Far Cry 2

[Tundra]

A few beers definitely makes an interesting Far Cry 2 experience. An extra level of chaos and unpredictability.

I don't know if i can handle an extra level of chaos, i've got a GTX 680 and the latest Ivybridge, this games runs so fast its borderline psychologically unnerving.

I'm on the second world/map in FarCry2, taking my time, savouring the game, taking it in my stride and then i came across this:

That looks huge.

Huge as in 'I bet i'll have to eventually have to blow it up', huge.

[darthbator]

I never really dug deep into this game. I feel like I really tried when it was THE idle thumbs topic. I just felt like the really long travel times and frequent checkpoint gunfights really hampered my ability to get into the game. Maybe I should go back and try one more time. There are so many things I loved about the bit I played! I just felt that the amount of time spent driving around tracking my map (an admittedly incredibly immersive implementation of a map) trumped the amount of time I spent doing anything else. Actually it might have trumped the amount of time I spent doing EVERYTHING else...

Maybe I'll start dumping a few hours a day back into this one to see if I can't maybe get that special experience with it that everyone seems to always rave about.

[TurboPubx-16]

I never really dug deep into this game. I feel like I really tried when it was THE idle thumbs topic. I just felt like the really long travel times and frequent checkpoint gunfights really hampered my ability to get into the game. Maybe I should go back and try one more time. There are so many things I loved about the bit I played! I just felt that the amount of time spent driving around tracking my map (an admittedly incredibly immersive implementation of a map) trumped the amount of time I spent doing anything else. Actually it might have trumped the amount of time I spent doing EVERYTHING else...

Maybe I'll start dumping a few hours a day back into this one to see if I can't maybe get that special experience with it that everyone seems to always rave about.

When I came back to the game after listening to the first run of the podcast it was like my brain had been altered to love the game. Three words of advice: bolt action rifle.

[rwcohn]

I put over 30 hours into Far Cry 2 (didn't even finish the game), and along the way made a little screenshot journal in Steam

This one is probably my favourite, just for the story it tells

[darthbator]

When I came back to the game after listening to the first run of the podcast it was like my brain had been altered to love the game. Three words of advice: bolt action rifle.

I feel like I need to go back and maybe re digest a few of those episodes so my appreciation for all their hyper progressive, immersive, game elements trumps the mundane nature of making it from here to there.

I think one of the things that "bothers" me is that I can't really think of any ways to make travel more entertaining without killing the immersion of the world at least a little.... Maybe the other elements of the game demand that part be so mundane to set a consistent tone...

[Tundra]

I put over 30 hours into Far Cry 2 (didn't even finish the game), and along the way made a little screenshot journal in Steam

This one is probably my favourite, just for the story it tells

could you link you steam profile screenshots page?

wouldn't mind having a look at you visual diary out of curiosity if that's ok.

[Tundra]

Has anyone changed the display settings for FarCry 2 at all?

I played around and the game looks ten times better when you get it set to your monitors calibration.

Here is a comparison of the bridge i blew up, the first is a Steam F12 grab:

Note, some reason no matter how i change the display settings in-game, a F12 screengrab always stays the same, which is... perculiar.

So the second is from my iPhone. It isnt the best i admit, but this is to show how i see/play FC2 so you get the gist of it.

I really notice god-rays, HDR, shadows and all the little details alot more, just by changing Gamma, Contrast and brightness - so it shouldn't hurt my graphics card, and just looks so much more lush and breathing of life.

In motion its much more noticeable:

[rwcohn]

could you link you steam profile screenshots page?

wouldn't mind having a look at you visual diary out of curiosity if that's ok.

Here ya go

Choice pick: http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/900972751202129028/928A7E9947C839F7A4D69639F8BFF628378FCC34/

[Jonathan]

Things got a little out of hand during my last outing:

[darthbator]

Yeah I'm still having a really hard time with this. I keep hitting strange fail states, I don't feel like the gunplay feels tightly tuned either. I'm getting ready to author my quitting the game post on this game. Something that constantly seems to happen to me is that a companion will send me on a "shortcut" from a main mission and during that shortcut I will fail in some unknown inexplicable way and it will course correct to the alternate path....

I don't mind the course correction but a lot of times I have no idea what the hell I did wrong. Then when I want to reload to figure out WTF happened I have to reload from the last SAVE POINT I got to. Oh great more dull slow driving....... I feel like this game is constantly punishing me with it's most boring mechanic Every time that happens I immediately turn the game off. I don't know if this is really "for me"

[Orv]

Well you're not wrong about the shooting, it's as terrible, if not worse than Crysis 1.

[Squid Division]

Things got a little out of hand during my last outing:

Way to go Chigurh

[Coods]

Setting a tree next to your safe house on fire, going to bed, and watching the tree burn in a time-lapse is pretty much the best thing ever.

[Gormongous]

God, I just popped into this game for a quick assassination mission and totally lost like three hours. There is nothing like Far Cry 2 for occasionally permitting me to slip into one of those lovely and only slightly problematic flow states where I kill two dozen men with a bolt-action rifle while under fire without taking a single hit or wasting a single bullet.

It reminds me of two passages from Iain M. Banks' Use of Weapons, as dorky as that is. When I'm in the zone:

He loved the plasma rifle. He was an artist with it; he could paint pictures of destruction, compose symphonies of demolition, write elegies of annihilation, using that weapon.

And when it fails me, like it always does:

He picked up the plasma rifle for the fifth or sixth time and inspected it.

It made him want to cry; it was such a beautiful weapon. Every time he picked it up he half hoped that it would be all right, that the Culture had fitted it with some self-repair facility without telling him, that the damage would be no more...

I even got a mission from that posh British mercenary in vaguely Waffen-SS gear tonight! He's my favorite guy, if that's even possible.

[Tundra]

Things got a little out of hand during my last outing:

That's the best shot i've seen so far. love the sloping savannah. Kudos Jonathan.

Yeah I'm still having a really hard time with this. I keep hitting strange fail states, I don't feel like the gunplay feels tightly tuned either. I'm getting ready to author my quitting the game post on this game. Something that constantly seems to happen to me is that a companion

I don't mind the course correction but a lot of times I have no idea what the hell I did wrong. Then when I want to reload to figure out WTF happened I have to reload from the last SAVE POINT I got to. Oh great more dull slow driving...

Save points? are you playing on a console? i highly recommend PC for this game. it looks alot better and you can quicksave with F5. might solve your issue with the gunplay too mate.

[Tundra]

also, Mayhem:

[Wodenpwn]

I'm a little late to the discussion, but I love this game! This was a way better adaptation of heart of darkness than Spec ops: the line. I played as the Seik mercenary and stopped buying things when I had the AK47, RPG and bolt action sniper rifle because they seemed to be the right weapons to use for the setting. What I really wanted for this game was co-op. Borderlands showed how much co-op brings to mediocre gun play (though I though FC2's gunfights were pretty servicable). I really wanted to roll up in a jeep full of my friends with guns blazing.

[stewmull]

i loved using the dart gun and silenced mp5, i remeber sitting across a river opposite a large complex at night. Picking a couple of guys with my dart gun. Slowely moving through the water with my mp5 and went through the entire base, killing everyone. but no alarm sounded and no one shouted out. Got to my target, took the inforamtion, shot him in the head with a silenced pistol and left. No one knew i was there. I felt like the most bad ass ops agent ever.

[gregbrown]

Setting a tree next to your safe house on fire, going to bed, and watching the tree burn in a time-lapse is pretty much the best thing ever.

I seem to remember the enemies not respecting the time-lapse, so you'd see them move as if they were in slow-motion as the day spins around them. (Also, I really enjoyed the shooting but you definitely have to respect the weapons and distances involved.)

[Vegas]

What I really wanted for this game was co-op. Borderlands showed how much co-op brings to mediocre gun play (though I though FC2's gunfights were pretty servicable). I really wanted to roll up in a jeep full of my friends with guns blazing.

I'm glad I wasn't the only one who thought this after playing borderlands. like, "this is cool, but what if we got rid of all the boring ARPG stuff and added a bunch of crazy dynamic rule sets in the game world?"

I looked for a far cry 2 co-op mod but couldn't find one

[brkl]

AFAIK there are zero Far Cry 2 mods of note. It's the furthest thing from a mod friendly game. Such a tragedy.

[Vegas]

AFAIK there are zero Far Cry 2 mods of note. It's the furthest thing from a mod friendly game. Such a tragedy.

That is a shame. Co-op made Doom 3 an amazing experience

[brkl]

I would never play anything else if there was a Far Cry 2 co-op. But it's not happening. Far Cry 3 is a far more conventional game and it does have co-op, but it's I don't think it has any free roaming component.

[Tundra]

I would never play anything else if there was a Far Cry 2 co-op. But it's not happening. Far Cry 3 is a far more conventional game and it does have co-op, but it's I don't think it has any free roaming component.

If Far Cry 2 had mods, it would be one of the few games i'd play the zombie mode. Zombies that come out at night a la Minecraft.

Zombie Zebra, need i say more.

Btw, Happy Halloween FarCriers!

[Tundra]

Another screen photo