Far Cry 3

Once you don't have to craft anymore the game starts losing steam fast. By the third area you can ignore animals and basically consider them a minor nuisance. And yes the menus are awful.

I got to the second island last night, and it occurred to me that this is kind-of like a FPS Just Cause, except that after thinking on it, JC2 was a much better game, and it's all the Ubisoft designs that pull it down. Not saying there wasn't repetition in JC2, but I think there's a presentation issue where it's essentially an Assassin's Creed city area, complete with towers (FPS climbing puzzle) and camps to do that make it into a rote task rather than spontaneous troublemaking.

I started using the ripper last night and that is a fun gun.

I wish the story missions were a little more free form. I've only done like 5 or 6 of them but they don't seem to embrace the rest of the game's free wheeling nature.

Agent 86 wrote:

I wish the story missions were a little more free form. I've only done like 5 or 6 of them but they don't seem to embrace the rest of the game's free wheeling nature.

Yes, thinking about it and comparing it to others games, not just JC2 but FC2 as well it does seem quite easy to get the "you are leaving the mission area". I can understand there's a few occasions where you have to do that, but it's kind of fighting itself as an open world game. Just give me mission criteria and let me worry about the rest. The thing I keep coming back to is that designers are control freaks who while wanting no one to have a bad time (which is good), they overstep to make sure no one can have any other experience than what they design.

Yes, this is one of the most schizophrenic games I've ever played.

On the one hand: it's an open world, do what you want, emergent behaviors from complex systems game
On the other hand: semi-corridor crawler, tightly-focused, story-based game

Where those collide, it is jarring.

And, personally, I wanted less of the other hand because I wanted to be spending more time playing on the one hand. What is worse (for me) is that the the designers did not trust the players to play the game they (the players) wanted to play, leading to collisions between the hands as well as forcing (if you want to open up the rest of the game) the player to play on the other hand. Adding insult to injury (for me) I hated the story, so all that other hand stuff just became less and less fun until I stopped playing it. Pity. There's a lot to like in the game.

This is why FC2 is so superior: it is an open world game. Period. Sure there's a story (which is pretty good for a videogame, probably because it is so minimal and open to interpretation), but you don't have to understand it or even follow it. Yeah yeah checkpoints. The game gives you the means to mitigate them, just go around them already.

On the gripping hand: Twisty, dumbass metaphor beaten into the ground is horrible. As is disjointed post.

Really though, I don't mind the story missions so much if they're clearly defined. You go into a different mode of play for them (and I've been through a lot in linear caves).

What bugs me more is that they go to the extent of building a pretty massive open world and don't do that much with it, and what they do put in there follows such a formula. I suppose that probably comes down to predictability (or preventing weird bugs) and eliminating bad times. Say for example you had systems of the factions fighting for territory autonomously then I can see all kinds of weirdness, but I think the effect on the game would be worth it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nl7hQ_BEdz8&list=PL4Sz7_l-PtwBJ2YpUN2_luT3pmMbdOlrD&index=1

I subscribe to this guy on youtube and a month ago or so he started this "Permadeath" run of Far Cry 3. I thought it was really entertaining and he says several times throughout his different videos that it's a different and enjoyable way to play the game.

Would there be any interest in doing a little "Permadeath" competition? It would be on whatever the name of the hardest difficulty is, no fast travel, and you just get to the point where you have to go see Dr. Earnhardt at the beginning of the game. The winner would be whoever could capture the most radio towers and outposts. We could even do a points system, like radio towers being worth 5 points each and outposts being worth 10.

Just a fun suggestion. I want to revisit this game now that I've finished it, but I have a hard time finding a reason to go back.

MountaineerWR27 wrote:

I want to revisit this game now that I've finished it, but I have a hard time finding a reason to go back.

I have a similar problem with many 'good' games I've played through, I need a bit more of a hook than just going through the same game again. I think this is why RPGs are quite good as often you do have to choose one path or another, whereas FC3 lets you have it all.

I'm about 7-8 hours in at the moment, really loving the world. Have it on ultra settings so the foliage, draw distance & textures are pretty damn good. Story wise its solid enough so far for me, great voice acting for the most part & the plain & simple goal of rescuing your friends with other plot points branching of that. Gameplay wise it feels as solid as any FPS out right now, animations are superb, the way you can just sprint & slide into long grass (in the crouched position) when you see any enemy is gratifying. The guns feel like there's weight behind them & the way you can shoot out enemy vehicles tire's for it to then go of course & drive down a hill is a superb feeling. Climbing wise its decent although Dishonored feels far superior in that aspect (Far Cry has that automated feel like a neck snap in Deus Ex Human Revolution), still it feels good climbing mountains & exploring caves.

The way houses, fields etc can burn has a great effect on the atmosphere of a battle. I think the stealth in Far Cry 3 is definitely one of the best in the last while as you feel safe from the pirates in the undergrowth, flank them around the sides of cabins, hills, tree's etc. Easily one of the top 5 of 2012 for me thus far.

polypusher wrote:

I finished this today and it was great fun. There was a bug that annoyed me the whole time, Im curious if I was doing it wrong.

C-4: Whenever I place it, it makes a loud sound and alerts every guard remotely nearby as Jason clumsily drops it at his feet. I dont remember having this much trouble with it in Far Cry 2. I also found I couldn't reasonably stick C4 in/on a Jeep, drive it full speed at a base, dive out and detonate, a favorite trick from the older game. Trying to tended to damage the vehicle and just rest the device gingerly on top, ready to fall off at the slightest turn.

I think you need to hold down the button for C4 to actually stick to anything.

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/bEl1Avh.jpg)

It's amazing the difference removing those pop up reminders, etc makes. I played last night and was enjoying the game a lot more. I was chillin' in the jungle just marking wildlife and looking for animals on my 'to hunt' list and then headed off to do some radio towers. It was so much easier to explore in an unstructured way and get absorbed into the environment. I also played a couple of missions and enjoyed them. I'm actually getting into the game now rather than just skimming across the surface.

I've decided to use less than optimal weapons for the combat. It gives me the feeling of having old rifles, etc that the villagers scavenged up for me.

Best moments last night:

Shooting a tiger in the head and killing it with a bow and arrow at close range in tall grass.

Shooting the driver of a jeep speeding towards me then watching it flip over down a hill, explode in a ball of flames and continue to to tumble into the distance.

/sigh of contentment

I had fun getting a contact high while using the flame thrower on specific crops last night. It took me a while to figure out why my screen was getting all fuzzy. Nice touch.

Jucofett wrote:

I had fun getting a contact high while using the flame thrower on specific crops last night. It took me a while to figure out why my screen was getting all fuzzy. Nice touch.

The music that plays during that sequence is awesome too. Sadly, it's not on the soundtrack. Anyone here happen to know what it is, or do I have to (sigh) resort to google?

Damien Marley and Skrillex - Make it Bun Dem.

Rallick wrote:
Jucofett wrote:

I had fun getting a contact high while using the flame thrower on specific crops last night. It took me a while to figure out why my screen was getting all fuzzy. Nice touch.

The music that plays during that sequence is awesome too. Sadly, it's not on the soundtrack. Anyone here happen to know what it is, or do I have to (sigh) resort to google?

It's Skrillex. I lol'ed when it played because WTF with dubtep. It just felt so out of place and I had to turn it off because it was getting irritating. I didn't mind the reggae at all, it was the annoying dub parts.

I finished this last week and I really enjoyed my ride with it. I didn't mind the story missions at all until towards the end when you started going after Hoyt. The part that was completely ridiculous to me was the helicopter rescue at the end. I mean seriously, how slow do you need to fly it WHEN YOU ARE TRYING TO RUN AWAY. It just felt dumb.

One of my favorite parts of the game was when I got the Squirrel Suit. That is the best! I love going high on mountains to fly halfway across the map to do a side quest.

Thanks for the info, TempestBlayze and Agent 86. Never been a big fan of what little I've heard of Skrillex, but for some reason that track just clicked with me. Apparently Amazon MP3 have the EP (which is just that track and 6 remixes) available for 0.99, so if you like it that's not a bad deal.

Just had another go with coop last night and apparently microphone support on ps3 is still broken. Staticky mess. Boo.

So after some contemplation, I figured out that this game is actually two games. One is an incredibly awesome open world game with lots of layers and depth. The other is a crappy QTE storyline.

Nevin73 wrote:

So after some contemplation, I figured out that this game is actually two games. One is an incredibly awesome open world game with lots of layers and depth. The other is a crappy QTE storyline.

Yes. "Schizophrenic" is the term I used in an earlier post.

I am an island liberator, dammit. Whole map clean of red. This makes me simultaneously happy and sad. I was kind of disappointed that I had a "disguise" that made the enemy camp liberation quite a bit easier. Standing outside the camps snapping pictures with impunity was a bit off-putting. I kind of dug that there were different stratagems for each of them. Sometimes I could sneak in and turn off the alarms. Sometimes that was too hard, but there was an animal I could loose on the population while I plinked off alarms boxes from afar. Sometimes I could takedown folk from cover. Fun and I'll kind of miss it.

I've run into an issue where the game is cloud syncing my saves back to a much older save. Set me way back on the story missions and has kind of killed my enthusiasm for the game.

Agent 86 wrote:

I've run into an issue where the game is cloud syncing my saves back to a much older save. Set me way back on the story missions and has kind of killed my enthusiasm for the game.

Do you play on two computers? I have had Steam cloud do the same thing. If you have Windows 7 here is a fix using the previous versions feature. You just need to find out where the local FC3 save is.

EvilDead wrote:
Agent 86 wrote:

I've run into an issue where the game is cloud syncing my saves back to a much older save. Set me way back on the story missions and has kind of killed my enthusiasm for the game.

Do you play on two computers? I have had Steam cloud do the same thing. If you have Windows 7 here is a fix using the previous versions feature. You just need to find out where the local FC3 save is.

I play on my desktop and sometimes my laptop. The thing that was weird was that the 1st time it happened I had been playing on my desktop, stopped for a bit then resumed on it a bit later. That's when the problem first reared its head. I'll give that fix a try, Thanks!

Time for my two cents.

I was a big fan of Far Cry 2 despite all of its faults and Far Cry 3 feels like a very different game. While I think many of the mechanics have been improved (e.g., stealth), I feel like some of tension has been lost. As mentioned elsewhere, it's pretty disappointing that once you clear a camp, that area remains safe forever. It might have been fun to have to defend those territories occasionally or to run into ambushes. Of course, the trade-off here is that those become annoying over time so maybe there's no winning here?

In any case, still a great game. Really enjoying it.

Time for my two posts...

Trashie wrote:

Time for my two cents.

I was a big fan of Far Cry 2 despite all of its faults and Far Cry 3 feels like a very different game. While I think many of the mechanics have been improved (e.g., stealth), I feel like some of tension has been lost. As mentioned elsewhere, it's pretty disappointing that once you clear a camp, that area remains safe forever. It might have been fun to have to defend those territories occasionally or to run into ambushes. Of course, the trade-off here is that those become annoying over time so maybe there's no winning here?

In any case, still a great game. Really enjoying it.

I've started leaving some outposts untaken so there is the chance of an occasional enemy patrol taking me by surprise. I'm enjoying the game now I have the crafting out of the way. I'm even enjoying most of the story missions.

Most disappointing moment this week:

I saw a white tiger and a black bear cross paths and they didn't fight.

Most rewarding moment:

A heavy appeared in a doorway very close to me, menacingly silhouetted by a red light. I had my bow equipped so I thought I might as well take a shot. I hit his head and he collapsed, arrow protruding from his forehead. Head shot 200 xp.

Edit: Looks like the next patch will let us set outposts back to hostile.