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  1. #1

    Forced helplessness, constant captures, and unconvincing cult leaders.

    Frankly, this game was incredibly frustrating to play. None of the cult leaders have any charisma at all, none of them have anything inspired or quotable to say. They just rant about 'having faith' (from a girl named Faith, very imaginative) or 'cleansing sin' or whatever
    Your standard 'crazy tv cultist' nonsense. Pure drivel, zero inspiration.

    If your material for the enemies is this weak, then maybe it's not a good idea to ties the PC to a chair and have the bad guy rant at them for ten minutes... three times per villain.
    Straight up, they have absolutely nothing to say. I might as well have been listening to TV static.

    I'll be honest, faith was so bad that I'd Fast Travel as soon as she started talking, or alt-tab out if I was trapped in a cutscene with her.
    If you're not going to let me point out how stupid and hypocritical she's being, then atleast let me punch her in the throat in the middle of her stupid monologue.

    Actually, Faith was especially bad because everyone talks her up as a big lying manipulator, but she completely fails to bring up anything even slightly compelling. She just rants about her path, the 'beauty' of the conversion process at Camp Misery (which should only serve to turn the Rookie against her more, given that he just shot all of her torturers and blew up her priestess with a missile launcher, so he clearly doesn't agree on that note) and locks you into cutscenes where you HAVE to do as she says, regardless of how unconvincing she is.

    I waited at the terribly unimaginatively named 'Leap of Faith' for 50 minutes, hoping for an alternate way to get out of that mission. Having the drugs wear off and you come to your senses still on the statue, before looking over the edge and seeing the pile of broken bodies and realising that she just tried to trick you into jumping to your death, would have been a much better outcome than 'No, you have to jump but you somehow survive and look around to see dozens of people who didn't' nonsense.

    Next I'm trapped in the 'follow the path' scene where I immediately go beyond the bounds of the path and are teleported back into the centre five times, as faith grows more and more exasperated with me, except then she just runs out of lines and the game won't proceed until I do what she tells me to.

    Why isn't there an option to tell her to eat a **** and stumble off on your own to try to shake off the drug-fugue?
    You added in an option that's literally just 'give up and go home' at the start of the game, but there's no option to try to actually oppose the villain's plots in the cutscenes?

    This game really feels torn. On one hand the game-play is all about resisting the cult and is chock filled with great game-play to make you want to play more, but every single cutscene seems to be telling you to give in to the Seeds, to do what they want, not oppose the cult.
    Even the way the capture sequences play out does that it a meta-sense, by making it painful to continue playing, to the point where it's tempting to just totally give up on the game and not come back to it.

    It feels like there are two designers on this game. The gameplay designer who wanted to make a decent and successful farcry game who you fight the baddies and depose some group of evil fanaticics who kidnap, torture and murder people, and the narrative designer who wanted to convince you not to do any of the game-play because the villains are right. (while ignoring that they're still evil cultists who need to die)

    The fact that the final villain doesn't get his comeuppance until the sequel, and that the hero fails and is broken into a cultist himself by the time New Dawn comes around is massively disappointing.

    It's a game that literally doesn't have a 'Good' ending, only three diffrent flavours of 'bad'
    Who thought that was a good idea?

    The shooting is fun tho.
    end review, 5/10, buy on sale (no more than £10) play solely for the shooting and ideally see if you can find a mod that straight-up rips out all the really stupid parts, like the capture sequences or maybe every scene where the villains have dialogue.
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  2. #2
    Kubik_715's Avatar Banned
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    So, we are very different. I give the game 100 / 10, for me FC5 is the best from series. And New Dawn... amazing! I would be glad if there was an option to join the Eden's Gate (maybe as DLC)...
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  3. #3
    Originally Posted by FledMagician Go to original post

    This game really feels torn. On one hand the game-play is all about resisting the cult and is chock filled with great game-play to make you want to play more, but every single cutscene seems to be telling you to give in to the Seeds, to do what they want, not oppose the cult.
    Yeah.....That was the Plan! To tear you apart from inside. When you are not sure - are you on the right side of the history or not. No one is angel in Far Cry. Even if you think you are right and your intentions are good.....never forget - Hell is paved with good intentions! And every brick you laid on this road of liberation may be nothing but one more step closer to hell. Life is more complicated than it seems. Life is not only black and white, not only day and night, there are evening,morning...there are many other colors. Life is not only Evil and Good. For children, yes, they should be taught directly - this is good and this is bad. They are little and don't understand many things - adults should give them compass....orientation...basis. Don't do to another person what you don't want to do to yourself. But life of an adult is much complicated....it's hard to understand where evil and good. Sometimes the boundaries are blurred, one flows into another....and this is Far Cry theme. Deep and philosophical.
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  4. #4
    crunc01's Avatar Member
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    FC 5 the best Far Cry to date aside from the forced capture and Points escalating way too fast. next to me was New Dawn aside from the damn RPG weapon tiers and ect..
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  5. #5
    crunc01's Avatar Member
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    btw you a very long winded to say you hate the game.. LOL
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  6. #6
    Kubik_715's Avatar Banned
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    Moreover you can install a mod where you can set up RP as you want.

    damn RPG weapon tiers
    In FC4 players didn't like climbing towers, so Ubi removed them, in FC5 players didn't like RP, so Ubi removed them, now in FCND player don't like RPG style, so what will be in next FC? It's hard to make a game that everyone will like.
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  7. #7
    KrayZee_'s Avatar Senior Member
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    The Far Cry 5 villains are not trying to inspire you at all. They are trying to brainwash you. John 'baptizes' his victims with water pollution, expecting to convert them into their religious cult with this method. Jacob uses torture to brainwash his victims and turn them into weapons. His methods include starvation, music and repetition. Faith charms her victims with air pollution and her method is hallucination. She wants her victims to escape cruel reality and embrace a harmonious world inside their head. In the end, that's why it seems like Joseph always wins.


    The theme for Far Cry 1 and Far Cry Instincts is survival that eventually leads up to putting a stop to a mad scientist. Far Cry 2 is a civil war in an African country, but everyone is in the gray area. Far Cry 3's theme is about insanity that very much correlates to Harvey Dent's quote from The Dark Knight film. 'You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.' Far Cry 4 is about a son fulfilling his mother's dying wish while everything else is irrelevant. Far Cry 5 is about brainwashing.

    Joseph is willing to kill anyone who stands in his way. However, when Joseph realized that he created a serial killer that threatens his doomsday cult, the only thing he wants to do is forgive the Deputy. The Seed family could kill the Deputy anytime they want if necessary, but killing the Deputy will not stop the resistance that the Deputy just started. If killing the Deputy won't stop the resistance, then forced brainwashing might. Both John and Faith failed to brainwash the Deputy except Jacob. John failed to convince the Deputy to become a cultist willingly, and Faith failed to turn the Deputy into an angel. Jacob succeeded, but it lead to his own death. In my opinion, Far Cry New Dawn is not canon. In New Dawn, it appears that Joseph successfully brainwashed the Deputy. However, the Deputy experienced enough brainwashing techniques that lead him or herself believing the world has ended and is convinced its his or her fault. In a narrative perspective, forced capture actually makes sense. The player, which is you, is reluctant and hates being captured. That's the point. The entire region of Henbane River is heavily polluted with bliss, which is why everyone easily hallucinates no matter where they are. When Ubisoft was making Far Cry 2 and the player is forced to shoot or inject morphine to their buddies. When one of the players and testers experienced that as the devs were watching them play, that's exactly what the devs were going for. The player thinks it's unfair and should be mindful about how many syringes they possess and how often are they going to revive their buddies. If they have no choice but to end their suffering, then so be it. The fact that so many people whined a lot, Ubisoft had to change how Far Cry works for Far Cry 3. When some people whined about climbing radio towers, Ubisoft had to listen. Ubisoft still wanted to design puzzles and platforming, so they that possible with prepper stashes since they can't do radio towers anymore. People didn't like hunting animals to craft better gear, but Ubisoft still wanted to keep hunting part of the game. Instead of crafting, the purpose of hunting and fishing in Far Cry 5 is to make money.

    Far Cry New Dawn lacks the 'forced capture' segments, but it was awfully strange that the player is forced to handcuff themselves and get tortured in the process. It made sense in a narrative perspective if you were captured and felt helpless. It doesn't make any sense to me by putting your gear in a bag, and then enter a room just to feel helpless in a situation that the player could easily prevent.

    I'm really tired of people whining so much. I don't mind criticisms, but I find the complaints about forced capture ridiculous. It's interesting how people don't seem to care much about being captured in a linear single player game, but they hate being captured in an open world game like Far Cry 5.
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  8. #8
    Honestly you sound like one of those typical fps gamer kids who really dosent care about/or understands the story and the villains at all and just complaining because you dont get your happy ending.
    "The villains are all just evil psychopaths who needs to die, and we are COMPLETELY the good guy here who do the right thing the COMPLETELY right way..." Full of pride... Yeah very simple minded way of looking at it... (No offense... The way you expresse you opinion just sounds very simple minded and like you dosent even care to learn about characters and story)

    A "police officer"(Cough yeah i know) who starts a civil war and runs around and actively seeks to kill people without having any knowledge about them just because some redneck teels you to, and never shows signs of acting like an actual good guy or law enforcement officer. Murdering hundreds of people indiscriminately, Teaming up with criminals from the resistance and setting people on fire and blowing everything up. Furtermore shows zero interest in helping brainwashed flawed people out(Even when they are redeemable) as they for instance just leaves a crying, victimized, brainwashed, unarmed and injured girl to bleed out/drown in a river without even TRYING to do SOMETHING. A person who is completely brainwashed herself and a person who shows deep internal struggle... Yeah what a hero and a good guy we got here! Acts with zero understanding to everything... The deputy is a pathetic excuse of a hero or a good guy if you ask me. Extremely unuanced and absolute minded. There is not really any reason to call the deputy a good guy in reality even tho they actually are supposed to be in this game . Just another killer robot... So no. The good guy in this game is really not a good guy at all who actually acts like a good person

    As many people(i can see in this forum) who play this game it seems like you completely missed a lot of things about the whole cult and the villains. If you see it this simple minded way as you describe it is probably because you dosent even try to understand the villains and their motivation and also dosent read notes and even bother to pay attention to them...
    I agree that the way the story is executed is a bit sloppy with the way they misused the silent protagonist and just didnt allow ANY agency and choices in the story, and also other things like how they use the bliss as magic plot tool without sense of logic and further explanation and basically how the story is executed in general, but the villains and how the cult works and how a cult keeps it together and how people are getting tricked and brainwashed into such cults are very well made... How they show that many people in the cult are not necessarily evil minded, but deeply brainwashed and indoctrinated to adhere to a viewpoint and also how they show the whole purpose of the cult. "preparing for the collapse which they KNOW is comming soon". Everything they are doing is based on preparing and survive the collapse, and it makes sense(mostly).
    The villains is to my mind is the most well made and realistic villains in any far cry game to this date, Because they actually have great reason and purpose for what they are doing... If you actually try to understand and read notes and listen to phone messages and basically just immerse yourself in the story, and maybe most importantly try to see THEIR point of view and try to see how THEY look at things they are doing and put it together with their stories given...

    Yeah Faith is called a liar and a manipulator to the max like you say and yeah she is acting hypocritical but the point is really not that you as a player should be "convinced" by her like that as you say. You should understand the point of her character and why she is like that, why she thinks that way and in her case how she is brainwashed and manipulated herself. She is not consciously trying to lie to you or manipulate you like the resistance are saying. In her case she is merely just corrupted and manipulated herself by this druggy bliss world she is hooked on, to think she is providing you with happiness... (bliss) and that is why she is hypocritical and seems like a liar who is trying to deceive you. The point of her character is that as you progress in her region you should see that she is victim of this bliss herself and that the bliss distorts her perception of reality as much as everyone else... There is also a lot of notes in her region who confirms this point.
    So it dosent seems like you actually pay attetion to anything in the story if you are just thinking "Come on why cant i punch her in the face" and "ahh come on leave me you are just crazy and everything you are saying is nonsense" and so on...
    You should not feel directly convinced(or want to surrender to the bliss yourself lol)as it is pretty clear that we are not affected by any mindcontrol behind a screen so it is hard to "feel convinced" as a player, but you should see how some vulnerable people are getting tricked or dragged into it and how different kind of people can be twisted and brainwashed by people like Joseph who "welcomes and accepts" them and provides them with a community bound them together and furthermore "helps them on the way with drugs" like in real cults too...

    Also Jacob who have some actual true points about survival and makes great sense in terms of preparing and it also makes sense why he got this extreme this way and why he thinks this way when you hear and actually PAY ATTENTION to his backstory

    Lastly the whole story, the ending and how it is happening is based much on the book of revelation and Joseph and his heralds are based on the four horsemen of the apocalypse. You the deputy are somehow sent to open the 7 seals to bring the world into flames like Joseph knows basically from the start as he also tells everytime a new seal is oppening. The heralds all the time tells you(the player)in subtle ways that he is right about the collapse and you are not helping people in the long run. (By destroying their well prepared cult and shelters)
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  9. #9
    Ubi-RealDude's Avatar Community Manager
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    It's incredibly fascinating to hear the different 'readings' of the text on display here; in terms of gameplay, narrative, and the intersections between. Very very interesting.
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  10. #10
    The thing I find most interesting, is that the history of Montana (specifically Butte) is almost never mentioned by people supposedly critiqueing the writing, and yet feature prominently in FC5, at least in terms of influence.

    The rise and collapse of the copper-mining hayday, the indulgence and 'sins' of the people who reaped the wealth, and the resulting pollution of the environment (which is still a problem to this day) etc... All feature heavilly as metaphors in FC5.

    In reality the writing in FC5 is great. It's just a shame more people don't bother to make the effort to understand it.
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