Following the futuristic Filipino battles of Crysis, the closest to photorealism in a game yet, yet with the alien technology essentially ending the game early for me, emptying it of its future war and convincing weaponry and injecting a fun, but ultimately less enjoyable alien menace, I decided to give Far Cry 2 a chance.
Stemming from the same original game, Far Cry, the team divided and most of the same team went on to make Crysis, whereas Ubisoft kept the title license and made Far Cry 2 with a separate development team. My immediate thought was that I’d much prefer Crysis, but with less body awareness than expected and the alien plot-line, I hoped that Far Cry 2 would satisfy me. With it’s African plains, apparently non-science-fiction or supernatural storyline and huge open areas the series of games are famous for, with hints of having as much visual bed-wetting (in a good way) as Crysis, the outlook is promising.
A beautifully-lit jungle with a muddy palette.
After a few hours of play, first impressions are mixed. Crysis is certainly much more polished, visually. FC2 does a decent job at rivaling Crysis in terms of graphics (the shadows and overall lighting effects are, for example, the most breathtaking I’ve seen), but with a colour palette scraped from the bottom of an old boot, FC2 simply doesn’t have the shininess and visual range of Crysis. Granted, the context would indeed limit the graphics somewhat, but there’s a muddiness that could have been polished a bit, along with some minor glitches that are just disappointing.
Great animation, despite the shoulder-clipping.
On the plus-side, the game is more freeform and provides a fantastic bodily-aware animation for every little action, from healing to opening doors to grabbing the seat in front of you when your vehicle stops suddenly. The HUD being absent from the screen for the most part, is great (especially the decision to remove any minor HUD displays such as save-notifications from screenshots), and the tangibility of the map and hammering on a jammed weapon whilst desperately using your eyes rather than relying on a magical floating radar to track your enemy bearing down on you through the jungle all combine to make a very immersive experience. Now, if only the glitches had been ironed out, this could have bumped Crysis off the podium.
The most detailed and convincing shadow system I've seen.
Checking a map whilst driving at high speeds is just as dangerous in Far Cry 2 as it is on the M25.
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