'Did I ever tell you the definition of 'Insanity'?'.
'Did I ever tell you the definition of 'Insanity'?'.
Insanity seems to be a running theme in Far Cry 3, which frequently pays homage to Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, which is fitting as the game has a down the rabbit hole feel to it throwing you into a vast world filled with interesting varied characters and no shortage of things to do.
Far Cry 3 puts you in the shoes of protagonist Jason Brody one of a group of thrill seekers visiting Rook Island on holiday with his brothers and friends. Much to their surprise the island is overrun with pirates led by the games poster boy Vaas who has an obsession with insanity and is no doubt bat-shit insane himself. After being captured by these pirates and witnessing the death of his brother, Jason is free to roam this tropical paradise making every effort to save the rest of his family and friends whilst befriending the islands locals. After an hours worth of tutorials and polite and not so polite introductions the player is given free roam of the island, where they can chose to either pursue the main story or explore the impressively huge environment.
The first huge improvement (or arguably new feature) from Far Cry 2, that the player will likely notice, are the stealth aspects. More often than not in Far Cry 2, there would be scenarios where as a player you'd be convinced you were concealed from view of the AI, but the game was having none of it; conflict would erupt and the element of surprise was lost. This happened at almost every outpost. This is one area that Ubisoft has given some attention and made quite a primary mechanic within the game. Adopting the increasingly popular sonar stealth found in pretty much every recent title with stealth elements which sees an indicator displayed respective to the direction of the AI that has noticed you, which increases in intensity the longer you are exposed. Stealth is introduced as a main feature right from the beginning and works incredibly well in the island environment with plenty of vegetation and woodland to discreetly approach the objectives from and in pretty much all cases is rewarded depending on your level of discretion.
Another one of the survival aspects available to the player is the ability to hunt, skinning animals for resources which can be used within the games crating system, which initially seems out of place in a shooter based game such as Far Cry, however it feels right at home in the open world Ubisoft has created. The game does a fine job of encouraging you to explore the hunting aspects of the game early on as various pelts are required to create new items such as holsters and inventory upgrades through the games crafting system, this gives the game an almost RPG flavour.
Continuing along the RPG theme, Far Cry provides the player with a levelling up feature through the process of skill trees; each catering to it's own mechanic such as stealth, weaponry and physical attributes. These skill trees are upgraded through the acquisition of XP which can be earned from completing missions, disposing of pirates discreetly and finding collectables. This welcome addition allows the player to see some progress in their character which sort of ties in with the story as Jason becomes more and more used to the environment which would naturally make him more useful within it.
Exploration is further encouraged through the application of radio towers and outposts. The former being a way of unlocking various sections of the map; each radio tower acting as a jammer and concealing it's own area which can only be amended by locating and scaling the antenna to disable it. Outposts are where pirates are found, disposing of which will unlock the outpost as your own hideout providing access to weapon shops, bounty boards and other side quests. Both these side aspects spice things up a bit and give the player something to do if they fancy a break from the main story.
Overall my time spent with Far Cry 3 was unforgettable, certainly being one of the highlights of the year. The limitless approaches to various scenarios coupled with the sheer amount of side quests and collectables make it easily the best in the series and certainly a high scorer on the bang-for-buck meter. Hopefully Ubisoft takes note of it's success and continues the trend in future instalments.
9/10