Gamer Savings Time: Far Cry Instincts Review

When I picked up FC:I I was expecting an open world shooter…almost a first person GTA.  Not being a fan of the open world genre, had me really worried that I had wasted $10.  Luckily, I was wrong. Far Cry Instincts is a linear and fast paced shooter that knows what it’s good at…and does it’s best to exploit these traits.  Far Cry: Instincts is an extraordinary shooter, who’s bare-bones story doesn’t do the fantastic gameplay justice.

You play as Jack Carver, a dude that gets basically ambushed and stranded on a topical island. He uses the weapons that he finds and the vehicles he steals to get to his destinations. Along the way, he is kidnapped injected with a serum that unleashes his feral genetic abilities.

The antagonist (obviously the man behind the injection) takes the role of a hunter and decides that Jack is now the his prey and sends an entire task force to take him out.  Just think of it as a first person “The Most Dangerous Game”.  With the help of allies that he acquires along the way Jack is lead through this adventure guns a blazing.

"Ok, take the damn picture, these guns are getting heavy"

I know that that’s a brief plot synopsis, but that’s really all you need to know about the story in Far Cry.  Many FPSs have long back stories and complex character building scenarios, that help carry the emotion filled story to a climax.  You will learn very quickly that story in Far Cry takes the back seat in a huge way.

Far Cry Instincts is a port of the popular PC title Far Cry that was developed by Crytek.  The original Far Cry was very open world-like and required some hefty PC processing power.  It also didn’t contain any of the Feral abilities that are in Instincts.  So, needless to say, Ubisoft took some creative liberties with both the story and gameplay.

These feral abilities give you several benefits in combat.  Jack has enhacnced speed, smell, strength, vision, verticality, and regeneration.  All of this is measured by an adrenaline meter.  This aspect of the game is only one of the many highlights, so let me run through many of the others:

1. Far Cry is beautiful! Probably the best looking XBOX game, period.  The lush greenery, while at times can be cumbersome, is gorgeous.

2. The mechanics of the gun work  are spot-on. The controls and combat engine allow the player to be deadly accurate with his or her chosen weapon.  Basically, there is absolutely no built-in handicaps that the player has to get used to, such as slow reticles or clusmy autolock.

3. The genetic enhancement aspects of the main character are intriguing, help to move the game along and keep the player’s attention.

4. You get to use a freaking hand-glider!

5. The vehicles, which can be tough to shoot from, are plentyful, easy to use and have familiar physics controling them (unlike in Halo).

Only a small example of the lust green environments you will battle through.

I keep touching upon the Feral abilities because I found them to be the most interesting part of the game.  I seriously can’t imagine Far Cry not having these powers, and these powers are so frequently used that to play the game without them them makes me beileve that the PC version is vastly different.

The obvious down side to FC:I is it’s story. You can tell that Ubisoft and Crytek were trying to make something memorable and engaging, but with a sever lack of story telling and seemingly endless running a gunning, the story really gets lost in the shuffle.  Had they spent more time crafting the cut scenes and developing the characters…like Uncharted did, this could have been my choice for the best XBOX game ever.  Also some of the stealth portions at the beginning of the game are clumsy and seem unnecessary.

Overall though Far Cry shows what the original XBOX can do by offering a beautiful, and technically proficient shooter with somewhat varied gameplay.  Since I don’t do PC gaming I am glad that this was ported to the XBOX and I am looking forward to playing it again on the XBOX 360 as Far Cry Instincts: Predator, once Gamer Savings Time reaches it.

Unfortunately, from what I hear the sequel is the exact opposite of what I liked about the original. Its going to be an open-world, non-science fiction shooter. Without the science fiction aspects of FC:I, I would have been terribly bored with the entire experience.

4.5/5.0