[REVIEW] Far Cry 3

Mat Paget
(PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 [REVIEWED], PC)

When playing Far Cry 3, you’ll come across a lot of conflict. These range from Good vs. Evil and Sanity vs. Insanity, to Stealth vs. Overtness and Bow vs. Gun. These are just the conflicts that are readily apparent when you start playing the game, but as you go further down the rabbit hole (never once considering how you’re going to get out), you start to realize the biggest conflict of all. One that sticks through the game’s entire duration: Story vs. Gameplay. A popular question is can good overcome evil? A more accurate question for Far Cry 3 would be, “Can excellent gameplay overcome a disappointingly bad story?”

The story begins with a bunch of trust-fund kids who decide to go on a vacation and get up to all sorts of mischief. They dabble in some cliff jumping, clubbing, skydiving, and even some sambuca. But, oh no! They get kidnapped by pirates. This should make you feel bad for the characters, but they’re not exactly likeable. In fact, the majority of the good characters are ones who will have you on the other end of a gun or knife at some point in the game. Furthermore, Vaas is an absolutely fantastic villain, but unfortunately, the story is pretty lacklustre and will sooner cause you to shake your head in disappointment, than actually encapsulate you.

And this is where the superb gameplay comes in. The shooting feels great, and the ability to choose a load out of four guns, and customize said guns, promotes something the game is excellent at — letting you do things your way. When taking over an outpost, you can rush in guns-a-blazing and take out every enemy in sight like you’re John Rambo; sneak up behind each enemy and take them out with a swift stab to the neck; or even set up camp a fair distance away, taking out each enemy with a sniper rifle. My personal favourite way of approaching these situations is to scout out the camp with my camera, and then if I see a caged animal, such as a tiger, set it loose on my enemies.

Believe me. You’ll want to spend most of your time with him.

Each approach is just as effective as the others. The stealth takedowns are brutally satisfying and, as you progress through the skill trees, your takedowns become more and more violent, adding to that incredible satisfaction of taking out your enemies without any of them the wiser. And compressors for your firearms are incredibly useful, especially if you decide to snipe your way through the game. Stealth is a huge part of this game and it’s done really well. The game even rewards your sneakiness, by throwing on an extra two-hundred percent to your XP, if you clear out an outpost while completely undetected.

Outposts aren’t the only thing to occupy your time outside of story missions, though. In addition to the Assassin’s Creed-like Radio Towers, there are quite a few side quests, and even though the majority of them are pretty boring, the Wanted Dead and Path of the Hunter diversions are exceptional. During Wanted Dead quests, you’ll be given a target to take out with your knife — hey, another opportunity to be stealthy! These are much like outposts, but instead of clearing everyone out, you really only have to do in one guy; it does help to take out the rest of his cronies first, though. These reward you with money and XP, while The Path of the Hunter quests will sometimes reward you with unique materials for crafting.

The crafting and hunting go hand-in-hand — you’ll have to collect a certain number of materials from a certain animal to craft new holsters, pouches, wallets, and other various gear. The hunting is more like a simplified Red Dead Redemption, than a simulation of what hunting really is; you go around shooting animals like no one’s business with whatever you happen to have with you — hunting sharks with grenades? Perfectly viable! At times, it can be hard to find the animal you just shot, and you will eventually get to a point where you’ll have crafted everything, rendering the hunting completely useless. You can sell skins for money after that, but there are so many ways to get money, and running low on it never becomes a problem.

He’s going to get it RIGHT in the neck.

Now, the game has a bunch of little issues. On the Xbox 360, frame rate drops are common, there’s slight screen tearing at times, and there are a bunch of minor graphical glitches. None of this will really bother you if you haven’t seen the PC version of the game. If you have, however, it may be hard to go back. Alongside these technical issues comes a weird little issue with precision the game has. There are times when you’ll need to swap a weapon with one on the ground, skin an animal, loot, or even gather plants. The game makes this task a little more difficult by forcing you to be ridiculously precise with where you’re standing when performing one of these actions.

You’ll get used to it by the end of the game, but that doesn’t stop it from being a problem. Throughout the entire game, I would have to make sure I was standing over a deceased enemy to loot him. If I was just a little off, I could risk throwing my gun away for his inferior firearm. It’s definitely something I was conscious of the entire game, and it slows things down in a completely ridiculous way.

There’s just one more problem: it’s really easy to blast through a lot of the worthwhile things you can do, and after completing all of those, I was left wanting more. Don’t get me wrong, this game has a lot of content, but the scope of the map mixed with the quality of the story and side quests can make it feel empty when compared to other open-world adventures; the world is just not as great to roam around in after having completed everything, as others are.

The Year of the Bow!

If you’re the kind to dig into some multiplayer, then you have a selection of both co-op and competitive multiplayer modes. The co-operative mode has its own story, where four unlikely partners set off to shoot some guy in the head, and steal his money. The gameplay consists of moving through areas and completing objectives, and the characters all have defining characteristics, but none of them are that memorable. If you’re more into competitive multiplayer, there’s something for you, too. Unfortunately, I feel that other games, like Black Ops II, just do it better. The only really interesting thing about the competitive multiplayer is that, at the end of a match, the winners get to embarrass the losers in a number of pretty hilarious ways.

Alongside the competitive multiplayer is the Map Editor — people with imaginations and too much time will use it to its full advantage. It has an incredible amount of depth to it, and you can pretty much create anything. Want a bunch of sharks to slide down a mountain, then slither across a jungle floor? You’ve got it! It’s potentially a fountain of hilarity, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be used seriously. A lot of people may also be intimidated by the number of options that are available to you from the get-go, but if you can get a hold on all of the different tools, you can create some really awesome maps.

I have a weird relationship with Far Cry 3. I am in love with playing it. Whether I’m shooting up an outpost, or stealthily taking out each enemy one by one with my trusty, neck-stabbing knife, I really can’t get enough of it. But then the story enters the picture, and I’m caught shaking my head at some of the disappointing decisions made throughout the course of its life. However, in the end, gameplay overcomes the obstacles the story sets out, and reigns king. If you’re into shooting dudes, stabbing necks, driving off-road, flying hang gliders, and hunting wild animals with unnecessarily powerful weaponry, then you’ll probably be able to overlook the story’s problems, and still have a fantastic time.