Let’s face it, there are so many FPS’s around it’s going to take a lot to convince us to buy another one, especially with Resistance 2 and the new Call Of Duty waiting in the wings. But Ubisoft’s African adventure looks like being an absolute cracker. Chris Burke gets hands-on…
Landing at the airport of some war-torn African backwater, the game begins with a cinematic jeep ride through beautifully rendered African bush into a township policed by dodgy militia. You’re a mercenary – with the choice of playing as one of a number of characters - there to kill an arms dealer. But he’s managed to turn the tables, infect you with malaria and disappear leaving you alone, sick and in a world of hurt. From what we’ve seen, what follows promises to be a fast-moving FPS of breathtaking detail and believability.
It’s a lot less linear than many FPS’s, with the ‘sandbox’ qualities we’ve come to associate more with third-person games like GTA IV. A large area of Africa – towns, lakes, brushwood, savannah - is your playground, and this is evident from only the first hour of play. It’s filled with dangerous enemies, different factions in a bloody conflict, plus environmental hazards and dynamic weather.
The game is mission-based, jobs are undertaken for the various sides in the war, plus freelancers and agents provocateur. You get paid in diamonds, as currency is worthless in these parts. Handy cases of gems have been carelessly left around the place for you to collect too, and as a bonus you get given a tracker to find them. You’ll also have a mobile phone which you will use to build up employers and friends (another GTA IV-style touch) or you can just go to bars where ex-pats hang out and pick up work that way.To help get you around, you can drive old cars, jeeps and boats. Even if you wreck them, you have a handy ability to pop the bonnet and fix them. Your actions throughout have consequence, and how you play is entirely up to you. If you carry out a particularly brutal and bloody attack, it will affect that side’s morale, and you can play factions off against each other.
You can play tactically, using your GPS and a monocular to scope out enemy camps and plan your attacks, or just wade in guns blazing. We only had time to scratch the surface of its Heart Of Darkness (or Apocalypse Now)-style story, but it’s clear Far Cry 2 has depth and gritty realism seeping from every malarial pore.
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