Enabling 'Very High' Settings Under Windows XP or Vista DX9
Something controversial about Crysis is that by default you can't enable the 'Very High' level for any of the in-game Advanced settings under Windows XP, nor in Vista DX9 mode, yet you can under Vista DX10 mode. Initially it was thought that this was due to Very High being DX10-exclusive. However this is not correct, it's an artificial limitation imposed by Crytek, and in fact it was during the Crysis Multiplayer Beta that it was discovered that you can indeed force Very High mode in DX9. Before we go any further however, it's important to understand that this is not a "DX10 hack", as under DX10 Crysis does indeed have some additional subtle effects which are exclusive and can't be reproduced in DX9 - see the DX9 vs. DX10 topic under the In-Game Settings section. For most intents and purposes though, Very High in XP (or Vista DX9) will look almost identical to Very High in Vista DX10, and also performs better to boot.
