Finished Far Cry New Dawn, some impressions so far
Likes:
- The Landscape. Even with heavy dependency on level of detail, since far off things can plop into sight. Exception are the helicopter flights, where the distance LOD is getting rather obvious.
- If the landscape, then of course level design too. No matter if rocks and woods or flower fields, or the bases and various buildings in the wild themselves, the love for detail is impressive and creates a believable world. Surely the setting reminded me every now and then on some MAD MAX movies.
- The weapon design. A Plastic bag with some buffer material as silencer, or zip ties for attachment of telescope to the weapon, gives a true feeling of a cobbled weapon. The saw blade thrower is really cool too, even if a bit too powerful (especially since it can kill multiple enemies in a row).
- The fights. Enemies going into cover, changing cover following your position changes, trying to surround you, communicating with each other and healing each other if possible, that gives interesting fast paced fights, where you have to use the environment to your advance, stay in movement and show fast reactions. Or if you see enemies in the distance and have not been discovered yet, you can take them out by some sort of long range weapon. Missing a bit the 'alarmer' type of enemy, which calls reinforcements (don't know in which Far Cry they appeared, 4 or 5 it was) if you don't take him out quickly. Maybe here reinforcements are automatically called by non silenced weapons.
- The in game songs from the radios or the guitar players in Prosperity. First time for me the music isn't tapping on my nerves in a Far Cry game, since mostly oldies ('Hold on I'm coming', 'Working in the coal mine' or 'That's the way (I like it)' for example) or guitar folk classics. Gave me sometimes even a little tear, since it reminded me on how hard the people in this post apocalyptic world may have tried to bring back the good old times before everything went out of order. Only one song felt out of place, some song with a smurf-like choir which reminded me of the music style of a composer involved in the making of 'Beyond good and evil 2'.
- The story. Two mislead sisters, a potentially dangerous cult leader with his power obsessed son, some intriguing highway men (Irving), everything inmidst some sort of civil war again, was an interesting story arc to follow.
Dislikes (New Dawn specific):
- Pubertal speech. Especially the wikibenia guy with his neverending 'what is an orgasm?' question I would sometimes liked to stick him his orgasms where the sun don't shine! But also everywhere else where NPCs were trying to be funny in a pubertal way it was more tapping on the nerves than really being funny.
- Exploding tank trucks. Especially when on the road with help on demand, which you certainly don't do again when you want to deliver the tank in one piece to the base. Maybe even Ubisoft discovered it was difficult this way to get some tanks and preferrably spawned them in the vicinity of a base, typically about 250 virtual meters round the base. Once I barely delivered a tank into a base, but before being able to exit the truck I exploded (in the death scene I saw through the open gates of the base in the distance an enemy with a rocket launcher).
- The special abilities given by Joseph Seed through taking a bite of a holy fruit. It's some kind of magic which one expects in a fantasy RPG but not in a solid ego shooter, where I expect solely bare metal weapons (or my fists) as a weapon. Hope they don't do something like this again in some Far Cry franchise games to come.
Dislikes (among several Far Cry titles, including New Dawn):
- Repetitive conquering of bases or repetitive conduct of an expedition. Storywise and in terms of story progress I like the 'one time taken, forever taken' approach, so I totally avoided to reconquer a base on rank 2 or 3 (except one where I accidentally triggered it by looting the base). I disliked it in Far Cry 4 too. What was okay for me there (and here): When coming close to a base I had conquered in the past, there where randomly spawning enemies outside the base trying to attack the base, so I was asked to help my comrades defend the base. But it's not the same as totally reconquer a base, which was and still is a no go for me.
- Killing animals for equipment. I want to kill human enemies in these kind of ego shooters, not playing a hunting simulator. As a matter of effect my rule of thumb was: If it doesn't attack you (rabbits, ducks or some cloven-hooved animals), don't kill them. Gathering plants or harvesting boxes and other containments is okay for me.
- Playing coop. I know I'm probably quite alone with this dislike in the wide world of Far Cry lovers, but I prefer to play an ego shooter alone and without enforced socialisation per design. So even didn't use the help on demand (which is an AI controlled NPC) very much.
Btw. finished the game in 84 hours (comparison: played Far Cry 5 campaign mode about 123 hours, for completionist reasons. And Far Cry 5 Arcade Editor about 201 hours, for roughly 5 maps).