Unpolished, full of screen tearing and tonnes of technical bugs. Inferior to it's predecessor.
Far Cry 3 Review
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The Good
Ubisoft has created an ambitious and massive Open World shooter that can barely run on current gen consoles.
This game is a free paced game where you can go anywhere you want. Swim with sharks, kill animals and many more.
Far Cry 3's intelligent and elegant open-world structure balances exciting action with the joys of free-form adventuring, making it one of the best shooters of the year.
Mix in a vast array of role-playing elements, and you have a fully featured single-player game that lasts upward of 35 hours or more, depending on how much you want to do. Kills earn you experience, which in turn earns you upgrades (such as more health bars) and new skills (kill an enemy from the ledge beneath). Corpses and chests can be looted for cash and saleable items; you then buy new weapons and maps, and can replenish ammo at safe houses. Out in the wild, you collect plant life of various kinds so that you can fill syringes with meds that heal you, make you less vulnerable, or enhance your senses.
Some of those enhancements make it easier to hunt wildlife, which is not only a fine pastime in itself, but also rewards you with skins and hides, which you cut from their corpses in properly squeamish fashion. Expect your quarry to put up a fight, though; tigers apparently don't enjoy being riddled with bullets and set on fire. Wild animals are more than just targets, however: they are also part of the world's ecology. Leopards attack boars, leaving behind their carcasses for you to loot, and scaring off the remainder of the herd. You might merrily waltz into a run-down shack seeking loot, only to have a couple of Komodo dragons wander in and sink their teeth into you. Such moments lend Far Cry 3 an air of unpredictability; you feel like anything could happen--and that whatever it is, you'll probably end up bleeding from it.
A game doesn't have to be great just because it gives you a lot to do, but Far Cry 3 is good at most everything it does. There are a wide variety of guns to shoot, and each weapon feels properly hefty and powerful. Vehicles are fun to drive, but feel just rickety enough to remind you that you're speeding through the jungle in a run-down jalopy, not zooming along a highway in a Ferrari. Various quirks can get you frustrated, though. Certain missions feature respawning enemies, which can put a damper on things, especially when you see a small crowd of pirates spawn in plain sight. Dying and respawning at a checkpoint to find all the enemies you killed still alive, yet all the ammo you used to shoot them depleted, is frustrating, as is the game's occasional failure to sense that you're holding down the button that heals you. A phone call that drives you to the next story mission might repeat again, and again, and again. Far Cry 3 is wonderful when it gives you free rein…but not always when it tries to direct the action.
On the PC, the online DRM can also be a hassle, as the game can crash should the servers go down, even while playing the offline campaign. But most of these annoyances are minor blights in a game that does so much, and does it so well. Far Cry 3 is an impressive piece of technology that showcases large portions of its landscape at once, though PC owners need a powerful system to enjoy the vistas at their most glorious. The rolling hills and stone temples invite you onward, yet this modern Eden is defaced by dilapidated shacks and military compounds. The difficulties of this spoiled promised land are reflected in the behaviors of its inhabitants. Vaas' unhinged rants, Buck's dismissive cruelty, and Dr. Earnhardt's hallucinogenic ramblings all speak to the troubles that cloud the sunny skies above.
Far Cry 3 rounds out a sizable and quality campaign with a series of cooperative missions that have up to four players shooting enemies and completing objectives. With only two players, certain encounters can get frustrating, and gunning down bullet-absorbing heavies can be a real slog. But when the action comes together, the impactful gunplay shines, even if the more-structured levels might have you missing the freedom of the open island. Competitive multiplayer doesn't feature many surprises during the course of the match, though the back-and-forth action of Firestorm mode, in which teams try to set fire to each others' supply depots while protecting their own, gives rise to tight battlefield tension.
Outside of matches, character progression is home to some intriguing twists to the usual array of expected features. One twist is decoding, in which you earn electronic objects (CDs, memory cards, etc.) after completing matches, and then decode them--an automated process that takes place over a few minutes or longer. Another is the battle cry, which provides a bonus (such as a health boost) to you and nearby teammates.
The good times are even further extended by Far Cry 3's impressive multiplayer map editor, which makes it relatively simple to bring your ideas to fruition. You could lose many hours to this one feature, let alone the game's other facets, all of which make this one of the most robust shooters on the market. Yet Far Cry 3's bigness isn't a detriment: you rarely feel that the game's size led to individual elements suffering from a lack of attention or detailing. Stretches of unpredictable exploration and free-form hunting alternate with challenging pirate confrontations, sometimes culminating with a rocket blast to the helicopter hounding you from above. This is an ambitious and finely tuned adventure that gets better and better as you play.
By
Kevin VanOrd, Senior Editor
Kevin VanOrd is a lifelong RPG lover and violin player. When he isn't busy building PCs and composing symphonies, he watches American Dad reruns with his fat cat, Ollie.
473 comments
1 Like I can't believe the hype this game got, makes no sense for me. Whats the deal with video games these days, were you got a 30 hs game, and 22 of those are side mission. Makes no fucking sense. Stop making all these stupid side-crap, and write a GOOD story with a GOOd fuckin ending, couse this one sucked, come on ubisoft. all your games are starting to look like.
@hihop_ss I agree....I got lost after 2 hours of playing, not knowing if I had to skin animals, save someone, go fishing, find mushrooms, buy stuff.... f...it. Visually is very good, and the chances of going pretty much anywhere are great, but, is very tricky to make an open world game like this and get lost in the main objective, I'm usually good at this games, but indeed, you loose track of what are you doing and it gets boring very quickly... I spent like 45 minutes looking for a retarded pig to make I cant even remember what.... I think I'll give it another try and that's it...
It has a better story than FC2 (not hard) but the visuals are poor in comparison, there are many bugs too. The plants are jagged with no textures and become 2D 'followers' at a certain height, grass can be found floating above the ground on every hill, holes can be found in the map, even found a creek that looks full of water but it doesn't react to you moving through it. It's ugly for a FC game but it's still a hell of a lot of fun.
This Game is amazing, I wish I played the 1st two, I might buy them after I finish this one;)
1 Like "Far Cry 3 isn't so much about story as it is about its world" Games are slowly becoming that.
I didn't find the game as intense as Farcry 2. I loved Farcry 2 and had no issues at all with it. I agree that once you take an outpost an area becomes too easy to travel through. What killed this game for me is those dreadful load times. I beat Farcry 2 on the hardest difficulty and did all the side stuff and it was brutal but fun. I don't know if I could handle playing this on a harder difficulty because it means sitting through more load times....painful.
Will you be able to have a ps3 and 360 coop game with Destiny where you are fighting the aliens together the save humans from exstintion ??
1 Like Too bad. It's close to a fantastic game but the difficulty is far too easy.Even playng on warrior level - I've stopped liberating outposts as an area gets very boring once that's done and theres no enemies around any more. That's a shame, as liberating outposts is really enjoyable but now I cant do it or the game gets boring lol. A lot of potential in this game but it's not nearly challenging enough. 6/10
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This games is epic. Dub step and burning some pot plants life can't get much better than that.
@troyhalo34 you have no taste. The dubstep and the trendy feminine characters and protagonist were the worst parts about the game. The psychotic jungle tribal drums of Farcry 2 was much better. This game did have cool wild life and great combat though. Too bad everything else was lame.
Great gameplay. Every move you make counts in this game. It feels like going through the Ranger Course all over again. Interesting walkthrough as you craft your medicine, your skills. Skill tree upgrade keeps the whole gameplay exciting. Graphics are good too. The weapons are a little bit cliche, but fun to meddle with each time. The only frustrating part is finding the relics lying around as the mountainous regions are almost impossible to infiltrate. All in all, the game is worth the rating.
I wonder...was this game reviewed before the first patch was released? Stupid question, I know, but I was just reading the version history and it came to mind that they added quite a few things. I just let my friend borrow this game from me because I beat it, and I'm hoping he doesn't encounter any bugs. He doesn't play online, so he will be playing the game exactly how it comes in the box. :(
With all the new games out right now it's hard to make a choice on which one to get. My top 5 list of must haves is 1. Dishonored, 2. Borderlands 2, 3. Far Cry 3, 4. Halo 4, 5. Black Ops 2.
I beat the game in one and half day on Warrior difficulty, Why is it not challenging like farcry 2?? OK great open world and stunning graphics...etc. But so easy pirates die quickly and all you have to do is carry the seringes and green leafs and heal everytime you are hit, this bothered me a lot since i finished farcry 2 on hardest difficutly and it was a real challenge and the way of saving was a challenge it self, IMO farcry 3 deserves 7 ot 7.5 maximum and farcry 2 is much much better.
@darksoul1968 far cry 2 the game with no hit detection was better and harder
im pretty sure it was harder because bullets don't register
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1 Like @Crimson_Erskine mmmmmmmm it seems you like easy games and hard games are too tough for you,i bet that you even play on lowest difficulty, if u r a true video gamer u would realize that a good open world game obliges you to explore in order to improve your self and beat the game such as diablo, borderlands, dragon age, divinity, demon and dark souls which are my favorites. Anyway go get educated and keep exploring the island in farcry 3, Good luck
3 Like @darksoul1968 @Crimson_Erskine hahaha what was that? "a true video gamer" and who excatly judges as to whether someone is "a true video gamer"?.....what you? haha, I agree with the other guy you really a tool
6 Like After playing Far Cry 2, which I absolutely hated, I was hesitant to pick up Far Cry 3. I bought Far Cry 3 anyway after reading the positive reviews it got and I have to say I don't regret my purchase one bit. Far Cry 3 is fantastic and it fixed nearly everything wrong of Far Cry 2. Game Of The Year contender for sure.
@original_elite I fully agree with everything you just said. Far Cry 2 fails in comparison to this masterpiece.
@original_elite I couldn't agree more. I too, was on the fence with FC3 because of the things I disliked in FC2. I'm glad I looked past that. I have only played 4 hours so far, but loving every second of it. I am going to play through as much as this game as I can and enjoy the whole game for what the devs made it to be. GOTY nominee at the least.
@original_elite i still like far cry 2 though...the only problem i had in that game was probably the guns keep jamming and stuff..a little too realistic but challenging..both games are awesome but this ones way better then second one hands down..a 10 for me...FC2 a 9 :-)
2 Like Decent enough shooter but just a tad overrated - this game is more like a 7.5 than 9.0. While the game world itself is open and players are free to wander and do whatever they want, the main missions linked to the story are disappointingly constrained i.e. often players are forced to use a particular method to accomplish a mission goal (such as using a knife only for kills) - this IMO, is a bad design choice for a game that sells itself as an open world game and a game that has a history of allowing players to choose their own path to completing a mission. Really a step backwards - IMO, if you haven't played it already, go back to FC 2 which is a much better game than no. 3.
@Agent_47"the main missions linked to the story are disappointingly constrained i.e. often players are forced to use a particular method to accomplish a mission goal (such as using a knife only for kills) - this IMO, is a bad design choice for a game that sells itself as an open world game and a game that has a history of allowing players to choose their own path to completing a mission. Really a step backwards - IMO, if you haven't played it already, go back to FC 2 which is a much better game than no. 3."
no no no mate thats bullshit or well maybe just your opinion.
Beat the game a few days ago, its good and worth a look but it lacks fun things to do after finishing the main story. The side quests are short and boring, Multiplayer is alright but seems like a missed opportunity, they could have made a large part of the island open to 50-100 people with all the elements of the SP open for use.
Looking foward to future Dlc, hopefully for SP.
nothing like fallout 3 at all. Far Cry 3 is a fps with some perks that can be unlocked with exp, more like Dead Island. Story wise FC3 is much better than FO3 but I still prefer fallout
the story for 3 is you have to turn a water pump back on. Truly epic, if you walk straight there it is barely 3 quests
@kingoflife9 no not rpg,it's just fps open world,there is no choice you can make during the game to change the story line or etc( just like Just Cause 2 but in fps style)the only choice you can make is at the last mission which lead you to another ending that's all.my opinion, it's a good fps with great visual but nothing new.8 of 10.
@kingoflife9 yah think of it like a kinda low budget fallout, its a big open world shooter but with the quality youd see from the games in the 10$ bin after a year
I'm a PC user and prefer PC controls, but in the case of Far Cry I can't see the advantage of playing on a PC unless you have a really high end system and can max out all the display sliders.
I thought waraga might have had another reason for making that comment, that was why I asked.
the grapics are spectacular. omg. i like how random the game is. u could be deep in a fight and things are not going urway and a wild animal may come out and turn the tide but at the same time u have to run for ur life lol. your very underpowered when u first start the game. i cant stand the resistance u fight with. they are never around until u take over a stronghold lol. but great game
1 Like I love this flipping game!!!!!! Every time I play it I see something new aNd the graphics look crisper and clearer ,more and more. This is one of the best games of all time! And I've played everything starting from the ColecoVision days!!! I know, pure experience!
People can someone help me with this strange bug....
There's a bug in the game that doesn't allow me use my weapons/granades etc I can only use syringes and throw rocks.... When I move i can't see the weapon that I'm holding... That bug appeared when I was for the first time on the second island. Since then i cannot proceed on the main quest....
1 Like I thoroughly enjoyed far cry 2 for what it did right (setting was great, the main "villain" was great and the gameplay minus travel was great) It had its fair share of faults mainly taking half an hour to get to a destination which got repetitive but this game changed that with a good fast travel system and while it is not perfect it is exemplary and I can say this is going to be my goty with halo 4 or borderlands 2 being the two following
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Far Cry 3
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- Publisher(s): Ubisoft
- Developer(s): Ubisoft Montreal
- Genre: Action
- Release:
- ESRB: M
Far Cry 3 Navigation
