I've been looking forward to this one for some time, and so far there are a few disappointing features but it is mostly good.
The game is basically a FPS GTA, an open world set in Africa where just about everybody wants you dead apart from those who give missions, who no doubt also want you dead but are exploiting you first. It's a very mean place, you can't go five minutes without getting shot at. It has nothing to do with the original Far Cry, and has no mutants.
The game opens with a lengthy journey in a jeep to a nearby town, which does a good job in explaining the rules of the world without bashing them over your head however it does drag on bit. You eventually get there and the plot gets underway - simply kill a man known as The Jackel, who has been supplying arms to everybody in Africa.
For approximately an hour after this point you are rather clumsily lead from point to point where the tutorial explains an awful lot of nothing - Ubisoft have made no effort to integrate this into the game world, so get used to loads of popups about things you've already figured out for yourself! Still, it serves its purpose.
During the tutorial you get for first go at combat, which is where the game shines. You get the flamethrower almost instantly and its pretty clear Ubisoft are proud of the fire effects - this Africa has a crazy amount of red barrels that really do go boom, spreading the fire everywhere which causes more explosions and fire...it is quite a sight to behold. I threw a single grenade into an enemy camp, landing next to a jeep, which exploded setting everything around it on fire, and before I knew it the whole camp had lit up with all the enemies running around trying to find out what the hell just happened! It's very impressive, the buildings\huts catch fire, trees catch fire, the ground catch fire, people catch fire. It's all effected by the wind too, and spreads realisticly.
The gun-play is good, not up to CoD4 standards but much better than previous console Far Cry efforts. The AI does a fairly good job in keeping things interesting but won't win any awards.
The game world is massive and unfortunately it feels a bit to much hard work finding your way to the next mission point - get used to seeing the map, because you'll need it displayed almost constantly. The problem is your character isn't particularly agile, so any steep hill he won't walk up, so you almost always have to walk the long way around (unless Ubi have decided that you can take the alternative route into a base). At several points on the map there are enemy checkpoints, who'll shoot on sight and chase you down if you run\drive away. You can see where these checkpoints are on the map and can avoid them, but it does mean taking the long way round. Thankfully the driving mechanics are surprisingly good, so it isn't all bad.
I don't feel particularly compelled to just explore like I did in Oblivion, or be apart of the world like in GTA4, because everything is so damn hostile. This isn't meant as an entirely negative comment because it's a bloody tense experience (you can only save in safe-houses or after missions), but it is a little much sometimes. During the opening drive you see all sorts of villagers walking along the sides of roads, minding their own business - more of this in the main game world would have done a lot for the experience, balancing it out and driving home the message.
I don't want to be too negative however, because this is an incredibly well put together package. The audio and visuals are among the best I've experienced on a console (360) and despite the scale of the map and density of the forests etc, there has been no sign of slowdown so far. At times this looks immense, particularly when the sun is at its lowest.
I don't think the game pushes forward the genre like some reviews have suggested, and it certainly doesn't push forward mature story telling like I was hoping (the script is ok but the delivery is pretty awful), but for any FPS fan this is so far, two hours in, shaping up to be an excellent, lengthy (4% complete) game.
The game is basically a FPS GTA, an open world set in Africa where just about everybody wants you dead apart from those who give missions, who no doubt also want you dead but are exploiting you first. It's a very mean place, you can't go five minutes without getting shot at. It has nothing to do with the original Far Cry, and has no mutants.
The game opens with a lengthy journey in a jeep to a nearby town, which does a good job in explaining the rules of the world without bashing them over your head however it does drag on bit. You eventually get there and the plot gets underway - simply kill a man known as The Jackel, who has been supplying arms to everybody in Africa.
For approximately an hour after this point you are rather clumsily lead from point to point where the tutorial explains an awful lot of nothing - Ubisoft have made no effort to integrate this into the game world, so get used to loads of popups about things you've already figured out for yourself! Still, it serves its purpose.
During the tutorial you get for first go at combat, which is where the game shines. You get the flamethrower almost instantly and its pretty clear Ubisoft are proud of the fire effects - this Africa has a crazy amount of red barrels that really do go boom, spreading the fire everywhere which causes more explosions and fire...it is quite a sight to behold. I threw a single grenade into an enemy camp, landing next to a jeep, which exploded setting everything around it on fire, and before I knew it the whole camp had lit up with all the enemies running around trying to find out what the hell just happened! It's very impressive, the buildings\huts catch fire, trees catch fire, the ground catch fire, people catch fire. It's all effected by the wind too, and spreads realisticly.
The gun-play is good, not up to CoD4 standards but much better than previous console Far Cry efforts. The AI does a fairly good job in keeping things interesting but won't win any awards.
The game world is massive and unfortunately it feels a bit to much hard work finding your way to the next mission point - get used to seeing the map, because you'll need it displayed almost constantly. The problem is your character isn't particularly agile, so any steep hill he won't walk up, so you almost always have to walk the long way around (unless Ubi have decided that you can take the alternative route into a base). At several points on the map there are enemy checkpoints, who'll shoot on sight and chase you down if you run\drive away. You can see where these checkpoints are on the map and can avoid them, but it does mean taking the long way round. Thankfully the driving mechanics are surprisingly good, so it isn't all bad.
I don't feel particularly compelled to just explore like I did in Oblivion, or be apart of the world like in GTA4, because everything is so damn hostile. This isn't meant as an entirely negative comment because it's a bloody tense experience (you can only save in safe-houses or after missions), but it is a little much sometimes. During the opening drive you see all sorts of villagers walking along the sides of roads, minding their own business - more of this in the main game world would have done a lot for the experience, balancing it out and driving home the message.
I don't want to be too negative however, because this is an incredibly well put together package. The audio and visuals are among the best I've experienced on a console (360) and despite the scale of the map and density of the forests etc, there has been no sign of slowdown so far. At times this looks immense, particularly when the sun is at its lowest.
I don't think the game pushes forward the genre like some reviews have suggested, and it certainly doesn't push forward mature story telling like I was hoping (the script is ok but the delivery is pretty awful), but for any FPS fan this is so far, two hours in, shaping up to be an excellent, lengthy (4% complete) game.
It's a real shame you can't just blend in to the surroundings, but are forever a "Hot Target". 
It's not actually that hard to clear a checkpoint so long as you are tooled up, it'll get frustrating when you need to get back to a safehouse and there is no other way through though!
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