Difficulty:

Just Right

Time Spent:

20 to 40 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Best in series"

Far Cry 3 is a wonderfully open FPS game which accomplishes all it sets out to(well, at least game-play-wise). Now, down to specifics:-

Presentation/UI/HUD: Some people might argue that the HUD is too obtrusive and impinges on viewing area, but that has been resolved with a recent patch. I didn't find that to be much of a problem anyway. Now, on to the menus, the handbook is wonderfully done which shows every minuscule bit of statistical data you could ever expect it to(almost GTA-like). No grousing there. But what COULD have been polished is the weapons menu. An in-game rotatable model of the weapon would have been nice with the light coruscating off it's surface and all. The text-changing loading signs and subtle audio work in the menus all bear the semblance of a AAA game. All in all, presentation is fairly good and straightforward.

Story: Okay, to put it bluntly, it sucks. It so sucks so bad that you wonder why they couldn't have just done the one advertised pre-release and just, you know, stuck to the damn plan. At times, the story-line defies rational thinking. It's got two endings out of which one has a mindless motive which further culminates into a mindless-er ending. In short, the story is the only major blemish here.

Game-play: Well, this is where it truly shines. It's thoroughly enjoyable to explore it's HUGE map to wit's end. Best adaption in an FPS I've seen so far. There are collectibles (Relics, memory cards and letters) strewn around whose locations you can get by buying appropriate maps from stores. Talking about stores, these are mostly vending machines you'll find in each safe house you get. The "Get" involves capturing enemy outposts and there are 34 outposts in the game, each netting you a safe house at that location. Story missions are varied and lots of fun. But the true fun in Far Cry 3 can be found only when you extricate yourself from the story and the explore the map. Conquering outposts may probably be the most enjoyable/rewarding/satisfying thing you may have ever done in any FPS. Stealth works almost flawlessly, though it might be a tad too forgiving at times. You can tag enemies using the camera which then allows you to track their movement even through walls(or mountain slopes). Then comes the fun part, you hunt each one silently, chaining kills when possible. Yeah, the takedowns you can do in this game are amazing; removing the pin off a grenade from an enemy and pushing him into another group of enemies, take-down one and use his knife to takedown nearby ones, takedown from above, below, etcetra. Don't want to get too close? No worries, you can take out an entire outpost using a silenced sniper rifle from an appropriate vantage point. The absolute variety of ways in which you can approach each one is truly the highlight of this game. Speaking of sniper rifles, there are around 40 weapons in this game, all of which are a joy to use. It would have been cooler if there were armories(like Far Cry 2) where you can view each weapon in-game during selection. There are radio towers scattered across the map and climbing them unlocks that region in the map much like Assassin's Creed. Each radio tower you climb makes a weapon free of cost in the stores. Some weapons have attachment slots which can be customized using optical scopes, laser scopes, silencers, increased magazine size, etcetra. They can also be coloured using the many paint-jobs available. The game also has wild animals which can be hunted down for hides used to craft different pouches which increase your ammo, loot, money, weapon and syringe carrying capacities. There are also plants which can be gleaned to craft various types of syringes. Sidequests include hunting and assassination quests; the latter being as fun as conquering outposts.There are also a lot of pointless story quests which are mainly run-and-fetch or kill-that-animal-and-report type quests which can get tedious and onerous over time. Each safe house acts as a fast travel point, so its easy to travel around (unlike Far Cry 2). All in all, game-play is pretty solid and guns look, feel and sound pretty good.

Graphics: On the PC (assuming you have a decent rig), the graphics look stunning. Explosions and alpha effects are excellent. There is a certain stuttering issue when inside closed sections like caves or houses even though I get around 40-45 fps. Many users are reporting that this happens when the fps falls below the 60 fps threshold. So apart from some minor inconsistencies, the graphics overall leave a good impression.

Audio: Yeah, yeah, top notch.

Overall: The best open-ended shooter in the market right now. Definite buy.

Score: 8.5/10