Ubisoft has been rather busy this month with new releases, first with the latest installments of the Assassin's Creed franchise and now with the successor to critically-acclaimed Far Cry 3, and oh my is it one enjoyable game.
For online I’ve only played the ‘Battles of Kyrat’ where there are three games types to choose from; Outpost is simple, the defending team defends the outpost while the attackers try to take it over. In Demon Mask, players from both teams have to find masks scattered across the map and take it to highlighted positions. Propaganda involves one team attacking three locations setting explosives at the locations while the other defends and defuses any planted explosives. In Battles of Kyrat players are either playing as The Golden Pass equipped with guns, grenades, mortars or vehicles while the Rakshasa (my personal favourite) are the hunters equipped with a bow and arrow, (fire and explosive arrowheads included) the ability to use syringes to aid them in battle and, by the far the best, the ability to summon an eagle, bear or Bengal tiger to join the fray… oh and you can ride elephants into battle too.
Everything is spread out over the huge map so expect a lot of exploring and I’ll give a little hint: the buzzard (a one man helicopter) is the best way to do so. Even though the PS4 has problems rendering the landscape and pop up is an issue, seeing an untamed wilderness from the skies is amazing and thanks to the power of the PS4 it really does look rather gorgeous. Another little hint, the buzzard combined with the grenade launcher sidearm is endless fun. Seeing enemies fly from the explosions at a bird’s eye view is hilarious and never gets old. In terms of playing the game there are only really two ways to go about murdering animals and people alike.
Taking the Rambo approach of holding a huge LMG and laying waste to any unfortunate soul is one but I prefer a more tactical and subtle approach, especially when taking outposts or fortresses as not only does it grant you more experience but there’s a great deal of satisfaction to be had finding a suitable vantage point and picking off enemies one by one as they scramble to avoid sniper fire. Or equally as enjoyable is shooting open animal cages and letting them do the dirty work… Especially elephants. They tear shit up.
Now in terms of the game and gameplay, it is basically the same as its predecessor. Instead of a tropical island, we are in Kyrat; a fictional region in the Himalayas with a vast environment to be explored. Some may argue (and I have heard this complaint from others playing the game) that it is too similar to Far Cry 3 and honestly it is, but my understanding wasn’t that it would greatly differentiate in the first place. Messing with a formula that was so well received is absurd. I’d like to ask the question whether people would want something different to the point where there are all but a few similarities between the two games. That being said there are new additions such as Fortresses which are essentially huge outposts and if you get spotted, well my friend, you are going to have a bad time. They’ve also added little things such as the repair tool no longer taking up a weapon slot, which I remember giving me grief Also there’s no need to craft green herbs into health because that’s automatically done. New enemies are introduced, known as Hunters and they can be quite the handful for a number of reasons. They can only be tagged for a few seconds before their highlight disappears and are incredibly accurate with the bow which drains your health and they have the ability to charm animals so they fight for them. To say they gave me grief is an understatement.
I’ve logged in a considerable amount of hours and finished the story, honestly on the day of writing this, yet there are still a fair few things I want to do both story related and non-story related. I say story related because, even though seeing the credits role, at segments in the game you are given choices that affect the story and the outcome. This is one of the few games where I feel willing to go back and see what differences wait for me. Although this game doesn’t really feel like its own, more of a Far Cry 3.5, it provides many hours of exploration and enjoyable gameplay.
Should I stay or should I go?
Have you had a chance to pick it up yet? You really should.
Let us now what you think in the comments below!