So, Far Cry 3 is out in Europe tomorrow, and after watching TotalBiscuit's "WTF is... Far Cry 3" video, I've been thinking I might pick it up. What differences are there from the original and the (in my opinion, horrendous) sequel? For one, the massive mountains blocking and guiding you around the world are gone. It's more of an open world now, and you can climb radio towers to get what appears to be the equivalent of the Points of Interest from Assassin's Creed(revealing secrets, loot, and miscellaneous stuff in your local area). There's also crafting involved now, and you have to hunt certain animals in order to craft things like loot bags, or gather herbs to create medicine and boosters.
While I'm certainly still disappointed in Far Cry 2, I'm thinking this third game will redeem the series. It's definitely looking like a good game.
I'm hearing good things. My biggest problem with Far Cry 2, aside from the malaria, were the rapidly respawning enemies that made travelling a chore. I hear they've resolved the problem.
I only got to play Far Cry 2 once - then I upgraded to Windows 7 and it wouldn't install properly. Thus I'm somewhat leery of giving Far Cry 3 a try. They supposed to have, fixed that sort of retardation yet?
What I did play of FC2 was fairly decent. I missed most of the story because the audio tapes were hidden around the world. It got to the end and suddenly I was bestest buds with this guy I thought I was going to try and shank. Very weird. Did like the gameplay though. As I took a running jump out the side of a guy's house into a river down a cliff as his house flew apart under gunfire after I'd killed him.... The open-worldy-ness, was quite good - almost like Crysis without those horrible aliens.
"Slippery slopes can be fun - kind of like a water slide."
- Larry, Burn Notice
Last edited by Nemmerle; November 29th, 2012 at 08:24 AM.
I only got to play Far Cry 2 once - then I upgraded to Windows 7 and it wouldn't install properly. Thus I'm somewhat leery of giving Far Cry 3 a try. They supposed to have, fixed that sort of retardation yet?
What I did play of FC2 was fairly decent. I missed most of the story because the audio tapes were hidden around the world. It got to the end and suddenly I was bestest buds with this guy I thought I was going to try and shank. Very weird. Did like the gameplay though. As I took a running jump out the side of a guy's house into a river down a cliff as his house flew apart under gunfire after I'd killed him.... The open-worldy-ness, was quite good - almost like Crysis without those horrible aliens.
Far Cry 3 is, from what I'm hearing, more like Crysis without those terrible aliens. Fortunately, the fire effects are still in the game, so if you're too lazy to take out an entire camp, you can just set it on fire and watch it burn down.
But yes, I'd describe FC2 as "fairly decent" at the most. It's far from the worst game I've played, but the entire environment, voice actors, and cramped spaces(cliff walls that magically make way for a road without, at any point, narrowing to an impassable path?). Whereas FC2 was set in the interior of Africa, as in mainland, FC3 is set on an island, which should naturally allow for greater freedom of choice. But eh, we'll see.
I'll pick it up tomorrow and post my thoughts in the evening. My prediction? I'll thoroughly enjoy the game.
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Last edited by Serio; November 29th, 2012 at 10:18 AM.
Visuals In the graphical area of things, I'd say Far Cry 3 is a massive step forward from the previous game. It no longer features the green-brown overlay, or the gloomy forest environments. They've been replaced with lush bright green, rolling hills, tall grey and white cliffs, dark forests and beautiful sunsets. Each and every leaf on the trees looks incredible, and not just a piece of copy-paste shodwork.
Water looks, unfortunately, the same. It's rather static on the surface, with only minimal waves shown. It's curious that Ubisoft Montreal would put so much work into cliffs and colour, but gloss over one of the things you'll be seeing most of; water. Once you get into the water itself, it changes. Your vision blurs momentarily, and when you get your bearings you'll find yourself surrounded by fish, underwater vegetation, and fantastic, handplaced shipwrecks.
The lighting system stays mostly the same, but has gotten some nice facelifts. The HDR feature is used to its most, and when you enter a cave you'll find yourself blind for a moment or two, until your eyes adjust. Similarly, exiting a cave will blind you as you wait for your eyes to adjust to the sunlight. This can be especially dangerous if you continue running, since many exits will have deliberately placed fall hazards.
Interface This is, unfortunately, the aspect in which Far Cry 3 fails the hardest. The user interface is big, clumsy, and near impossible to navigate. Instead of a single menu for video options, your settings are spread across;
Video - Controls resolution, SSAO, VSync, and other superficial options
Calibration - Controls brightness, gamma, and contrast
Video Quality - Controls environments, textures, water, geometry
Controls - Controls your controls
Gameplay - Controls hints and subtitles
Audio - Controls your audio settings, as it implies
That being said, Far Cry 3 offers a great deal more customization than most console ports. It allows you to adjust just about everything, from the kind of anti aliasing, down to individual settings to lights, shadows, textures, environments, viewing distance, FOV, mouse acceleration, mouse sensitivity, etc. Things you'd expect to see in a game.
Gameplay If I had to compare, or give a good idea, of how Far Cry 3 plays out, my first choice would be Crysis encountering Just Cause 2. You have a massive open world laid out before you, with wonders and secrets all over, but with a focus on approaching each objective however you want to. For example;
I was exploring an area with a radio tower, and zip lined down to a cliff overlooking an encampment. Marking the various patrols, I threw a rock into the guard post closest to me. The guard turned to check the rock, and I jump into the yard. He did, unfortunately, hear me and alerted the rest of the camp. After a long shoot out, two pirates broke off from the group and moved around the tower, at which point I leapt down and stabbed one in the back, turned around and shot the other, then placed C4 on the nearby truck. I leapt off the cliff into a small bush, and waited for the patrol to get near... Then detonated the explosive. Instead of being drawn to me, the entire encampment and reinforcements were drawn to the explosion, allowing me to move in and steal their loot.
This is just one of many different approaches, all open to you from the beginning of the game. If you're into picking them off from a distance, you can bring along your sniper rifle and pick the appropriate traits. Or you can sneak in and take them out from behind with your knife and bow. Heck, if you want to watch the world burn, just bring your rocket launcher, flamethrower, and molotovs and let the physics do your work.
In addition to the main story, the game also features a haul of side missions. These include, but aren't limited, to assassinations, races, shooting competitions and hunting. You can also find and collect three series of items, each providing either insight into Rook Island, its history, or providing you with skill bonuses.
Story & Characters This is actually the part that surprised me the most. Far Cry 3 features a cast of characters that are exceptionally written, voiced, and modelled. For once, your character isn't a trained soldier, super soldier, exiled knight or mercenary for hire. Instead, he's just a person trapped on an island at the wrong time.
Though I haven't yet spent much time with the main story(I've been mostly running around exploring the island), it does take you far and wide, both into the jungle, to a high cliff, through a long and well constructed cave sequence, and onto rolling plains.
Also, though this is more a thing that bugged me in the past game, unlike in Far Cry 2, you can actually see the villagers in the various villages now. Gives them more life.
Conclusion At the present time, there are issues with the Far Cry 3 servers, rendering achievements unachievable and multiplayer impossible to access. I assume they'll be fixed by the US launch next week, but until then, you're forced to play in Offline mode to avoid some nasty DRM related bugs and issues.
Those problems aside, I can definitely see this game as a potential candidate for my personal Game of the Year. It's rare for a sequel to be more successful than its predecessor, but I think this could be one of those cases.
And, since you no doubt want them, here is a haul of screenshots I took through Steam:
Spoiler:
Some tech stuff Currently, the game is set to the highest settings possible and runs incredibly smooth. It's in DX11, though there seem to be speculation that it's glitched and functions as DX9. I haven't made any measurements of it, but I'd estimate my FPS to be between 50-60 FPS at 1920x1080, with no Anti Aliasing and VSynx disabled. It should be noted there are currently no Nvidia drivers out for it.
Some tech stuff Currently, the game is set to the highest settings possible and runs incredibly smooth. It's in DX11, though there seem to be speculation that it's glitched and functions as DX9. I haven't made any measurements of it, but I'd estimate my FPS to be between 50-60 FPS at 1920x1080, with no Anti Aliasing and VSynx disabled. It should be noted there are currently no Nvidia drivers out for it.
If you are running a program like Afterburner the OSD will let you know if it's loading the DX9 or DX11 version of the game, it'll show next to the framerate counter.
If you are running a program like Afterburner the OSD will let you know if it's loading the DX9 or DX11 version of the game, it'll show next to the framerate counter.
I thought about that, but couldn't be bothered to dig up Afterburner again.
Well, after much editing, re-editing, cursing, fist slamming, and facepalming(not to mention a 51 GB .avi file), I finally managed to output a good chunk of Far Cry 3 gameplay. Ultra settings, 1920x1080, so you may want to hit the full screen button for maximum enjoyment of the game.
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Far Cry 3 
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