Ah yes, back when Ubisoft was passionate about their games.
Far Cry 3 was crazy good when it was released, everyone i knew was playing it:)))
It was a BIG change from Far Cry 2, they got it so right that they decided to release 5 more games just like FC3 💀.
The story was cool, with one of the most popular antagonists in gaming (Vaas). The setting was pretty, an Island archipelago with loads of wild nature and wild pirates.
The soundtrack was great, that mission where you burn the weed plantations while listening to "Make it Bun Dem" on the background is the best mission in the series.
Far Cry 3 was a great sandbox with lots of freedom and many things to get lost into while exploring the wilderness and killing pirates while avenging your friends.

9

Why do so many people seem to think that this is the holy grail of Ubisoft games? It's more repetitive than their most recent ones and people always bring up Vaas as the one saving factor when he's barely in the game and isn't at all a good character, his performance is the only memorable thing about him. Every single character is a raging stereotype and every piece of accompanying dialogue seems like it was written by a 14 year old that thinks they know how real people speak.

The story is no better, it has no sense of pace or complexity or nuance, the whole game is basically one giant fetch quest with the occasional "destroy this location" mission being thrown in. Act 2 was especially boring, of the missions that I can actually remember the ones where you have to find a compass and then its multiple pieces was some of the most boring shit I've played in a long time, same with that one mission at the end of the game where you have to sneak past a million guards without being detected, like how is that supposed to be fun? Who approved that?

The open world is horrible as well, the setting is just not fucking fun man... the terrain is a nightmare to traverse when you don't have the wingsuit which is for 2/3 of the game but by then it's too late because the game is almost over and you don't even get that many chances to use it if you're not specifically looking to use it. This game is just bland bland BLAND

So yeah, probably the worst Far Cry game.

Every Game I've Ever Played - Ranked (By Score)
Ubisoft - Ranked
Far Cry - Ranked
2012 - Ranked

Far Cry 3 did a hell of a lot for the future for FPS', both good and bad, but on its own, it's not a good game. The story is interesting enough and Vaas is an incredible character but they try too hard to implement stealth that basically doesn't work (Ubisoft moment). The gunplay is mediocre, most cars drive like shit and the whole crafting system is flawed. The fact I have to find specific types of animals that don't show up on the map just to get a tiny bit more inventory space is backwards and very frustrating.

I've also had CONSTANT crashes.

I will give this game some props in the character department, as most of them are very interesting and stand out in their own way. Having played a bit of this game before, I think I was blinded by nostalgia thinking this game was going to be a lot better than I had imagined and that might have soured my experience, but sadly it just wasn't fun for me and I don't want to put any more time into a game I have stopped enjoying.

Me lembro de ter ficado encantado quando joguei no x360 do meu primo em 2012/13, jogo lindíssimo.

Consegui zerar hoje, é bom e bem divertido. O enredo focado na crise de identidade e insanidade do Jason casou bem com a ambientação e o clima do jogo.
A gunplay é muito foda, mas a progressão é meio fraquinha, você libera as armas e upgrades muito rápido e fácil.

Achei curto, ouvi dizer que tinha umas 15 horas de gameplay.

Entre 8 e 9 horas para zerar.

"Eu já te contei qual é a definição da insanidade?"
Que obra prima esse jogo meus amigos, com um dos melhores vilões da história dos videogames, um história excelente, ótimos gráficos, uma jogabilidade viciante e um lindo mundo aberto, extremamente vivo. FarCry 3 é o ápice da franquia, trazendo inúmeros momentos extremamente marcantes e sendo muito divertido, com um enorme arsenal de armas e formas de destroçar seus inimigos. Tanto que até hoje os outros FC tentam copiar a fórmula e magia que esse jogo possuí, sem sucesso. Até o modo coop dele era divertido de jogar, com boas mecânicas e até com uma história bacana.
Veredito: Um dos melhores jogos da geração do PS3, brilhando em inúmeros elementos, desde seus gráficos, história, personagens e até mesmo em sua gameplay e mundo aberto. Um jogo obrigatório para fãs de videogame.

Before I get started, I want to say that the state of the PC port is pitiful. PCGamingWiki has all this shit listed, and even though you can ignore fine-tuning some - or in my case, most - of them, that doesn't change how it is in-game. I've had some random disappearances happen while in fights, the microstutter is abundant, animation errors from both play and AI being wonky, instances where an interaction prompt wouldn't appear until I backed off a certain distance, it's sad. Far, far from the worst PC port available, and I imagine some of these issues could have cropped up due to advancements in OSes compared to what it was like in 2012, but it's still a shame to see. You'd think Ubisoft would've tried to make some adjustments so that it's in a better state instead of weirdly and randomly getting rid of online and DLC support for it and several other games, but nnnnnope. I would also like to apologize in advance if this gets very wordy.

So, Far Cry 3. Deriving from an abundant sources like Apocalypse Now, Deliverance, and Deer Hunter and 1989's Prince Of Persia, numerous folks over the years have said this was the Patient Zero for how modern, AAA games have structured their open world environment. A claim that's both warranted and unwarranted, if I must be honest, which ironically enough was because Ubisoft themselves failed to learn about what makes this game work in isolation compared to entries both before and after. Rook Island, as a whole, is actually fairly light and breezy to explore, even back in 2012. Yultimona talks about this, but by the time FC3 released, you had games like Ubi's own Assassin's Creed, some of Rockstar's non-GTA titles like Bully and Red Dead Redemption, Sucker Punch's inFamous, even cult hits like Saints Row 2, and - from the same year no less - Sleeping Dogs. I could go on and on with these namedrops, but you get my point, the whole aspect of the genre mold was being and already formulated by then.

The distinction FC3 attempts from, and in most cases succeeded in, setting Rook Island apart was utilizing the setting as both the foundation of the gameplay loop, as well as being characterized within the narrative. Whether it's from (frankly underutilized) old letters from long-dead Japanese soldiers that once laid out here, the various wildlife you can find, the hallucination sequences in the story itself, even old, rotted temples and caverns, the island beats a pulse as you go along. Sure, some of the games I've previously listed have done this to a degree, but not to this grand and consistent degree. That being said, the actual core activities you can do are pretty rudimentary. Clearing outposts, using different vehicles to go around, hunting the plants and animals as well as doing some races via supply runs or actual lapped stuff or poker games are still fairly enjoyable, but I also forgot how dull the human bounties are, climbing the radio towers always stays as a stagnant and menial chore, and you have like, little to no reason to do the side quests considering obtaining money can be done from the previously mentioned items, or just looting and selling shit. There's also collecting relics or memory cards which is fine enough I suppose. Considering the bite-size nature of each mission arcs, as well as how doing each activity leads into a mini-escapade to do after, I'd say the loop is pretty founded... until you hit the last third where it just sort of does an Ouroboros as to give the remaining story beats some space since it uh, blatantly becomes a typical linear FPS by then.

Another aspect that gets utilized in both ends are the three skill trees. After getting tatted by Dennis, a follower of Citra's tribe the Rakyat, from escaping Vaas and his entourage's trap, main white boy Jason Brody goes under the tribunal influences, and from this he gains power after getting the designated experience, and alongside this there's also the crafting system you can use to upgrade your various possessions, like wallets, holsters, etc etc., needing this in order to rescue the rest of his friends and brother. Narratively it works super well, and functionally it strikes a fair bit better than other games trying to use this approach, mainly cause a chunk of them are stuff that makes sense to get as an upgrade. Granted though, there's still the occasional power that feels like it should've been included by default. Like yea OK, I can kinda see why a longer time underwater or different syringe types are gated off, but do you really need to make investments on halving your vehicle damages, or having to make mandatory beelines for ammo upgrades since you start off so pitifully small? A silver lining from this, at least, is that it's pretty easy, I've gotten all the necessary skill upgrades in the first third, almost all the ones in the second third, and got all of them right before the final stretch of missions, as well as maxing out half of the crafting upgrades during the transitional phase to that second third, and then all of them not that long after.

As for combat itself, there's two flavors, assault and stealth. The assault part's good! A majority of the guns had the right amount of oomph and punch to them, making the encounters pretty enjoyable to go through. I stuck with Assault Rifle for mid-long range, Shotgun and Pistols for close-mid range, and the Bow just cause it's fun as hell and activates that sweet dopamine when I land a shot from far away, and I was swappin and pickup up weapons when needed to scrape by. Stealth's... fine, but it very much needed more time to be built upon. You got a distraction tool, a weird implementation of leaning (you have to get close to a wall or cover while iron sighted and it does it automatically, like I said it's weird), a camera to tag enemies with, and you get a few - and I do stress, few - ways to sneak inside or go past enemies. The problem is that it's super rooted into the linearity and rigid aspect of the gunplay, meaning that despite all these fancy tools and skills to use on enemies, sometimes you're inevitably gonna have to fight em off when exposed. You can be able to kill everyone undetected, and the opportunities of doing so is rather plentiful, so it isn't too bad, but it's still rather annoying anyway. Really, it was at its best when outside elements trickled in, such as wild animals causing a ruckus for either me or the enemies, as well as guards driving by yet stopping when they get in an alert state.

The story's gonna make up the rest of the review now, as a heads up. If you, miraculously, have little to no info as to what happens, I'll make a line break before and after the section, since it's... quite something. I like some aspects and the ideas it offers, but the execution of it is very muddled and doesn't utilize it enough to mean much, if you want a summary. I sure do wish Backloggd incorporates a spoiler text format already instead of only giving us an ultimatum.

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The main point of the narrative is how violence can degrade and mentally warp a person's wellbeing, being emphasized by Jason becoming more bloodlust as you continue on, as well as being the focal point of the previously-mentioned Vaas, who's the brother of Citra and was once a part of the Rakyat, the sleazy Australian sexual predator Buck, holding one of the friends hostage, and snobby prick Hoyt, the ringleader of the whole shebang and also an avid fan of poker allusions, each knife fight against them warping away from reality and becoming a dance floor reminiscent of one of the clubs prior to the island visit. Allies throughout are Dr. Alec Earnhardt, a drug-dealing botanist who gives your friends a safe retreat from the ongoings as they repair a boat to escape, CIA Operative Willis Huntley who's just as deranged as the rest of the inhabitants despite trying his best to convince you otherwise, and then Sam Becker, an undercover op posing as one of Hoyt's privateers that gives you a way-in to help take him down. As noted earlier, Rook Island, is the force for each one of these people, affecting them and making them go quite looney, maybe with the exception of Willis who's just kind of like that to begin with.

Thing is... it doesn't really give them the best of character. The simplicity of the friends works due to how they really, really just want to get the fuck out of there, and also note how Jason grows quite a strange development as it continues on. It works for Willis since he delivers some of the funniest and batshit lines in the game, as well as giving his own commentary on things in this game's codex equivalent. It works for Vaas due to his role designed to not only be a dualism approach as to being a mirrored position of Jason, but also be like Darth Vader, a villain lacking screentime yet stealing the spotlight whenever they appear due to how they enhance and upheld the actions of the story - which, ironically enough, worked considering this game's lasting legacy is quoting the famous insanity speech from Albert Einstein despite it being one of his last appearance in the game, also being helped out by how the voice behind him, Michael Mando, decided to improvise when acting him out, causing the team to plan him out even further after giving him immense praise. It doesn't really work for half of the key players cause there's barely anything that makes them stick out aside from their fucked-up, sinful caricature (Buck = Lust, Hoyt = Greed, Sam = Wrath, Earnhardt = Sloth). It probably was the point, sure, but considering how well the others slotted in, I don't think it ultimately speaks as much by comparison.

And then you get to Citra who's somewhat emblematic on the writing's messy nature. I neglected to mention it until now, but there was a bit of a debacle on the game as to how it depicted the culture of the Rakyat, and also cause well, you're playing as a white guy pretty much helping them out so strongly. One of the sources I linked earlier had producer Dan Hay briefly talk about this, but lead writer Jeffrey Yohalem goes into further detail in this Rock Paper Shotgun article, one point being that Jason's position was more so that of a used gun, hopping from owner to owner in order to carry out their own deeds through the acts of violence. To a degree I can see this being the intent, there's more than enough implication that Citra has and will continue to do this on other people, little of the actual hallucination sequences actually showcase any sort of insensitivity, and ultimately, you were pretty much at the wrong place at the wrong time once the story started. Thing is though, the way some of these tropes come off seems rather rocky, especially given that one of these sequences uses has the act of stabbing the eye of a demonic giant be used as an allusion to Jason climaxing inside her, and also cause the tribe members themselves don't really do much of anything to begin with, only Dennis actively contributes.

It's really disappointing since I never minded the abundant use of Alice In Wonderland quotes found in chapter transitions, and it doesn't become outright awful, but it left me a lot to desire upon seeing it all unfold again after so many years.

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Though this is the first time since I've played FC3 after several years and never getting the drive of just doing so, I've gotta say it mostly lived up to what I can remember it. Despite the rocky and inconsistent quality throughout, I did end up still liking the game to a fair degree. I feel like this is one of those cases where it's the sum of the parts that makes the experience enjoyable, rather than one or two individual aspects carrying it all together. This is far from my favorite Ubisoft title that I've gone through thus far, yet for some reason I often think about this. Maybe it's cause of the ambitious nature, maybe it's cause of how it was one of the final release the brand as a whole made before fully becoming the """apolitical""" tepid sludge it is today, maybe it's both, but it's a piece of art that's somehow stuck by me. I am interested as to how the first and especially second game fair, as well as Blood Dragon too since I never played it, but I'm pretty fine not touching the following entries. Maybe 4, but that's about it.

The issue with the entries this series past Far Cry 3 is that none of them carry the same purpose, other than to continue working on an established formula to rake in the dough. Far Cry 1 and 2 are arguably tech demos pretty neat (post-mortem edit: I hadn't actually revisited Far Cry 2 when I wrote this). Tech demos Pretty cool games that are fully fleshed out; that can still be enjoyed today and carry their own set of vibes and moods. By the time Far Cry 3 came out, its Open World format wasn't as impressive. To cut a long story short: Grand Theft Auto IV and Far Cry 2 came out in the same year. Assassins Creed started popping off, and Just Cause 2 sprung into being in 2010. There was still some iteration to be done, but generally speaking, the blueprint for these kinds of games was established well in advance.

Surprisingly, what separates Far Cry 3 from the bunch is that it has a story to tell. Its characters have a little more depth to them than just being there to give the player objectives whenever they need to progress. The conflict feels real, and the elements of magical realism give it enough edge to be compelling. The Alice in Wonderland comparisons might be a little on-the-nose, but it never gets so obvious that it gets in the way.

Far Cry 3 isn't a landmark title because of its Open World. I hear that from a lot of people, "oh, if Far Cry 3 weren't so big, Ubisoft wouldn't have recycled the same format for almost ten years." You're barking up the wrong tree; Assassin's Creed was doing the whole rigamarole before 2012. Far Cry 3 is a landmark title for Far Cry because of the man on its poster. Vaas might not be in the game much, but even if you know almost nothing about this game, you likely know his speech on insanity. It became embedded into pop culture damn near the second he said it for the first time. The implication I'm going for here is that this is the point where Far Cry became less ambitious. Every single game in this series has to have an antagonist that's either a dictator or acts eerily similar to one because of Far Cry 3. This isn't all that bad until you consider how Vaas is actually used in Far Cry 3. Vaas is one villain of many, corrupted by a world that's gross and ugly. Vaas isn't the villain in Far Cry 3; its world is. Tell me: outside of the hostile wildlife, cultists, and threat of destruction, what's ugly about Far Cry 5's world? I can tell you; it's an ugly place. But it almost feels contrived in a way that Far Cry 3 isn't. And that goes for most, if not all, of the games that followed in 3's footsteps.

If it weren't for the side quests, which lack the same momentum and creativity as the main quest, this would be an easy four stars. I don't like how compressed the sound quality is, and the multiplayer isn't worth checking out. But the rest of it would still be great. But otherwise, this is still a fun game. If you're tired of how pointless the last games in this series feel, definitely consider checking this one out.

Funny enough, the rest of the franchise would become the definition of insanity itself…

But this one though…

This one, is the best example of a great game, well written, extremely well made, BUT…. Riddled with classic questionable Ubisoft decisions that could have destroyed it, had it not been for one… tiny, little, detail…..

Vaas Montenegro.

One of the best written, acted, and developed characters of videogame history.
Mixed with one of the best protagonists as well.

Jason Brody being a mirror of Vaas’s tragic story, is the fuel that keeps this game burning even so long after its release.

Had it not been for Hoyt’s final island that takes up half of the game, everyone would agree this game was a 10/10…. It is to me, but, I understand why it isn’t to many.

This game marked history as the creator of the best open world formula of it’s time, that slowly became more and more cursed due to it being overused in every single Ubisoft game even to this day.

It is a great, memorable experience that has the staying power of any of the ultimate classics of videogame history like Bioshock and Spec Ops: The Line.
(But… not 100% as great as those of course)

So…

To end this review, I ask you….

Did I ever tell you the definition…. Of insanity?

[Classic Edition] These modern Ubisoft games don't have lot of substance to them already, so replaying one of them was just a bad idea. There's not a thing in this that wasn't done better in subsequent games, and it did not hold up well on a replay. The Ubisoftification of open world seemed to really take off after this game and I really felt it here. Fucking BO-RING. Climb the tower, liberate the outpost, nothing interesting to do in between, and no creativity in how to do so.

The story is not nearly as smart as it thinks it is, with the main character actually saying the line "What have I become?" Wow. I truly am affected by his plight. We are the true monsters. Culminating in the amazing ending of "will you choose to kill this person and betray your friends because... I dunno because you feel like hitting right trigger instead of left trigger today, I guess."

For the villains, Vaas is just as disappointing as I remember, Michael Mondo's performance is the best thing in here, and the game just goes "okay enough of that!" And what the fuck is up with all the other villains? They're boring as fuck sure, but the two of them making damn sure you know they rape young boys? Real strange choice. Like Ubisoft was thinking them being war mongers and slave traders just wasn't enough.

And I don't know what they were thinking with these hallucinations. Fucking time wasters is what they are. Shitty QTE boss battles, crappy walking sequences, super lame giant tribal monsters to blow up with your infinite arrows. Oh and that jumpscare at the end. Hoof, yowzers. I nearly fainted I was so scared! Maybe it was supposed to be more like an alarm clock, because God knows I was falling asleep at this point.

For a 10+ year old game, I was genuinely surprised that - past the technical limitations of the time, the game is still genuinely fun and engaging to go through the story and complete some of the side activities.
I can't comment on the rest of the side activities like the hundreds of collectables or the radio towers/camps as there's a lot of "Ubisoft" padding that was avoided.
Past that, genuinely engaging gameplay and graphics that still look pretty good nowadays. Story was pretty good but the performances really sold the characters (other than MC Jason who sounded scrawny for a hardened killer lol).
Weapon unlocks and new equipment throughout the story kept things interesting. Set pieces were all also very fun (looking at you, skrillex weed and also classical music while Jason spits one liners)
I wanna give this a 7.8/10 since the Ubisoft padding and technical limitations mostly.