What a complete waste of a game. This can't even be considered a decent action game, because they somehow managed to get that part wrong. Ok to start things off, yes this isn't a Resident Evil game. I am not going to say that's what makes the game bad because everyone knows that already and has been beat to death. Now apart from this just being a generic Gears of War clone, this has got to be the game with the worst control and movement of a character in an action game during the 2010s. The sprinting seems like you are trying to run with a bike on your side. The menu fucking sucks, it is so unnecessarily stupid for the sake of being different. I have no idea why they thought that it was necessary to do that. Weapon diversity and sandbox is a shell of its former self. It is so devoid of what made Resident Evil 4 and 5's sandbox so fun to explore and experiment with. The gun-laser sight seems off from the sharpness of Resident Evil 4 and 5 but I can't say with certainty if that is a legitimate claim or not. The enemies are bullet sponges and annoying to fight. You would go from 2-man doors to cutscene, walk 20 seconds, 2 man door and repeat. The story is batshit insane and is very hard to follow due to the campaign structure, that is saying something for a Resident Evil game. The side characters are forgettable or so corny that you remember them in the wrong way. Soundtrack is basically non-existent. I can't remember a single track from the game let alone one I enjoyed. This game sucks and I can't find anything that I enjoyed in this game. I can't even enjoy it ironically because the game just sucks the enjoyment out of you and it leaves you mentally drained after every mission. I have never felt as unsatisfied for beating a game as I did with this one.

As a game its 'fine', its nothing amazing but the general Ubisoft quicksand box of collectables, side-quests, towers and such all work well. Its fine.

But honestly for such a series that prides itself on explosive combat, gun-ho one man army plots and over the top villains, every part of the story is just flat out miserable from start to finish and its just a slog to actually want to continue down the path when you know nothing is actually going to improve in any way, shape or form. I get subscribing to the whole 'shades of gray' narrative can work but occasionally you need a bit of light at the end of the tunnel and this isnt it.

To me Far Cry 4 was a huge step down from Far Cry 3.

Far Cry 3s gameplay loop worked for that game and that game only, since it worked by looping in the gameplay with the narrative, With every upgrade you got both you and Jason Brody were getting better and more intuned with the jungle, both making Jason a more blood trusty killer and making the gameplay loop more fulfilling.
You don't get that in Far Cry 4, you get a protagonist who's pretty much just a blank slate, a cast of characters that are unmemorable, and a gameplay loop that feels more like a checklist of things to do rather than feeling like you should do it.

I believe this was the 4th time I have tried to play this game over the years. Each time I got a bit into it and just gave up but I was determined to finally get it off the backlog and finish it. Upon finishing I think its probably one of the most middle of the road games I have played in recent memory.

Following from Far Cry 3 was going to be a tough task and I think due to that Ubisoft made practically the same game again, beginning the stale gameplay format that Far Cry is now unfortunately known for.

The story is really quite bland, nothing that memorable really happens outside of a couple cool missions. The main thing that I want to talk about are the characters. Ajay is a massive downgrade from Jason Brody in terms of protagonists. Jason had real character development throughout Far Cry 3 with the island changing who he was as a person, while Ajay does pretty much nothing and is just your generic guy with a gun. His main goal is to scatter his mothers ashes, which is a nice way for the game to end but apart from that Ajay doesn't have a smidge of the character that Jason had. Unfortunately another downgrade is in the villain, obviously it is going to be very hard to live up to Vaas and Pagin Min does a good job to be memorable, but he is literally in the game 4 times. Vaas wasnt even the main villain in 3 and he appears more than Pagin does throughout the whole game. Despite that Pagin is your standard charismatic psychopath who does command the scenes he is present in, Troy baker does a good job as always and I really like his design. I think the problem is that they tired to hard to make another Vaas, but didnt bother to give him any memorable moments outside of him killing one of his own guard at the start so you know he is insane. Side characters are also a big dip from 3 where only 2 matter across the game and both of them are insufferable. Amita and Sabal are the two would be leaders of the golden path and the game strangely implements a choice system where you pick who to side with. Due to not particularly caring for either character I just went with who I thought made more sense at the time and ended up flip flopping between both of their missions. I ended with Amita as leader but after looking into both endings, probably would of been better off with Pagin.

Gameplay wise it plays very similarly to 3. Shooting feels a bit dated but the movement feels a bit better. I like the driving and the immersive healing animations are always cool. Im not a huge fan of crafting systems and having to hunt for resources is something that I normally wont do unless 100% necessary so I finished this game with barely any upgrades besides a few essential ones like extra weapon slots. I wasn't a fan of the stealth sections in this game as I found that the enemies would spot you from miles away and would hear suppressed bullets from miles away as well. Speaking on the enemies, they are all total bullet sponges with the shirtless enemies that run at you with knifes being able to take like 15 AR bullets to the chest before going down. I didn't touch much side content but I probably should have just to have unlocked some better guns.

Visually I do think this is a big upgrade from 3, the mountain landscapes look beautiful and im a fan of the setting in general. A lot of the ground stuff is similar to 3 but has been given appropriate upgrades. Score wise is nothing special, no tracks of note. Technically I had a few visual bugs, nothing game breaking but one cutscene in particular where you are watching Pagin give a speech on a tv, the tv just wasn't on, so I actually missed one of Pagin's 4 appearences.

I think that Far Cry 4 unfortunately began the trend of the repetitive gameplay loop that has become associated with this series now. I dont think it is a bad game by any means but it lacks anything major to set it apart from Far Cry 3. Out of the whole series it's probably my 3rd favourite behind 3 and 6. I might try 5 and new dawn again but that wont be for a while. Worth a play if you are a fan.