I would say just go look at Nebulas screens or videos. Crysis 1 has a certain blandness too it that C2 far exceeds, in it's good moments.
So the best parts of one game compared to the worst part of the other game, eh?
To me Crysis 1 is a brute force texture monster.
Strange view as texturing is not Crysis highlight but rather the shading and lighting system. The texture detail comes to life thanks to the fully realtime shading and lighting system unlike most other games relying on lightmaps and or baking to do it in cheaper form and worse results in a dynamic environment.
The weapon models are also just bad, very poorly lit, compared to the quality of the rest of the graphics. And weapon models are a big deal since you're staring at them all game.
It's relative, compared to the rest it is of decent to good quality. Compared to other games weapons detail it is good to very good as in texture detail, shading is excellent. But sure I would say BFBC2 probably has the best/most realistic looking weapons and some other games has to the eye more impressive looking guns. However DOF or blur on guns dont make pretty guns but if you want you can set in menu to have it like that in Crysis to by default when aiming (weapon to your side).
But anyway dont be fooled by the dark weapon look as your body casts shadows onto weapon in first person to. Best way to see them are to just enter the weapon config menu with sun at your back.
EDIT: I made newer shots instead of my old ones and hud disabled. Crysis weapon picture links below in spoiler.
Also this one shows shader quality of the As metal surface. Obviously you have to see it in motion to see the smooth shinyness transition, reflections and other shading affects it has applied. Anyway point is they are not bad and they are not "very poorly lit". Can be better, is not the best, but very poorly it aint, it's good, very good.
http://img822.imageshack.us/img822/8500/metalchrome.jpg
Check out the Warhead weapons shots below to.
C1 in certain places almost had a low budget feel, compared to the animation of even top console titles like Killzone. It's a high production values game, but sometimes feels like that low budget east European PC developer quality is strong as well.
It got it's low points like most other games to, AI is not always fault free, animation system, visuals, layout etc. The more complex the games mechanics are and game open world style the more faults will be even in high budget titles. However same rings true for the other game you mentioned, bringing PS2/xbox quality to mind in certain spots/ocassions. But it's fine to compare but atleast try to not base it all on one games all worst parts/points vs all the best of the other game(s). Worst vs worst, best vs best and avg vs avg.
EDIT: Btw I find it funny Crysis is the only game used for comparision when Warhead is the sucessor to Crysis with improvements, even weapons! So is Crysis Wars. Heres cake!
Certainly very good and improved from Crysis weapons. Picture links from Warhead weapons below in spoiler.
