Every true PC gamer had this week marked on their calendars, Crysis the spiritual successor to Far Cry is out and I can tell you this is one game that will live up to the hype. By now you have probably read some of the reviews, even played the demo yourselves, and seen our videocard test where we show you a somewhat harsh reality that Crysis, being the most graphically advanced game out there, takes a toll on performance and you will need a very fast system to enjoy it to the max. Those with slower systems can still run it though as the engine scales relatively well.

But Crysis is no tech demo, the guys at Crytek have once again built a great enjoyable game upon a good engine and game software platform. I was very pissed off a few years ago when these guys did not get all the recognition they deserved for Far Cry (the original PC game) but it’s likely that won’t happen again.

I also wanted to mention that the full game happens to run a bit faster than the demo. I can’t quantify on the exact difference but from what I’ve seen on my own PC running the same first level, it seems overall smoother with a few things fixed here and there gameplay-wise, too. Looks like the developers were hard at work in the last few weeks between the demo and the full game release with last minute optimizations. On a GeForce 8800 GTS 320mb card I had to turn to some low quality settings to get really smooth gameplay on the demo, but on the full game I’m running comfortably with all at medium at 1680×1050, which is not too bad.

Finally, to get you on a positive Crysis mood here’s a YouTube video depicting some graphics capabilities using the Sandbox editor on DirectX9 with “very high” settings:

Our friends at Legion Hardware were the first website in the whole net to post official benchmark numbers for AMD/ATI’s latest videocard the ATI Radeon HD 3870. It definitely paid off living in Australia for our good friends as they were almost 18 hours early to the game…

The bad news are however that the Radeon HD 3870 is no GeForce 8800 GT killer, which is what many of us were expecting. Instead ATI will keep playing the pricing game, where its HD 3850 model will be the fastest card available on its price range (~$180), while the HD 3870 is expected to undercut the GeForce 8800 GT by some 25% at $225, offering on average the same decrease in performance.

With apparently no further plans from either camp until early 2008, the mid-range cards will likely be selling like hot cakes during the holidays. And while this kind of performance has never been so affordable, neither Nvidia or ATI has brought us a true next-generation product that will let us play Crysis comfortably with any setting we throw at it, heck I wouldn’t have mind paying $500+ for such a card!

But again, whether you like the 8800 GT better or prefer to go ATI’s way, both products fall within a price range that we wouldn’t have imagined just months ago. Competition is king in this industry, now let’s just push those cards in retail, we don’t want to hear “out of stock” for the rest of the year.

I didn’t know if adding some humor would be a good fit for the blog, but let’s say because I’m still trying to set the tone here (and keep those updates coming), let me experiment with a video from CollegeHumor.com that I just found to be hilarious. I’m sure many ten-somethings, and pretty much all twenty, thirty and forty-somethings will be familiar with Street Fighter, or so I hope…

This is only the first part, look here for the next episodes…

Per has done it again! As far as I’m aware he was the first and only source for bringing Bioshock to Windows 2000. Crysis is yet another (great) new generation shooter that officially only supports XP and Vista, but he has managed to bypass that limitation and get the demo fully working on his trusty Windows 2000 rig…

To play Crysis on Windows 2000 you need three files, powrprof.dll, dbghelp.dll and xinput1_3.dll

You can get powrprof.dll from a Windows XP or 2003 install, the version I used which worked was 6.0.3790.3959 from a 2003 SP2 server install. dbghelp.dll is used by many games, the version I took was from my Steam directory, version 6.7.5.0

You can find the xinput1_3.dll in the latest DirectX monthly redist (or the Bioshock DVD if you followed that guide too). In the extracted archive open the file APR2007_xinput_x86.cab and extract the xinput1_3.dll file.

Please read the complete instructions here. You may also be able to get some support from our community if you come across any problems. In addition, here are some benchmarks he ran on Win2k, XP and Vista 64-bit. You can also get a full scoop on Crysis’ videocard performance and scalability from our article posted last week.

If you thought the release of Mac OS X 10.5 was the big news for Friday, think again. In the wider PC world, or in PC gamers’ world for that matter, the release of the eagerly awaited Crysis sounds like more exciting news. The demo came unannounced after a delay early this month, but it’s now out there so what are you waiting for?

The demo includes the complete first level, dubbed “Contact,” which will give you roughly 45 minutes of gameplay. In addition, Crytek is packing in the CryEngine 2 Sandbox game editor, giving the community the opportunity to get familiar with the tools they will have at their disposal before the actual game ships on November 16.

As a side note, Nvidia has released new Forceware beta drivers (169.01) that are optimized for use with this SP demo. If you ask me it’s ridiculous how you need to upgrade drivers every time a new major title is released, it happened with Bioshock, UT, and now Crysis. But anyway, pick your OS and download here.

PS: In all fairness, the release of Leopard are exciting news. Certainly the #1 candidate for the most polished and user-friendly OS currently available.

This little tweak has been available from our forum for a few weeks now thanks to Per who apparently is still running the old trusty Win2k (and you thought you were being conservative keeping XP for a while longer). It has been confirmed by users this should work for both demo and full versions of the game that officially only supports XP SP2 and Vista.

To play Bioshock on Windows 2000 you need two files, dbghelp.dll and xinput1_3.dll:

• You can get dbghelp.dll from a Windows XP or 2003 install, the version I used which worked was 5.2.3790.3959 from a 2003 SP2 server install.
• You can find the xinput1_3.dll on Bioshock’s install DVD or in the root directory of the demo zipfile in a folder called “dx redist” Open the file APR2007_xinput_x86.cab and extract the .dll file.
• Now you need to open it in a HEX Editor, I use Hex Workshop.
  Search for the textstring: “TraceMessage” and replace that with “GetUserNameA”
• Place both .dll files in the games install directory under \Builds\Release
  (Don’t overwrite the files in your winnt/system32 dir!)

That should do the trick! You may want to install the latest videocard drivers available, too, since both Nvidia and ATI have addressed bugs and optimizations targeted to Bioshock. More information and user feedback on this fix can be found in our forums. Enjoy, and thank Per!

You have to give it to Valve, the creators of Half-Life and the equally successful Half-Life 2 sequel, not only these guys develop great games, but their focus on detail and execution has really paid off.

It’s good being Valve, after all they have kept on capitalizing big on Counter Strike for the past few years despite of the fact it wasn’t their own creation. But hey, they did create the mod tools and put them out there for gamers to use and expand their game platform (at no cost). They later relaunched the original HL bundled with Counter Strike, since then other similar successful game bundles have followed up until now that they bring the Orange Box.

It’s a beautiful concept, really. Half-Life 2: Episode 2 took way too long to be finished, and Valve knew that. The episodic series momentum was gone for many, so now instead of launching a rather short good game for $30, they have packed it up with the long time coming vaporware-returning-from-the-dead Team Fortress 2, and guess what, it’s another great game. Not to be outdone with that, for the usual retail price of $50, they are giving away the original Half Life 2, the additional pack HL2 Lost Coast, HL2 Episode One, and a sneak peek next-generation FPS single player experience they call Portal.

The Orange Box was just released today through the Steam distribution system and should be available from retail stores as well.

Execution… have to give it to them. From the popularity observed during the Team Fortress 2 beta and the established base of Half Life fans, this looks to be yet another winner for Valve.

I must admit I’m a console gamer on a very limited basis. I have owned a PS2 for years but for the most part I have limited myself to a handful of what I consider great games, beginning with the Pro Evolution Soccer/Winning Eleven franchise.

It wasn’t until recently that I got myself an Xbox 360 to go along my new HDTV, and man was I impressed. The fact that I started up by booting the Bioshock demo probably added to the experience, but even with the gorgeous graphics that can now be had using new high-def TVs, I did not buy Bioshock (for the 360), and I’m yet to decide if I will jump ship on either Gears of War or Microsoft’s recently released Halo 3. The fact is, I still feel much more comfortable playing shooters on my PC, for that same reason I went and bought the Orange Box so I could get some TF2 beta action.

Now, you will excuse my rambling, but back to where I wanted to go with this post… Microsoft’s Games for Windows initiative is great, I mean, at least it’s something! But you will want to think again if you believe the software giant is really committed to PC gamers. I find it ridiculous and even insulting that Halo 2 was released for the PC just three months ago when the console version was launched back in November 2004!

I’m pretty sure PC game sales wouldn’t cannibalize those of the Xbox, and because both platforms have so much in common, I’m also sure a really committed team of developers would have been able to bring a Windows version in no time if they wished to.

It’s not that we desperately need Halo 3 for Windows. The PC without a doubt has received and will continue receiving a number of AAA titles by the end of the year (Crysis, anyone?), but looking at Microsoft’s Games for Windows efforts, they could do so much better.

This is a funny video, worth your next couple of minutes ;)