It’s pretty obvious that Crysis 3 wasn”t intended for current generation consoles. Bringing the trilogy to a close on Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 may look and sound great, but it certainly doesn’t feel great. This is a PC game, through and through.
Playing it on Xbox 360 has definitely been a challenge. Frequent stuttering, loading screens that outstay their welcome, graphical issues, sound hiccups, complete crashes, achievements won’t unlock. Everything that could possibly go wrong has gone wrong.
Recent patches since launch have helped with some of these issues, but it’s still not plain-sailing. 1.3 aims to keep righting previous wrongs, only this time it hopes to put all remaining major problems to bed, once and for all.
Is the Nanosuit fully engaged this time?
Version Tested: Xbox 360
1.3 is unique in that it has format-specific features, and so I should preface this by saying I have only been able to test the Xbox 360 version of this patch.
For a full list of patch notes, click here
Campaign
That said, there are definitely improvements. The major difference here is that you will now be rewarded for beating the final Seph boss and completing the game. Prior to 1.3, there was a game-breaking glitch which either caused the final boss not to spawn properly or it froze the game completely after defeating the final boss and/or it refused to unlock the final achievement. These problems have now been ironed out, and Crysis 3 is absolutely completable without the end-game crapping out on itself.
While my save game was fine and compatible with the update, Crytek have advised that not all save games will be, and they cannot guarantee a 100% fix rate. They do advise, however, that reloading the scenario will ensure the final boss runs without any problems.
Unfortunately, the patch doesn’t make the final boss any less frustrating, laborious or inherantly dull. Even on Recruit difficulty, the boss and his adds are punishing, and the whole process is extremely tedious. Get past all that, though, and at least the game will now reward you for that.
Some users also had issues with corrupted save files during the Red Star Rising mission. Crytek have assured this has been fixed in 1.3, although not all save files can benefit from this. Not encountering this problem myself, if anyone can confirm or deny in the comments, that would be really helpful.
Multiplayer
Most remaining updates are focused on the multiplayer component of Crysis 3. One of the big ones will see a reduction in bandwidth usage. Crysis 3 online, as you might expect, is very data intensive. Fortunately, the fix does provide improvements to latency that I, and other users, have experienced and the online game does run a lot more smoothly. As a result, Crysis 3 online is more dynamic and responsive across all modes.
Unfortunately, I still experience semi-regular disconnections from the host and am forced to wait while the game pretends to identify another (even though it’s just going to kick me back to the lobby). Regular disconnections from the server also keep happening, though it’s a distinct improvement from previous versions of the game.
At this point, Crysis 3 should be past (or at least seen to be passing) these issues, not still getting plagued by them. This absolutely needs to be Crytek’s main focus in the 1.4 update.
For the 360, one of the exclusive fixes looks at aim assist not working correctly in some map areas. Ironically, this actually needs to be tweaked further as it has become too helpful, especially for automatic weapons. The reticule regularly dragged me into lethal positions on charging enemies, making it easy for me to bring them to their knees.
As pertains other updates, several users have commented saying they have experienced severe dips in frame rate after installing the patch, as much as 50% in some cases. I haven’t noticed any detrimental effects on the 360 version, but I am mostly hearing these concerns from PC users. If anyone on the format can confirm or deny, again, i’d be much appreciated.
…Previously…
2/5
Being unable to complete the game due to end-game glitches and having to suffer through regular disconnects and host migration is unacceptable for a game that supposedly went gold and was apparently patched for improvements.
…After this patch…
3/5
1.3 has finally solved many of the main issues in Crysis 3. It now means the game is completable and also means that streaming online data is no longer as intensive on the servers, meaning the online gameplay is much more responsive than before. However, regular disconnects and host migration remain an issue, the aim assist has become too helpful as opposed to a non-entity, and the game still remains sluggish on 360, pushing the system way past its limits.
…Current Rating…
3/5
Crytek have made some positive steps with this patch. The campaign is playable from start to finish, and players won’t need to worry about game-breaking bugs along the way, but there is still much work to be done. The online space, in particular, needs further tweaking and balancing. Unfortunately, Xbox 360 is not, and never will be, the best place to experience Crysis 3. No amount of patching can fix that, but it is encouraging to see Crytek continue to support the game at a high level.
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