Far Cry 2

I've been playing this for two weeks, and hours and hours of my life now, so I'd like to respond in depth to the advertiser's claims about this game.

"Choose from a plethora of weapons", but because of our weird "primary, secondary, special" weapon classification system, you can only carry an assault rifle OR a sniper rifle, so kiss goodbye to any hope of actually utilising weapons in a tactical way in the single player game.

" Experience real freedom while roaming in more than 50km2 "; that's right, feel free to wander the African savannah, looking at rocks and trees. Some of the rocks will be bigger than the others. Some will be smaller. Some of the trees will be tall. Some will be short. Break up the monotony of your tour of African rocks and trees by either shooting mercenaries or... shooting mercenaries. And hey, if shooting mercenaries gets boring, well, we've always got more rocks and trees for you! If you're done with the story missions, play enthralling side missions - you get to shoot mercenaries! If you're lucky, there just might be some rocks and trees on the way...

" Discover Africa as if you were there thanks to amazing artistic research supported by next-gen technology to make it come to life!" Translation - discover Africa as though our programmers had had it described to them. Enjoy spending time in a coutry where everyone in the country arbitrarily wants you dead for no good reason. And finally, after years of waiting, there's finally a game where you can enjoy the thrill of malaria in your own home! That's pretty much every man's dream, having malaria.

" Fight for two rival factions" neither of whose policies you will be told about, neither of whom seem to represent any faction in particular, and neither of which you will care about, because we were so busy creating believable fire, we forgot to create a believable conflict. Are they fighting over food? Water? Disco music? You'll never find out, and you'll never care.

"choose your own path and make your way up to your primary target by any means necessary"; give up on any approach but 'shooting everything that's not me' after the first four seconds of the first gun fight.

"Feel free to explore this gigantic world and play over 70 side quests to earn help, new weapons and vehicles!" 70 side quests of remarkable similarity. Earn guns with the destructive power of a blowpipe attack from a child with asthma. Drive in vehicles that handle like a tortoise dying of depression.

"Next-gen technology brings a brand new experience to Far Cry 2. Be surprised by medics dragging wounded soldiers into a safe place. Read fear in grunts' eyes as your reputation and in-game actions make them want to drop their guns and run for cover." Translation - Next-gen technology brings you exactly the same experience as every FPS you've ever played, only with less going on.

To conclude:
Pros:
Malaria.

Cons:
You can only have a sniper rifle or an assault rifle, so tactical FPS options limited.
Enemies so effective at locating you, it's like they're using The Force, thus making stealth gameplay a joke.
More wandering from place to place than the Fellowship of The Ring.
Either the mercenaries are bulletproof or the gun shop only supplies rubber bullets.
Factions characterless and dull.
Missions repetitive and flavourless.
"Story" pretty non-existent.
Sidequests like main quests, only with no discernable rewards.

I'm a long time PC gamer but fairly new to the xBox and was pretty amazed at some of the whining here.

So much effort has gone into this game it pains me to see people trying to blame it for failures in their own gaming skill, ingenuity and attention span.

It's Far Cry; you can do what you want. If you think of trying something, the designers have probably thought of it first and added bells to it. There is no spoon feeding and you'll have to develop in-game skills and tactics. If something isn't working for you, engage your brain and try something else. The game will reward you.

And all this moaning about driving and check points... give me a break! The factions aren't going to set up road blocks that can't stop one man with a car and an assault rifle are they? They haven't been designed with lazy-Joe-gamer in mind, they've been designed to maintain realism and your immersion in the game. All your missions are covert, regardless of who you are working for, so both factions see you as an enemy.

So, how do you beat them...? Start thinking tactically.

Firstly, they are just guards. They don't stray too far from their posts. If you have to go through a check point the best option is just to power through. Stopping to fight them each time is just retarded.

You'll need to learn to drive fast and you'll need to remember how certain posts are laid out (some have worse barricades or more LMG emplacements etc). You'll have to find a good route through which works for you.

Learn to drive off road. There are corners you can cut and some of the worst posts you can drive round entirely. Its amazing fun to swerve off the road and go barrelling through the trees. If you get really good you can look behind you and watch them trying to follow and crash.

Drive at night... off road... with the lights off. The guards can't see far at night and actually lie down and go to sleep. You can roll up slowly and then power through. You'll be long gone by the time they get up and run to the guns or their vehicles. With your lights on however, they'll see you approach and be ready.

Find a vehicle that works for you. The buggy is fast but seems a bit fragile and the rear mounted engine gets shot out too quick for my tastes. The cars are a better option if speed is your thing. I prefer the Jeep with the mounted gun. Set it rear facing before you drive - it will save you valuable seconds if you do need to take out anyone following you. Upgrade the reliability of any vehicles you use regularly so you can fix them quicker.

Only stop and fight as a last resort, and even then avoid getting out on foot if you can. If you have to bail (black smoke from the engine!) then run first, shoot later. Finding cover is everything. Sometimes you just can't avoid a pile up and getting all hemmed in amongst burning cars and exploding glass, so a good close quarters weapon is recommended (MAC-10 is my favourite).

However, there are plenty of hidden trails and paths scattered all over the place, particularly if you see a safe house that looks a bit off the beaten track. They're not marked on the map, so you'll have to explore a bit, but it is often much quicker to use them. Sometimes you can go by foot, car and boat and reach your mission destination in minutes without meeting a single patrol or check point. All this moaning about taking 20 minutes to get to the other side of the map is pathetic and usually unnecessary.

Well, I hope I've used one aspect of the game to show what Far Cry 2 really has to offer, and I hope I've countered some of the 'da map is way too big - wurst game ever' kind of comments.

Far Cry 2 may not be to everyone's tastes, but for me, that is a good thing.

First of all I think this game is amazing, graphics and size of the game are spot on.

The reason I'm only giving it 3 stars is because it full of bugs, 33 hrs of play, 65% complete and everyone of my save games went currupt. Now I have to start again. The is a well know problem and hopefully Ubisoft will eventually fix it. I know there are plenty of other bugs but this is the main one to me.

If the game was tested properly before release it would easily have been a 5 Star+ game.

If you want a game for a mess about exploring the maps then for £17.99 it's a bargain, just don't expect to complete it until its been patched.

This game is like no other. The bad reviews are because people are comparing it to games such as CoD or Halo online but honestly, how can you compare this to them when they are completely different.

Positives

Huge map with some amazing views if you climb to the top of a mountain and look out - realism at its best
Good combat system, the weapons and melee are similar, well almost identical to games like CoD but I feel they 'hit the spot' better than those games.
Graphics are amazing, just as you would imagine africa to be.
Unique - no game is like this. There is no game out there that is an open world with complete warfare and open space, it may sound like a GTA or SR, but put that with the combat of CoD and you get Far Cry 2.
Fire - This game by far has the best fire graphics and its realism such as spreading fire through the waterless vegetation of the african savannah scene.
Animals - The animals in this game are as realistic as ever, Zebras roaming free throughout their natural habitat and gives you the feel of sitting in an african safara truck cruising their land. Hell - They even dent your car if you run one over!!

Negatives

Repetitive scenery, rocks, more rocks, and plenty of trees.
Distances can be extremely long and tiring and they do get quite irritating as its a quite often occurance to have a mission on the complete oposite side of the map to yourself.
Too many interuptions when you want to go somewhere - whether it be having to take out a guardpost or it being a random car that crashes into you that starts attacking you.

Overall this game is a must have for any kind of shooter/free roaming game fans. You must be patient though as you will quickly become tired of it if your not. Hopefully some DLC will sort out the long distances or something else.

I hope this review has helped.

Look this is the low down:
1. Amazong graphics, i think they're the best out there.
2. The map is too big for the amount of ways you get around; i.e. You cant fast travel via the map, you cant call a taxi-u wudnt but something like that and you cant go up any terrain.
3. The story is too open. Instead of hearing what to do and going to do it on your way your car might break down and ur weapons might break so your on a 2 hour diversion in order to get a new weapon and you don't have a blinking car to get there.
4. An action where you can't dive into combat and this is so dissapointing as it becomes stategic which doesn't suit this genre of game.
5. Healing yourself is interesting and i have no problems with it.
6. Online is fun and thre ranking and rewards arn't bad at all.
7. No fast cars and its unrealistic as it will say your going 120mph but u fell like ur doin 30 and if you crash into a tree it doesn't dent, fall or graphically do anything ehcept mess ur car up only.
8. Destructable enviroment is good but shooting a tree trunk with a mounted gun would make it fall and it doesn't. This is the case with much of the big things in the environment.
9. Fire is brilliant and hasn't be beaten in any game so far.
10. U can't set a gps and follow an arrow or anything u have to read a map and it makes travelling even worse.

I have this game and have played it for about 5 hours and haven't played it since due to the gameplay being far too boring due to bad travelling and combat. Rent first, u have been warned.