Games With Grey

Alongside the Assassin’s Creed series, the Far Cry games serve as Ubisoft’s flagship. The games’ collective acclaim and popularity is easily understood, for each individual game is brimming with enjoyability; player engagement is immense, whether speaking of the earlier Far Cry 2 or the later Far Cry 5. Such player engagement has undergone expected expansion with time’s passage.  Indeed, the whole series is like a constant march of progress (barring a few instances – consider only Far Cry 6, riddled with unignorable, frustrating flaws). The games, too, are defined by their remarkable addictiveness, an addictiveness marvelously wedded to immersiveness. In many less accomplished titles, the overall gameplay experience occasionally seems a chore; tedium overflows; player engagement is fleeting. The Far Cry games mark this observation’s inverse; tedium and tiresomeness are both scarce. Consider for instance 2012’s Far Cry 3, perpetually engrossing. Owing to these engrossing attributes, many critics made a crucial – and rather valuable – connection; these critics lumped in Far Cry 3 with Skyrim, released a scant year earlier. For these numerous critics, Ubisoft’s work might be seen as derivative – or at least lacking more monumental departures from the past. “Far Cry 3 is simply Skyrim with guns,” they wrote. While these two titles possess ample similarities – both predominantly employ the first-person perspective, while both place dramatic emphasis upon exploration – clashes inevitably exist, too. As illustration, Far Cry 3’s gameplay evinces a certain freneticism lacking in Bethesda’s work; Skyrim is comparatively restrained. But the games are united in their commanding addictiveness, immersiveness; the vocalized comparison has merit, illuminating Far Cry 3’s position within the industry. Games inevitably and always take inspiration from other games; it is only logical, then, that these overlaps should exist, should thrive. 

But Far Cry 3 must not be unduly dismissed as wholly unoriginal – nothing could be farther from the truth. Accordingly, it is important to stress that, in a way, this precise title – and essentially all subsequent titles in the series – can develop into a hobby of sorts, something the dedicated and entranced player can turn to time and time again for enjoyment and escapism. This hobby-like nature defines Skyrim, all TES games, and a litany of other titles – see most obviously the Borderlands games, which cleverly implement robust new game + systems, courting and preserving player interest always, providing them with potentially hundreds of hours of playtime. While Far Cry 3 and its successors may lack the depth present in these two other series, which extensively rely upon more advanced (though typically wonderfully intuitive) RPG progression systems – see Borderlands’ robust skill trees, Skyrim’s branching perk system – the player grows ever and always. Far Cry 3’s player character Jason Brody is subject to similar growth; experience points are rewarded liberally, whether side content or primary content is tackled, bested.For all these systems’ comparative trivialness, just enough gameplay depth exists to court player interest as overall playtime potentially blossoms into dozens of hours. Here, game length does not match the expansiveness characterizing an immensely replayable title like Borderlands 3 – few titles do – though still dozens of hours can flash by with fair rapidity, as the player is transported from this cruel world and positioned elsewhere, somewhere magical. 

While it is easy and instinctual to first speak of Far Cry 3 – as was actually done above – Far Cry 2 is of major importance, too. For with this title, Ubisoft laid the groundwork for everything to come, even if that foundation was rather shaky and insecure. Still: there could be no Vaas or Pagan Min without Far Cry 2’s enigmatic, charismatic Jackal, the gun runner who “armed both sides” of an African civil war, as a loading screen helpfully mentions. But beyond being a simple blueprint and nothing else, the game is also set apart for its uniqueness, most prominent in the gameplay features (for the title zealously clings to conventional open-world design tropes, a clinging which actually diminishes originality and uniqueness). With time’s inevitable passage, the complexities defining Far Cry 2 were destroyed outright, displaced by sometimes impressive systems and sometimes lackluster ones – Ubisoft enthusiastically strove for streamlining. In the four year gap separating these two titles, Far Cry 2 and Far Cry 3, the industry was subject to rampant and hasty change. Indeed, the FPS genre specifically underwent dramatic growth, ascending to a position of total dominance. For in those four years, 2007’s Modern Warfare received two distinct sequels from Infinity Ward, sequels which served a neat refining function. But these games boasted expansions, too, principally in the now-massive number of game modes. The traditional, single-player campaign existed alongside an increasingly robust and increasingly emphasized multiplayer system. MWII, meanwhile, implemented the highly replayable, challenge-based spec ops game mode, a neat diversion which could drain the more dedicated player base of countless hours. Furthermore, MWIII supplemented these other offerings by including a sort of survival mode, also designed to devour any given player’s free time.

Progress, then, was a constant, and when 2012 rolled around, audience expectations had changed. It would be totally inaccurate to state that core players diminished in size or lost their industry influence, of course. It is accurate to state, though, that developers, including developers like Ubisoft, clung to heightened accessibility, ever striving to engross the more casual player bases, then thriving and emerging in earnest; mobile gaming was indeed beginning its ascent towards relevancy, though the impulse for accessibility is also partially attributable to the Nintendo Wii’s considerable successes, absolutely. To this end, reflecting this fascination with invitingness, Far Cry 2’s potentially alienating design decisions were deliberately excised. Gone were weapon durability systems, while the much derided malaria mechanic saw similar removal. Far Cry 3, then, was far more directed than its predecessor. Increased directedness does not instantly and always equate to a better overall gameplay experience, of course, and many of the removals are sorely felt. For all its beauties, in some ways Far Cry 3’s tropical gameworld is less atmospheric than Far Cry 2’s Africa, a decidedly abysmal state steeped in darkness and decay. Immersiveness saw preservation in the four years’ interval, though of a comparatively weaker sort. Now, the player does not consult the game map in real time, as was the case in Far Cry 2. Instead, a dedicated map system exists, highly intrusive in nature, damaging immersion and the overall pacing when assessed – in clinging to industry trends, a sort of devolution occurs.

With its strange uniqueness and novel design decisions, Far Cry 2 is an impressive achievement indeed, though one steeped in divisiveness. Some flaws like the rapidly respawning enemies oftentimes result in considerable frustration, cheapening and invalidating the player’s actions. The world’s barrenness is frequently and painfully felt, too; immersiveness cannot totally negate this barrenness. Still: Far Cry 2, atmospheric Far Cry 2, is set apart, both in the series on the micro level and the industry on the macro one; it is a very exciting and rewarding experience. For in almost all facets of its design (and especially in its world-building), Far Cry 2 rejects all vestiges of beauty, all in deliberate efforts to foster oppressiveness; Ubisoft would morph war torn Africa into a character in its own right. This decision is potentially alienating, of course, and if a player is repelled by this presented African wasteland, then all of the game’s more positive attributes might go unacknowledged or unappreciated; setting matters, can charm or repel. This thought is applicable to every individual title in the series – and by extension all open-world games. Essentially no developers’ labors will resonate with all members of their intended playerbase; this is inevitable. It follows, then, that in crafting their worlds, developers – like Ubisoft – should cling to their vision and design worlds they would want to explore, absolutely. And Ubisoft’s desires are diverse – the African landscape is complemented by a Montana landscape, for instance, which is in turn complemented by a Himalayan landscape, and so on. Each individual landmass has its own distinct identity; more and more players are engaged. And the Far Cry games’ game worlds collectively serve as a panacea of sorts. For whether speaking of Montana or the Himalayas, the developers go beyond the dull cityscapes which serve as primary inspiration for so many developers, no matter their imaginations or capabilities.    

Rather unexpectedly, greatest creative flourishes are relegated to certain “stopgaps.” Namely, Blood Dragon, an extension of Far Cry 3; Primal, an extension of Far Cry 4; and New Dawn, an extension of Far Cry 5. Superficially, these games’ existence suggests Ubisoft’s greediness and thirst for profit. In practice, however, their existence is justified, and they were simply the developers’ method of satiating the intended audience between more major, dramatic titles; Ubisoft’s efforts were thus rather altruistic, intended to elicit more and more player pleasure. But these three titles, their respective gameworlds, are brimming with originality, even as logic suggests derivativeness would overtake all. Indeed, in all of these cases the maps of the base game were readopted (though subject to ample alteration, of course – creativity ever surges). But such readoption, mostly a negative, cannot override the triumphs achieved. And so the Blood Dragon player navigates a bizarre landscape of neons and darkness, strange laserbeams extending upwards to the dreary heavens. And so the Blood Dragon comes into contact with literal dragons, whose existence is never explained. And so the Primal player inhabits the world of 10,000 BC, a world vastly detached from this present one. For Primal’s world is one of brutality – and a striking sense of beauty, as the landscapes are (mostly) unaffected by human habitation and the like; it is a relaxing space, for all that brutality, the hostility of the game world, as animals and human adversaries alike strive to cut down the player character – and in the case of docile animals, to disarm the player with their more beautiful attributes. And so the New Dawn player navigates the Hope County, Montana vastness, trodding the same ground tread in the original Far Cry 5. But distinguishments exist, dramatic distinguishments. For this world is decidedly post-apocalyptic in nature, as the narrative is a direct extension of what came before – see an atomic bomb’s detonation. Alongside that detonation – and the passage of fifteen or so years – comes vibrancy and verdancy, as greens are supplemented by dazzling oranges, and more strikingly lavenders. Here is no Fallout – this post-apocalyptic vision is arresting, embracing color rather than drab grays and browns; New Dawn is a panacea, too, a novel one, pushing back against grays and browns. These three titles could be dismissed as unnecessary and a bid for capital, but this is an excessively cynical dismissal. For each of these three titles is brimming with innovation, and the greatest innovations lie in the art direction, Ubisoft’s domain.

Even with the world building’s magicalness and unpredictability, the Far Cry games’ gameplay is a predictable, unsurprising affair; the formula adopted in Far Cry 3 has yet to undergo substantial alteration – the core framework has been built upon and beautified, but now a newer framework is sorely needed. One immense sea change did occur, of course; see the mentioned evolution from Far Cry 2 to Far Cry 3. But since 2012, the series is relatively stagnant in terms of progression; the games instead engage in safe, tentative tinkering. Were the gameplay systems foundationally unsound or unenjoyable, then, the entire experience would collapse into itself. Fortunately, this is not so – consider only the series’ addictiveness and its engrossing nature. For unlike, say, the contemporaneous Call of Duty, Ubisoft’s 2012 effort emphasized player choice, arming the player with ample toys and encouraging them to employ those toys in increasingly creative ways. Here is no Dishonored, of course, even as that title was released the same year as this one. Indeed, in terms of complexity that title absolutely obliterates this one, though still Far Cry 3’s Jason Brody remains empowered, capable of adopting various approaches as the situation – or player whim – dictates. Consider only the capturable outposts, puzzles of a sort which are hallmarks of the series. The player can approach these outposts in a stealthy fashion, executing takedown after takedown, throwing knife after throwing knife, until all the opposition lies cold, increasingly cold, upon the ground. Stealth is singularly rewarding and immensely satisfying, absolutely, and fortunately stealth has been the greatest subject of refinement; player flexibility expands; stealth is a key gameplay pillar. And yet, it exists alongside other, equally compelling gameplay pillars. See for instance gunplay. From Far Cry 3 onwards, the player has access to an exhaustive, ever expanding arsenal of weaponry, each gun behaving uniquely, boasting different recoil patterns, different aesthetics, and so on. Increasingly, customization and player choice are encouraged. Fortunately, too, whichever weapon or combination of weapons is chosen, gunplay is immensely enjoyable. Indeed, if an outpost is assaulted directly, guns blazing, tension overflows, not too dissimilar to the tensions accompanying a stealthy, subdued approach. 

Another crucial, sustaining gameplay pillar exists, too – exploration. Whether one is exploring the Himalayan mountainscape Kyrat or the Hope County, Montana vastness, ample time is spent in simple navigation. Such navigation is never dull – the game worlds all are brimming with vigor and motion; see the animal presence, first introduced in Far Cry 3 and increasingly emphasized as the series progressed ever onwards. Some animal inevitably existed just over this horizon, this hill or mountain, waiting to pounce upon the player – or regard them curiously. NPCs move to and fro, too, sometimes fighting other NPCs, other times fighting the animal presence. Essentially: whichever map the player navigates, the navigation process is never dull, but is instead brimming with excitement. Even Far Cry 2’s demoralizing Africa is enjoyable to explore, its ample diversity preserving player interest even as the bleakness overflows. 

Increasingly elaborate movement systems, meanwhile, only heighten the joys of exploration. And so the player can leap about the environment, can scale predetermined surfaces and so on; verticality is emphasized, and this emphasis ever expands, to the experience’s total betterment; player empowerment surges. By Far Cry 5, for instance, a fair majority of objects are scalable, heightening the joys of exploration while also providing greater tactical and strategic freedoms.  The grappling hook introduced in Far Cry 4, meanwhile, absolutely revolutionized the exploration process; cliffs could now be ascended – or descended – in secure ease, while the grappling hook’s implementation and usage created many exhilarating situations. When these tools and liberties for verticality exist alongside other, similar tools – see a wingsuit and a deployable parachute first introduced in Far Cry 3 – empowerment increases further still. It is impossible to overpraise the exploration process; it is the pillar which bears the most weight, bears it nobly and heroically. Vehicles have their place, too, and their piloting not only prompts increased traversal speeds but also a strange sort of invigoration, owing to the overall hastiness of locomotion. Aerial vehicles are especially thrilling to pilot, and leaping from some plane or helicopter far above the gameworld proper, only to pull the parachute’s cord just before impact – excitement and tension again overflow. Some scattershot gameplay missteps inevitably exist; the successes achieved in exploration are not ubiquitous. See the crafting / hunting systems as manifest in Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4, which essentially involve traveling to a predetermined location and slaughtering the animal located there, all in efforts to obtain crafting materials, directly connected to progression and player growth. Far Cry 5 fundamentally bettered these flaws by minimizing animals’ connection to progression; experimentations again arise. 

Indeed, Far Cry 5 is locus of experimentation – consequently, it stands alone, stands as the series’ pinnacle. The most dramatic upheavals were indeed directed towards progression. Gone was the emphasis upon crafting and hunting, while a conventional XP system was similarly removed, all in favor of a perk system. Essentially, almost every completed action contributes to any given challenge’s advancement – kill an enemy with a headshot, this challenge progresses; catch a certain number of fish species, and still another challenge progresses. This clever implementation makes even the trivialest of actions matter. Fishing, what could be seen as a mundane act here and elsewhere, is now brimming with excitement, as the player is left to ponder over which fish species lays on the line as the reeling process commences – is it a salmon or bass? Here, with these systems, the player is not funneled in one distinct direction, as was the case from Far Cry 3 onwards, where experience distribution was directly connected to player performance in any given action, the approach adopted. If an enemy outpost is traditionally assaulted in a bombastic fashion, then few experience points are distributed. Fair enough. But if said outpost is assaulted and taken without raising an alarm or evading detection outright, that experience point distribution expands, meaning stealth is actually incentivized over open combat. While the player can still engage in gunfights early and often, still the developers in these earlier titles almost punish the player for playing in a specific fashion; the overall experience suffers as the player’s efforts are bounded ever and always. This complaint is somewhat moot in that XP generally is very liberally distributed no matter how one tackles a situation – if the campaign missions are completed alongside the occasional secondary mission, appropriate levels are easily attained. Still, this overall restrictiveness must be lamented, for it dulls gameplay luster. 

And yet, Far Cry 5, bold and compelling Far Cry 5, upends these trends with the implementation of the perk system, heavily (though unintrusively) emphasized. Significantly, perk magazines are discoverable, too. Whenever these magazines are collected, a single perk point is awarded. The objects are rightly coveted, and stumbling upon the so-called prepper stashes, which oftentimes contain the magazines in fair measure, is an immensely exciting affair. Indeed, this side content is cerebrally engaging, sometimes featuring basic puzzle-solving, other times emphasizing platforming and traversal puzzles, as the grappling system is cleverly and imaginatively employed. Completing these prepper stashes is far more enjoyable than, say, slaughtering x number of y animal, a formula plaguing Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4, a tedious formula. Rather revolutionary in gameplay design, Far Cry 5 is laudable indeed,engaging in ample redirection – though still, a total sea change remains elusive; Far Cry 5 is merely on the cusp of perfection, brimming with (mostly realized) potential. The world-building is especially laudable. As an American, Montana is not as exotic as, say, the Himalayan state of Kyrat; I could board a plane and be in Montana in only a few hours. But this diminished exoticness is no failing. For Hope County fulfills the transportive aim, seizing upon the player and relocating them to the Montana vastness. Owing to the natural pace of progress, meanwhile, it follows that, technically, Far Cry 5 should eclipse its predecessors. And so it does; technical mastery and swelling creativity coalesce within Far Cry 5, a monumental, if grounded, achievement. 

The Far Cry games’ narrative, meanwhile, is steeped in unpredictability, each individual narrative decidedly detached from the last. But one crucial unifier is in place – all narratives are anchored by an excellently-portrayed villain. Far Cry 3’s Vaas has almost become the series’ figurehead, owing to his iconicness and his early uttering of the question, “do you know the definition of insanity?” In practice, his presence is frustratingly minimized, in that the player character cuts Vaas down at roughly the narrative’s halfway sort. This early removal is not necessarily a failure in its own right, though the larger villain which actually replaces Vaas is absolutely lacking in the intrigue and menace which Vaas possessed in considerable abundance; the new villain, Hoyt, is boring indeed, despite his occasionally intense violent displays, barbarities. In many ways, Vaas eclipses Jason Brody, too, Far Cry 3’s player character, an everyman of sorts, though one lacking relatability – Brody is a dull construction, and while his character growth is remarkable for its bizarre exaggeratededness, that growth never spawns likability; Brody is boring to the last, even as he resolutely pushes back against Vaas and against Hoyd, the mastermind beyond Brody’s capture, the capture of most of Brody’s friends. Crucially, though, Vaas’s exertions and Vaas’s exertions alone escalated intended capture into murder, as Brody’s companions are brought painfully low by Vaas’s hands. Hoyt strove for their punishment and torture, though Vaas exaggerated such torture’s intensity. Upon Vaas’s death, then, the narrative grows directionless, illustrating the essentialness of a strong villain’s presence.

Far Cry 4 is keenly aware of this essentialness from the first and through towards the last – see only Pagan Min, Kyrat’s tyrant and exploiter, foundationally vile. His vileness is given active expression in the narrative’s very opening, fostering focusedness immediately. The player is fast provided a motivation – violent and tyrannical Pagan Min must be toppled. Ajay Ghale, the title’s player character, may consider himself as ancillary to these affairs – he traveled to Kyrat simply to scatter his deceased mother’s ashes – though his considerable humanity and feeling nature necessitates involvement in those selfsame affairs. And so he becomes embroiled in a civil war of sorts, working for the Golden Path, a resistance movement against Pagan Min co-run by two decidedly different individuals with decidedly different motivations and aims, one seeking to preserve the past, the other striving for future advancement and sustained stability. Ajay, conflicted, undergoes growth similar to Brody’s. But even while discoursing and sometimes passionately feuding with Golden Path leaders, likability evades Ajay Ghale, too. But as with Vaas, Pagan Min anchors the narrative, compensates for Ajay’s failings and banality. Pagan Min’s destruction at the narrative’s conclusion is thus a rewarding and cathartic affair – it is a major triumph, and the player can rest easy in the knowledge that an entire region, an entire state, has been totally liberated from a brutal, unceasingly brutal tyrant, oppressor. Far Cry 5’s narrative directly builds upon these successes, the narrative adopting a more emotional tone, as the darknesses inflicted upon Hope County’s remaining citizens are dwelt upon extensively and brutally. Indeed, Joseph Seed, deluded Joseph Seed, eclipses Pagan Min and Vaas in sheer terms of villainy, for Joseph Seed is not strictly villain in the conventional sense, but is also a master manipulator, distorting many minds in his quest for control – see the trio of individuals just below him, most painfully the sole female, Faith. Lost in life, she found “purpose” underneath Joseph’s protection and guidance, unable to detect the darkness within him, a darkness resting always just beneath the projected facade of wisdom and altruistism; Faith is a terribly tragic character indeed. In this regard, the leaps in narrative complexity from Far Cry 2 to Far Cry 5 are astonishing. For in that earlier title, the villainous figure, one known only as the Jackal, was developed in a subtle and indirect fashion. While this does mean he was steeped in curious moodiness and mystery, this commanding ambiguity minimizes his villainous attributes – or his more human attributes. A compelling narrative framework exists, and Far Cry 5 eventually perfected that framework, ambitiously emphasizing Joseph’s story and those supporting him.         

When considering Ubisoft’s reach, its ever-expanding reach, one is hopeful for the future, specifically in the Far Cry games’ future. In an ever-changing industry, escapist games like these always have their place, ever fostering player engagement, bringing ample enjoyment to the masses. This optimism is ultimately dealt a sharp blow, however, when one considers the most recently released title, Far Cry 6. As game and experience, it is brimming with flaws. The experimentations it does execute – see alterations to the progression systems and a renewed fixation with crafting and resource gathering – largely meet with failure, ironic of course in that the series desperately needs experimentations, which are only frustratingly – or never – realized here. In efforts to inject some narrative depth, meanwhile, the cutscenes shifted towards a third-person perspective, and while logically this creates a more cinematic direction, in practice this change is essentially meaningless and miniscule – Far Cry 6 is steeped in flaws and failings. Most damnable is the game’s overwhelming largeness, Ubisoft subscribing to the notion that a bigger gameworld is inherently a better gameworld (a trend almost all developers of open-world games have embraced now). And so the map is endless, its endlessness serving an intimidating function. This intimidation is obviously a total negative, and owing to its magnitude I was actually unable to finish Far Cry 6, an anomaly in the entire series; it is difficult to gloss over the rampant failings. Some three years have passed since that title’s release, and while it was supported somewhat post-launch, that post-launch content was mostly derided, its existence mostly unneeded. One is hopeful that, when Far Cry 6’s successor does in time launch, substantial alterations, needed since Far Cry 3, shall see implementation. Adapt or die: and so it is with the Far Cry games, which have long neglected foundational, substantial adaptation.