Right. So, my blog update is complete, now all I need to do is refine my portfolio. This might require a bit of research as I haven’t actually made one before… anyway…
I want to start writing something meaningful again, so I want to talk about Far Cry 2. For those of you who don’t know, Far Cry 2 is a “revolutionary” new FPS set in the deserts of Africa. Don’t think that because you have played FarCry that you know what the game is like. Cause you don’t. At all. Sure, it is a game designed to be played, and it is first person, but apart from that, everything is different. It isn’t even developed in the same country (Canadian eh?).
That rant aside, let’s get to the meat. Upon first playing the game, you sit through a 5-minute long car ride with an African taxi driver, who gives you the whole run-down of the political situation within the area you have flown into. This in itself was a very poor design idea, as tells the player, rather than letting them find out for themselves. After finally getting out of the jeep, you find yourself losing consciousness to a screen with a mucus-looking border. Malaria of course! What is more realistic than annoying missions to get meds just so you can continue to play the game!? *cough*
The story doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense. You take missions from the two different political parties who are in a war, and become a “left-hand lackey” to both of them, well known for your ability to do anything your asked, but as soon as you leave the building every person within sight shoots at you. Actually, more like every NPC in the game was told your exact position, and jumps in to a jeep to track you down and try and kill you. It is because of this uhm… “interesting” design feature I have only completed the missions to 50%. And no more. I refuse to believe that getting into a vehicle will automatically attract 1 – 4 jeeps of 2 – 3 Africans who want to skin me alive. From the political party I am meant to be helping out.
Aside from my complaints about story, technical aspects of the game are lacking as well. Your character has little-to-no direction other than a cross on a “map” (Which reminds me of the GPS-map-thingo from Babylon-AD) unless you exit to the menu, where your objectives are “clearly” marked. The graphics in the game resemble most FPS games of this era, running slightly better on my system than other games (Crysis). This leads me to believe that either the engine is well made (Hmm… unlikely with the amount of crashes, bugs, forum posts and QQ’s about how buggy the thing is, and my inability to play on DX10 mode due to well… insects) or that the game doesn’t look as good as you first think. Then again, I couldn’t play in DX10 mode because of bugs.
Other annoying side-notes are the voice acting of the characters, which sounds like the programming team after an all-nighter agreed to do the voices for an extra $20, and the large travelling distances between missions. As a first person shooter, Far Cry 2 does the standard well. You aim, you fire, things die. But as a free-form sandbox game, it fails in all regards. Annoying guard posts which are impossible to pass without picking up 2 trucks of baddies following you, malaria missions purely to flesh out game time, and NPCs too stupid to realise you are on their side.
Overall, I would probly rate this game a 6 / 10. It is playable, but don’t take it serious. You will get pissed and punch your monitor. *Thinks* Actually, if you need a new monitor, play it on hard!
Andrew
