Crytek may have taken the flak it received for the monster it created a little too close to heart and tried to keep it lean this time but taking in the DX11 support that isn't coming and you are left feeling unloved. Even the settings page has been dumbed down completely to simple presets. Granted, you probably won't have to tweak things to death just to get a few more FPS, but having to resort to a 3rd party app to make any advanced adjustments to things like FOV or disabling mouse acceleration is simple neglect.
In some ways C2 is head and shoulders above C1: The missions are focused, the gameplay is tight and the controls have been optimized to be much more useful. In the original Crysis I hardly ever used half of the suits abilities due to the time required to switch and the almost useless duration time. C2 fixes that and adds an upgradability factor to the suit requiring nanites left behind by the alien enemy - You spec the suit to how you want to use it. The levels are well designed and feel real, connected and varied in the context of the game considering it takes place in an environment we pass through every day.
Regardless of requirements or tech level, C2 looks fantastic and plays buttery smooth on the highest settings on my GTX470 SLI rig. I'm simply let down by the high water mark that could have been. Here we are, nine years after DX9 was introduced and the PC's greatest-push-it-till-it-bleeds developer takes a step backwards to play nice with six year old hardware.
