PC News and Game Reviews

Far Cry was a great game, right up to the point when them stupid indestructible mutants showed up. With Ubisoft taking the rights to the name “Far Cry”, and Crytek taking the technology, I was sure that Crytek would make the better game. I am biased of course, but I always put faith in the original developers. Well it would seem I was wrong, and Ubisoft found an excellent development team, who made a great game…..read on!

Story
Fairly standard stuff here. Set in default generic African war torn country. Two factions are fighting for power. Supplying both sides with guns and ammo is the ominous “Jackel”. you goal from the outset is simple, kill the “the Jackel”, the bastard supplying both sides with weapons. As the story plays out it becomes clear your mission will not be ending quite as planned.

Gameplay
First the bad…always the bad. There are too many checkpoints in this game. When starting a mission from point A to point B, you may encounter as many as 3-4 checkpoints en-route. These checkpoints are manned by up to 4-5 men, including fixed machine guns and “the jeep of death”. Now I would not mind if you could drive around them, or simply plow straight through…but the developers kindly gave the AI the ability to race after you in jeeps. Dont get me wrong, the idea/action is great…..but when it happens 4 times in 10 minutes, it becomes very repetitive and a major hastle as you expend precious ammo en-route to your target. I hear the checkpoints were added because play-testers complainind the game could be too boring due to its size, wrong solution. The ability to attack and destroy a checkpoint (permanently) would have been a good feature, as endless firefights on your way to a mission becomes annoying.

Weapons Shops: Everyman needs an AK. To acquire new weapons in FC2 you can simply pick them up. Doing this however has one major problem. The enemy weapons break and jam all the time, only when you use them….I never noticed an enemy having weapon malfunctions when gunning me down so the answer is the weapon shop, where you pay for new weapons in raw diamonds. The problem is the the unlocking system. In order to get new more powerful weapons you need to do a mission for the arms dealer. The missions are all the SAME! You travel to an area and attack the same convoy of 1 truck and 2 jeeps. It plays out the same, all the time. I really can’t see why the devs would not have introduced a variation to the missions. Maybe the truck convoy as one, kill a competitor as another, blow up a shipment coming in by air/boat etc…..variation.

The end….this is the end….my only friend The Jackel. The end is very linear. More of a gripe than a problem, would have liked to have a bit more choice.

Another compliant from a fellow gamer (playing on an archaic PS3 with a really rudimentary joy pad for control) noted that the payoff for exploring alone is not enough. The odd diamond case scattered about is a joke. Who puts one diamond in a case and goes to the trouble of putting it at the top of a mountain!!! Missions to recover cases of diamonds could have featured. The barkeep in Mikes could have told you a story about a plan that went down or a convoy that got hit, you go off find the convoy and a clue to the guys who took it. Finding random diamonds did not reward exploring, like in S.T.A.L.K.E.R the quests should encourage exploration of all areas, not token diamond treats!

The Good - Excellent gunplay. Firefights are dynamic and sprawling. You can approach an enemy village and tacky it by simply setting it on fire, or by peppering it with grenades from a hillside. You can snipe….or run and gun. There were complaints about the AI, I did not see many issues with the AI, certainly worked better than Crysis.

The Fire: Great touch. Tactical use of fire introduced a new dynamic into the FPS genre. Fire burns and spreads. People run away from fire…..people run into sniper scope……people die.

The Story: While being very simple, it does create a sense of a desperate country on the verge of breakdown. A country awash with guns in Africa is a bit of cliche, but there is enough meat in the story to keep you engaged (no need for aliens…thank god)

GFX
What can be said, great. The game looks great. Shadows and textures are excellent. Day night cycle is great. 10 out of 10 on the eye candy front.

Sound
The sound is really good. The noise of the open savanna is like watching a national geographic. Zebra can be heard “Zebraing” out of them. White enemies speak in a “diplomatic immunity” S.African accent. All good on the sond front, with the score changing when danger is afoot. 9/10

Longevity/Replay Value
Well I have only played it once, but will definitely play through it again. I did find it quite easy once I got better weapons, however the dynamic narrative does make every playthrough different. Although the missions wil remain the same, its the order in which they are done, and the characters invloved that make it appear different. I would give it a 7/10 for replay value, it’s certainly not one to sit on the shelf for years untouched.

Conclusion
Very enjoyable game to play that has annoying niggly bits. This is not a truly open world, and if your after dynamic faction conflict this is not the game for you. The factions do not fight outside of scripted battles. In fact they do not move, at all. The world is truly beatiful and an amazing achievement in itself. All in all it has to be an 8/10. Its gun play saves it from the design decisions that really annoyed me.