You can play Crysis just fine on a at 1600 x 1200 on a 700$ gaming system today. 90% of what you see is done by the graphics card, and for $180 you can get a GTX 260 which plays crisis just fine. Leaving 500$ for the rest of the system which is still ok. (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150...)
http://www.gamespot.com/pages/forums/show_msgs.php?topic_id=... for an actual gamers review w GTX 260.
thanks, but most of those gamers are noting low frame rates, less than 50 fps... while still playable, it's not as smooth as the '07 demo.
That demo is also at a lower resolution than 1600 x 1200.
However, the average frame rate is almost useless, it's the minimum that's important and an absolute minimum of 24FPS on the most demanding demo is perfectly playable. Mostly when you play the game it's far higher than that, but in the middle of a huge firefight when vegetation is being chopped to bit's it's still playable.
PS: I wish most reviewers would note the worst frame rate instead of letting 100FPS in some areas cover for sub 30FPS in others. EX: http://www.guru3d.com/article/palit-geforce-gtx-260-sp216-so...
I was thinking pedantically that there are more powerful "computers" available than a high-end PC and they would be able to do even better than this example, but then it occurred me that it's also possible that game engines are the most sophisticated physics/graphics engines... worldwide, they probably have more attention and money focussed on them than even the US military could afford (guessing).