First off... Far Cry... whoo. Half Life may finally have a challenger to the throne of single player FPS gaming. If you guys haven't seen this one, check out the website, which has links to gameplay videos and the two demos. Simply incredible graphics, physics, AI and open ended gameplay. "Here's some islands, there's lots of bad guys, here's some objectives, do it however you want."
The vehicles and lack of "tunnel" level design make it totally viable to come up with your own solutions to the game challenges, and it's so refreshing compared to "common" FPS fare. Don't want to deal with that base of mercenaries? Okay, sneak around it over the hill, avoiding the guards. Or get a hang glider and fly over it and hope nobody spots you. Or steal a boat and drive around that part of the island, far enough out that noone can see.
Want the base destroyed? Drive that boat up next to the shore and use the mounted rockets. Or sneak up on that hill and commandeer a guard tower to snipe 'em one by one. Or take out a patrol on the road, steal their Humvee, and tear through it like Rambo. Or... or... or... it's just good. And it runs surprisingly well on my 1.3Ghz Athlon with GeForceFX 5200 (bottom of the DX9 line), so it's a respectably scaleable engine. Highly recommended.
Okay, second. Anybody ever play this? It looks like a pretty derivative Nethack ripoff, but I just put about a half hour into it and had a lot of fun. It's faster than Nethack, with more immediate rewards - probably not as satisfying but you don't seem to die as much either. Free, anyhow - give it a try! :-) |
