capedcrusader
2003
In my opinion, it’s the best among games like Galaga; the main theme music from the opening menu instantly draws you in. There’s an incredible perfection in the game’s design, with simple playability and a variety of features, especially when you try to uncover the game secrets, you get lost in it. The tremendous quality and effort put into the game can be seen in the emotional credit screen that flows after completing 100 levels. Despite being released in 2003, the fact that it even has controller support is another remarkable detail. Even if I’m not playing it, it’s always installed on every machine I use.
2006
It turned out to be a low-budget Grand Theft Auto clone, but there are aspects where it surpasses GTA in some respects. The most surprising thing for me is that the game is an Xbox exclusive. The closest game to this one is Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, and in terms of events and activities, I can say they are neck and neck. In fact, the side activities in Saints Row could have been a standalone game; they are quite fun and designed to feel “mandatory.” I say mandatory because you need to build up your respect meter to progress in the main story, which is possible by doing side activities. So, you end up progressing by alternating between a main mission and a side mission, completely detaching from the already scattered story.
The game has average physics and satisfying gunfight mechanics. The sound and modeling of the weapons are not bad, even better designed than many games of the same genre. The variety of vehicles is limited, and the vehicle controls are quite simplified.
Considering the price and the entertainment it offers, it has turned out to be a decent production with a score of 6.5/10. The character is fun and overly edgy, but not as memorable as those in GTA games, which is due to the game’s progression aspect being problematic both for its time and today. Due to the low budget, the main character is not well-developed, and instead, we are offered the option to create our own character, but even at this point, there isn’t much variety in customization options.
The game has average physics and satisfying gunfight mechanics. The sound and modeling of the weapons are not bad, even better designed than many games of the same genre. The variety of vehicles is limited, and the vehicle controls are quite simplified.
Considering the price and the entertainment it offers, it has turned out to be a decent production with a score of 6.5/10. The character is fun and overly edgy, but not as memorable as those in GTA games, which is due to the game’s progression aspect being problematic both for its time and today. Due to the low budget, the main character is not well-developed, and instead, we are offered the option to create our own character, but even at this point, there isn’t much variety in customization options.
Westwood has beautifully presented the answer to the question of how to unbalance a game. The story mode is a lot of fun, but the multiplayer aspect of the Red Alert 2 DLC is incredibly unbalanced. Additionally, its soundtracks are quite good.
RA2 is probably one of the games I’ve spent the most time on among those I’ve played. It not only taught me what RTS is but also piqued my interest in actual history with its narrative of an alternative history. As a child, I used to think the Soviet Union’s logo looked like an anchor, which drew my interest, but as I learned history, this charming detail gradually turned into antipathy. There are many details that make this game great. If we start with the story, the scenario of the Soviet invasion of the USA is quite intriguing, and it’s a production that best addresses the Soviet nightmare from the Allies’ perspective. The map designs in the story sections and the details on the maps are exquisite. When you get curious and focus on the details, you can see that a truly magnificent job has been done. Although many states are represented in the game, we can essentially divide it into Soviet vs. Allies. I can also mention that the special units each country has don’t offer much other than encouraging strategic behavior in multiplayer battles. What makes this game the best of its time and beyond is the realism and detail of the objects in the map designs, which are the best for a 2.5D game. Buildings, bridges, civilians, countries’ structures, and military units look very realistic and semi-serious in design. At this point, the game stands out uniquely with its animation and sound quality, as well as the average actors featured in the cinematics added to the story part.
The gameplay mechanics are fast and direct the player to think in real-time, which I believe significantly aids in speeding up the decision-making mechanism. It also leads to a wide range of strategic flexibility in gameplay, meaning it’s quite likely to have different experiences every time you play the game. The diversity of air, land, and sea units supports this aspect. Although the game is quite old, the mod community is determined not to let it die. Besides the main game, you can experience mods like Mental Omega, Scorched Earth, The New War, and Apocalypse.
The gameplay mechanics are fast and direct the player to think in real-time, which I believe significantly aids in speeding up the decision-making mechanism. It also leads to a wide range of strategic flexibility in gameplay, meaning it’s quite likely to have different experiences every time you play the game. The diversity of air, land, and sea units supports this aspect. Although the game is quite old, the mod community is determined not to let it die. Besides the main game, you can experience mods like Mental Omega, Scorched Earth, The New War, and Apocalypse.
2021
It is the best Far Cry game made after Far Cry 3. With a structure that feels more substantial in terms of story compared to previous games, and a game design that supports the narrative, it has an engaging gameplay. With a massive map and tons of things to do, the game fully justifies its price. Ubisoft is truly a leader in the industry when it comes to map creation; their games can be criticized in various ways, but the game maps they create make others like Rockstar seem like interns’ work. Following the character Jason Brody, Dani Rojas, voiced by Nisa Gündüz, allows us to embrace the character and feel the purpose, which has been a nice touch in addressing one of the missing points in Far Cry games. We should not pay attention to those who say it’s a copy of previous games because it has nothing to do with the previous game; the gunplay feels more realistic, the variety of weapons is quite satisfying, and it has some of the best weapon animations I’ve seen since Call of Duty Modern Warfare. Compared to previous games, this one is really challenging; the part where you grab a gun and enter Rambo mode like in Far Cry 3 is gone. I don’t know which sane person thought of putting a health bar on enemies, but it could be the worst part of the game, a terrible choice. I don’t think it suits this type of game; it completely takes away the sense of freedom from the player, meaning it’s ridiculous that an enemy still stands after I’ve emptied 1-2 magazines into their head.
When evaluated with its DLCs, it’s a solid game. The previous game, Far Cry 5, looks like trash games given away with magazines compared to this one. If you have free time and want an experience close to Far Cry 3, I recommend it.
When evaluated with its DLCs, it’s a solid game. The previous game, Far Cry 5, looks like trash games given away with magazines compared to this one. If you have free time and want an experience close to Far Cry 3, I recommend it.
2020
Compared to the first two games, the latest installment in the Watch Dogs series exudes a sense of incompletion. I’ve noticed a detail in the Watch Dogs series; the cities featured in the Midtown Madness games and those in WD seem coincidentally similar. Midtown Madness had a Chicago map, and Midtown Madness 2 featured San Francisco and London. Returning to WD Legion, the design of London is exquisite, and as usual, Ubisoft has more than demonstrated its mastery in creating open worlds. The narrow streets of London, the left-hand traffic, the predominantly gloomy and rainy weather have been depicted at the highest level I could see in a game. While the map is so perfectly crafted, the theme of the game has become a factor that undermines the map. I found the choice of a dystopian London inappropriate. The future theme is okay, but there’s a tremendous sense of incompletion; there are bird-like drone flights everywhere, Albion soldiers and vehicles are omnipresent in the open world, and the more technological vehicles alongside attempts to integrate classic London-appropriate cars stand out awkwardly. The presence of Minis and Aston Martin-like vehicles alongside the latest models is a retro touch, but it seriously clashes with the theme of the game. Another important aspect of map design is the absence of the Watch Dogs 2 playground in this game, which is a huge negative. As I progressed in the game, I was shocked; they’ve destroyed what made Watch Dogs, Watch Dogs, they’ve hollowed it out. Ubisoft probably took the criticisms of the second game too seriously; I can’t find any other logical explanation, but most of these criticisms are influenced by half-wits who deify mediocre games and a biased press that can’t break out of a certain circlejerk. In previous games, we could use the map as we wished and let creativity flow, but in this game, the only gameplay factor has become the cargo drone.
The most highlighted feature of the game, the playable NPCs, is a disastrous choice. While main characters stood out in the Watch Dogs series and the two main and one side character in previous games were quite satisfying, the playable NPCs in this game have emerged with a half-baked, ridiculous design and have ruined the general gameplay mechanics. Each NPC has its pros and cons, but we can’t add anything positive to them as a team; we can’t even buy weapons in the game, which is a massive downgrade from the first two games. There are three main NPCs that do the job: one is a hitman, another is a spy, and the most important is the construction worker type who flies the cargo drone. After assembling these three, you don’t lose anything in the game if you don’t grind for NPCs. Permadeath could take things to a different dimension, but it doesn’t cover up the disaster of this design choice, unfortunately. If you’re going to play, play with the hitman; they’ve designed a character mixing John Wick and 47. Since there’s no main character in the game, NPC dialogues become bland, and after a while, you lose the desire to follow them and just want it to end. Apart from the NPCs, the main characters in the game are meh compared to previous games. Even the AI dialogues are more bearable, think about that.
The combat mechanics from the first two games are gone, the pleasure of armed conflicts has disappeared, and in their place, mechanics resembling the shallowness of Rockstar games have been introduced. There’s a close combat mechanic that seems very unnecessary compared to previous games, and even that feels half-baked; I’m talking about a point where you end up drawing your gun. In the WD series, weapon use was always secondary for me, but the hack mechanics are also terrible. Instead of the quadcopter, we hack and use random drones, which has devoured the personalization aspect, and the RC car has been replaced with a spiderbot, but neither seems useful to me. In Watch Dogs 2, I completed so many missions without stepping into the mission objective with this duo; this possibility exists in this game, but there’s no flavor. Even Marcus sitting down and opening his laptop screen added an aesthetic. Watch Dogs Legion is tremendously lacking in aesthetics, bland in these aspects, and has dragged the series backward.
The vehicle controls, which provided a bad experience in the first two games, have been slightly improved in this game, but this time they’ve limited the vehicle options, and we constantly see the same vehicles in the open world. It’s hard to understand whether the vehicles have electric or combustion engines because there are gears in vehicles with electric motors; I hope I’ve misunderstood this situation because it’s a significant design flaw. They’ve removed the ability to control traffic lights from the first two games, which was fun for creating chaos, and they’ve removed hackable objects in the city, making car chase sequences quite dull. Escaping from Albion has been overly simplified; the game has become excessively casual.
The mission designs are also behind the first two games; without a main character in the game, the purpose and the path to it remain very dull. There are no creative missions, no blackout option, and more hackable features on enemies have disappeared. Watch_dogs was more aesthetic in this regard; they’ve literally erased the things that made the game a game. Even the collectible items in the first two games had their fun, so I don’t understand the mindset behind designing this game.
Apart from that, I’m playing the game on Xbox Series X, and I haven’t finished it yet. The performance mode with stable 60 fps doesn’t look bad, the quality mode at 30 fps makes the game look fantastic, but it’s not playable at 30 fps; it’s strangely uncomfortable. Even options like VRR, ALMM, and Dolby Vision couldn’t save it.
For now, it’s a 6/10 ordinary open-world game for me, and unless there’s an extremely surprising game-changer event at the end, my views will remain the same.
The most highlighted feature of the game, the playable NPCs, is a disastrous choice. While main characters stood out in the Watch Dogs series and the two main and one side character in previous games were quite satisfying, the playable NPCs in this game have emerged with a half-baked, ridiculous design and have ruined the general gameplay mechanics. Each NPC has its pros and cons, but we can’t add anything positive to them as a team; we can’t even buy weapons in the game, which is a massive downgrade from the first two games. There are three main NPCs that do the job: one is a hitman, another is a spy, and the most important is the construction worker type who flies the cargo drone. After assembling these three, you don’t lose anything in the game if you don’t grind for NPCs. Permadeath could take things to a different dimension, but it doesn’t cover up the disaster of this design choice, unfortunately. If you’re going to play, play with the hitman; they’ve designed a character mixing John Wick and 47. Since there’s no main character in the game, NPC dialogues become bland, and after a while, you lose the desire to follow them and just want it to end. Apart from the NPCs, the main characters in the game are meh compared to previous games. Even the AI dialogues are more bearable, think about that.
The combat mechanics from the first two games are gone, the pleasure of armed conflicts has disappeared, and in their place, mechanics resembling the shallowness of Rockstar games have been introduced. There’s a close combat mechanic that seems very unnecessary compared to previous games, and even that feels half-baked; I’m talking about a point where you end up drawing your gun. In the WD series, weapon use was always secondary for me, but the hack mechanics are also terrible. Instead of the quadcopter, we hack and use random drones, which has devoured the personalization aspect, and the RC car has been replaced with a spiderbot, but neither seems useful to me. In Watch Dogs 2, I completed so many missions without stepping into the mission objective with this duo; this possibility exists in this game, but there’s no flavor. Even Marcus sitting down and opening his laptop screen added an aesthetic. Watch Dogs Legion is tremendously lacking in aesthetics, bland in these aspects, and has dragged the series backward.
The vehicle controls, which provided a bad experience in the first two games, have been slightly improved in this game, but this time they’ve limited the vehicle options, and we constantly see the same vehicles in the open world. It’s hard to understand whether the vehicles have electric or combustion engines because there are gears in vehicles with electric motors; I hope I’ve misunderstood this situation because it’s a significant design flaw. They’ve removed the ability to control traffic lights from the first two games, which was fun for creating chaos, and they’ve removed hackable objects in the city, making car chase sequences quite dull. Escaping from Albion has been overly simplified; the game has become excessively casual.
The mission designs are also behind the first two games; without a main character in the game, the purpose and the path to it remain very dull. There are no creative missions, no blackout option, and more hackable features on enemies have disappeared. Watch_dogs was more aesthetic in this regard; they’ve literally erased the things that made the game a game. Even the collectible items in the first two games had their fun, so I don’t understand the mindset behind designing this game.
Apart from that, I’m playing the game on Xbox Series X, and I haven’t finished it yet. The performance mode with stable 60 fps doesn’t look bad, the quality mode at 30 fps makes the game look fantastic, but it’s not playable at 30 fps; it’s strangely uncomfortable. Even options like VRR, ALMM, and Dolby Vision couldn’t save it.
For now, it’s a 6/10 ordinary open-world game for me, and unless there’s an extremely surprising game-changer event at the end, my views will remain the same.
2016
Masterpiece of open-world games
Watch_Dogs 2, the sequel to the first game, is a phenomenal production. I can’t find the words to describe the pleasure and enjoyment I get every minute I play. I experienced the same situation I bought it from the Xbox Store for a very nominal amount months ago and started playing it in recent months. The complex structure of the game and its difference from generic open-world games had initially put me off, but as I began to understand the system and gameplay mechanics, it transformed into a completely different experience.
Map design, the most important factor in an open-world game, is at a high level in this game. Scaling a challenging area like San Francisco to its closest real-life counterpart and making it run on consoles like Xbox One and PS4 is a great achievement because the developers have managed to fill every area in the created open world. This is clearly the best open-world map since Liberty City created in Grand Theft Auto IV. The SF and summer atmosphere push you to play more, and Ubisoft manages to do this with visuals that don’t even look dated today. The way they present this and the interesting features of the open world to the player with a clever mini-game style structure like ScoutX is beyond fantastic.
The characters in the game are more effective and fun than in the first game, but this time we don’t feel the weight of the main character Aiden Pearce. Each of the DeadSec missions is different, and the quality consistently rises from start to finish, accompanied by fantastic side mission designs. Co-op additions, although not part of the game’s core structure, are well thought out, but despite Watch_Dogs 2 having the potential to compete seriously with GTA Online, we didn’t see such an approach from Ubisoft. The variety of hacks compared to the first game and their support with drones and RC cars is not easily accessible; this game is clearly the best among the Watch Dogs games. It’s not easy to offer pure fun without any gaps in an open-world game, and in this game, we can have hours of fun even while chasing collectibles.
Although the armed conflicts are a bit more subdued compared to the first game, the aim of the game isn’t to fully immerse the player in gunfights. It’s fantastic to be able to complete missions with constant different alternatives and varieties.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much improvement in vehicle usage, and the modeling and variety seem less. They’ve tried to compensate for this with an abundance of fast travel options, but I would have sincerely wished for it to be better. The game has a 60 fps patch on Series X, and I think the console provides the most comfortable gameplay experience; this game is not suited for keyboard and mouse. I can’t remember another game where NPCs act so naturally and react so much to the main character. People didn’t understand the Watch_Dogs games and struggled to embrace them because Rockstar’s monotonous games are overly casual. As the game progresses towards the final missions, taking the hacking aspect to space enters the top 10 of unforgettable experiences in games. While the price has hit rock bottom, it’s a must-play; the game promises a lot of fun.
Watch_Dogs 2, the sequel to the first game, is a phenomenal production. I can’t find the words to describe the pleasure and enjoyment I get every minute I play. I experienced the same situation I bought it from the Xbox Store for a very nominal amount months ago and started playing it in recent months. The complex structure of the game and its difference from generic open-world games had initially put me off, but as I began to understand the system and gameplay mechanics, it transformed into a completely different experience.
Map design, the most important factor in an open-world game, is at a high level in this game. Scaling a challenging area like San Francisco to its closest real-life counterpart and making it run on consoles like Xbox One and PS4 is a great achievement because the developers have managed to fill every area in the created open world. This is clearly the best open-world map since Liberty City created in Grand Theft Auto IV. The SF and summer atmosphere push you to play more, and Ubisoft manages to do this with visuals that don’t even look dated today. The way they present this and the interesting features of the open world to the player with a clever mini-game style structure like ScoutX is beyond fantastic.
The characters in the game are more effective and fun than in the first game, but this time we don’t feel the weight of the main character Aiden Pearce. Each of the DeadSec missions is different, and the quality consistently rises from start to finish, accompanied by fantastic side mission designs. Co-op additions, although not part of the game’s core structure, are well thought out, but despite Watch_Dogs 2 having the potential to compete seriously with GTA Online, we didn’t see such an approach from Ubisoft. The variety of hacks compared to the first game and their support with drones and RC cars is not easily accessible; this game is clearly the best among the Watch Dogs games. It’s not easy to offer pure fun without any gaps in an open-world game, and in this game, we can have hours of fun even while chasing collectibles.
Although the armed conflicts are a bit more subdued compared to the first game, the aim of the game isn’t to fully immerse the player in gunfights. It’s fantastic to be able to complete missions with constant different alternatives and varieties.
Unfortunately, there isn’t much improvement in vehicle usage, and the modeling and variety seem less. They’ve tried to compensate for this with an abundance of fast travel options, but I would have sincerely wished for it to be better. The game has a 60 fps patch on Series X, and I think the console provides the most comfortable gameplay experience; this game is not suited for keyboard and mouse. I can’t remember another game where NPCs act so naturally and react so much to the main character. People didn’t understand the Watch_Dogs games and struggled to embrace them because Rockstar’s monotonous games are overly casual. As the game progresses towards the final missions, taking the hacking aspect to space enters the top 10 of unforgettable experiences in games. While the price has hit rock bottom, it’s a must-play; the game promises a lot of fun.
2014
Like many others, I was impressed by the Watch_Dogs E3 trailer, but after the trailer, the game was heavily criticized upon release, which made me unnecessarily lose interest. After the first mission, I didn’t want to continue. The primary reason was the hate campaign against the game and Ubisoft, and the other was the complex gameplay mechanics. At that time, I was more accustomed to linear games with less variety, so I couldn’t get into it or understand it. This year, I finally finished the game on Series X at 60 fps, and I realized all that hate was unnecessary; I think most people hated the game without finishing or understanding it. Watch_Dogs offers everything an open-world game should have and more.
A charismatic main character who is a man of action, not dialogues
A fantastic open-world Chicago
Gameplay mechanics that offer variety and are not just a shooting gallery
A dark story that seems cliché but is embellished with gameplay mechanics
Main and side missions that keep the player in the open world, and a hacking system created for the open world to be the player’s playground
The game looks like an original work combined with a mix of many products, with glimpses of the movie Drive and Max Payne. Speaking of gameplay, it’s smooth, not boring, and not overly difficult. For a TPS open world, it has rich animations, making Aiden Pierce’s character feel very responsive. The most impactful feature on gameplay is the skill tree; without fully unlocking the skills, you can’t truly experience the game. The variety in missions and the freedom to approach them, whether stealthily or full combat, is well-thought-out. Watch_Dogs offers various weapons and vehicles for both gameplay styles. Blacking out Chicago at night to fight, moving silently, or completing missions without touching anyone makes the game truly unique. Using weapons in the game is incredibly fun and somewhat realistic for a TPS. Escaping from police or enemies is extremely fun because Ubisoft offers an open world where we can use the city as we like, not just a monotonous one. Watch_Dogs presents a serious theme to the player, but the game’s excessive seriousness makes the less serious elements stand out awkwardly at some point. The augmented reality games included in the game are well-thought-out but don’t fit the theme. This includes the digital trip feature. Unfortunately, vehicle usage and modeling are very poor for an open-world game; Ubisoft could have surpassed Rockstar at this point since the game was made by the creators of the Driver series. I liked that the collectible part of the game tells separate stories, adding variety, and it’s not boring to do so. Dealing with certain puzzles has also been a nice touch. I said the story is cliché, but unfortunately, characters other than Aiden Pierce are quite weak in supporting the story (except the masked DJ), and the game seriously struggles with building a connection with the characters. The open-world NPCs are not bad for their time but could have been better. At least they react to Aiden Pierce after the end of the game. As for the music, the radio is weak; I had to play with it off after a while, but the OST is wonderfully designed. Graphically, the game fails; Ubisoft showed what it could do at E3, but the consoles of the time could only carry such a quality open world to a certain point. Since no next-gen patch has come, it’s passable for now, but I think it will stand out in the future. Maybe a remake wouldn’t be bad. The DLC wasn’t bad, but Watch_Dogs is a game built around Aiden Pierce; playing as another character and story doesn’t fully engage the player. Watch_Dogs is a game with a unique atmosphere; even walking aimlessly with hands in pockets on the streets has its own aesthetic. The game has some of the most fulfilling combat mechanics in an open world, with the slow-mo feature being very cleverly done, thankfully added, as it adds a lot of aesthetics to the gameplay. The city is well-suited for creating chaos, designed as a playground for the player, as I mentioned. Towards the end of the game, the city becoming our enemy was a great and unexpected touch. If anyone hasn’t played it yet, like me, they’re really missing out on a lot.
A charismatic main character who is a man of action, not dialogues
A fantastic open-world Chicago
Gameplay mechanics that offer variety and are not just a shooting gallery
A dark story that seems cliché but is embellished with gameplay mechanics
Main and side missions that keep the player in the open world, and a hacking system created for the open world to be the player’s playground
The game looks like an original work combined with a mix of many products, with glimpses of the movie Drive and Max Payne. Speaking of gameplay, it’s smooth, not boring, and not overly difficult. For a TPS open world, it has rich animations, making Aiden Pierce’s character feel very responsive. The most impactful feature on gameplay is the skill tree; without fully unlocking the skills, you can’t truly experience the game. The variety in missions and the freedom to approach them, whether stealthily or full combat, is well-thought-out. Watch_Dogs offers various weapons and vehicles for both gameplay styles. Blacking out Chicago at night to fight, moving silently, or completing missions without touching anyone makes the game truly unique. Using weapons in the game is incredibly fun and somewhat realistic for a TPS. Escaping from police or enemies is extremely fun because Ubisoft offers an open world where we can use the city as we like, not just a monotonous one. Watch_Dogs presents a serious theme to the player, but the game’s excessive seriousness makes the less serious elements stand out awkwardly at some point. The augmented reality games included in the game are well-thought-out but don’t fit the theme. This includes the digital trip feature. Unfortunately, vehicle usage and modeling are very poor for an open-world game; Ubisoft could have surpassed Rockstar at this point since the game was made by the creators of the Driver series. I liked that the collectible part of the game tells separate stories, adding variety, and it’s not boring to do so. Dealing with certain puzzles has also been a nice touch. I said the story is cliché, but unfortunately, characters other than Aiden Pierce are quite weak in supporting the story (except the masked DJ), and the game seriously struggles with building a connection with the characters. The open-world NPCs are not bad for their time but could have been better. At least they react to Aiden Pierce after the end of the game. As for the music, the radio is weak; I had to play with it off after a while, but the OST is wonderfully designed. Graphically, the game fails; Ubisoft showed what it could do at E3, but the consoles of the time could only carry such a quality open world to a certain point. Since no next-gen patch has come, it’s passable for now, but I think it will stand out in the future. Maybe a remake wouldn’t be bad. The DLC wasn’t bad, but Watch_Dogs is a game built around Aiden Pierce; playing as another character and story doesn’t fully engage the player. Watch_Dogs is a game with a unique atmosphere; even walking aimlessly with hands in pockets on the streets has its own aesthetic. The game has some of the most fulfilling combat mechanics in an open world, with the slow-mo feature being very cleverly done, thankfully added, as it adds a lot of aesthetics to the gameplay. The city is well-suited for creating chaos, designed as a playground for the player, as I mentioned. Towards the end of the game, the city becoming our enemy was a great and unexpected touch. If anyone hasn’t played it yet, like me, they’re really missing out on a lot.
I completed the game as it should be, with the character Kassandra, and I generally liked it. I was going to push for 100% completion, but I had to leave it because there are tons of games waiting to be finished. Although the gameplay mechanics generally resemble those of Origins, it seriously diverges in the combat aspect. The animation quality, which is meticulously created for the weapons used, can surpass the quality of games that have received the GOTY award today. The graphic and sound quality in the game is at an amazing level, especially felt more during ship usage, such epic-level water physics, graphics, and presentation are only available in Sea of Thieves.
The main story of the game could have been much better, but the developers chose to diversify side quests that could be part of the main story, rather than focusing on the main story itself, to keep the player engaged in the game. I didn’t like this much. Frankly, the quest system is too scattered; while heading to one quest, you can pick up 5-6 more quests along the way, and the involuntary deviation from your main objectives becomes nauseating after a point. The level scaling nonsense, which should not exist in the AC series, needs to be reduced and eliminated as soon as possible. There’s a skill tree, and I want to enjoy grinding with weapon and armor sets, but the level scaling system takes away the power we’ve built in our character.
If you’re going to spend hours on it, I recommend it with the DLCs. If you’ve played Origins recently, this game might bore you excessively, so consider this a warning.
The main story of the game could have been much better, but the developers chose to diversify side quests that could be part of the main story, rather than focusing on the main story itself, to keep the player engaged in the game. I didn’t like this much. Frankly, the quest system is too scattered; while heading to one quest, you can pick up 5-6 more quests along the way, and the involuntary deviation from your main objectives becomes nauseating after a point. The level scaling nonsense, which should not exist in the AC series, needs to be reduced and eliminated as soon as possible. There’s a skill tree, and I want to enjoy grinding with weapon and armor sets, but the level scaling system takes away the power we’ve built in our character.
If you’re going to spend hours on it, I recommend it with the DLCs. If you’ve played Origins recently, this game might bore you excessively, so consider this a warning.
They call this game a Zelda clone, but it completely surpasses all the Zelda games combined. The world that has been created and the unique graphics processed for it, the carefully prepared dialogues, and the variety offered with its gameplay mechanics are at the pinnacle of its genre. There’s a combat system that feels solid and satisfying, a feeling you can’t even get in most Souls games. Wandering aimlessly on the map is enjoyable; it could even be called an odyssey in a fantastical world. Despite the game being so good, because it’s a Ubisoft game, it’s considered bad, but the mud-graphic Zelda from Nintendo, which can’t even handle textures on consoles, is considered good.
2012
Far Cry 3 has many reasons to be considered one of the best open-world FPS games ever made. Primarily, Far Cry 3 is the most significant installment since Far Cry 2 because it took a considerable risk with different directives chosen during its production and building upon the foundation laid by Far Cry 2. If we regard the Far Cry series as a face, Far Cry 3 is the most important game that completes this face. It feels like a reboot to the series after Far Cry 1 and 2 with many innovations. While the tropical island in Far Cry 1 was just an island, and the wild jungle in Far Cry 2 was just a forest, Ubisoft transformed the island in the third game into a living entity, not just an island atmosphere. Far Cry 3 has a layered structure, from its loading screens to its story. The island where the game takes place should have a design that exists in this world but is disconnected from it due to the story of Far Cry 3, and Rook Island offers us this in abundance. The atmosphere filled with structural diversities such as dead Japanese soldiers, crashed vehicles, unexplored areas, strip clubs, statues, and treasures made according to old and new beliefs, and flies buzzing around us is a testament to the quality that only Ubisoft can provide.
Far Cry 3 tells us a modern-day Alice in Wonderland story, with the bar in Bangkok representing the rabbit hole being the starting point of this tale. Ubisoft has tried to narrate the work of a modern Alice in Wonderland with memorable characters and savagery felt in every layer of the island atmosphere, just like the original story. Our avatar named Jason Brody, who fell down the rabbit hole, finds himself in a hell depicted as a paradise, and I doubt there is another production that can tell the story of this power fantasy with its pains so epically. Rook Island is an interesting place in every aspect, with indicators such as vehicles from World War II, dead soldier bodies, Chinese underground temples, British mines, fallen planes, and decayed cannons, making the player feel it truly has a past. On this island, there are neither the rules of war nor any particular bureaucracy; the real dynamics on the fake paradise island created with the illusion of a paradise are alcohol, poker, drugs, and human trafficking traffic. The illusionist democracy and freedom on the island are two-sided; in such an environment, you can shout and scream as much as you want, but similarly, you can scream for your life, and no one would hear either way. We could have started Ubisoft’s depicted Wonderland with Grant Brody, Jason Brody’s brother, who would be the most suitable character to stand against the savagery and decay offered by the island, but the game presents us with Jason Brody, who fights the chaos within himself, has no way out, and is the most amateur name that could stand against the savagery of the island. However, Ubisoft, focusing on the power fantasy from the beginning to the end in Far Cry 3, tries to present Brody’s amateurism through dialogues, but does not give the player a different feeling between his first and last murder. We do not feel any amateurism, whether using a weapon or unarmed; it feels as if we, as players, have experienced this Wonderland multiple times, guiding Jason’s hand like an experienced guide.
Far Cry 1 and 2 had animals, but the use of animals in the third game is presented from a very different perspective. The developers have made animals one of the most important sources of danger on Rook Island. The reflection of danger and power to the player is wonderfully presented through the attack of animals. Visually heavy and powerful, Ubisoft has beautifully integrated this reaction into the game’s world with the help of the FPS camera, and when these animals attack the avatar, you can feel the Far Cry experience best through the eyes of the animals. Some surprise while others shock the player. The fact that they attack purely instinctively without presenting any monologue to the player has managed to create another element of combat in the game. Again, due to the creative and clever choices of the developers, forcing the fight with these animals in the progression has been a very good choice. Ubisoft has raised the bar with this game, taking the man vs. nature event from the second game to the skies and opening a different area in the gaming industry. Today, you can hear and read people’s praises about this in Red Dead Redemption 2, which represents a script fest world.
Far Cry 3’s foundational gameplay elements are rooted in the mind of Jason. Due to its design choices, the game carries psychological elements from the first loading screen to the end. They’ve added a layer to the game with Jason’s mind, blurring the lines between reality and fantasy. This was attempted in Far Cry 2 with the malaria effect, but it turned into a controversial choice by the end. In Far Cry 3, the hallucinations help layer the game’s theme. The boss fights take place in dark, isolated hallucinatory spaces. The use of knives in these fights helps personalize the experience for the player. The use of psychology and philosophy is not just mechanical but is integrated as a layer into the game. While in Far Cry 2, this was presented as nihilism, in Far Cry 3, it is conveyed through Jason’s emotions and thoughts.
Far Cry 3 is built around Jason Brody’s mind and the power he gradually acquires, leading to conquest. With worldbuilding, gameplay elements, and vehicle usage, it offers a unique story to the player. Although Far Cry 3 might seem like a first-person perspective mash-up of an average Grand Theft Auto and Just Cause game, it possesses a deeper phenomenon. Iconic characters like the ghostly Willis, the cracked-up doctor, sadistic Buck, cruel Hoyt, the queen of the wild jungle Citra, psychopath Vaas, and Dennis, one of the greatest simplers in video game history, are all centered around Jason, the protagonist, showing the effort put into the game’s presentation. On Rook Island, we are tourists who punch sharks and mark enemies with our camera, simple definitions that make everything we do more fun compared to previous games. These elements show how the developers’ different approach in Far Cry 3 can be punishingly mindless fun. Every mechanic in the game is a tool offered for you to conquer the island; the game wants you to dominate the world it presents and is built entirely around this concept. Unlike previous games that required excessive struggle, this game simplifies the challenge to keep the player engaged without disconnecting them from the game world. Jason gains power very quickly because the game’s world wants to give the player full control and mastery over the island atmosphere as soon as possible. While more animations would be needed for the opposite situation, this game opts for more economical methods of animation usage compared to Far Cry 2, and this choice becomes stinginess in later games. The primitive health system present in Far Cry 2 is more limited in Far Cry 3 and contains less brutality compared to Far Cry 2. The game supports this economical use with innovations like the takedown system, automatic cover, raising the weapon when close to cover or an object, and blind firing from these positions. We can say there is no difference between Jason’s first and last use of a weapon. If the game had tried to make the player feel guilty instead of presenting a power fantasy, we would see a variety of animations in weapon usage. Far Cry 3 successfully offers the player a fantastic Indiana Jones and Rambo experience of exploration and conquest. We can see this when a tiger attacks you, the tension at that moment, and then skinning the tiger to turn it into a tool that contributes to the power fantasy. We can feel a sense of power in all the animations in the game, something that Far Cry 2 lacked. This is experienced even in vehicle usage, falling from places, animal attacks, and death animations. The only times the avatar feels powerless in the game are during cutscenes and QTEs in this loop. At the end of the game, Jason losing his finger is a reflection that shows how easily this power can be taken from us. While Far Cry 2 is physically a better game, Far Cry 3 stands out with better movement mechanics. There are countless animations regarding movement, and these animations serve the game’s power fantasy. The opening of the fast travel option at outposts after capturing them is a convenience offered to the player for conquering the world. Lost letters, relics, radio towers, and outposts perfect the presentation of exploration and conquest, while the fluid animation of the movement scheme completes the power fantasy offered by the game. Far Cry 3 has perfectly reflected the adaptation of Hollywood action movies to video games and has thus established the foundation of the Far Cry series. We can easily see this in the subsequent games of the series. The stealth mechanics added to the game for casual players to enjoy the Far Cry experience have influenced the industry, and we can see this in almost every game. Presenting the power fantasy of Far Cry 3 to the player as if they were shopping in the skill section has been a humorous approach, reflecting the thought ‘I can kill enemies this way too’ by opening it in the skill section and increasing the tattoo on the avatar’s arm to represent this, a level still unreachable by many game companies today.
Far Cry 3 offers its players a power fantasy experience firsthand with a variety of classic, modern, and exotic weapons. This marks the beginning of today’s standardized Ubisoft formula, with weapons suitable for every playstyle that everyone can adopt. At this point, Ubisoft has surpassed itself in terms of diversity; the machete, which was a cosmetic element in the second game, becomes one of the most important killing tools in this game. Even the tanto knife we acquire through letters has its own character in the game. If we divide the game into two parts, in the northern part of the game, our weapon options are limited and not of high quality, but as we move to the southern part, the increase in our power is accompanied by better weapon options, which is still a missing element in the Far Cry series that makes us feel the progression. The jamming of weapons in Far Cry 2 (in line with the man vs nature theme) has been changed in Far Cry 3 to personalizing and improving weapons with attachments (power fantasy), and instead of the golden AK-47 in Far Cry 2, we can experience signature weapons in this game. This choice is entirely aimed at providing power and fun. I wish we could see such changes in every game brand that owns a series…
The use of weapons, animations, and sounds in Far Cry 3 completely feeds the power fantasy offered by the game, and we do not see this level of weapon use in the Far Cry series again. Even the reload animations in the game are neither tactical nor amateurish but fully reflect the game and its world. The identity loss felt intensely in the third game is the main reason for the success gained by both the hardcore fans of the series and in attracting new fans. While reflecting the beauty of the world it presents, the game also offers danger and savagery. In an open-world game, leaving the mission area can bring up a fail screen, and we can continue to play in a world that should not be playable after the end of the game; situations like this that have caused the series to lose its identity have led to the birth of a legendary series. Far Cry 3 is a production that has turned a cliché Hollywood script into a cult creation through video games. Jason Brody is a cliché character for today’s gaming world, but he wasn’t so cliché in 2012. There is still no avatar with such character depth in the series, and some games didn’t even have an avatar… The fact that the avatar we control has a character makes this game significant because without character depth, Far Cry 3 would be no different from any Doom game. The reflection of the avatar’s power in gameplay mechanics, effectively conveyed to the player with something as simple as a tattoo, and again, this power being reflected to the avatar and indirectly to the player as a sexual fantasy through a character like Citra, the opposite of Vaas, is an event that did not exist at that time and still does not exist today.
An unreachable pinnacle, a partial turning point for the gaming industry. Far Cry 3 is a Ubisoft masterpiece that has managed to turn even its negatives into positives.
Far Cry 3 tells us a modern-day Alice in Wonderland story, with the bar in Bangkok representing the rabbit hole being the starting point of this tale. Ubisoft has tried to narrate the work of a modern Alice in Wonderland with memorable characters and savagery felt in every layer of the island atmosphere, just like the original story. Our avatar named Jason Brody, who fell down the rabbit hole, finds himself in a hell depicted as a paradise, and I doubt there is another production that can tell the story of this power fantasy with its pains so epically. Rook Island is an interesting place in every aspect, with indicators such as vehicles from World War II, dead soldier bodies, Chinese underground temples, British mines, fallen planes, and decayed cannons, making the player feel it truly has a past. On this island, there are neither the rules of war nor any particular bureaucracy; the real dynamics on the fake paradise island created with the illusion of a paradise are alcohol, poker, drugs, and human trafficking traffic. The illusionist democracy and freedom on the island are two-sided; in such an environment, you can shout and scream as much as you want, but similarly, you can scream for your life, and no one would hear either way. We could have started Ubisoft’s depicted Wonderland with Grant Brody, Jason Brody’s brother, who would be the most suitable character to stand against the savagery and decay offered by the island, but the game presents us with Jason Brody, who fights the chaos within himself, has no way out, and is the most amateur name that could stand against the savagery of the island. However, Ubisoft, focusing on the power fantasy from the beginning to the end in Far Cry 3, tries to present Brody’s amateurism through dialogues, but does not give the player a different feeling between his first and last murder. We do not feel any amateurism, whether using a weapon or unarmed; it feels as if we, as players, have experienced this Wonderland multiple times, guiding Jason’s hand like an experienced guide.
Far Cry 1 and 2 had animals, but the use of animals in the third game is presented from a very different perspective. The developers have made animals one of the most important sources of danger on Rook Island. The reflection of danger and power to the player is wonderfully presented through the attack of animals. Visually heavy and powerful, Ubisoft has beautifully integrated this reaction into the game’s world with the help of the FPS camera, and when these animals attack the avatar, you can feel the Far Cry experience best through the eyes of the animals. Some surprise while others shock the player. The fact that they attack purely instinctively without presenting any monologue to the player has managed to create another element of combat in the game. Again, due to the creative and clever choices of the developers, forcing the fight with these animals in the progression has been a very good choice. Ubisoft has raised the bar with this game, taking the man vs. nature event from the second game to the skies and opening a different area in the gaming industry. Today, you can hear and read people’s praises about this in Red Dead Redemption 2, which represents a script fest world.
Far Cry 3’s foundational gameplay elements are rooted in the mind of Jason. Due to its design choices, the game carries psychological elements from the first loading screen to the end. They’ve added a layer to the game with Jason’s mind, blurring the lines between reality and fantasy. This was attempted in Far Cry 2 with the malaria effect, but it turned into a controversial choice by the end. In Far Cry 3, the hallucinations help layer the game’s theme. The boss fights take place in dark, isolated hallucinatory spaces. The use of knives in these fights helps personalize the experience for the player. The use of psychology and philosophy is not just mechanical but is integrated as a layer into the game. While in Far Cry 2, this was presented as nihilism, in Far Cry 3, it is conveyed through Jason’s emotions and thoughts.
Far Cry 3 is built around Jason Brody’s mind and the power he gradually acquires, leading to conquest. With worldbuilding, gameplay elements, and vehicle usage, it offers a unique story to the player. Although Far Cry 3 might seem like a first-person perspective mash-up of an average Grand Theft Auto and Just Cause game, it possesses a deeper phenomenon. Iconic characters like the ghostly Willis, the cracked-up doctor, sadistic Buck, cruel Hoyt, the queen of the wild jungle Citra, psychopath Vaas, and Dennis, one of the greatest simplers in video game history, are all centered around Jason, the protagonist, showing the effort put into the game’s presentation. On Rook Island, we are tourists who punch sharks and mark enemies with our camera, simple definitions that make everything we do more fun compared to previous games. These elements show how the developers’ different approach in Far Cry 3 can be punishingly mindless fun. Every mechanic in the game is a tool offered for you to conquer the island; the game wants you to dominate the world it presents and is built entirely around this concept. Unlike previous games that required excessive struggle, this game simplifies the challenge to keep the player engaged without disconnecting them from the game world. Jason gains power very quickly because the game’s world wants to give the player full control and mastery over the island atmosphere as soon as possible. While more animations would be needed for the opposite situation, this game opts for more economical methods of animation usage compared to Far Cry 2, and this choice becomes stinginess in later games. The primitive health system present in Far Cry 2 is more limited in Far Cry 3 and contains less brutality compared to Far Cry 2. The game supports this economical use with innovations like the takedown system, automatic cover, raising the weapon when close to cover or an object, and blind firing from these positions. We can say there is no difference between Jason’s first and last use of a weapon. If the game had tried to make the player feel guilty instead of presenting a power fantasy, we would see a variety of animations in weapon usage. Far Cry 3 successfully offers the player a fantastic Indiana Jones and Rambo experience of exploration and conquest. We can see this when a tiger attacks you, the tension at that moment, and then skinning the tiger to turn it into a tool that contributes to the power fantasy. We can feel a sense of power in all the animations in the game, something that Far Cry 2 lacked. This is experienced even in vehicle usage, falling from places, animal attacks, and death animations. The only times the avatar feels powerless in the game are during cutscenes and QTEs in this loop. At the end of the game, Jason losing his finger is a reflection that shows how easily this power can be taken from us. While Far Cry 2 is physically a better game, Far Cry 3 stands out with better movement mechanics. There are countless animations regarding movement, and these animations serve the game’s power fantasy. The opening of the fast travel option at outposts after capturing them is a convenience offered to the player for conquering the world. Lost letters, relics, radio towers, and outposts perfect the presentation of exploration and conquest, while the fluid animation of the movement scheme completes the power fantasy offered by the game. Far Cry 3 has perfectly reflected the adaptation of Hollywood action movies to video games and has thus established the foundation of the Far Cry series. We can easily see this in the subsequent games of the series. The stealth mechanics added to the game for casual players to enjoy the Far Cry experience have influenced the industry, and we can see this in almost every game. Presenting the power fantasy of Far Cry 3 to the player as if they were shopping in the skill section has been a humorous approach, reflecting the thought ‘I can kill enemies this way too’ by opening it in the skill section and increasing the tattoo on the avatar’s arm to represent this, a level still unreachable by many game companies today.
Far Cry 3 offers its players a power fantasy experience firsthand with a variety of classic, modern, and exotic weapons. This marks the beginning of today’s standardized Ubisoft formula, with weapons suitable for every playstyle that everyone can adopt. At this point, Ubisoft has surpassed itself in terms of diversity; the machete, which was a cosmetic element in the second game, becomes one of the most important killing tools in this game. Even the tanto knife we acquire through letters has its own character in the game. If we divide the game into two parts, in the northern part of the game, our weapon options are limited and not of high quality, but as we move to the southern part, the increase in our power is accompanied by better weapon options, which is still a missing element in the Far Cry series that makes us feel the progression. The jamming of weapons in Far Cry 2 (in line with the man vs nature theme) has been changed in Far Cry 3 to personalizing and improving weapons with attachments (power fantasy), and instead of the golden AK-47 in Far Cry 2, we can experience signature weapons in this game. This choice is entirely aimed at providing power and fun. I wish we could see such changes in every game brand that owns a series…
The use of weapons, animations, and sounds in Far Cry 3 completely feeds the power fantasy offered by the game, and we do not see this level of weapon use in the Far Cry series again. Even the reload animations in the game are neither tactical nor amateurish but fully reflect the game and its world. The identity loss felt intensely in the third game is the main reason for the success gained by both the hardcore fans of the series and in attracting new fans. While reflecting the beauty of the world it presents, the game also offers danger and savagery. In an open-world game, leaving the mission area can bring up a fail screen, and we can continue to play in a world that should not be playable after the end of the game; situations like this that have caused the series to lose its identity have led to the birth of a legendary series. Far Cry 3 is a production that has turned a cliché Hollywood script into a cult creation through video games. Jason Brody is a cliché character for today’s gaming world, but he wasn’t so cliché in 2012. There is still no avatar with such character depth in the series, and some games didn’t even have an avatar… The fact that the avatar we control has a character makes this game significant because without character depth, Far Cry 3 would be no different from any Doom game. The reflection of the avatar’s power in gameplay mechanics, effectively conveyed to the player with something as simple as a tattoo, and again, this power being reflected to the avatar and indirectly to the player as a sexual fantasy through a character like Citra, the opposite of Vaas, is an event that did not exist at that time and still does not exist today.
An unreachable pinnacle, a partial turning point for the gaming industry. Far Cry 3 is a Ubisoft masterpiece that has managed to turn even its negatives into positives.
2008
Far Cry 2 is Ubisoft’s first Far Cry game and frankly, it’s my first Far Cry game as well. There is a world of difference between Far Cry 1 and Far Cry 2, making it difficult to define Far Cry 2 as a game. It shows how Ubisoft can create a masterpiece when trying to experiment with something. The game was developed by Ubisoft Montreal and released in 2008, and its Dunia engine makes the game unique.
Unfortunately, people focused on its shortcomings when the game was released. Since the game was not designed for the casual audience, it remained an obscure production. However, Far Cry 2 is far beyond that and is an incomparable creation. The famous Crowbcat video shows details of the game and comparisons, but there’s not much else explained. If we evaluate the game based on this, it’s very good, but all these details make the game boring when played without understanding, which is evident from the comments on the topic.
Unlike other Far Cry games, Far Cry 2 is based on conveying full reality to the player rather than an artificial one, making it a true survival game. Those who dismiss Far Cry 2 as boring are actually defeated by the sense of struggle it offers or miss out on the experience because they often don’t understand it. In the game, we are constantly battling with our avatar, enemies, nature, and vehicles, and this battle never stops. I think this design choice is wonderful and definitely better and more realistic than the sense of struggle offered by Souls games, which can’t go beyond absurdities.
The player shapes the story of Far Cry 2 within certain plot boundaries. The opening sequence of the game in Africa, where we go to kill our character from the first game, introduces us to the atmosphere and then to our main target, Jack Carver, aka The Jackal. The character development and change from the first game are great because the janky-style character from the first game appears in the second game with a purpose and philosophy. We don’t encounter him much in the game, and unfortunately, we try to understand his philosophy and the mentioned characteristic features through voice recordings. An alternative and interactive design choice could have made the game more memorable.
‘What your old clients don’t seem to understand is that they can’t kill me. Do you understand what I’m saying? Nobody kills me. Nobody. I’m the one who decides who lives and who dies - me.’ - The Jackal
The choice of Africa as the setting for the game and the open world created with various areas provided a completely different experience for the player in 2008. The lighting and colors used in the game were way ahead of their time. The fact that our character has malaria and the game uses this mechanically was also one of the best choices made by the developer to make the game special for its time and still criticized today. This is important for the man vs. nature theme because in Far Cry 2, unlike other games, we are not the king of death; we feel this with the mechanics the game offers. Most dangers in other games are actually fake dangers, but the mechanics in this game are quite real. The struggle we face when we run out of malaria pills or the difficulties experienced during a fight when malaria strikes are design choices not seen in games today, presented to the player in 2008 as a risk but a very successful one. Turning malaria into an enemy inside us rather than keeping the enemy outside is a mechanic only producers at Ubisoft’s level could attempt. Far Cry 2 is essentially a lesson in how to create a sense of fun from anti-fun, replacing scripted events with natural reactions to provide an immersive experience. If the challenging mechanics of this game were removed, it would be nothing more than a generic shooter, and it would lose its experimental essence that makes it a topic of discussion even today. Keeping the stress mechanic at such a high level in the game and making it more casual in subsequent games has helped the Far Cry brand survive and maintain a core audience despite criticism.
In open-world games, the player’s primary goal is to plan and then adapt or improvise based on the situation. Far Cry 2, however, uses its stress mechanic to show how a non-scripted disruption can alter and change the player’s planned course of action, demonstrating that even perfect plans can be misunderstood, as evidenced by this game. The stress experienced by the player, whether due to a malaria attack or the absence of a medkit during a firefight, reflects the survivalist state of our avatar, the harshness of the terrain, and the man vs. nature theme, all achieved through primitive health restoration methods. Additionally, the game’s random weapon jams, which create tension in combat because you never know when they might occur, beautifully reflect this stress mechanic. The fire mechanic in the game, which is neutral and can be both a friend and a foe, is another silent in-game element that perfectly conveys this stress. The backfire from your rocket launcher can cause large fires depending on the area, adding to the tension.
In Far Cry 2, almost everything outside the region is foreign to it. Cars, weapons, equipment, and characters are elements that are not native to the geography but are essential for the survival of characters who are strangers to the area. For example, our main target is The Jackal, but all the equipment we use to reach him are smuggled goods from The Jackal. The way The Jackal’s anti-villain characteristics are portrayed is a testament to Ubisoft Montreal’s design success.
First-person shooter game designs are often defined by a weapon or object, and this is experienced as weapon vs. everything. In Far Cry 2, the weapons we use tell the story best; they are not produced in the region and do not belong there, but they reflect the region’s cheapness and poor quality. For instance, the details on an IED, a heavy weapon designed to be detonated remotely, tell us about the nature of the game. A cheap cell phone, messy wires, and a bomb that could explode in our hands at any moment. The cheap design of the weapons in the game consistently reflects your world and emphasizes that our character is not as powerful as we might think.
Unfortunately, other FPS games do not offer the experience of telling a story through the weapons used. The weapons in the game can convey excitement, stress, panic, and anger. Where else can we experience a weapon exploding in our face during combat? The game presents its weapons with the best animations for its time, including idle, reload, and jam animations, despite some issues. The fact that fixed machine guns catch fire and become unusable after firing for a while is considered a luxury today. The deterioration and rusting of a newly purchased weapon over time aesthetically demonstrate how challenging the game’s geography is.
There is even a hidden stealth system in the game that is not fully revealed to the player. The game realistically conveys the cheapness of the geography with a few pieces of paper for a map, the accompanying GPS, and the cheap cell phone used in side quests and generally. Offering complex gameplay with simple mechanics is not an easy task. The open world of the game is deliberately designed to be challenging, ensuring that everyone who wants to play the game and see the end of the story fully adapts to its world. The chain of reactions is the real winner of this game. Your plans can be disrupted by a weapon jam, unpredictable AI enemies can attack you with RPGs, you can have a malaria attack, and you can be surrounded by fire caused by the rocket, all of which naturally present a sense of freedom and difficulty that is a masterpiece.
In Far Cry 2, the main manifesto of our silent character is the character’s hands. Apart from the weapons we use, the hands are the best element that tells us about our character, helping us find where to go, discover hidden elements in the region, repair vehicles, and heal. Today’s FPS games often lack hand animations in our character interactions, usually reduced to button mashing (especially in subsequent Far Cry games). The question of whether the feeling of interaction created by hands can form the foundation of a game is best answered by Far Cry 2. Our character’s hands realistically convey feelings of disappointment, pain, hesitation, effort, and skill, essential for our survival.
Far Cry 2’s inspiration comes from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s film Apocalypse Now.
The game has a fantastic sound design and music that fully reflects the geography it is set in, drawing you deeper into the atmosphere as you listen. Although it does not appeal to everyone and is subject to criticism by the casual crowd, for me, it is Ubisoft’s masterpiece, and the closest they have come to surpassing it is with Far Cry 6, which only reaches about halfway there.
Unfortunately, people focused on its shortcomings when the game was released. Since the game was not designed for the casual audience, it remained an obscure production. However, Far Cry 2 is far beyond that and is an incomparable creation. The famous Crowbcat video shows details of the game and comparisons, but there’s not much else explained. If we evaluate the game based on this, it’s very good, but all these details make the game boring when played without understanding, which is evident from the comments on the topic.
Unlike other Far Cry games, Far Cry 2 is based on conveying full reality to the player rather than an artificial one, making it a true survival game. Those who dismiss Far Cry 2 as boring are actually defeated by the sense of struggle it offers or miss out on the experience because they often don’t understand it. In the game, we are constantly battling with our avatar, enemies, nature, and vehicles, and this battle never stops. I think this design choice is wonderful and definitely better and more realistic than the sense of struggle offered by Souls games, which can’t go beyond absurdities.
The player shapes the story of Far Cry 2 within certain plot boundaries. The opening sequence of the game in Africa, where we go to kill our character from the first game, introduces us to the atmosphere and then to our main target, Jack Carver, aka The Jackal. The character development and change from the first game are great because the janky-style character from the first game appears in the second game with a purpose and philosophy. We don’t encounter him much in the game, and unfortunately, we try to understand his philosophy and the mentioned characteristic features through voice recordings. An alternative and interactive design choice could have made the game more memorable.
‘What your old clients don’t seem to understand is that they can’t kill me. Do you understand what I’m saying? Nobody kills me. Nobody. I’m the one who decides who lives and who dies - me.’ - The Jackal
The choice of Africa as the setting for the game and the open world created with various areas provided a completely different experience for the player in 2008. The lighting and colors used in the game were way ahead of their time. The fact that our character has malaria and the game uses this mechanically was also one of the best choices made by the developer to make the game special for its time and still criticized today. This is important for the man vs. nature theme because in Far Cry 2, unlike other games, we are not the king of death; we feel this with the mechanics the game offers. Most dangers in other games are actually fake dangers, but the mechanics in this game are quite real. The struggle we face when we run out of malaria pills or the difficulties experienced during a fight when malaria strikes are design choices not seen in games today, presented to the player in 2008 as a risk but a very successful one. Turning malaria into an enemy inside us rather than keeping the enemy outside is a mechanic only producers at Ubisoft’s level could attempt. Far Cry 2 is essentially a lesson in how to create a sense of fun from anti-fun, replacing scripted events with natural reactions to provide an immersive experience. If the challenging mechanics of this game were removed, it would be nothing more than a generic shooter, and it would lose its experimental essence that makes it a topic of discussion even today. Keeping the stress mechanic at such a high level in the game and making it more casual in subsequent games has helped the Far Cry brand survive and maintain a core audience despite criticism.
In open-world games, the player’s primary goal is to plan and then adapt or improvise based on the situation. Far Cry 2, however, uses its stress mechanic to show how a non-scripted disruption can alter and change the player’s planned course of action, demonstrating that even perfect plans can be misunderstood, as evidenced by this game. The stress experienced by the player, whether due to a malaria attack or the absence of a medkit during a firefight, reflects the survivalist state of our avatar, the harshness of the terrain, and the man vs. nature theme, all achieved through primitive health restoration methods. Additionally, the game’s random weapon jams, which create tension in combat because you never know when they might occur, beautifully reflect this stress mechanic. The fire mechanic in the game, which is neutral and can be both a friend and a foe, is another silent in-game element that perfectly conveys this stress. The backfire from your rocket launcher can cause large fires depending on the area, adding to the tension.
In Far Cry 2, almost everything outside the region is foreign to it. Cars, weapons, equipment, and characters are elements that are not native to the geography but are essential for the survival of characters who are strangers to the area. For example, our main target is The Jackal, but all the equipment we use to reach him are smuggled goods from The Jackal. The way The Jackal’s anti-villain characteristics are portrayed is a testament to Ubisoft Montreal’s design success.
First-person shooter game designs are often defined by a weapon or object, and this is experienced as weapon vs. everything. In Far Cry 2, the weapons we use tell the story best; they are not produced in the region and do not belong there, but they reflect the region’s cheapness and poor quality. For instance, the details on an IED, a heavy weapon designed to be detonated remotely, tell us about the nature of the game. A cheap cell phone, messy wires, and a bomb that could explode in our hands at any moment. The cheap design of the weapons in the game consistently reflects your world and emphasizes that our character is not as powerful as we might think.
Unfortunately, other FPS games do not offer the experience of telling a story through the weapons used. The weapons in the game can convey excitement, stress, panic, and anger. Where else can we experience a weapon exploding in our face during combat? The game presents its weapons with the best animations for its time, including idle, reload, and jam animations, despite some issues. The fact that fixed machine guns catch fire and become unusable after firing for a while is considered a luxury today. The deterioration and rusting of a newly purchased weapon over time aesthetically demonstrate how challenging the game’s geography is.
There is even a hidden stealth system in the game that is not fully revealed to the player. The game realistically conveys the cheapness of the geography with a few pieces of paper for a map, the accompanying GPS, and the cheap cell phone used in side quests and generally. Offering complex gameplay with simple mechanics is not an easy task. The open world of the game is deliberately designed to be challenging, ensuring that everyone who wants to play the game and see the end of the story fully adapts to its world. The chain of reactions is the real winner of this game. Your plans can be disrupted by a weapon jam, unpredictable AI enemies can attack you with RPGs, you can have a malaria attack, and you can be surrounded by fire caused by the rocket, all of which naturally present a sense of freedom and difficulty that is a masterpiece.
In Far Cry 2, the main manifesto of our silent character is the character’s hands. Apart from the weapons we use, the hands are the best element that tells us about our character, helping us find where to go, discover hidden elements in the region, repair vehicles, and heal. Today’s FPS games often lack hand animations in our character interactions, usually reduced to button mashing (especially in subsequent Far Cry games). The question of whether the feeling of interaction created by hands can form the foundation of a game is best answered by Far Cry 2. Our character’s hands realistically convey feelings of disappointment, pain, hesitation, effort, and skill, essential for our survival.
Far Cry 2’s inspiration comes from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola’s film Apocalypse Now.
The game has a fantastic sound design and music that fully reflects the geography it is set in, drawing you deeper into the atmosphere as you listen. Although it does not appeal to everyone and is subject to criticism by the casual crowd, for me, it is Ubisoft’s masterpiece, and the closest they have come to surpassing it is with Far Cry 6, which only reaches about halfway there.
2024
It seems that a remake of Persona 3 has been created based on Persona 5, although I have no knowledge of the original game. Therefore, I didn’t feel unfamiliar with the gameplay. Comparing the character writing, subtexts, features, and social interactions, Persona 3 felt more sophisticated than Persona 5. The RPG elements are enjoyable, but I wonder if they could have been more diverse. Surprisingly, the game was released in Turkish on day one due to the proximity between Xbox and Sega. Although there are occasional translation errors in Turkish, at least it allows following the story coherently.
As with most JRPGs, this game features a turn-based combat system, which I find utterly tedious. Repeating the same actions becomes nauseating after a while. I wish they had used a dynamic system like the one in Yakuza: Like a Dragon; I didn’t get tired of turn-based combat in that game. Again, due to this system, the combat section of the game becomes excessively lengthy, especially towards the end, leading to a feeling of “just finish it already.”
The story is quite satisfying, and the storytelling and presentation are top-notch. I particularly enjoyed how the music becomes more dramatic as the game progresses.
In my opinion, it deserves an 8.5/10. Mitsuru Kirijo might be the best-designed character I’ve seen in video games, and my favorite character in the game was Maya. There’s one aspect that puzzled me: the ability to form romantic relationships with anyone we want. Just as I thought the game might lead to a harem situation, it ended. If you have access to Game Pass, I recommend playing it for the social interactions it offers.
As with most JRPGs, this game features a turn-based combat system, which I find utterly tedious. Repeating the same actions becomes nauseating after a while. I wish they had used a dynamic system like the one in Yakuza: Like a Dragon; I didn’t get tired of turn-based combat in that game. Again, due to this system, the combat section of the game becomes excessively lengthy, especially towards the end, leading to a feeling of “just finish it already.”
The story is quite satisfying, and the storytelling and presentation are top-notch. I particularly enjoyed how the music becomes more dramatic as the game progresses.
In my opinion, it deserves an 8.5/10. Mitsuru Kirijo might be the best-designed character I’ve seen in video games, and my favorite character in the game was Maya. There’s one aspect that puzzled me: the ability to form romantic relationships with anyone we want. Just as I thought the game might lead to a harem situation, it ended. If you have access to Game Pass, I recommend playing it for the social interactions it offers.
2014
Wow, it’s the best game of the 8th generation and a masterpiece. Insomniac’s finest work to date, almost indistinguishable from a true masterpiece. Can all aspects of game design and gameplay truly be perfect? Yes, it seems they can.
The game’s main theme is pure fun, and it brilliantly captures that essence from start to finish. In 2027, during a promotional event for the drink ‘Overcharge Delirium XT’ in Sunset City, things take a nightmarish turn. The beverage, released without proper testing by its manufacturer, Fizzco, promises immense energy but instead mutates people into hideous mutants. As a former Fizzco employee, our created character decides to stay in the city and unravel the mystery.
The game’s graphic design is exceptional and unique, with the open-world city tailored to the game’s mechanics. The art design is magnificent.
The gameplay mechanics are entirely geared toward speed and enjoyment. I’ve never experienced a game that feels this good to play. From movement mechanics to the thrill of combat, everything is designed to entertain the player. The characters, dialogues, and overall execution surpass even the 8th generation’s standards.
The game’s underrated status, coupled with the unnecessary and foolish Xbox One hatred (likely fueled by Microsoft’s involvement), is unfortunate. After playing ‘Sunset Overdrive,’ which has a similar Insomniac touch, it’s clear that the studio hasn’t quite matched its own quality in subsequent games. The transfer of the game’s rights to Sony is also a sad development.
I wish Rockstar would study the mission design that ties the story together. Insomniac’s approach to mission design in the ‘Spider-Man’ games leaves much to be desired.
For those who haven’t played it yet, give this game a chance. It’s practically free, especially with the included DLCs, and the entertainment value is phenomenal. The game’s soundtracks alone are a masterpiece.
The game’s main theme is pure fun, and it brilliantly captures that essence from start to finish. In 2027, during a promotional event for the drink ‘Overcharge Delirium XT’ in Sunset City, things take a nightmarish turn. The beverage, released without proper testing by its manufacturer, Fizzco, promises immense energy but instead mutates people into hideous mutants. As a former Fizzco employee, our created character decides to stay in the city and unravel the mystery.
The game’s graphic design is exceptional and unique, with the open-world city tailored to the game’s mechanics. The art design is magnificent.
The gameplay mechanics are entirely geared toward speed and enjoyment. I’ve never experienced a game that feels this good to play. From movement mechanics to the thrill of combat, everything is designed to entertain the player. The characters, dialogues, and overall execution surpass even the 8th generation’s standards.
The game’s underrated status, coupled with the unnecessary and foolish Xbox One hatred (likely fueled by Microsoft’s involvement), is unfortunate. After playing ‘Sunset Overdrive,’ which has a similar Insomniac touch, it’s clear that the studio hasn’t quite matched its own quality in subsequent games. The transfer of the game’s rights to Sony is also a sad development.
I wish Rockstar would study the mission design that ties the story together. Insomniac’s approach to mission design in the ‘Spider-Man’ games leaves much to be desired.
For those who haven’t played it yet, give this game a chance. It’s practically free, especially with the included DLCs, and the entertainment value is phenomenal. The game’s soundtracks alone are a masterpiece.
2001
The first ‘Halo’ game is more than just a game; it’s a revolutionary milestone in the gaming industry and a culturally significant creation. Its revolution lies in making the traditionally challenging FPS genre accessible to console players, while also introducing innovations to the FPS genre. The split-screen co-op design was groundbreaking, and its popularity contributed to the creation of Xbox Live.
‘Halo’ remains timeless and unique due to the sense of mystery it evokes, the magnificent universe it creates, and the freedom it offers players. The memorable gameplay mechanics, supported by unforgettable soundtracks that players still appreciate today, contribute to the game’s emotional impact.
The game’s excellent design draws inspiration from the 1986 film ‘Aliens.’ Elements like vehicles, sleeping pods, and characters like Sergeant Johnson and Sergeant Apone closely resemble each other. The design of parasitic enemies like ‘The Flood’ is another prime example. Bungie has acknowledged this influence.
Apone: ‘All right, let’s go, people. The Corps ain’t paying us by the hour!’ Johnson: ‘Hit it, Marines! Go! Go! Go! The Corps ain’t paying us by the hour!’
Despite not gaining much traction in our country due to its unique perspective, ‘Halo: Combat Evolved’ remains a cultural masterpiece. As a brand, ‘Halo’ has become synonymous with gaming culture and is a must-play for anyone who enjoys games.
‘Halo’ remains timeless and unique due to the sense of mystery it evokes, the magnificent universe it creates, and the freedom it offers players. The memorable gameplay mechanics, supported by unforgettable soundtracks that players still appreciate today, contribute to the game’s emotional impact.
The game’s excellent design draws inspiration from the 1986 film ‘Aliens.’ Elements like vehicles, sleeping pods, and characters like Sergeant Johnson and Sergeant Apone closely resemble each other. The design of parasitic enemies like ‘The Flood’ is another prime example. Bungie has acknowledged this influence.
Apone: ‘All right, let’s go, people. The Corps ain’t paying us by the hour!’ Johnson: ‘Hit it, Marines! Go! Go! Go! The Corps ain’t paying us by the hour!’
Despite not gaining much traction in our country due to its unique perspective, ‘Halo: Combat Evolved’ remains a cultural masterpiece. As a brand, ‘Halo’ has become synonymous with gaming culture and is a must-play for anyone who enjoys games.