The safes aren't exactly brimming with treasure though: $250 and 4 bars of silver looking very sparse in something the size of a steamer trunk -- about as much as a bear skin plus a skunk are worth, which you can collect walking up any road.

The 'black market' [skill] AP ammo OTOH is a real game-changer.

Blowed up the giant statue of Joseph, killed Faith, blowed up the drug factory, freed the sherrif in a cascade of shootin' galleries and  missions-on-rails, which all felt pretty old as far as game design goes.

The open world game is brilliant, but whoever wrote the story with all the torture and sadism going on is kind of a sick fuck, no?

I do like Peaches.

I decided in the end that it was to distinguish your protagonist's killing from 'baddie' killing.

Yeah I get that, but it's not like the protagonist is suffocating babies or cooking parents to feed to their hungry kids. That's just OTT.

Ive sunk ~74-hours into this sucker, and the progress bar shows only 50% completion.  8-O

(I freely admit I am shilly-shallying around in the open world, doing loads of repetitive stuff, but that's how I play most games, and how I measure if they're any good. I also freely admit I had to let Peaches die, during a ferocious firefight against three LMG-wielding jesus christers  :-(( )

That's how I play games too. I don't like mopping up sub-quests after completing the main storyline, so I try to get through them early.

RIPeaches

Peaches is back in action. I've been pushing into dark areas of the map, cleaning out some prepper stashes, picking up perks and testing out new weapons. Can't figure out if Johnny is already dead or there's something I need to trigger for the showdown, haven't done Jacob yet so maybe he gotta go first. Oh, just checked out a walkthrough. There's a bunch of missions left to do initiated by assorted stupid characters which I mistook to be side missions.

> I don't like mopping up sub-quests after completing the main storyline, so I try to get through them early.

Always bugs me when games place too much urgency on the primary mission, to the extent of making you feel guilty to spend ten minutes helping a farmer.

Far Cry generally don't do that. If anything, it's too easy to lose the plot. And the plot kinda sorta doesn't actually matter anyway, which is good, because it's stupid.

Will you be having a go at the "New Dawn" sequel?

Defo. FarCry+ve, sad though that is to admit. But I'm giving it time, maybe to a price slice. I was a bit cross with 5

50% off at ubi store ATM.

Why were you cross with 5?

The ending. We'll discuss it when you get there. Thanks for the heads-up about the reduction btw. I'll probably pick it up.

I have an inkling about that, based on the premise of "New Dawn". I was put off by the marketing, with the crazy Fortnite -ish neon color scheme (which already blights some of the guns in 5), but the trailer makes it look like more of a 3/4/5 re-skin, complete with tedious villains*.

I'm eyeing the 'Nam DLC for 5.


*the characters are actually pretty interesting, it's all the cut scenes and phony fights in lala land that makes 'em tiresome.

The Vietnam DLC is fun. Short, but fun and with good reasons to replay.

I always like the fantastic bits of FC, whether it's hallucinatory quests or alternative worlds, and I think New Dawn may have some of that vibe throughout, so I'm looking forward to it. I'm just a bit too mean to pay full-game price for what is, in essence, a DLC itself.

I find the fantastic bits in FC (notably 4, and to a far lesser extent 5) are kind of interesting, but waaay overdone as central story elements. Having used aplenty from the supermarket of pharma, the virtual experience doesn't really cut it for me.

What I like about 5 moreso than 3 and 4, and I think this is also why you like 4 (as you mentioned), is that it is grounded in a reality I can directly relate to, having grown up and substantially lived in rural (both Northern and Southern) Usian communities. 5 quite accurately models rural Americana, the mix of down-to-earth charm with firearms-and-religion psychosis. And the landscape is spot on, it's like a hike in the wilderness without the fresh air and exercise.

Yes, the druggy bits are a bit like what people who hadn't done hallucinogens would do if they were imagining what trips were like, which may well be the case. (side note: VR is much more like hallucination or dream than flat games. Somebody should be designing VR digital trip simulations at the moment - I'm sure there would be huge market for it). I still enjoy them (the FC levels), though, for their randomness.

Interesting point about engaging with FC5 more strongly through familiarity. I designed a couple of games for heritage trusts based around their properties - Belsay Hall in Northumberland and Knaresborough Castle - and before that I commissioned my Art Gallery, Cartwright Hall , to be made into an Unreal Tournament map. It was always very odd, playing these places in-game and then walking through the actual architecture - some kind of uncanny valley thing going on.

I attended the Yorkshire Games Conference a few weeks ago and a level designer from Hitman 2 was showing how meticulously they were designing levels on real locations.

I'm not sure which drug(s) 5 models, though I suspect opioids -- 4 is deffo shrooms/acid/mescaline type stuff. It simulates some of the visual effects pretty good. What a virtual simulation can't do is superimpose your own memories, imaginings, fears &ct. on the observed world, which to me is how hallucinations and dreams work. So it very quickly degrades from 'gee, this is neat' to 'meh, another stupid computer trick'. Maybe it's more vivid in VR, I dunno. Straight up open world games definitely influence how I look at the real world with the uncanny valley thing. Best recent (2019) movie I've seen about that is Serenity  -- just naming it is actually a spoiler!

Edit: Nam's aboard.

Thanks for the heads up about the discount on FC5: New Dawn. I supplemented that with an additional 20% discount claimed with some Ubi-point things I didn't know existed until Pere Ubi told me in very timely fashion that they were about to expire. I ended up paying 13 and a bit quid for it, which seemed fair.

Life then promptly changed in turbo gear in a deliberate conspiracy to prevent me from getting so much as a sniff at the credits, so first impressions will have to wait until this evening.

I started up the 'Nam DLC and thus finding the world underpopulated with, you know enemies as I stumble around in the jungle, which kind of resembles a golf course that hasn't been mowed in a couple of weeks, with some trees and big-ass rocks. Anyhoo there are a bunch of 'side-missions' available in a menu, so I suppose the onus is on me to go find the action. On the bright side, returning to FC5 I find the gun locker has been restocked with some nice 'Nam-era toys, including a pretty decent M16. I did my time in the Jacob shooting gallery (BOORING!!!) and now happily back open-worlding in the White Mountains, where the terrain is breathtaking.