Beauty Meets Beast
| Platform | OVERALL |
|---|---|
| PC | 8.60 |
| Overall | 8.60 |
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Far Cry may have come out for the PC back in 2004, but as I didn't have a PC back then (used the mighty Dreamcast to surf the web!) let alone one to GAME on, my first experience with the game had to wait until 2012. And what an experience it is. This game had me going through just about every emotion a game can make you feel; joy, horror, anger, awe, happy, laughter...I went through it all, and not always in the ways the developers intended. You see, as cutting edge a game as FC was at the time, and still is in some ways, it is also just as glitchy & downright frustratingly tedious to play at some points. Anyone who's played Far Cry Instincts on the Xbox knows the basic idea of this game, as even though the games are different, they share the same story, setting, and much of the same tech and AI. I didn't think so at first, but after making my way through FC I must say that Instincts WAS the better overall game of the two. It had better pacing, much less frustrating gameplay, a more coherent story, and mainly just improved on everything the PC game did before it. It was wise of Ubisoft to build the Xbox game from the ground up. Far Cry on the PC starts off great...which is why I originally felt it would be the better game. There's no fluff from the moment you press play, you're just instantly thrown into a beautiful yet dangerous world. The level design is amazing, just like Instincts, and really makes you feel like you're in this tropical paradise. There's all kinds of effects going on, and animals & insects going about their lives, to trees & grass blowing in the wind. Story-wise, you play as Jack Carver, an ex-special forces guy employed to bring a woman to these islands. Only people are there that don't want them there, and all kinds of shit hits the proverbial fan. Again, the story here is very sparse and even though its the same story as told in Instincts, its nowhere near as compelling. Instincts also had much better voice actors who did a great job bringing the game to life. The voice work in FC PC rivals Resident Evil 1 in its mediocrity. The problem with this game is that the AI is all over the place, going from pretty good to horribly bad to insanely cheap. Should a bunch of mercs two fucking islands away really be able to pinpoint my location as I'm crouching through some shrubs? I think not. There was also times when the exact opposite would happen....guys getting stuck in place and looking up at a second floor where I was 5 minutes ago as I walk up and blow their brains out. Balance is something that separates a good game from an amazing game, which is what made games like Resident Evil 4 and Half Life so incredible and fun to play. And this is another area where Far Cry falters. The second half of the game gets disc snapping, frustratingly difficult. Especially the last few levels. This is made even worse by the fact that there is no quick save in this game, unlike most every game on the PC....so you have to rely on an old school checkpoint system to have mercy on you. And seeing as good ol' Jack can't take anymore than a few gunshots, you will need much mercy. There's literally times where you will be running for your life, praying for a "SAVING GAME" to flash on the screen. It makes the game very trial & error intensive towards the end, which brings it down from being as great as it should be. That said, when the game works, it works incredibly well. The environments can be a joy to traverse, and the combat can be very satisfying. Its definitely easy to see the relationship between this game and what would become one of the best FPS ever, a little game called Crysis. For that reason alone, its still worth checking out....just make sure to play it on easy. With adaptive AI turned on. Even though Far Cry Instincts fixed many of this game's issues a year later in 2005, Far Cry on the PC still has enough going for it to make it recommendable. |
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Posted by edgecrusher Mon, 18 Jun 2012 10:31:46
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travo (6s)
In typical Ubisoft mid-2000's fashion, the level design, enemies, and generally everything else is completely different in both games.
Instincts was basically a sequel with the exact same story.
These two games are more different than the past 4 Call of Duty games. FC on the PC is also huge....20+ hours.