“Far Cry 4” is much like it predecessor. So much like it I’d say that it was using the crib notes. The demo only showed one level cut right out of the game so all context was removed but if felt like it could have been cut right out of “Far Cry 3”. That is necessary a bad thing because “Far Cry 3” was brilliant.
The demo was a ‘take the stronghold’ style of mission. I was given the choice to either fly in on a chopper and shot from the sky with range, ride on the back of an elephant and kick the doors in the a ten-tonne foot, or stealth in and ninja around. As I was rather rusty with shooters I opted for the stealthy option. In hindsight, that was a bad idea. I should of gone with the ten-tonne foot option. That was because in the stealthy scenario gave me only the crossbow and little knowledge if I had a secondary sidearm. The crossbow is great and has weight when you fire it. But it has less range, or at least arrow drop needs to be compensated for more, then I expected. This meant that I had a few deaths mainly because I was being a bad shot. Can’t really fault the game for that. It’s been a while since I played a shooter like this. An even longer while since I played “Far Cry 3”.
After a few attempts I got the hang of the crossbow and was firing off people left and right. After a few more runs I was popping headshots and ninja-ing on the rooftops like a proper bowman. That was it for the demo. It was obvious that they wanted to show off the multiple ways things could be done but considering it’s a ‘Far Cry’ game I always though that was self evident. You could ninja your way round the map or ride in a car (or in this case elephant) blaring ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ were ever you went. The one thing I wanted to get a taster of was the story. The “Far Cry 3” story was great. Stodgy in places but great none the less.
The thing that I fear about this game isn’t whether it will be good or not. It’s going to be digitized awesome flawed only by the fact that it is locked to UPlay (and only UPlay as it is here in the UK) for no reason besides Ubisoft wants its own Steam. Or at least Origin. Having another one of those is already a part terrifying and irritating concept. I just means that consumers lose even more control over how that buy stuff. The day when I went to one place out of many, (HMV, CEX, Game, Steam, etc,) to get my games are long passing. It’s concerning because when it one ‘und only one‘ place to get a game, they can price whet ever they want for what ever they like.
Just by the tiny amount I played the game I can tell it will be great fun to play. What I fear is whether the game will be repeating itself or not. Having some influence from it’s predecessor is fine but I really hope that it can carve it’s own identity.
What I want it to be is “Far Cry 4”. Not “Far Cry 3+1”