The true baptism of fire is imminent: the Steam Deck, like countless PCs before it, has to be put to the test. As with any new device, one crucial question arises: will it run Crysis? The answer is: no, it doesn’t. The original 2007 version freezes with a black screen. But Crysis Remastered? It boots, it runs, it plays – and with settings optimized for handhelds, you can have a great experience that can handle almost 60 frames per second. Looking for detail rather than absolute performance? The game also does a good job on medium settings and native resolution, allowing this portable version of the game to rival the original version when running on the very high presets – and still at native 720p.
But this is Crysis, so the options are there to bring the Steam deck to its knees. Can It Run Crysis mode turns frames per second into seconds per frame. It’s similar to the original Quake on an old 386 processor. Of course the deck is a resource constrained device and we have to keep that in mind. The in-game ray tracing support has a software fallback, meaning it runs on SteamOS, but that’s really not a good idea. To achieve decent performance and/or extend battery life, we’re looking at a new form of optimized settings. It’s not only about the best value for money, but also about not being afraid of further compromises. Similar to the Nintendo Switch, the smaller screen means that significant loss of detail during gaming is less noticeable.
It turns out there’s a fair amount of wiggle room here, to the point where I had to wonder if we can actually run Crysis Remastered at 60fps, or if we’re at least getting close? To test this, I used the second level, which culminates in a basic attack where dozens of AIs and some tanks advance towards your position. It’s a great spot to explore CPU limitations earlier in the game. We also used it as a benchmark when we overclocked the Nintendo Switch to improve the frame rates of the other handheld version of the game. Even on low graphics settings that give the CPU more power and performance, the Steam deck falls into the 40s in this big battle.
Using custom variables to go to lower settings could get us closer to 60 fps again, but at this point the visual trade-offs become unacceptable. Shadow quality and pop-in look pretty bad, and the transition of objects from 2D sprites to 3D objects is hilariously obvious. Another way to increase CPU performance is – bizarrely – by reducing the resolution. Crysis Remastered’s CPU load increases with resolution, presumably with pixel count, which scales with level of detail. So going down from 800p or 720p to 540p helps both the CPU and GPU. But it also affects accuracy while playing. Close-to-medium range encounters are fine, but long-range vision is compromised, even on the handheld screen. And there’s nothing system-level FSR support on the Steam Deck can do to change that.
We tried it. We fought hard to get a portable 60fps experience with Crysis, but ultimately all roads led to a 30fps setup for the best balance of image quality, performance, and detail. I’d recommend using the system-level 30fps cap offered by SteamOS, which offers a more consistent frame experience than either of the console versions. And while Crysis Remastered supports the full 1280×800 resolution, I would also recommend going down to 1280×720. Yes, this gives you 40px borders at the top and bottom, but they’re not particularly noticeable in the midst of the action, and you’re giving that extra headroom to maintain 30fps or squeeze out a bit more battery life.
As for specific settings, the medium preset is the closest match to the original Crysis at very high, with additional tweaks to beat the game’s OG rendering. Set the post-processing to high to get access to the CryEngine’s really nice per-object motion blur, which greatly improves the flow of the 30fps experience. This also gives access to other tweaks like screen space reflections, which really help the less glossy surfaces in the game. I also recommend the high vegetation setting, which gives us far better foliage coverage than the original Crysis.
The medium preset also enables some additional features not included in the 2007 version, including screen-space shadows for smaller objects in the world, and grass casts shadows as well. Crytek’s SVOGI Global Illumination system is also present and offers a really nice simulation of light reflections. It all adds up to a Crysis Remastered experience that looks really good. I completely beat the first four levels of the game on the hardest difficulty and the 30fps was maintained throughout, apart from the classic Crysis checkpoint stutter. There are also some minor issues that appear to be related to SteamOS’ 30fps cap where we measured 50ms frame time. But fortunately that is rarely the case.
By limiting performance and not pushing the processor to its limits, we also get decent battery life. I hit two and a half hours of uninterrupted gaming. Considering the battery life drops to an hour and a half when you crank Steam Deck’s Van Gogh APU to full power, that’s pretty good. And of course, there’s still the option to turn the settings down even further if you want to play longer. Or you can reduce the resolution to 960×540 and use FSR to upscale back to 720p.
So does Crysis run on the Steam deck? Of course it does. But more importantly, I think it can actually play this demanding game quite well. Of course, the resolution is lower than on the last-gen consoles (it’s handheld!), but you get a visually improved experience compared to the PlayStation 4, especially in terms of vegetation density, as well as smoother performance. The compromise that hurts the most from a PC perspective is the 30 fps cap. Valve is working on adjusting the refresh rate of the display and I think the settings here should be good for 40Hz/40fps. In terms of frame rate, this puts us in the middle between 30 fps and 60 fps, which means a smoother gaming experience. But the impact on battery life will be significant and inevitable. Regardless, we’ll be keeping a close eye on this should official support for adjustable framerates hit the Steam Deck.
Originally written by Alex Battaglia, Video Producer, Digital Foundry
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