The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

Far Cry 2, in so many ways, is just a pain to play. You’ll spend the first hour or so totally confused about its mechanics. Why don’t my save points have ammo and health kits? Why don’t they repair my guns? Why do these random cars always hunt me down? Why do members of a faction I’m working for try to shoot me? Why is the game so damn hard? Why does every enemy take a million bullets?

My first play session, I played for about an hour, and after a bunch of dying, I got really frustrated. I promised Brer I’d try it again, though. On Easy, this time.
On Friday, I flipped it to easy and tried it again.

I’m totally hooked now.
Far Cry 2 is a game that is completely, completely mean to a player just starting it. It has tutorials and explains its mechanics, but they really only make sense after you play for awhile. It doesn’t tell you things like drinking bottled water refills your health, or that by finding the ammo stations in guard posts, you can “scout” them and make your map more useful. It never mentions the buses, which are critical to getting around. (The only reason I knew about them was from listening to podcasts.) It never mentions that you need to go rest at a safe house to reset your buddy rescue. It never really mentions that you can’t pick up weapons from enemies ever, because they will jam, and that instead you need to make occasional stops at your arsenals to pick up new copies of the guns you’ve bought so they don’t jam. It does mention that doing buddy missions will improve your safehouses, but it doesn’t really mention how doing this changes them from out of the way annoyances you go to just because you want to save or move time forward so you can fucking see to checkpoints you hop from one to the other from in order to make sure you’re always prepared for the battle ahead. The flow of this game is a mystery to the new player.

Once you plow through, get some money, buy some decent guns, and learn these things, though? The game starts to get really, really fun. Sure, it’s still bothersome that every person on the face of the planet wants to kill you. Sure, it’s still sub-optimal that there’s only the vaguest of plots. But suddenly, the world changes into this combat playground. You pick whatever loadout you want at your arsenal for your play style, and then you murder everything your way. Convoy to take out? You can wait at the side of the road with an RPG, or snipe the driver out of his seat, or run it off the road with a car. Whatever you think of in the rules of the world, you can probably do, and do effectively. It’s addicting like that.

Of the things I like about this game, the map has to be one of the best. It’s completely immersive. You press the map button, and your guy puts away his guns and pulls out a paper map and a GPS. It looks cool, and it’s just neat to have your map laid out in your lap while you drive, for instance. At the same time, it’s still completely useful. It transposes the information your guy is getting from the GPS on your paper map, so it has everything I need to know about where I’m going and how to get there. More games need this map system. I love it.

I really suggest setting the game to easy, as well. Even at normal, this game is kind of unforgiving. I die all the time on Easy as it is. I would compare Easy to the “normal” setting of Call of Duty 4. There’s little shame in it, especially in a game where most of the fun comes from dicking around.

If you would have told me I would be so into Far Cry 2 back when I bought it, I would have completely laughed at you. But damn, I’m into it now. I don’t know how much longer I’ll play it. I’m almost positive I won’t beat it. (I’m at about 20% completion as of this writing, apparently) But there’s a reason why it got Idle Thumbs’ GOTY. If this game was a bit more polished, it would be mind-blowingly fantastic. As it is, it’s a very, very rough diamond. Still, it was totally worth the 15 bucks I paid. I have no complaints at this point. I’ve gotten my money’s worth.