E3 2012: Hands-On With Far Cry 3

[News Portal]

The new [app=8213]Far Cry 3[/app] looks a lot more scripted than the series' previous outings, but as Patrick Stafford discovered, there's a respectable sandbox game lurking underneath.

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[brimlad]

“You can create troughs of fire and burn the AI, and get rid of them that away. Or, we’ve included the ability for the player to throw a rock, spook the AI, and then put a little more intentionality in what you want them to do.”

nice to see rock throwing back in the game, was great fun in FC1 luring AI out into the open with your never ending supply of rocks. Flaming arrows is a nice touch, forgotten how many times I set myself on fire with the fc2 flame thrower lol
thanks Patrick

cheers

[DarkMellie]

It doesn't always need to be a sandbox! In a shooter, I far prefer some measure of linearity.. Crysis 2 was an okay example of this.

Sandbox is, to me, all about third person. It's GTA, it's Mafia 2, it's Just Cause 2, it's ArmA 2... it's not an FPS.

[Jez]

It doesn't always need to be a sandbox! In a shooter, I far prefer some measure of linearity.. Crysis 2 was an okay example of this.

Sandbox is, to me, all about third person. It's GTA, it's Mafia 2, it's Just Cause 2, it's ArmA 2... it's not an FPS.

Why is a third person sandbox preferable to a first person one?

Though I found Far Cry 2 to be pretty dull and stopped playing it when I got to the second region if I remember right.

[pinkwithhappiness]

I really wanted a full co-op campaign when they announced co-op for this game, but it's only 6 or so missions
Guess if the missions last an hour each like they say, it's still more than i got out of Kane & Lynch haha

[Edward]

Far Cry was a good game, with great locations and an action story.

Far Cry 2, wasn't anything like the first and had that stupid malaria, you get off the plane and get it straight away? Who is so stupid to think how likely that is?

Also how stupid to go to a country and not take malaria tablets etc? It's as if the main character knows nothing and you keep having to get more tablets it was annoying.

You take out some guards and clear a camp, your searching around and they respawned. So you had to kill them again and again.

Crysis made you stick to a set path all the time, so when you knew this looks like a good ambush spot I'll go around it. No you have to go in the middle....

Big maps should mean you can do what you want to compete the mission and less set checkpoints. Just a way point to get such and such, do it your way.

I didn't think of the series as a sandbox.

[DoHo_]

A lot of people seem to forget Far Cry Instincts, and in every Far Cry related topic I will mention it. It was an Xbox title (and later a 360 title) and to date has been my favourite Far Cry. Even without the "huge" maps, even with a linear, often scripted gameplay and story, it was MUCH more enjoyable because the jungle setting had been crafted a lot better. There were still a few parts where you could choose your own path, and the maps still felt pretty "open" but it was the scripted moments and the feeling that events had been purposely crafted that made it a good experience.

As we saw in Far Cry 2 giving us nothing but freedom, and putting us in a world that can't account for that freedom (i.e. continuously spawns enemies, is a mostly static world with little to no changes), makes for a bad experience.

My point is that having elements of Far Cry 3 scripted means they've taken a lot more care to make sure those elements will be good, and that our actions will have results and may change the game world, and having it open ended means we still get that freedom; so overall this is really good news for me!

[DarkMellie]

Thanks heaps for that DoHo, I've often looked at Instincts on the GoD store on my Xbox but was really unsure as to quality, even after reading a lot of reviews and player comments. Yours sealed the deal, sounds like a worthy purchase!

[PlasmaDavid]

After the failure to capitilise on so many potential features in Far Cry 2, I fail to see why anyone is looking forwards to FC3. It's just going to be another consolitus ridden pile of "could have been".