I just read this book and tried CryENGINE 3 development environment. Reviewed last week and posted the same on my blog.

Likes

Each recipe is accompanied with adequate screen-shots to assist in quick understanding and implementation.

The flow of the book is gradual, authors have maintained the flow and not hopped on different topics.

Explanation of each step is given in a separate section that summarizes the whole process flawlessly.

Each recipe ends with a "There's more..." section, which attracts the readers to explore the in-depth functionality presented there-in.

Dislikes

There is no information on the installation and the version release.

Authors have missed to include pieces of information on game sound mixing & profiling through Data-driven sound system, river tools, Particle Motion blur & Shadows, Facial animation editing and Stereoscopic 3D.

Tone of the book

The authors have maintained high professionalism with verbose content clarity and ethical writing for appropriate use of the tool.

The Verdict

CryENGINE3 Cookbook is the first edition on Crytek's Game Engine Technology. The topics are well - versed & descriptive, suitable for both beginners and professional users. Dan Tracy and Sean Tracy have both made their excellent debut by displaying their efforts in a cookbook style for creating and organizing the contents of this book.I feel that the book lacks lucidity on topics viz. Flow graphs and advanced parameters such as SSAO, GI and cvars as these have not been explained in-depth. On the positive side, the reader is excited to explore these effects by trial and error methods. If you want to fully utilize the capabilities of CryENGINE3 for your project, I would recommend you to refer online documentation too.Finally, this book proves itself to be a head starter for beginners. If you have already had hands-on with CryENGINE2, this book will surely leverage your experience to a higher level.