Far Cry 2

[Singular Intellect]

Oh, because it's so much fun to sit on a bus and slowly rumble down the dirt roads. Maybe watch a few zebras go by the window.

Actually, that would be cool feature. Of course some itchy trigger finger individuals might find that boring, but then it's an option, not a necessary means of travel. Not mention there could chances of a mission coming out of just riding the damn thing, like talking to another passenger, bus gets pulled over by bad guys, etc.

[Ford Prefect]

Oh, because it's so much fun to sit on a bus and slowly rumble down the dirt roads. Maybe watch a few zebras go by the window.

In some of my lesser moments, I have considered long distance travel via trains. Not willing to include dirty loading screens in my head, I imagined a system by which you could sit through the entire trip (or explore the train, get quests and whatnot), or you could time-lapse the whole shebang and get it done faster. The time-lapse when you're sleeping in Far Cry is already pretty cool. You could apply it to bus rides (I guess).

I have played a fair amount of this game, and I'm impressed by it. It looks great, has a good atmosphere (stabilising critical health, for example, really gives the impression of being stuck in an African warzone, even if it's cosmetic) and is fun to play. I miss being able to cut down trees with ease, but that's trvial and setting them on fire is even better. The Jackal is also a great villain, if only from execution. His characterm odel seems familiar though - does anyone know if he was based on an actor or something?

[Darwin]

too much texture and geometry pop-in for a PC title, some strange limits on the control customization and the shadows especially are wacky, showing as shimmery diamonds until you get close enough for them to conspicuously switch over to full shadows.

What hardware you running? I hadn't noticed anything like that on my 8600.

Though I did notice the console-itis with the combat; no lean, prone or weapons customization.

8800GTX. I should try and get a screenshot. there's one particular building on the south side of the first main town that shows it really conspicuously.

[Darwin]

8800GTX. I should try and get a screenshot. there's one particular building on the south side of the first main town that shows it really conspicuously.

three screenshots to show what the shadows are doing. It's a bit late in the day, if I had hit it earlier, it would be a bit more obvious.

As I approach the dark colored shack on the right, shadows from the tree are visible as odd diamond shapes.

Getting closer, a line climbs up the building changing the diamonds to high detail shadows.

At about 20 yards, the entire building face has resolved in high detail shadows

[Rightous Fist Of Heaven]

Been playing it for 10 hours total now and liking it quite a bit more than Crysis. Though one of the things I found annoying was the fact that those pesky checkpoints dotting every road get re-populated a tad too fast. Really, I come to a checkpoint, waste the motherfuckers hanging at it and return in 10 minutes to find an all new crew present. Although having now moved over to the second map area and finding plenty of vehicles with either mounted .50 cal machine guns or MK-19's, cleaning the points is far less of a chore. Just park the damn jeep and lay down some ma-deuce fire or 40mm grenades in rapid succession

[Singular Intellect]

three screenshots to show what the shadows are doing. It's a bit late in the day, if I had hit it earlier, it would be a bit more obvious.

As I approach the dark colored shack on the right, shadows from the tree are visible as odd diamond shapes.

Getting closer, a line climbs up the building changing the diamonds to high detail shadows.

At about 20 yards, the entire building face has resolved in high detail shadows

What settings are you running on, Darwin? I must admit I never noticed anything like this, and I'll try to look for it next time.

[Singular Intellect]

Well, after more experience with the game I can admit it's becoming somewhat addictive. First I'll get the additional complaints out of the way:

-some noticeable problems with key bindings...I use Enter to toggle interaction with vehicles and such, but I'm forced to use the 'e' key if I want to leave a gun turret. Very annoying...I have to use 'a' and 'd' to change my watch for time lapse, when those bindings don't exist in my control setup.

-modifying weapons on the fly isn't there, something I had expected the game to have simliar to Crysis. You can still buy modified ones which is okay.

-minor bug where the cell phone rings and the voice doesn't show up; at first I thought it was a realism effort whereas you lost the signal, but missions would show up right after.

-as previously mentioned, the guard posts reset far too quickly; it seems you only need to get a certain distance away before they get completely remanned and gunned.

-limited world interaction is something that I've noticed; in Crysis you can pick up just about anything you can realistically expect to; FC2 doesn't let you pick up shit and you just run over ammo to grab it. This is annoying as I liked Crysis's feature of allowing you to toss objects somewhere to distract the AI by investigating it and physially grabbing your items.

Nevertheless, I'm having a riot doing missions and now I'm more interested in them as a means to acquire more powerful and advanced weapons.

I had to force myself into bed last night around 2am because I just couldn't pull myself away; I'm being a complete asshole and killing every buddy I make...I want to see what happens.

The dynamics weather system is awesome, I noticed the wind picking up quite a bit, and next thing you know it's raining. I love it.

In comparison to Crysis, Far Cry 2 has some real advantages, but some noticeable disadvantages. Right now I'd call them about even in terms of enjoyability for me, although Far Cry 2 seems much more likely for replayability in single player.

[charlemagne]

Been only playing for maybe 1 hour now, but oh my god, this game is pretty. It also runs perfectly on my machine (8800 GT and 4 GB RAM but only 1,8gh dualcore CPU), this engine is a lot better than the Crysis one.

[Darwin]

three screenshots to show what the shadows are doing. It's a bit late in the day, if I had hit it earlier, it would be a bit more obvious.

As I approach the dark colored shack on the right, shadows from the tree are visible as odd diamond shapes.

Getting closer, a line climbs up the building changing the diamonds to high detail shadows.

At about 20 yards, the entire building face has resolved in high detail shadows

What settings are you running on, Darwin? I must admit I never noticed anything like this, and I'll try to look for it next time.

Funny you should ask.

Ubisoft got the bright idea to call the settings High, Very high, and Ultra high. I had started the game at Very High, just assuming that that was the best setting. This is stupid like fast food places where their only drink sizes are large, extra large, and bladder buster.

[charlemagne]

Ubisoft got the bright idea to call the settings High, Very high, and Ultra high. I had started the game at Very High, just assuming that that was the best setting. This is stupid like fast food places where their only drink sizes are large, extra large, and bladder buster.

Yeah, that's a "trend" in game settings I don't get either. There's usually also settings that only go to "High", while others go to "Very High", and a few up to "Ultra High", which is really confusing when you're playing around with settings. Would it be so hard to call the highest setting "Highest" if you have to go beyond just "Low, Medium, High"?

[Mr Bean]

Funny you should ask.

Ubisoft got the bright idea to call the settings High, Very high, and Ultra high. I had started the game at Very High, just assuming that that was the best setting. This is stupid like fast food places where their only drink sizes are large, extra large, and bladder buster.

Let me take issue with that, except for "bladder buster" that was pretty much how my child-hood movie theater marketed it's drinks. There was medium(28 oz), Large(36 oz), Extra Large (48oz) and the Mega(64 oz).

By Xenu if you payed for a large, you GOT a large.

However in Farcry's cases, much like with Crysis, I believe the reason they split them into very high and ultra high is due to texture size. Don't turn on ultra high unless your card has a gig of memory on it sort of a thing since it's using 2048x textures instead of the current high end 1024x textures.


*Edit yes, High is 512 x 512, Very High is 1024x1024 texures and Ultra high is 2024x2024. The difference between them is of course sharper graphics at the expensive of need allot more video memory.

[CaptHawkeye]

Man, I keep thinking i'm about to get tired of the game but I never do. I haven't even bothered with the stupid multiplayer or "special content" for us pre-order posers.

I only wish the game had allowed the pleasure of the original model iron sight Springfield rifles. Stupid EA and Activision have convinced everyone the Springfield was only ever a sniper rifle.

[Stark]

Been only playing for maybe 1 hour now, but oh my god, this game is pretty. It also runs perfectly on my machine (8800 GT and 4 GB RAM but only 1,8gh dualcore CPU), this engine is a lot better than the Crysis one.

I'm on a similar rig, and I've got the same experience - Crysis didn't need the huge computer ignorant people like to think, but I can run Far Cry on medium-high (no I'm not using their stupid ZOMG HUGE names) with Dx10 and all the post effects on. My only complaint is that (like Crysis) some of the textures look pretty bad, but generally on objects, unlike Crysis where it was things like terrain textures that sucked even on ultra-mega high.

Bubble Boy, I think if you press interact while the phone animation is going, he puts it away - I've done this deliberately in many firefights. You hang up on whoever it is, but you still get the objectives etc. I also played the game until 2am... a serious change from Crysis, where I was bored in ten minutes.

It kinda amuses me that people run on marketing checkboxes, though. Sure, the lack of weapon modification (for instance) is probably bad in a modern game, but you're some disease ridden nobody in backwood Failed Statia. I don't think you have an infinite number of suppressors on you the way Nanoman did. My only problem with the ammo thing is how it seems borked; when I was using the 4-shot nade launcher as primary, the primary (bullet) pickup didn't reload it, nor did the toolbox'o nades. It occassionally filled up, but I have absolutely no idea what type of pickup does that. Shame too, that gun lets you just flatten whole villages instead of the 'firefight' thing.

Sadly, weapons that get rusty enough actually break eventually.

[JointStrikeFighter]

Those grenade ammo boxes refill the M79 stark.

Also that reminds me, I am going to die soon if i don't get some more meds lol.

[Vympel]

Well high quality rifle suppressors nowadays have a claimed service life of 30,000 rounds, I don't see why Nomad/ Psycho's suppressors in Crysis should wear out or need to be replaced. I'd despise it if it was like Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4 (even though suppressors were never in short supply).

On the other hand, I must say I prefer Crysis' feel when firing and killing to Far Cry 2, but that's purely subjective - I've only just started playing and so I have no experience with any other firearm but the G3KA4. I've given it an "accuracy upgrade" whatever that means

When I first got the flamethrower, it jammed on me after a few tries because obviously it was a piece of shit I had picked up, was funny watching my guy try and fix it when I was assaulting the slaughterhouse.

Oh, and are you supposed to "die" when the Jackal talks to you in the hotel and then the town is attacked, or can you actually get away?

[Singular Intellect]

I've given it an "accuracy upgrade" whatever that means

Things like 'accuracy upgrade' and 'reliability upgrade' are under the computer's purchase system called 'Manuals'. You're not actually 'upgrading' the weapons, you're just reading up on how to hold them properly and maintain them in better condition.

When I first got the flamethrower, it jammed on me after a few tries because obviously it was a piece of shit I had picked up, was funny watching my guy try and fix it when I was assaulting the slaughterhouse.

Oh, and are you supposed to "die" when the Jackal talks to you in the hotel and then the town is attacked, or can you actually get away?

I got away, but regardless you have to knock out one way or anotherin order to get to the next part of the game.

[Flash]

I got away, but regardless you have to knock out one way or anotherin order to get to the next part of the game.

Yeah, after a certain amount of time you just pass out. The first time I played I got stuck in a shootout at the front door of the hotel and thought i'd fucked it when I went down.

Started again to test a few things, and that time I went out a second floor window and legged it. Made it halfway across the bridge out of town before I passed out.

[Stark]

Well high quality rifle suppressors nowadays have a claimed service life of 30,000 rounds, I don't see why Nomad/ Psycho's suppressors in Crysis should wear out or need to be replaced. I'd despise it if it was like Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4 (even though suppressors were never in short supply).

I guess you never noticed how he always had a supressor ready to fit to any gun? You can walk through the game putting a supressor on every gun you find, and leave a trail of acog'd AKs behind you! Military trivia is meaningless when confronted with this obvious infinite source of addons, inappropriate to the tone of a 'yeah you're in a desert and fucked' game.

The buddies annoy me because you can't tell them to fuck off; I got bailed out by bandana man, killed everyone, jumped in a car and pissed off... and apparently he just sat there until he died, because he's dead now. I didn't even notice until I was aimlessly poking around my journal. Huzz... ah?

[JointStrikeFighter]

Incidently has anyone found any hangliders yet?

[Pulp Hero]

Started again to test a few things, and that time I went out a second floor window and legged it. Made it halfway across the bridge out of town before I passed out.

I made it exactly to where the bridge starts on the first try, I thought I'd tripped a scripted event, but its cool to know you can get a little farther.

The game is fun on my 360, but I am really raging over the fact there is no prone and no suppressors. That fact means I can't do covert ninja-ops on my missions.

[Darwin]

However in Farcry's cases, much like with Crysis, I believe the reason they split them into very high and ultra high is due to texture size. Don't turn on ultra high unless your card has a gig of memory on it sort of a thing since it's using 2048x textures instead of the current high end 1024x textures.


*Edit yes, High is 512 x 512, Very High is 1024x1024 texures and Ultra high is 2024x2024. The difference between them is of course sharper graphics at the expensive of need allot more video memory.

I've got a 768mb 8800GTX, so I'm good with the big textures.

my main complaint is the condom-style naming conventions here.

[Darwin]

Started again to test a few things, and that time I went out a second floor window and legged it. Made it halfway across the bridge out of town before I passed out.

I made it exactly to where the bridge starts on the first try, I thought I'd tripped a scripted event, but its cool to know you can get a little farther.

The game is fun on my 360, but I am really raging over the fact there is no prone and no suppressors. That fact means I can't do covert ninja-ops on my missions.

There's 3 silent weapons (not including the machete) and they're all decent.

[Stark]

Yeah, the suppressed pistol is accurate enough to snipe with out to mid range, and it's cheap as fuck. Speaking of weapon issues, I'm really quite impressed overall with the lack of conefire and forced weapon balancing. The machine pistols are really quite effective, only limited by the lack of pickups for their ammotype on badguys, whereas I expected them to be super-retarded conefire silliness.

I'm getting kinda cranky at the arms dealer limit, though; I busted out to the flamer in about half an hour, and now he's just gone. I imagine he'll return later, but I have little interest in the silly 'shoot man in house' missions that all boil down to 'snipe from 300m away with pistol' or 'burn entire savannah down, shoot guy'. I got so sad when my Barret exploded that I went and bought an SVD, even though I'm one arms-dealer mission away from being able to buy the 50cal. Then again, the SVD still one-shots everyone and just seems to have a lower zoom and a bigger clip, so maybe it's not so bad.

EDIT - speaking of the machete, it might be silent but the game still features psychic guards. On the cel-assassin mission with the target in Pala, I chopped that guy up good with nobody around and no noise, but everyone still wanted to kill me. It's not hard to get away (indeed I only saw one guy try to stop me) but that shit is annoying. In regular missions you can snipe and chop your way through guys silently, however.

[Singular Intellect]

Incidently has anyone found any hangliders yet?

I found one in the first level, and tried it out. It kinda sucked...there was very little control (plus it defaulted the controls with it and I had to fucking use 'w' 'a' 'd' again).

Despite what irritating things this game does have here and there, I'm completely impressed with it. Example:

I was driving to my next mission, minding my own business, when this little fucker in a jeep starts chasing me. I'm moving at a good clip, but decide to jump into the gunner position anyhow. I start shooting the shit out of his vehicle and kill him quickly, but not before the fucker rear ends me and keeps on going. That took me by surprise, since they don't usually do that; so when I killed him my vehicle still had a lot of speed, so I turned my turret around to see where the hell I was going...just in time to see the edge of the upcoming cliff and river below. My vehicle flew in the air and landed in the water. I survived, but lost my vehicle and had to hike to the next spot I could find or jack one.

It was a frigging movie scene, I swear!

[Covenant]

8800GTX. I should try and get a screenshot. there's one particular building on the south side of the first main town that shows it really conspicuously.

three screenshots to show what the shadows are doing. It's a bit late in the day, if I had hit it earlier, it would be a bit more obvious.

As I approach the dark colored shack on the right, shadows from the tree are visible as odd diamond shapes.

Getting closer, a line climbs up the building changing the diamonds to high detail shadows.

At about 20 yards, the entire building face has resolved in high detail shadows

This is artifacting from alpha maps. In 3D texturing, alpha maps are a way to apply 'transparency' to a model so that the final render looks like it has clear spots even when it's solid geometry. The leaves of that tree are not actually rounded, they're diamond shapes, with a leaf-and-transparent color texture applied to them. However, alpha map rendering is a bit of effort for computers and graphical processors, so your settings are probably telling the game not to render the alpha maps until you get close, so at certain distances in certain situations the game may choose to render the diamond shape instead of the textured shadow shape to save on effort.

Normally they make the leaves flat planes, not diamonds. I assume they made them diamonds this time just for this reason, to allow the game to 'cheat' occasionally and make the non-alpha shape still look remotely leaflike. If you want to fix this, either look for an alpha map setting or a shadow quality setting.