Crysis 3 is broken on PS3, and we won't review until it's fixed
- Posted March 11th, 2013 at 16:51 EDT by Kyle Prahl
- 20 Comments
The third installment in developer Crytek's venerable open-world FPS series hit store shelves three weeks ago, but I haven't published my review for PSU yet. There is a single, frustrating reason for this, and I'd like to update readers on the situation with an emphatic recommendation. The question is, should you buy Crysis 3?
No. At least, not yet.
You see, Crysis 3 is fundamentally broken in a way that prevents me from finishing the game. Here's how it goes, as spoiler-free as possible: There's a final boss fight (obviously). Immediately upon dealing the finishing blow to this boss, the game transitions to a first-person cutscene (Crysis 3 is rather fond of these setpiece moments). As the cutscene (which is not the ending) wraps, the screen fades white (also typical for Crysis 3). Then, black--and a hard freeze. Right before the game's climactic finale, the heart-pumping, plot-twisting culmination of everything that came before, the game freezes. Every. single. time.
I can't view the ending of Crysis 3.
I'm not the only PS3 gamer experiencing this issue. Indeed, it's a systemic problem plaguing what seems like the entire PS3 community. Here's what some members of the MyCrysis forum community had to say:
DeNNN3OOO (3/11/13): "When I kill [REDACTED] my PS3 stop working and I have a black screen on TV! What should I do to solve this problem?"
kw2681 (3/8/13): "After killing [REDACTED] my ps3 is still freezing.nothing changed in 2 weeks,where is the fix crytek???i payed 60 euro for a game i cant finish."
r0sePHich (3/8/13): "Yup.. My little brothers 360 version is the same, except yr can't beat the alpha.ceph before it freezes.. Patch 1.1 was supposed to address this, but only made it worse. And no follow up from them either.."
Grim13 (3/9/13): "I was just abou to post the exact same thing. Crytech, when will I be able to finish the game? How long is this going to take?"
Crytek's official response, posted two weeks ago, reminds me of the way Bethesda treated PS3 gamers with its piss-poor release and support of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Here's what Crytek had to say on the matter:
"Hi all,
We are aware of and investigating the following issues, with an aim to include fixes for them in any future patches:
-Crashes during the final boss fight in SP
[OTHER ISSUE NOTES OMITTED]
Due to nature of development, fixes for these issues cannot be guaranteed"
Wait, what? I can't finish your game, and you can't guarantee I'll one day be able to? Even the PR agency representing the game, whom PSU contacted directly, hasn't provided comment from the development team.
To make matters stranger, a bevy of Crysis 3 reviews have already been published by other websites. Many of these outlets received pre-release code, and relatively few were PS3-based. The cause of the hard freeze remains ambiguous, but these early reviews (which don't mention the problem) would seem to indicate that it cropped up in later patching. Some users have reported success in bypassing the freeze by reloading the entire final mission from the game menu, manually. I haven't tried this for myself, but it does not (and would not) change my stance on the matter. This shooter--Crytek's "masterpiece"--is broken, and for a game with a heavy narrative focus, that's a death sentence.
It's a shame, because the rest of the game impresses. Gameplay is solid, presenting a beautiful world with more vertical freedom than the series has ever seen. The story manages to take nonsensical loose ends from past installments and tie them together into something resembling 'meaningful.'
Despite these strong points, you should not buy Crysis 3 (yet), and PSU won't be publishing a review of the game until Crytek addresses the issue.
If you own Crysis 3 on PS3, and have experienced this issue for yourself, let us know in the comments below. And, by all means, stay glued to PSU.com in the days and weeks to come for updates, including (we hope) our eventual review.
Email
Related Content
Comments
-
SPOTTED
- 4:55pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 1
I don' t think I ever bought a broken game on any console...until the PS3, where every one of them seems to be broken in one way or another. Still love to read the comments where people say YAY a patch is coming....Fools, the game should have never needed a patch assuming you forked out $60 for a brand new game!
-
*goo
- 5:23pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 2
Review sites need to stop holding off on their opinion when a game is broken and start reviewing it for exactly that reason. A broken item deserves to be reviewed poorly. It should never have been released if it wasn't play-tested appropriately - if it's fit for sale, it's fit for review. Warts and all.
-
KyleOnTheRun
- 5:37pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 3
@2 I believe it's more important that we share a recommendation to readers. In this case, I advise that no PS3 owner should buy the game. It's a review, without the formal score. A fundamentally broken product doesn't deserve the same scale--or any scale, for that matter--as functional products.
-
DarkNemesis
- 6:41pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 4
@1 the only broken games on the PS3 are from lazy third party companies. In my experience no single exlcusive that I have bought was broken in any way. Patches happen on all consoles and PC, but that is just general improvements.
-
steviej
- 8:38pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 5
@4
It's been almost 7 years and these games are known to work fine on other consoles, how many years of poor results does one have to see before they stop blaming developers and look to the console?
Why is the PS4 easier to develop for, like the 360?
Why is the PS4 going to unified memory, like the 360?
Why is the cell processor being discarded?
Are we really going to proclaim that the PS3 had issues with lazy developers for 7 years? Well, if that's the case, then maybe it was not the right console to purchase?
-
IAmBlutoo
- 8:57pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 6
I agree third parties are lazy(Bathesda). Naughty Dog shows em how its done. It doesn't take 7 years to figure out the PS3.
Having said that the PS4's x86_64 cpu is has a much smaller learning curve. And with the PS4's technology, it will be much easier to develop for. This time there will be no excuses(lol).
As for Crysis 3, I got it for PS3 but haven't finished it yet as i am working on other games primarily. And I won't play it again until they fix this. Thanks PSU for the heads up.
-
-
-
Gameoholic007 |
Demented007- 10:40pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 9
It has to do with the porting of the game between platforms from pc. A lot of times, when a game is done on pc, I notice some have trouble trying to run on the PS3, But, if the developer takes the time, and actually learns the architecture of the Cell, the results pay off with no problems at the end. Crytek is one of my least favorite developing companies, because they do mostly pc development, and came into console development late, and failed to learn the tricks with the PS3 from the very start. The 360 and PS3s architecture are way different between the two, so in turn, the results may vary depending on the knowlege of the developer. The PS4s hardware setup isnt based off of the 360s, it just a normal typical setup for consoles,and even pcs. The main reason that the PS3 has trouble, is not because it has a split memory setup, there just wasn't enough of it in their to feed the needs. The 360 has its own probs with its unified setup, mainly because there isn't enough in it also.
-
KyleOnTheRun
- 11:41pm EDT - March 11th, 2013
- 10
@8 Thanks for your input. It seems that some have managed to avoid this issue, but how remains a mystery.
-
tankerkevo
- 12:53am EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 11
"Right before the game's climactic finale, the heart-pumping, plot-twisting culmination of everything that came before, the game freezes. Every. single. time."
Answer: You died. Every. Single. Time. I thinks it's quite poetic and I'm picking up a copy. Thanks for the review, and I'm sorry about the spoiler.
-
Alex Dyagilev
- 1:30am EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 12
let me start by saying i own a ps2 and ps3. but ever since i built my own custom super powerful gaming rig, i have not touched my ps3 and it is currently for sale. Crysis 3 should never have been releasred on consoles to begin with. ps3/360 are running heavily outdated hardware. i realize that not everyone has $1200 to spend on a gaming pc like mine (bear in mind all but one of my components were bought on sale with great deals) and most people are way too stupid to build a computer. however, my hardware knowledge was severly limited before i started. all it takes is an internet connection and some research to understand how to build a rig. since my pc can run C3 on max settings (with fxaa), i can be certain that ill be able to run any game on max for next 2-3 years without even overclocking my cpu/gpu. in fact, the reported specsn for next gen consoles (ps4) dont even approach my computer. ergo, its outdated before its even released. consoles will ALWAYS be inferior to pc gaming machines. and because ppl keep buying them, game devs get away with making games with outdated graphics (PERFECT example is far cry 3 - the graphics there would have been impressive 4 years ago, crysis 1 with mods looks better, im not even gona mention C2 - the only game on the market thats better than C2 is C3.) thats why i rlly respect Crytek, they actually pushed and annihilated the graphical limit we experienced beforee. so the PC version is Crytek's masterpiece, NOT the ps3 version - thats just a scaled down sad shadow of what the game truly is.
-
-
Bo Oldenburg
- 4:28am EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 14
i hope the will fix this soon or it will be the last game i buy from crytec.
-
Timejumper65
- 7:32am EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 15
I hate it when this happens. You wait for a game, you watch all of the videos, you read about it, you play the other games in the series and then you buy it, play it, and it is broken. These things are always known on the front end and never passed on to the consumer. This game should have never been released unitl it was 100%. In my opinion the game is beautiful but this flaw makes it ugly. One of these days we all are going to band together and file class action lawsuits. We loose money but they keep making it.
-
-
Nakatomi Uk |
Nakatomi_Uk- 12:12pm EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 17
What about the people who own a PS3 and dont have it connected online and try to play this game they wont be able to finish it without the patch there are a small % with no PS3's online but still my question stands
-
-
Sylvon Macleann
- 6:32pm EDT - March 12th, 2013
- 19
I've completed the game on supersolider last week. Snoopae69
-
doctimw
- 1:17pm EDT - March 16th, 2013
- 20
I too am very frustrated with PS3 and Crysis 3. Very disturbing to enjoy a game to the end only to actually NOT get to the END!!! Maybe they are trying to keep this as quiet as possible until the PS4 comes out!!! Not all insiders agree with the actual PS4 abilities!! XBOX will be our platform for now on!! Thank you PSU for informing the rest of us that WE ARE NOT ALONE!!!! YOU HAVE GIVEN US LITTLE GUYS A VOICE!!!
This will permanently ban this user and delete all associated comments. This action is irreversible, are you SURE you want to do this?!
