Far Cry has always been a series with tremendous potential. The open tropical areas of the first game provided a lush setting for a fairly pedestrian adventure, marred by the eventual appearance of game-breaking mutant monsters. Far Cry 2 brought things down to earth with a gritty story of mercenaries in Africa, but suffered from irritating gameplay decisions like constantly respawning enemy outposts and a tendency for your character to have malaria attacks in the middle of firefights. Far Cry 3 is the promise of the series finally realized, with a compelling narrative driving you through a breathtakingly beautiful and hostile tropical island that challenges without irritation and guides without being restricting.
Jason's odyssey takes you through 38 missions that offer the most guided and scripted experiences in the game. Here is where you'll escape burning buildings, man the turret in numerous AI-driven vehicles, explore long-forgotten tombs hidden beneath abandoned World War II era installations, and get to know the shady characters inhabiting the island. It's roughly a 10 hour journey straight through, but to sprint through the story alone is to miss the entire appeal of Far Cry 3.
The island is absolutely crammed with a wide variety of content. The immense map is revealed by reaching broadcast antennas, scaling them, and deactivating a jammer at the top, not unlike the way Viewpoints work in the Assassin's Creed series. This will reveal the immediate area and show you available missions and activities. The brilliant part is how all the disparate activities lead into one another due to the rewards they provide.
The island is absolutely crammed with a wide variety of content. The immense map is revealed by reaching broadcast antennas, scaling them, and deactivating a jammer at the top, not unlike the way Viewpoints work in the Assassin's Creed series. This will reveal the immediate area and show you available missions and activities. The brilliant part is how all the disparate activities lead into one another due to the rewards they provide.
Far Cry 3 is a tremendously immersive and time-distorting game. It never wears out its welcome because of the variety of tasks at hand combined with the unpredictability of the enemies and the island itself. A digital camera lets you tag enemies from a distance, making them easy to track visually even through cover. Performing recon on a target location is extremely important, but several times I found myself suddenly stalked by a tiger or a bear while I was in the process of scouting an outpost from cover. Caged predators in outposts can be freed to wreak havoc among the enemies guarding it. The enemy humans are just dumb enough to be believable, and with practice it becomes possible to torment them creatively while remaining invisible. Of course, the game is perfectly willing to accept a player who just wants to stride into camp and start shooting, too, but you'll have to be extremely quick on the trigger, especially as the game progresses and the enemies up their arsenals accordingly.
The balance of Far Cry 3's gameplay and world is remarkable. It's challenging without being frustrating, it's helpful without being handholdy, and it's unpredictable without feeling random. It is one of the best open world shooters I have played, ranking up there with theS.T.A.L.K.E.R. games and the first Crysis as far as giving you a playground in which you may do as you please.
The balance of Far Cry 3's gameplay and world is remarkable. It's challenging without being frustrating, it's helpful without being handholdy, and it's unpredictable without feeling random. It is one of the best open world shooters I have played, ranking up there with theS.T.A.L.K.E.R. games and the first Crysis as far as giving you a playground in which you may do as you please.
side from the occasional texture glitch or stray enemy phasing into a rock (a problem easily solved with well-placed explosives), Far Cry 3 is a technically brilliant and expertly balanced gameplay experience that offers an immense amount of content and a high degree of polish. At the time of writing I have put nearly 60 hours into it across two playthroughs, and will probably play it a third time on PC later on. I suggest you do the same.
No comments:
Post a Comment