped away, you have. . . just another alien-invasion shooter. I was personally never interested in Crysis because i saw gameplay videos and it. looked. BORING. So who cares about the pretty sunsets?

Finally, UT3 is just UT2004 with better graphics. Its a multiplayer game, so there's no story to continue or AI to improve, its just new maps and a makeover. With that in mind, UT2004 is still just fine, and already has plenty of mods, so why upgrade?

 

[shadow skill]

Come on people if you were pc gamer tired of upgrading your pc and you had to choose between ps3 and xbox 360 versions which would you choose?

Xbox 360: As far as we know there can't be Mouse and Keyboard support unless Microsoft changes thier policy on the use of Keyboards over live to accomodate UT3.

The Live network is basically closed (anyone notice how there is no XNA game launcher yet? (Correct me if I am wrong.))and the basic tools are available for free download! (Glares at Epic.) Thus leaving Epic in the lame position of having to negotiate with Microsoft to essentially force Microsoft to completely change how they [Microsoft] do things with respect to content distribution, so there is a very real possibility that the mods may not happen at all; or even if they do the interface for installing said mods may suck total ass compared to the other versions of the game.

If you make a mod and want to port it over to the 360 it would make sense that you would want to test the mod on the console before you bother to release it to the masses or even your friends to make sure that what you have developed on the PC is appropriately calibrated to the console(s.) Now imagine if you had to get the mod approved by MS before you could even begin the real testing because it is not possible to simple put the mod on a usb key and copy it directly to the 360 hard drive....It would strangle 360 mods before they ever even got off the ground.

Then there is the whole pay to play thing with Live....

PS3:

Mods can be copied from usb storage media without Epic having to do any negotiating or asking Sony to change the way the online and indeed console OS work to allow thier game to function as intended.

Free to play and dedicated servers (Not that the 360 couldn't have dedicated servers.)

Mouse and Keyboard support no question, no need to have some bs third party controller or other hack just in case. (I think controllers like the fragfx are a form of cheating anyway.) Frankly I think any and all games now should support mouse and keyboard with full mapping, but that is another topic.

Voice chat etc again free.

Why would people even wait for the 360 version to come out instead of getting the ps3 now and getting the game, or simply upgrading their pc when the 360 version finally does come out and end up with hardware that MIGHT actually be able to run Crysis properly given what we know right now about the problems they [Epic] are having getting Microsoft to give them the OK to create the proper experience? I can't understand the logic behind not simply cancelling what is increasingly looking like a doomed port, does Epic just want to embarass themselves and the dev team by releasing a shit port like Ubisoft did with by releasing a game with bugs up the ass on both consoles?

 

[yonsito]

For me, there's just too much to play at the moment. And I have less time for gaming nowadays.
I haven't finished Bioshock yet, I squeezed in the Orange Box because it's short and I still have some older games that I want to play, e.g. Stalker.
I'm sure that I will eventually buy UT3 as UT2004 was a lot of fun, but I won' right now. And Crysis, well maybe with the (inevitable) next system upgrade, whenever that is.
I sometimes think to myself that the short discount time of games may just be to blame here a litte bit but I won't say that out loud because I like discounted games.

 

[soladrin]

its pretty obvious why both didnt sell that good.

Crysis required butt loads of expensive tech to play.

UT3 betrayed the UT2k4 fans by removing dodge jump, and the general feel of the game isnt as good as UT2k4 (though that last part may be personal, but im seeing lots of people agreeing) the demo was enough to show this to most people and they didnt bother buying it i guess. I've been playing UT2k4 since release, and i still do, and i dont see UT3 getting anything near the competitive community 2k4 had, it just feels... slower, i guess. It's just not what you expect from a UT and epic showed us they can still make a good game with GoW, but they screwed us over with this, and that joke of a Campaign won't make up for it either.

 

[The Irrelevant Gamer]

Not shocking. Most PC gamers don't have uber machines. Among thirty guys I know off the top of my head who PC game on a regular basis two of them have brand new machines with innards that can run everything well, and of course Crysis can't even be maxed on those. Crytek picked a shrinking market (PC gamers), and catered to a niche within that market (new technology whores), and failed to have anything in Crysis other that beautiful graphics to justify the purchase. I bought it, played it, and sold it in the space of a week.

As for UT3 I didn't even know it was out, and to many people I'm sure it looks like a Gears of War clone. Yes I know it is from the same people, and UT came first. I'm saying other people might not know that.

 

[Katana314]

Here's the deal.

Complain all you want about "tech demo" but believe it or not Crysis did have unique gameplay. Problem was, it was badly implemented in levels that missed its own point, and ran very poorly on even the best of machines.

UT3 is UT2004 minus 2001. It doesn't do enough differently to justify anything new. Thankfully, Epic still have a lot of money coming in from licensing contracts. Bioshock, Mass Effect, Gears of War, R6V...they all use the engine.

In conclusion, neither game was really good enough. I'd like to see the Orange Box comparison thrown in, in regards to its PC sales. INCLUDING Steam sales.

 

[shadow skill]

I am willing to bet that if they left UT3 exactly the same as 2k4 the same retards crying that it isnt ut2k4 would be saying it is too much like 2k4. I wish Epic would fire all of their art people though, they seem to love what I call "hard gay" imagery. I can't tell which is worse the desire to make men that look like women on the part of the Japanese or this "hard gay" style that Epic and apparently the Huxley team seem to be enamoured with.

Have any of you seen the vids for UT3, can anyone tell me that the women don't look like men?

Here's the deal.

Complain all you want about "tech demo" but believe it or not Crysis did have unique gameplay. Problem was, it was badly implemented in levels that missed its own point, and ran very poorly on even the best of machines.

UT3 is UT2004 minus 2001. It doesn't do enough differently to justify anything new. Thankfully, Epic still have a lot of money coming in from licensing contracts. Bioshock, Mass Effect, Gears of War, R6V...they all use the engine.

In conclusion, neither game was really good enough. I'd like to see the Orange Box comparison thrown in, in regards to its PC sales. INCLUDING Steam sales.

If there was a moron dev team of the year award it should definetly go to Crytek's Crysis team since they managed to make a game that basically no one on Earth can actually run properly.

 

[Enigmatic_Apple]

Does anyone find the shooting on Crysis boring? I mean fuck. When I shot my first baddy in Half Life 2, it was unlike anything I had ever played before. I loved the big brother esque setting and goddamn did that game have atmosphere. I can't shake the Far Cry with pretty graphics feeling with crysis.

 

[Lockback]

I was running Crysis reasonably well on a X2 3800, 2 gig Ram and a 7900GT.....

I didn't think that system was exactly huge. I had to turn down *A LOT* of the features and run it at a lower Res (though still higher than 360 or PS3 put out). I did upgrade to a 8800GT and now the game runs well (not perfect, but well).

However, its not a fun game. Neither is UT3. Neither is Quake Wars. Thats why they are not selling well. UT3 may sell better for the PS3, but I think that has more to do with the lack (although its quickly filling) of good games for the PS3.

Orange Box? Mass Effect? Bioshock? Those are fun, so they sell well.

 

[the_carrot]

Here's the deal.

Complain all you want about "tech demo" but believe it or not Crysis did have unique gameplay. Problem was, it was badly implemented in levels that missed its own point, and ran very poorly on even the best of machines.

UT3 is UT2004 minus 2001. It doesn't do enough differently to justify anything new. Thankfully, Epic still have a lot of money coming in from licensing contracts. Bioshock, Mass Effect, Gears of War, R6V...they all use the engine.

In conclusion, neither game was really good enough. I'd like to see the Orange Box comparison thrown in, in regards to its PC sales. INCLUDING Steam sales.

I couldn't find sales figures for the orange box, mostly just references to the fact that Valve doesn't pay much attention to sales and development costs.

My experience with Crysis, and I have played it, though not through to the end, has been pretty straightforward, Run, shoot, hide, jump, kill enemy soldiers. The armor is interesting to a limited degree, but it reminds me of Halo and MGS rolled into one, simply toned down a little, and a little better rounded a concept. I think some of these gameplay elements are borrowed. Not that they are terrible, in fact it is somewhat fun to play...But the rendering of the game and it's demands on my system make it difficult to play. As someone said in a previous post, the game isn't very scalable, and really the good points of the game are tarnished by the enormous expense needed to run it well, or the ability to run it at all, while I am unable to make the upgrades. Not that I would anyway, I want some more mileage out of my hardware than this, but that's a horse of another color.

UT3 is another issue. It is much like the other UT games, and a rehashed game is just that.

The nitpicking aside however; What I'm getting at, is that I think consumers have wizened up and seen them for what they are. You obviously think Crysis is worth it, but don't let me put words in your mouth. I don't see the good gameplay elements of Crysis as being worth the... $600.00 I would have to put into my computer to make it run well. In that way I really think it is a tech demo, here's what tomorrows hardware can do, Here's a reasonably good game to run on it...when you get the hardware to run it well.

Probably I shouldn't bash it so hard, maybe Crytek just missed the boat on this one. Vista's takeup has been low, Nvidia saturates the market with products, and the heyday I mentioned (that I feel is happening) may not have had the character that Crytek thought it would. Which leads me back to my point that I think consumers are wizening up. They want to play PC games, but don't want to upgrade every six months. Yes graphics can be cool, but are not intrinsically important to gameplay. People give me flack for this, but I really think the graphics of Bloodrayne2 were sufficient for modern gameplay. I have no problem with things going further, and I want things to go further, but I don't think it has to be the anchor for PC games.

 

[innocent42]

Well, it's all been said. Crysis is too much of a graphics-bottlenecked game, UT3 is just 2K4 with some different stuff etc. How well did Halo 3 sell? Having played it, I can say with some authority that it is an exceedingly mediocre game, certainly with singleplayer worse than Crysis and multiplayer worse than TF2. If it sold well, it's because of the massive marketing campaign. A better conclusion to draw from this article is that some games are better marketed than others, and right now the two newest PC titles were not hyped enough. Is that really a bad thing? I for one am exceedingly sick of hype convincing everyone to buy mediocre games, and less hype may well mean that less people are tricked out of their money, which in the end could force developers to be more creative and make better games.

Another thing: I bet that COD4 is selling really well. One of my friends has a kickass machine that can run Crysis moderately well, yet he has more fun with COD4. Why? It's just a better game. Better gameplay, more interesting levels, runs better, still looks good. Furthermore, I've played the game on both the PC and the 360 and I can say without a doubt that the PC version controls much better, and looks sharper too. I don't think people are abandoning the PC platform so much as abandoning some of the games on it. All this talk about consoles offering equivalence is still not true, though it becomes more true every generation. But that's another topic entirely.

 

[the_carrot]

There wasn't a problem with UT3 except character concept. As Shadow said, the "hard guy" complex. Muscles so big they couldn't touch their face. Bigger problem with them looking like that, is you have this huge mofo wiedling a rocket launcher in one hand, and he isn't even a Juggernaut...... That kind of put me off.

I think the art style is fine. Simple, straightforward, military guy appeal. Nothing really innovative, but really the avatars are so small when you play it hardly matters, the detail is lost.

 

[shadow skill]

So millitary guys like WOMEN that look like men now? Note that I'm not talking about women who happen to be beaten with an ugly stick, that is a different issue.....

 

[the_carrot]

So millitary guys like WOMEN that look like men now? Note that I'm not talking about women who happen to be beaten with an ugly stick, that is a different issue.....

Are you replying to me?