Farcry 2

Was thinking of doing this but i'm not prepared and then again I NEVER AM!!  So this could take me all day, i've opened up tihs loads of webpages on my PC because I know it will crash under the huge stress and I can walk away knowing my day is full lol I'm so stupid! 

Soooo  War Torn Africa??  I am no huge gamer, complete too few games, lose interest, wander off and put Revenge in usually but I have this glorified dvd player called a PS3 (a lovely thing really, I want it's babies) but dont get the dancing thing in Playstation home bah humbug lol and I find a cheap copy of Farcry 2 for it (knowing if I had found it that cheap for the 360 I could get passed the 10,000 points things) can't win em all hey ho. 

Friends had said it's a 30 hours or so gameplay game which means 70 hours for me because I take my time when I can and look around and do silly things "normal" people do but then again, what the hell do I know? 

So swimming everywhere instead of using the ancient Jeep that you can repair when it starts to wearily smoke,whinge at you, with an ancient ratchet, a touch of realism.  Walking everywhere, through forests and the leaves you can't brush by so they move, some review said you could, I was dissappointed. 

Okey dokey - let downs before the great things!  The AI is disturbingly stupid and random - what was that game I rented recently.....  Frontlines - fuel of war?  That correct?  The AI on that was impossible!  I'm pointing my weapon and shooting you in the face you decrepid hostile german soldier and you are smiling back at me saying uhuh not yet, you cant shoot me here, the creators of this poxy game won't allow me to die as I should, I made a pact with the devil as did every other soldier you will encounter along the way haha!  Oh is that right?  Then kcuF ffO ya Bastid i'm putting this game in the bin, well not quite, i'll take it back to blockbusters actually.

Game reviewer I am not, just ramble is my forte, maybe this will change today, here, now but I dont think so! 

Where was I lol

Yeah the AI African Soldiers on both sides of the fractions are very silly and random but love for the simple beauty of this game I certainly do have. 

So the story is you are this guy caught in the middle of a huge Civil War between to Fractions, both sides are supplied weapons by "The Jackal" bit like Prescott Bush in WW2? And you have to hunt this man down, I hope you get to kill him, i'm only at 31% completion so maybe I shouldnt be writing about it yet!  You have Malaria so along the way you have to find certain people who can supply you medicine which is a bit of a ball ache but part of the realism, usually you have a mission to find men in shacks in the middle of nowhere to supply passports to, to eventually get these tablets/medicine.  Errands for your health if you like.

Now the visual beauty of this game I find incredible, the game case is absolutely right, the most realistic fire I have seen in any game!!  For example you have molotov cocktails (and grenades so far - maybe more incendiary devices will come along)  and when you toss one in the brush either for fun or near opposing Africaneers...... realistically gobsmackingly awesome looking I think.  Set fire to trees, wooden huts, and the grass burns just as it should, brilliant. 

So, the town of Pala.  Just a tiny encampment if you like in the middle of nowhere but a place to find main story missions from both fractions of the civil war, work yourself up in the rankings if you like, missions get more challenging and deeper as you go along as with most games.  At 31% I think I've just completed something of importance but don't know if thats true yet - i'm not a true gamer as I have said.  It's a fantastic touch to this game entering Pala, African guards at barriers, relaxed sloping on the walls of buildings or watching you warily as you look for work or your medicine with frequent utterances, a friend said to me they all sound like cockneys but he's slightly deranged lol Two parts of Pala are no-go areas if you like manned by opposite tense members of the fractions.  Damn is it Faction or Fraction??  Neither feels right in this context but one of them is goddamn it - I'll stick with Fraction hehe

So Pala is great, kinda cool but the entire thing is so cool looking. 

The world is a huge place - you can traverse the open world in different vehicles or walk run or swim - even FLY! Yet to do this though so cant yet comment.  The main stay vehicle is a run down jeep that you eventually get the ability to fix when you've crashed into too many rocks or been hit by the soldiers vehicles you meet VERY often randomly.  You have a machine gun fixed to the open top roof that you can switch to very quickly when you see a jeep coming at you over the beautiful horizons.  Oh and you will come across idiots in like a Datsun Sunny or something ramming you, angry coz you kicked his chicken (oops thats Fable) and why these pratts think they'll even make a dent in your jeep I do not know. 

There is a nice jeep like a Landrover Discovery that makes you feel like Eddie Izzard, like a proffesional transvestite when driving it but it has no weapon attached, major downfall, comfort over safety, nah(wtf?) And there's a brilliant little dune buggy with a roll cage that's much much much fun to drive!  Think i've come across a bus or big flattop jeep kinda thing too but i'm sure they'll be more to come. 

The only currency in Farcry 2 is diamonds (blood diamonds - great film) and you get paid for your missions in this way - you will find them (221 in total)?  all over the open world hidden in briefcases and that's a bit of a kicker because just like Assasins creed, having to find little things like that is so time consuming that it can make or break a great game for me.  Not that it is difficult to find these because you have a diamond locator that bleeps green when they are close and stays lit green unblinking when you are looking in the correct direction, so no biggie for people with patience. 

With these diamonds you can buy weapons from a dodgy geezer in a shack who offers you side missions and you can upgrade all your weapons - capacity, stop potential jamming of guns etc. 

Back to AI of soldiers - so you are coming to a shanty town to murder some murdering bastid and his cohorts, men will be randomly surrounding these places watching for perpetrators of injustice like yourself (hey take a look at yourself here lol)  the funny thing is sometimes they notice you from like a year away and come running and other times you can almost be smelling their breath before they take a pot shot at you.  I like the realism of the weapons here too, they jump around when you fire and dont hide in the brush unless your gonna set it alight, it gets confusing as to where the enemy is shooting at you, really it does.  Stand in the open, be a man/woman and fight for the truth lol

The last down fall is small stations in the map where the main roads split.  They are manned by bad men who want to kill you but if you kill them, run them over (oh you can be ran over too)  shouldnt they be forever dead and not resurrected or re-manned if you like the next time you pass by? Nah - they are still there each time you drive by, fun to run people over, ran over a deer last night, big lump in throat, my bad.

All in all - (I forget quite a lot about the game actually)  I think it's an incredible piece of work, truly I do, for all it's faults.  I like that it will take me 70 hours, I love the incredible scenery, the beauty of the nature in game, mountains, waterfalls, roads and crreks, waterboats and lilleys and the fire, kcuF me the Fire lol

Time to go, maybe I can continue when the game is more completed but for now, a highly recommended game if you have time left over the festive season.  Enjoy - many thanks for sticking with me if ya did :-)