Crysis 3 creative director on sandbox play versus ‘Michael Bay moments’

In trying to figure out whether Crysis 3 will be any good, the main thing I care about is how open the levels will be. The environments in the first half of Crysis were huge, bigger than Battlefield maps, and it’s what gave that game a sense of freedom. Crysis 2 never quite gave me that feeling, so I wanted to find out how the third game would measure up. I asked creative director Rasmus Højengaard.
PCG: Crysis 1 had very open landscapes, whereas Crysis 2 was set in tighter urban areas – where on that scale does Crysis 3 fall?
Rasmus Højengaard: It’s not linear like Crysis 2, and it’s not a completely open island you can explore. But we’re utilising the advantages of each of these settings whenever it makes sense in the game, right? So if we want to make sure you experience a massive Michael Bay moment, then it’s no good to place you in the middle of a big grass field then crossing your fingers and hoping that you will see it. On the other hand, if we want to empower you in the sense of control in that you can plan things out and execute them and get a great feeling of success afterwards, then it’s not cool to put you in a sewage pipe, because there’s not a lot of variety there.
So it’s about utilising each of these advantages at the right point, and that’s what I meant about dynamic range, we’re really trying to go for both of those spectrums with this game, and the environment supports that, because we have the type of environment you have in Crysis, as well as the type of environment you have in Crysis 2. And we can just kind of move you around and use these wonders to push each of these things so that you get both of these experiences.
And a thing to mention also is that linear gameplay is a little more consumer friendly. Whereas sandbox gameplay is a little more hardcore. So we don’t wanna do either or, we wanna make sure that there is something in there for everybody to enjoy.
PCG: So are there big open stretches of jungle?
Rasmus Højengaard: Well, there’ll be bigger open areas than what you saw here today, yes, for sure.
What we saw was a longer version of the trailer, to give you an idea of the environments he’s referencing here: pretty tight ones.