Recently, GamersGate.com had a Ubisoft 50% sale. I was perusing the games on sale and I saw that Far Cry 2 was marked down to US$14.95. Taking a liberal US$1=S$1.55, I calculated it should cost me about $23. Not a bad price I must say. It’s still retailing around S$60 and 2nd hand sales still figure about S$30 or so, which I am not too keen on, because of the install limits.
However, I was willing to take a chance on GamersGate, as in a particular FAQ section, it states its policy on install limits.
How many times can I download and/or install my games?
Any game bought on GamersGate is yours to download and install as many times you like. Some games are protected with an activation limit but that limit is easily reset with an email to support@gamersgate.com
Also, Reclaim Your Game, a website explaining the ins and outs of DRM and other related gaming issues, has given a positive light on GamersGate’s tech support.
Quality of Tech Support: Very good. My only issue with them was actually a billing problem they weren’t directly responsible for, but they still helped me to resolve it within a matter of days. GG has an overall very good reputation for tech support.
I felt like it was alright for me to go ahead with my purchase, and since it was a very good offer, I decided to take the plunge.
I did not regret it. Far Cry 2 is great!
To be honest, I have “tried” Far Cry 2 before, albeit in a not so legal way. I loved it too back then, and after completing the initial tutorial mission, I promised myself that if I were to continue playing this game, I would really enjoy it so much more if I were to purchase it.
I’m running it smoothly on “Very High” at 1280×1024 resolution on my system and I never noticed a slowdown or any drop in frame rate, even when there seemed to be a lot of action on screen. I could probably push it further, but it is already looking awesome. It really feels like a well-coded and optimized game, unlike a few other games in my arsenal, notably Grand Theft Auto 4 and Neverwinter Nights 2. (For NWN2, at the time, I was running a 7900GT, a mid high-end part. And the game is still sluggish that I have to turn off so many settings. Thus, I didn’t think it was a well-coded app at the time. I think if I were to replay NWN2 now, it would be better, due to my graphics card being more powerful.) I have read that the game runs well at higher settings even with a mid-end graphics card, and it is quite well-deserved.
I have extolled on the virtues of open-world games before. I love it. I’m not too keen on having a pre-scripted and pre-determined location on where to go and what to do. I feel restricted by it. I don’t mind it, but the choice of letting me go off-track is nice.
However, I can see that this openness setting may not be for everyone. There is a lot of driving to be done, and although it is a cool part of the game, it could get pretty boring for some. There won’t be any enemies while you’re on the road. There may be other convoys passing through who will shoot you on sight, but those are far between. The roads are mostly empty. There are the occasional roadblocks and guard posts along the way, but it’s pretty much the same thing over and over again. Repetitiveness will set in and it quickly becomes boring. I’m not much of an FPS player, so the whole been-there-done-that has not set in yet.
Anyway, the protagonist you play seems to be a mercenary, hired by the U.N. or N.A.T.O. or something, to kill this guy called “The Jackal” who has been supplying arms to the warring factions in this African setting. At the very beginning, you get malaria, and while you’re lying sick in your motel room, The Jackal has already found you. For some reason, he doesn’t kill you, citing that since your original mission to kill him has already failed due to you contracting malaria, you have no reason to hunt and kill him now. He leaves and you go back to your feverish sleep. When you wake up, your motel seems to be caught in the middle between of a firefight between the two factions. You can kill as much as you like, but somehow, the script requires you to “die”. You’re taken to someone’s base where he explains that you may have killed some of his men, and you have to somehow work off your debt to him or something, by doing the various missions he has for you. Anyway, when this whole sequence is over, you’ll end up at some locale with a bar and a weapons shop (which will probably serve as your “home base”). In the bar, you’ll meet a couple of guys, for reasons really unknown to me, will suddenly be your BFF.
Huh? Whatever…
Plotholes aside, I haven’t seen much of the missions yet, but being an FPS, I shouldn’t expect anything more complicated than “kill-them-and-blow-shit-up”. Even on some missions that require you to get some item or other, you just have to go to the required location, kill everyone, grab item, go back and get reward. It’s not that deep but the whole kill everyone part is pretty fun, and cathartic even. Especially after a hard day at work, it’s great to be killing some dumb virtual humans.
Oh yes, I said “dumb” because I’m playing it on “Normal” difficulty. My brain and twitch trigger finger aren’t as sensitive as they used to be. I remember being able to beat old Sega Genesis games like Super Street Fighter 2 and Thunder Force 3 on the hardest difficulty setting. Now I get my ass kicked even on the normal setting of those games (who’s dumb now? 
). In Far Cry 2, the AI isn’t so difficult on normal, just nice for newbies like me to feel like superman. Armed with a constantly jamming sniper rifle and the entry level pistol, I can pretty much make short work of anyone from far away. And that’s how I like it! The map shows you everything, like guard posts and other places of interest, where the enemy will surely be. So I can stop some way off, sneak in and try to gain the high ground. And nicely pick off the bad guys one by one. Shoot first, ask questions later. Of course, the whole thing is made more exciting by the fact that my sniper rifle is a weapon that I got off someone I killed, so it’s very prone to jamming. I need to complete the weapon shop missions so that I can unlock the other nice weapons to buy.
I don’t really like the music score though, but this is simply a matter of opinion. I feel like I’m using the music to know if there are other baddies around, because when you’re fighting the enemy, the tempo will increase to provide you with that mood. But when you finished off the last guy around, it will simply fade away. Thus, this can be used as an indicator if you have cleaned out that particular area or not. There was a time where I scouted around with my sniper scope but couldn’t see anyone, but the music was still pumping on. I found out that there were 2 guys coming from the side and behind. I felt like a cheat as I knew there still were enemies around because of the music.
I have only played around 4% of what the game has to offer. I have just read somewhere that at the beginning, it is best to do the weapon shop missions, which will unlock the rest of the available weapons to buy, so that’s what I will focus on for now.
Overall, I like this game. It’s like GTA4 from a first-person perspective, but without the headache-inducing over-contradicting storyline, where the protagonist agonizes about killing some guy in a cut-scene, but murder dozens of innocent civilians when you’re playing. Of course, I can’t comment yet on how much the story from this game will suck (and it will, judging from the opening act which I can’t really fathom). Being a mercenary for hire, I would expect to be playing for both of the warring sides, since I don’t have an allegiance to one side in particular.
In the mean time, I’m having too much fun killing and blowing shit up. 
