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Far Cry 4 (2014) Review 10 years later.
8 months ago
General
This game should be called Near Cry 4 because of how closely it plays like Far Cry 3.
And that's really all I can say about this game. If you loved Far Cry 3 and wanted more of it, Far Cry 4 is your thing. In some ways, Far Cry 4 is an improvement over Far Cry 3 with a larger world, more beautiful graphics, and a world that feels like you're in Nepal. Unfortunate, you get a story that falls short with a great villain that is woefully underutilized and a map that is too large for what it actually is full of filler and fluff content.
Far Cry 4 starts with you playing as Ajay Ghale, son of the legendary revolutionary leader Mohan Ghale who led the Golden Path, an organized resistance group taking arms against the tyrannical King Pagan Min who rules Kyrat (basically a fictionalized version of Nepal/Tibet) with an iron fist. Ajay is there to spread the ashes of his deceased mother at a place called Lakshmana. You get invited to Pagan's palace where you can choose to go to Lakshmana with Min or escape his palace and take arms against him choosing to work with the two leaders of the Golden Path; the progressive and pragmatic Amita and the traditional idealistic Sabal who are at each other's throats.
The thing that disappoints me about the story is that there are legit some good plot hooks that are severely underutilized. You likley already know that Far Cry 4 has a secret ending where you can wait in Pagan's palce for 15 minutes to get a secret ending where he takes you to Lakshmana and ends the game there. I wish you actually had a choice to choose to side with Pagan Min because he's a charismatic villain who just doesn't get enough screen time. No surprise but you find out that Amita is just another Pagan Min who wants to turn Kyrat into a drug state with child soldiers destroying buddhist temples and icons considered sacred to the Kyrati people. Sabal leads the country into an economically bankrupt theocracy as he turns into a religious fanatic who cant stop glazing Ajay's dad and kills off anyone who isn't a Buddhist. And given the context of those two endings, you really should have gotten the choice to fight for Pagan Min because the "good guys" are actually bad including Ajay's dad as a full villain play-through where you get revenge on Amita and Sabal for using you to fulfill their extremist ends.
Ajay is a crappy protagonist to boot because he esentially gets pushed around by Amita and Sabal in the main game behaving like a dumb silent protragonist when the game should have made Ajay more assertive and basically tell off Amita, Sabal, and Min to help sell his character. Ajay spends too much time being sildent and letting people order him around when the story would have benefited from Ajay pushing back against other characters and saying his side of the story and thoughts instead of being steamrolled in cutscenes. If you're gonna give me a voiced character with an established backstory, USE IT! I also find it hilarious that Ajay keeps going back to the stoner duo who drugged and kidnapped Ajay for several sidequests because Ajay is not permitted to stand up for himself. The stoners are even squatting on his father's property for FREE! Honestly, its just seems that Ajay is forced to carry the idiot ball instead of throwing it back and telling other characters to fuck off.
And honestly, i'm harsh on the story because this is a game that comes close to making a meaningful message but fucks it all up. Amita and Sabal are both different shades of Pol Pot, a brutal Communist Cambodian dictator who led the Khmer Rouge and committed multiple genocides/purges of undesirables. I feel that the story should have continued after you usurp Pagan Min in which you now have to fight against the Golden Path to remove Amita or Sabal with Ajay being furious that he was tricked by them into a real boss battle and give a proper ending to Ajay's story. It should have not ended with Pagan being deposed but ended with Ajay cutting through their bullshit and give Kyrat a chance to breathe from the grasp of multiple power hungry cunts. Instead, all you get is a post-game cutscene showing how bad Sabal and Amita are which feels unsastifying. Perhaps realistic but I would have liked something more than the current ending.
Really, I just wish we got a more vocal and cutthroat Ajay alongside a more prominent Pagan Min who gives you the option to pick his side over the Golden Path. For how weak the story is, Ubisoft is able to make the shocking moments feel real because initially, I sided with Amita back in 2015 as I disliked child marriage and Sabal's religious fundamentalism / disdain of women so when I replayed the game this year choosing to side with Sabal, I always felt like I was going against my values. I valued Amita's pragmatism in making sure we get the intel we need and using drugs to keep the army funded but not to the point that she starts using child labour and soldiers to keep Kyrat occupied by her and vice versa. I went onto the internet to see what people chose and I was surprised to see that the general sentiment was that other people picked Sabal because Sabal keeps glazing you and actually wanted to save you at the start while Amita wanted to leave you alone in Pagan's palace. Another person remarked that they grew up in a post-soviet country where places of worship were destroyed so the moment that the commenter saw Amita destroy Buddhist temples, they switched over to Sabal because they knew destroying religious figures will lead to worse things down the road. To me, the fact that I actually went to see other people's choice and justifications shows me that they had a good choice and branching system with compelling but flawed options; I just wish they did MORE with it.
Story aside, the world of Kyrat is a massive step up from the Rook Islands in Far Cry 3 as it feels like a lived-in version of Nepal instead of the Rook Islands feeling like it was made in a level editor overnight. There are multiple Buddhist objects, shrines, and mani wheels that really help sell then fact that this is Kyrat and even the addition of those strings of prayer flags, sherpas, and even the Urdu text make this feel real. The UI is also well done as it feels clean like a mobile UI while also incorporating vibrant purple, orange, and blue colours. Far Cry 4 is not just content with taking inspiration from Nepal, it want you to feel like you're there compared to Rook Islands, Hope County, and Yara. (How do you even manage to fuck up recreating Havana in Far Cry 6 but have it be so fucking barren and lifeless Ubisoft?)
The gameplay is the same as Far Cry 3 down to the open-world formula and gameplay loop so there's nothing new there. It carries over most of the same guns from FC3 while also adding in some new guns which is nice including new signature weapons. You get the same mission of clearing open-world outposts and collecting items as you deal with sidequests and hunting. If you liked Far Cry 3 and want more, Far Cry 4 is for you. Its the comfort food of FPS being that you get to be a guerrilla unleashing chaos on the oppressive forces with copious amounts of guns and explosives. You get a pocket M79 grenade launcher you can shoot while driving and you get to use mini choppers to rain grenade rounds down on outposts if you wanted to. The freedom is ALL there for you.
As for me, I liked Far Cry 3 but like every Far Cry game, it always overstays its welcome. The open world is divided into two areas, North and South Kyrat. You start in the south and work your way up north but I'm going to be real with you, the game did not need North Kyrat in its entirety. You could have just took some landmarks and shrunk them down into one map so the game does not feel like a slog while also reducing the amount of fluff in there. That's really all I can say because it becomes so apparent that once you go into North Kyrat, you see just how haphazardly it was put together compared to the south. I wish we got a LOT more missions set in the mountains as the whole Willis Quest line was honestly amazing for how you got to see snow-capped monasteries and caves of Tibet taking care of both guards and animals. It looked and felt so good that we should have gotten a lot more of it.
One final point is that I liked the Shangri-La sections where you played as Kalinag who explored Shangri-La with just only a bow and a knife plus his tiger. It was a nice change of pace but perhaps overstayed its welcome.
Initially, I had good memories of playing Far Cry 4 when I played it back in high school. I honestly enjoyed it but as an adult who played more than enough Ubisoft games, I really started to feel bored and burned out by the end especially once I ended up at the point in the game where I maxed out everything before the final boss. I will say that my rose-tinted glasses fell off but I was able to learn more about Far Cry 4 as I explored areas I never did first time around. I even read through the readable collectibles such as the lost letters and Pagan Min's handbook that puts a LOT more background into the story than the game gives you.
So overall, Far Cry is like every Ubisoft game, it starts out with legit good ideas but they never commit to them fully even when doing so would make the game far more memorable. I would still pick this as my favourite far cry game because of of all the Far Crys 3-6, 4 was the one that kept a long-lasting impression on me.
If you just want to try out far cry for the first time, I would pick 4 myself because it improves a lot on 3 but I wouldn't ignore Far Cry 3. Its ultimately up to you but I feel you cannot go wrong with Far Cry 3 or 4. Far Cry 5 & 6 are games i cannot recommenced sadly.
And that's really all I can say about this game. If you loved Far Cry 3 and wanted more of it, Far Cry 4 is your thing. In some ways, Far Cry 4 is an improvement over Far Cry 3 with a larger world, more beautiful graphics, and a world that feels like you're in Nepal. Unfortunate, you get a story that falls short with a great villain that is woefully underutilized and a map that is too large for what it actually is full of filler and fluff content.
Far Cry 4 starts with you playing as Ajay Ghale, son of the legendary revolutionary leader Mohan Ghale who led the Golden Path, an organized resistance group taking arms against the tyrannical King Pagan Min who rules Kyrat (basically a fictionalized version of Nepal/Tibet) with an iron fist. Ajay is there to spread the ashes of his deceased mother at a place called Lakshmana. You get invited to Pagan's palace where you can choose to go to Lakshmana with Min or escape his palace and take arms against him choosing to work with the two leaders of the Golden Path; the progressive and pragmatic Amita and the traditional idealistic Sabal who are at each other's throats.
The thing that disappoints me about the story is that there are legit some good plot hooks that are severely underutilized. You likley already know that Far Cry 4 has a secret ending where you can wait in Pagan's palce for 15 minutes to get a secret ending where he takes you to Lakshmana and ends the game there. I wish you actually had a choice to choose to side with Pagan Min because he's a charismatic villain who just doesn't get enough screen time. No surprise but you find out that Amita is just another Pagan Min who wants to turn Kyrat into a drug state with child soldiers destroying buddhist temples and icons considered sacred to the Kyrati people. Sabal leads the country into an economically bankrupt theocracy as he turns into a religious fanatic who cant stop glazing Ajay's dad and kills off anyone who isn't a Buddhist. And given the context of those two endings, you really should have gotten the choice to fight for Pagan Min because the "good guys" are actually bad including Ajay's dad as a full villain play-through where you get revenge on Amita and Sabal for using you to fulfill their extremist ends.
Ajay is a crappy protagonist to boot because he esentially gets pushed around by Amita and Sabal in the main game behaving like a dumb silent protragonist when the game should have made Ajay more assertive and basically tell off Amita, Sabal, and Min to help sell his character. Ajay spends too much time being sildent and letting people order him around when the story would have benefited from Ajay pushing back against other characters and saying his side of the story and thoughts instead of being steamrolled in cutscenes. If you're gonna give me a voiced character with an established backstory, USE IT! I also find it hilarious that Ajay keeps going back to the stoner duo who drugged and kidnapped Ajay for several sidequests because Ajay is not permitted to stand up for himself. The stoners are even squatting on his father's property for FREE! Honestly, its just seems that Ajay is forced to carry the idiot ball instead of throwing it back and telling other characters to fuck off.
And honestly, i'm harsh on the story because this is a game that comes close to making a meaningful message but fucks it all up. Amita and Sabal are both different shades of Pol Pot, a brutal Communist Cambodian dictator who led the Khmer Rouge and committed multiple genocides/purges of undesirables. I feel that the story should have continued after you usurp Pagan Min in which you now have to fight against the Golden Path to remove Amita or Sabal with Ajay being furious that he was tricked by them into a real boss battle and give a proper ending to Ajay's story. It should have not ended with Pagan being deposed but ended with Ajay cutting through their bullshit and give Kyrat a chance to breathe from the grasp of multiple power hungry cunts. Instead, all you get is a post-game cutscene showing how bad Sabal and Amita are which feels unsastifying. Perhaps realistic but I would have liked something more than the current ending.
Really, I just wish we got a more vocal and cutthroat Ajay alongside a more prominent Pagan Min who gives you the option to pick his side over the Golden Path. For how weak the story is, Ubisoft is able to make the shocking moments feel real because initially, I sided with Amita back in 2015 as I disliked child marriage and Sabal's religious fundamentalism / disdain of women so when I replayed the game this year choosing to side with Sabal, I always felt like I was going against my values. I valued Amita's pragmatism in making sure we get the intel we need and using drugs to keep the army funded but not to the point that she starts using child labour and soldiers to keep Kyrat occupied by her and vice versa. I went onto the internet to see what people chose and I was surprised to see that the general sentiment was that other people picked Sabal because Sabal keeps glazing you and actually wanted to save you at the start while Amita wanted to leave you alone in Pagan's palace. Another person remarked that they grew up in a post-soviet country where places of worship were destroyed so the moment that the commenter saw Amita destroy Buddhist temples, they switched over to Sabal because they knew destroying religious figures will lead to worse things down the road. To me, the fact that I actually went to see other people's choice and justifications shows me that they had a good choice and branching system with compelling but flawed options; I just wish they did MORE with it.
Story aside, the world of Kyrat is a massive step up from the Rook Islands in Far Cry 3 as it feels like a lived-in version of Nepal instead of the Rook Islands feeling like it was made in a level editor overnight. There are multiple Buddhist objects, shrines, and mani wheels that really help sell then fact that this is Kyrat and even the addition of those strings of prayer flags, sherpas, and even the Urdu text make this feel real. The UI is also well done as it feels clean like a mobile UI while also incorporating vibrant purple, orange, and blue colours. Far Cry 4 is not just content with taking inspiration from Nepal, it want you to feel like you're there compared to Rook Islands, Hope County, and Yara. (How do you even manage to fuck up recreating Havana in Far Cry 6 but have it be so fucking barren and lifeless Ubisoft?)
The gameplay is the same as Far Cry 3 down to the open-world formula and gameplay loop so there's nothing new there. It carries over most of the same guns from FC3 while also adding in some new guns which is nice including new signature weapons. You get the same mission of clearing open-world outposts and collecting items as you deal with sidequests and hunting. If you liked Far Cry 3 and want more, Far Cry 4 is for you. Its the comfort food of FPS being that you get to be a guerrilla unleashing chaos on the oppressive forces with copious amounts of guns and explosives. You get a pocket M79 grenade launcher you can shoot while driving and you get to use mini choppers to rain grenade rounds down on outposts if you wanted to. The freedom is ALL there for you.
As for me, I liked Far Cry 3 but like every Far Cry game, it always overstays its welcome. The open world is divided into two areas, North and South Kyrat. You start in the south and work your way up north but I'm going to be real with you, the game did not need North Kyrat in its entirety. You could have just took some landmarks and shrunk them down into one map so the game does not feel like a slog while also reducing the amount of fluff in there. That's really all I can say because it becomes so apparent that once you go into North Kyrat, you see just how haphazardly it was put together compared to the south. I wish we got a LOT more missions set in the mountains as the whole Willis Quest line was honestly amazing for how you got to see snow-capped monasteries and caves of Tibet taking care of both guards and animals. It looked and felt so good that we should have gotten a lot more of it.
One final point is that I liked the Shangri-La sections where you played as Kalinag who explored Shangri-La with just only a bow and a knife plus his tiger. It was a nice change of pace but perhaps overstayed its welcome.
Initially, I had good memories of playing Far Cry 4 when I played it back in high school. I honestly enjoyed it but as an adult who played more than enough Ubisoft games, I really started to feel bored and burned out by the end especially once I ended up at the point in the game where I maxed out everything before the final boss. I will say that my rose-tinted glasses fell off but I was able to learn more about Far Cry 4 as I explored areas I never did first time around. I even read through the readable collectibles such as the lost letters and Pagan Min's handbook that puts a LOT more background into the story than the game gives you.
So overall, Far Cry is like every Ubisoft game, it starts out with legit good ideas but they never commit to them fully even when doing so would make the game far more memorable. I would still pick this as my favourite far cry game because of of all the Far Crys 3-6, 4 was the one that kept a long-lasting impression on me.
If you just want to try out far cry for the first time, I would pick 4 myself because it improves a lot on 3 but I wouldn't ignore Far Cry 3. Its ultimately up to you but I feel you cannot go wrong with Far Cry 3 or 4. Far Cry 5 & 6 are games i cannot recommenced sadly.
