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So I'm probably pretty late to the party train, but one of the gifts the wife got me was $100 in steam giftcards.
Having heard nothing but good things about the game I picked up the deluxe edition for $20. Hell yeah.
On to the actual game.
Far Cry 3 was one of the games of the year from 2012 and was released at the very end of that year.
Far Cry has always had an interesting mystical bend but this is far less present and far more present in Far Cry 3. It's up to the player to decide the nature of the various hallucinogens Jason imbibes.
The game is incredibly fun and has a nice strategic asset to it. Kinda ruined that for myself when my first playthrough was on easy and I spent half the game able to melee tigers to death in a straight up fistfight but I digress.
Basically the main free range combat of the game comes from assaulting enemy encampments. These typically go like 1. Set C4, kill two-three guys with this. 2. Kill two more guys with the long range Light machine gun or a sniper rifle. 3. Release whatever megafauna the pirates are keeping (Sumatran tigers or Grizzlies) 4. Join in the fray with a grenade launcher. 5. Profit.
The driving is worse than it's ever been and I completely ignored the supply drop missions. The vehicles handle like horse piss but the keyboard's inability to pick other choices between "Floor it!!!" and "lay off the pedal entirely" only makes it far worse. They slide along like slugs in an oil slick. This is supposed to represent the jungle environment but on the roads it feels incredibly unwarranted.
This is basically a thread to discuss the game.

I got it for £4 in the sale.

Whiney protagonist and annoying first twenty minutes of the game aside, it's a great game. Really love to tear ass across the island and Vaas is fething brilliant.

 BrookM wrote:
Whiney protagonist and annoying first twenty minutes of the game aside, it's a great game. Really love to tear ass across the island and Vaas is fething brilliant.

The wingsuit is so fun. Once you learn that you're only supposed to tap "s" and "a" to avoid collision even driving becomes a fun hectic daredevil adventure.

I wish I was better with the bow, but it's difficult sometimes to judge the "arc" of the arrows. The silenced sniper rifle is amazing though. You can just camp on a hill and take out an entire outpost.

 Velour_Fog wrote:
I wish I was better with the bow, but it's difficult sometimes to judge the "arc" of the arrows. The silenced sniper rifle is amazing though. You can just camp on a hill and take out an entire outpost.

My problem with the bow is that, in terms of gameplay mechanics, it's functionally useless.The enemies behave the same way as silenced fire-arms; Just like the silenced sniper rifles they'll still immediately rush to the point of origin of the attack, i.e. You. At least with a silenced firearm you have the refire rate to take 'em out before they find you.

This is probably one of the big flaws of the game for me, the enemies fricking 'echo location' of you. To be honest the game works best going the route of Pure takedown. (The level's layouts and AI-Patrol Waypoints are clearly designed with chain-takedowns in mind.)

It's a crying shame the bow is so poorly utilised in Farcry 3, the physics model is great and the arrows have a satisfying impact, i'm also not gonna lie and say the bow wasn't a 'lil tricky but it was satisfying. If they had implement this great asset as an 'undetectable' kill, like the takedowns it would have been fab and my main weapon.

Great Game though.

I've only played for few hours but to me bow seems to have few advatages over firearms.

1. I think bow never loses accuracy when moving, firearms do.

2. You can reuse arrows. Sniper rifles tend to run out of ammo quite fast. Although arrows in general are harder to come by.

3. Bow is more silent ie it can be shot closer without AI hearing you.

4. Different ammo types (shame game doesn't have dedicated ammo switch button).

But your are right perkustin the usefullness seems negligible.

A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

nomotog wrote:

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

Oh yah. That.

Jungle magic. Or Voodoo.

The bow is not more silent in my experience. I used the bow alot btw, i basically stressed tested it, trying to find out why it felt so useless.

As for recycling arrows, 15 (the first upgrade iirc) is more than you'll ever need. Ammo is plentiful and cheap in the game.

The different ammo types are a neat idea but again simply less useful versions of other things. In fact they are useless for stealth play (unless you managed to kill every guy in the outpost with one explosive arrow.) As ANY pyrotechnics wipes out your undetected bonus.

Also the bow has no reticule so it's actually impossible to tell if it loses accuracy. Although in my experience it does.

As for the tatoo i would assume the 'Magic' is simply an abstraction of Jason going back to Dennis, or probably Citra later on, to get some more work done on his sweet sleeve.

I love the game, and sadly Blood Dragon didnt captur what made it good.
But IT is fun going hunting for tigers with machine guns, And I loved the bow for taking out the alarms
And Im not sure, I think there is mysticism. Such him taking the juice, it telling him what is happening to his friends, who to go and who to find.

Very true -- Blood Dragon did not capture the best parts of FC3. It's still a good game, however, if you can find it for ~$5 or less.

Blood Dragon is supposed to be nothing like FC3 though, it is a massive over the top homage of 80's action movies, everything about it is one big reference or in-joke to one thing or the other.

But it's built on FC3, which was not really necessary for the 80s romp. In fact, Blood Dragon fails to take advantage of anything that is cool about FC3. Blood Dragon could have easily been a Fallout 3 mod, for example, without really losing anything.

While I enjoyed Blood Dragon, it's not a good indication of the positive aspects of FC3.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I love the game, and sadly Blood Dragon didnt captur what made it good.
But IT is fun going hunting for tigers with machine guns, And I loved the bow for taking out the alarms
And Im not sure, I think there is mysticism. Such him taking the juice, it telling him what is happening to his friends, who to go and who to find.

Blood Dragon was better, actually.
Blood Dragon was it's own thing, with the deadly wildlife turned up to 100, set to Terminator & Predator music.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

nomotog wrote:

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

What do you mean theory? Isn't that flat out said with the new tattoo burning itself into your skin after you get an upgrade?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BrookM wrote:
Blood Dragon is supposed to be nothing like FC3 though, it is a massive over the top homage of 80's action movies, everything about it is one big reference or in-joke to one thing or the other.

Bingo.

 ThePrimordial wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

What do you mean theory? Isn't that flat out said with the new tattoo burning itself into your skin after you get an upgrade?

The game is wonderfully ambiguous about it. It could be a magic tattoo, or you could be suffering from a drug fueled fever dream. I like the idea that it's magic because it means the game isn't some "realistic" FPS.

nomotog wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

What do you mean theory? Isn't that flat out said with the new tattoo burning itself into your skin after you get an upgrade?

The game is wonderfully ambiguous about it. It could be a magic tattoo, or you could be suffering from a drug fueled fever dream. I like the idea that it's magic because it means the game isn't some "realistic" FPS.

Well there are other reasons too.
Like how Jason can eat RPGs with no real damage, His unbelievable stamina, the ability to melee tigers to death & kill Bull sharks effortlessly, and finally easily pushing upside down jeeps back on their wheels.

 Perkustin wrote:

...This is probably one of the big flaws of the game for me, the enemies fricking 'echo location' of you.

It was far, far worse in FC2. That game was the most hilarious display of magical enemy-locating powers in any game I have ever played.

You'd be crouched down, at maximum distance away, with a silenced sniper rifle, in a ghillie suit, at night, in a bush. Fire at one guy, the whole camp swarms towards you.
Then they fire at you with their AKs from the same range and somehow hit you. Oh yeah guys, i'm sure you saw me take that shot! Unless you have some sort of freakish high-powered heat detecting goggles there isn't any possible way any of you saw me, and I don't think those were too common in the poor, dodgy parts of Africa.

FC2 was an incredibly infuriating game.

 Sparkadia wrote:

 Perkustin wrote:

...This is probably one of the big flaws of the game for me, the enemies fricking 'echo location' of you.

It was far, far worse in FC2. That game was the most hilarious display of magical enemy-locating powers in any game I have ever played.

You'd be crouched down, at maximum distance away, with a silenced sniper rifle, in a ghillie suit, at night, in a bush. Fire at one guy, the whole camp swarms towards you.
Then they fire at you with their AKs from the same range and somehow hit you. Oh yeah guys, i'm sure you saw me take that shot! Unless you have some sort of freakish high-powered heat detecting goggles there isn't any possible way any of you saw me, and I don't think those were too common in the poor, dodgy parts of Africa.

FC2 was an incredibly infuriating game.

On normal difficulty I can use the AMR as my main sniper and never get caught from a distance of 150 meters.
I never noticed it as a problem. I did notice they would eventually find you regardless some way or another but that just gave me an excuse to go all Rambo.

 ThePrimordial wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 Happygrunt wrote:

 ThePrimordial wrote:
A bow with explosive arrows was always part of my loadout. It doesn't have a big enough explosive radius to hit three guys (it can hit two) but it makes assaulting bases a lot easier due to not needing to take time to line up a shot.
This game has a fairly OP shotgun. Anything within 30 feet of the barrel is dead. The buckshot wil go through one enemy, killing him, and then kill two guys behind him!!!
Does anyone have an explanation of where Jason got the Tatau?
I think after he escaped Vaas against all odds, the jungle itself said "mad props" and gave it to him.

Uh, the guy who gives you missions gives it to you when he finds you on a beach. He actually says that in a cut scene.

He doesn't tell you why it keeps getting larger and more intricate though. My theory is magic.

What do you mean theory? Isn't that flat out said with the new tattoo burning itself into your skin after you get an upgrade?

The game is wonderfully ambiguous about it. It could be a magic tattoo, or you could be suffering from a drug fueled fever dream. I like the idea that it's magic because it means the game isn't some "realistic" FPS.

Well there are other reasons too.
Like how Jason can eat RPGs with no real damage, His unbelievable stamina, the ability to melee tigers to death & kill Bull sharks effortlessly, and finally easily pushing upside down jeeps back on their wheels.

You still see that in quote un quote realistic games. Yes they aren't realistic, but they cling to the idea that they are and refuse to admit any supernatural elements. I like games that admit the supernatural more then games that exclude it. In fact I think the big problem with far cry 2 was that it tried to b realistic and one of the big fixes of far cry 3 is that they striped down the realism. Though maybe not enough.

 ThePrimordial wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I love the game, and sadly Blood Dragon didnt captur what made it good.
But IT is fun going hunting for tigers with machine guns, And I loved the bow for taking out the alarms
And Im not sure, I think there is mysticism. Such him taking the juice, it telling him what is happening to his friends, who to go and who to find.

Blood Dragon was better, actually.
Blood Dragon was it's own thing, with the deadly wildlife turned up to 100, set to Terminator & Predator music.

Bingo.

Then it should not have carried th FC3 name. It should have been called something else TBH

I had Far Cry 3 for a while earlier this year, and I was loving every second... right up until you kill Vaas. The bigger bad didn't interest me in the slightest and it went from a great open world game to something painfully generic; it killed my momentum in completing the game stone dead, and I traded it in a week after killing Vaas. Aside from the last 1/3 of the game being lackluster, I loved it. The hunting was great, weapon customization was a nice touch, and using the bow was so fun it's unreal.

 Manchu wrote:
But it's built on FC3, which was not really necessary for the 80s romp. In fact, Blood Dragon fails to take advantage of anything that is cool about FC3. Blood Dragon could have easily been a Fallout 3 mod, for example, without really losing anything.

While I enjoyed Blood Dragon, it's not a good indication of the positive aspects of FC3.

It may use the engine and assets of the game, it is not meant to be the same experience as Far Cry 3. Far Cry 3 is about a whining douche becoming a hero and in the meantime killing a lot of people because of drugs and the promise of titties. Blood Dragon is all about being a bad ass cyborg commando from the nuclear jungles of the second Vietnam war who swears a lot, flips people off while ripping out hearts and making bad jokes that for some reason do not fall flat.



MK 4 style melon-fether!

Blood dragon uses the same mechanics pretty much 1:1 i.e stealth is still the best way to play/most satisfying. Admittedly Rambo was a bit of a master of stealth but the terminator and John Matrix certainly weren't.

Far Cry 3 is distinctly less fun when you try and play it like Call of Duty. For one thing it's bloody easy to just mow them down with shotgun blasts, especially if you plow upgrades into health and syringes (I forced myself into using only 3 health bar things for ~1/2 of the game, only the forced action segments forced me to upgrade to four. Same with health syringes, as they also became ridiculously powerful early on. The game only presented difficulty to this approach with the heavy enemies but c4 or an Rpg could take them out and there was usually an RPG lying around. This also presents another problem, stuffing the levels with Heavies would make the game artificially difficult as there weapons were accurate and high damage.

Oh, I forgot: Guns have a nice and beefy sound to them when you shoot. More games need this, not the wussy popping and banging of Call of Battlefield, but these over the top rattles and booms that make you want to crank up the speakers. I walked around with the AK not because it was great, but because it made a nice Hollywood noise. Same with the DShK, I love that fether and will always spray like mad, because it makes such a sweeeeeeet, heavy as feth noise. Also, I love to overheat it and watch whiney white messiah kid pull that cocking lever, again with a nice heavy Hollywood sound to it.

I really liked FC3, but it seemed too long in my opinion. By the last part of the game, I found myself rushing through it just to finish it and move onto something else.

Agreed, as said, it should have just been a bit more to get to him and left the next guy out entirely.

The game was much better than I expected and very enjoyable.

Blood Dragon was fun and funny.
Well done for what it was aiming at.