Cryostasis is $6.50 at Gamersgate this week

[tviceman]

I have no problem whoring out games I think are good or at least very, very worthy of a sale. Cryostasis at $6.50 is an amazingly cheap price for this game.

If you've never heard of it, it's a slower paced first person shooter with a heavy story driven game play and tons of hardware accelerated physx effects. I definitely recommend picking this up if you've got a well-equipped rig. The physx effects need a gtx 260 216 or better for smooth gameplay.

There is no playable demo, but then again we're only talking about $6.50.

 

[Molondo]

Can canadians buy from this site?

Maybe i'll wait when it drops on steam.

 

[TheVrolok]

The demo seemed kinda buggy when I was playing it.. is the retail better? It seemed really cool and 7 bucks is killer.

 

[TheVrolok]

I bit the bullet anyway .. 7 bucks.. it seemed like a fun little gem.. nothing incredible, but for 7 bucks, why not. Though, DL speed from GamersGate isn't anything special. Getting 120kbps right now.

 

[gorcorps]

The demo seemed kinda buggy when I was playing it.. is the retail better? It seemed really cool and 7 bucks is killer.

So there IS a demo? The OP says there isn't.

 

[TheVrolok]

So there IS a demo? The OP says there isn't.

I don't know if there's a true demo, the only thing I played was a pre-release tech demo to show off the physX

nVidia still has it up http://www.nvidia.com/content/graphicsplus/us/download.asp

 

[coloumb]

If you don't have hardware Physx - the graphics are going to be incredibly bad simply due to playing at very low settings. The overall [linear] story is pretty damn cool - you alter events in the past to change the present [and outcome of the game - which is on a linear path]. If you happen to fail changing a past event - you don't die - you just go back into the present and try again until you succeed [you can die in the present day though]. A few puzzles/areas will make you go "WTF am I suppose to do?!". And there are a few areas that will make you jump out of your seat.

For $6.50 - it's not a wash if you don't like the game and it's chump change if you do.

 

[TheVrolok]

If you don't have hardware Physx - the graphics are going to be incredibly bad simply due to playing at very low settings. The overall [linear] story is pretty damn cool - you alter events in the past to change the present [and outcome of the game - which is on a linear path]. If you happen to fail changing a past event - you don't die - you just go back into the present and try again until you succeed [you can die in the present day though]. A few puzzles/areas will make you go "WTF am I suppose to do?!". And there are a few areas that will make you jump out of your seat.

For $6.50 - it's not a wash if you don't like the game and it's chump change if you do.

Would you recommend a dedicated PhysX card? I've got my GTX 285OC, but also have an 8800GT collecting dust in a box I could throw into my second PCI-E slot and use as a dedicated PhysX card.

 

[tviceman]

Would you recommend a dedicated PhysX card? I've got my GTX 285OC, but also have an 8800GT collecting dust in a box I could throw into my second PCI-E slot and use as a dedicated PhysX card.

I can say unequivocally YES the dedicated physx, especially something like an 8800GT, will provide a substantial performance increase.

I played through this game months ago when it was first released a GTX 260 216 OC. It took setting most in-game graphics options to medium-low were appropriate (except for textures on high), I kept motion and camera blur on, and had to play at 1440x900 to get an acceptable frame rate with hardware physx enabled.

Last week I bought a 9600 GSO (96 shaders) to use as a dedicated physx card and I am not exaggerating when I say the game now runs substantially smoother with all settings maxed @ 1680x1050 than it did at the lower settings and res before I added in the 9600 GSO.

 

[TheVrolok]

I can say unequivocally YES the dedicated physx, especially something like an 8800GT, will provide a substantial performance increase.

I played through this game months ago when it was first released a GTX 260 216 OC. It took setting most in-game graphics options to medium-low were appropriate (except for textures on high), I kept motion and camera blur on, and had to play at 1440x900 to get an acceptable frame rate with hardware physx enabled.

Last week I bought a 9600 GSO (96 shaders) to use as a dedicated physx card and I am not exaggerating when I say the game now runs substantially smoother with all settings maxed @ 1680x1050 than it did at the lower settings and res before I added in the 9600 GSO.

Hmm, maybe I'll have to test this then. I'll give it a shot without the 8800GT and then stick it in and dedicate it for PhysX. I just don't really want to keep my 8800GT in full time just for one game as I've got my case nicely organized the way it is.

 

[TheVrolok]

Played for maybe half an hour.. the graphics are interesting in that it looks really good and fairly bad at the exact same time. It's really hard to describe. Maybe the best way is to say that the general graphics (textures/polys/models/etc.) are pretty generic, but the particle physics/water are fantastic. I'm sure this was intended as this game attempts to make full use of PhysX.

As far as speed goes, I was generally getting around 30-40 FPS with everything on/at high @ 1680x1050 with the system in my sig. EXCEPT for the moments when a large amount of physX would be occuring at once (i.e. numerous icicles breaking and pieces shattering all about) at which point it would slow to a crawl/freeze for a few seconds (most likely until the particles stopped bouncing about).

I'm definitely going to try dropping my 8800GT in my 2nd PCI-E slot as a dedicated PhysX card to see what happens but I completely forgot that my 620HX only has 2 PCI-E power cables/connections and both are going right to feed my GTX 285OC. So I'll have to pick up a 2x4-Pin Molex -> PCI-E adapter to power the 8800GT. Will most likely shelve the game until then. It does look like it could be fun, though, in a novel way. I do like the atmosphere.

7 bucks for an experiment? Worth it. And I do think I'll enjoy the game (at least 7 bucks worth) when I drop my 8800GT in for a little added performance. However, I do warn those with less than peppy systems to not bother. Without the fun PhysX effects the game may not be worth it, the caveat being that I haven't played through it, so who knows, maybe the story is fantastic but I don't foresee any novel gameplay here.

 

[Ryland]

This game is coming up as $12.95 for me.

Would an Nvidia 8600 PCI (non E) card work for physx?

 

[tviceman]

Played for maybe half an hour.. the graphics are interesting in that it looks really good and fairly bad at the exact same time. It's really hard to describe. Maybe the best way is to say that the general graphics (textures/polys/models/etc.) are pretty generic, but the particle physics/water are fantastic. I'm sure this was intended as this game attempts to make full use of PhysX.

As far as speed goes, I was generally getting around 30-40 FPS with everything on/at high @ 1680x1050 with the system in my sig. EXCEPT for the moments when a large amount of physX would be occuring at once (i.e. numerous icicles breaking and pieces shattering all about) at which point it would slow to a crawl/freeze for a few seconds (most likely until the particles stopped bouncing about).

I'm definitely going to try dropping my 8800GT in my 2nd PCI-E slot as a dedicated PhysX card to see what happens but I completely forgot that my 620HX only has 2 PCI-E power cables/connections and both are going right to feed my GTX 285OC. So I'll have to pick up a 2x4-Pin Molex -> PCI-E adapter to power the 8800GT. Will most likely shelve the game until then. It does look like it could be fun, though, in a novel way. I do like the atmosphere.

7 bucks for an experiment? Worth it. And I do think I'll enjoy the game (at least 7 bucks worth) when I drop my 8800GT in for a little added performance. However, I do warn those with less than peppy systems to not bother. Without the fun PhysX effects the game may not be worth it, the caveat being that I haven't played through it, so who knows, maybe the story is fantastic but I don't foresee any novel gameplay here.

The story is interesting, but at the same time really confusing. Especially the final battle. In fact, none of the monsters make any sense whatsoever with the game's story. IMO, the game is more or less a technical demonstration of physx, but I still enjoyed it thoroughly (enough to want to play through it again).

This game is coming up as $12.95 for me.

Would an Nvidia 8600 PCI (non E) card work for physx?

I would think so, as it's mostly just doing calculations and not transferring large amounts of textures/data. But honestly I do not know.