Far Cry Instincts (Pal XB)

[Spatial]

In terms of the game... it plays like a tighter version of Far Cry.

Instincts so far is like a remix... a renvisaging of what went before than a fully fledged sequel. To use a comparison... Far Cry is Evil Dead, and Far Cry Instincts is Evil Dead 2 in terms of the differences both versions have.

Spot on there.

Why the bikes, jet ski's etc didn't make it into the PC version I'll never know.

Can't wait to see what the new Crytek engine (shown off on shakey cam a couple of days ago in the PC folder) wil be capable of.

Had a comedy moment earlier on this afternoon whilst playing (spoiler tags used just in case but there's no real spoilers in there)

->Open Spoiler<-

Running around in the dark mines later on in the game I shot one of the guards whilst hiding on a walkway above. Cue the remaining guards firing blindly in the darkness and killing each other.

Don't know if it was scripted but I couldn't help but laugh

[Ish]

Played it quite a bit today. It's shaping up to be my favourite FPS since Half Life 2.

[EvilBoris]

The narrative is 100x better than the PC one. It always anoyoed me that the 1 sentance at the beggining of each level was meant to be considered a story in the pc version. The First person cutscenes in Instincts are fantastic.

[Concept]

It is indeed, the same team that does splinter cell.

I saw Crytek flash up during the game's launch, so I presumed they handled the conversion. It shows if it's the Montreal team. They're the most talented in-house development house that Ubisoft own.

I agree with Spatial and Ish... definitely one of the strongest first-person shooters I've had the pleasure to play since Half-Life 2. It's much more focused and involving than the original Far Cry.

As for the narrative... yeah, it's much better. Instincts still smacks of focus/market-testing inspired drivel (listen to the language and look at the enemies/characters you encounter), but like I mentioned before this time it's much more Rambo-style cheese than macho made-for-TV arse.

Gets a big thumbs up for me, this. I wasn't expecting much from a port of Far Cry... as a result it's managed to confound the expectations I had.

[Wools]

oh yeah something rather important, when you first play the game it shows a 2/12 minute trailer that can't be skipped as the game cache to the xbox hard disc ala Halo 2. However if you don't have your xbox set to the right date the game automatically thinks it's the first time it's powered on and you can not skip it. so make sure your XB date is set correctly!

Cheers for that, it's been driving me insane!

I have not played much of the single player as there has been one big distraction for me. The map maker.

It's the most addictive part of any game I've played and a fantastic inclusion.

[eastyy]

Is it substationally different from the PC version?

[Concept]

Substantial enough to warrant picking up (in my opinion).

It's a reinterpretation of the original (i.e new story, new levels, added gameplay elements), with many of the flaws ratified. Oh, and an amazing demonstration of how to use the Xbox properly.

[EvilBoris]

A whole new game

[Ish]

Absolutely

[eastyy]

FAr cry for the pc
Loved the outdoor bits
Went downhill with the mutant and underground bits

[PeteJ]

I'm a sucker for FPS and all signs are pointing towards me loving this - but I can't find it anywhere. WTF???

[Soi]

My only criticism (apart from the game corrupting my 3 hours in save...) is that you don't have to be stealthy. If you run around shooting those people in your way and ignoring everything else you can really tear through the levels (as I'm doing to get back to where I was).

The online is great too -Predator mode especially. Essentially a great twist on CS or Assault (in Halo terms). With a room of 6, 4 Mercs (those having to activate an alarm by standing next to it for 40 seconds) and 2 Predators (who have to try to stop them) works well.

There are 3 modes: Chaos (deathmatch), Predator and Steal the Sample (CTF basically). I've not played Steal the Sample yet, but I imagine it is good (especially on the 2 Bases type map that I made for it). Chaos is ok, but slightly ruined by the fact that whoever is winning gets a big icon over their head for everyone to see. Sort of makes 1v1 pointless. Anyway, that doesn't matter because this game's strengths aren't in that mode.

[Jakeway]

How easy is it to actually hide or get away from the predators?

[Paleface]

Jakeway - do you mean multiplayer? If so, it's not really about hiding. Unlike, say, Juggernaut, where one player takes everyone on, the two sides have different objectives: the Predators need to kill all the Mercs (or, rather, have them all dead at once); the Mercs need to have stood by the generator for a total of forty seconds to win.

The thing is, the Mercs don't respawn. If a Predator kills a Merc, he's dead... except that if one of the Mercs kills a Predator, all dead Mercs respawn. So the Predators need to kill all the Mercs and not die themselves. Meanwhile, the Mercs just need to focus on standing by the generator, and, where possible, shooting the **** out of the Predators.

It works well because there's a balance - if you're the last Merc left but you kill a Predator, you get your whole team back. When playing with Soi and co, we found that one Pred to 3-4 Mercs (depending on skill) worked well. 2v4 is definitely better than 1v5.

In terms of hiding, it's not so easy, because the Predators can swap to Feral Sense and see a glowing outline of anyone hiding. Of course, they can only do that if they have enough Adrenalin, but still, it's not easy.

[Ish]

Paleface your description of the online play has got me intrigued. I suppose I should give the multiplayer a go today. I've just been enjoying the single player too much to even contemplate it. This evening perhaps.