"This commitment entails modifications to some of our game engines, as well as the inclusion of subtitles in the conception phase of game development," stated the company.

Far Cry 2 is due out in stores October 21, 2008.

• More than 18 perfect score reviews
• More than 40 combined Editors' choice, Game of the Year awards (US)
• Nominated for 10 Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences awards (including Game of the Year)
• GameBump's own Best Shooter of 2007

Ubisoft has announced that Far Cry 2 is being developed for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. The game will be managed by Ubisoft Montreal and is slated to be released sometime in 2008-2009.

Quoth directly from the press release:

More than just a visual and technological achievement, Far Cry 2 immerses players in an entirely new kind of gaming experience, featuring a custom-made video game engine built from the ground up. Players will discover a true open world gameplay set in one of the most beautiful environments in the world, Africa, brought to life by high-definition next-gen technology.

Terrorists are bad. Shoot bullets at them.

Ghillie suit? More like Silly suit!

Get to the choppah!

• 100 - Offiicial Xbox Magazine: "Simply put, Call of Duty 4 does everything right and nearly nothing wrong."
• 100 - GamePro: "I seriously cannot think of a single flaw in CoD4."
• 100 - GameDaily: "This shooter is so addictive, gorgeous (both visually and aurally) and unrivaled..."
• 99 - Planet Xbox 360: "At the end of the day there is only one reason not to buy Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and that is if you’re no longer breathing."
• 97 - Team Xbox
• 96 - Cheat Code Central
• 95 - GameZone
• 95 - 1UP
• 94 - GameTrailers (video review here)
• 94 - IGN
• 90 - Official Xbox Magazine UK
• 90 - GameTap
• 90 - GameSpot (video review here)
  

Ubisoft has announced today that Far Cry 2 is being developed for the PC and is slated for a Spring 2008 release.

"Far Cry marked the beginning of a new era for shooters. An era of gorgeous graphics and of advanced artificial intelligence," stated Tony Key, Ubisoft VP of Marketing. "We are confident that Far Cry 2 will have the same impact again on the FPS genre landscape."

Those interested in viewing the site can do so here.]]> Thu, 19 Jul 2007 12:35:00 -0500 Aaron Dunlap http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_preview_call_of_duty_4_modern_warfare_3601 http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_preview_call_of_duty_4_modern_warfare_3601 http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_preview_call_of_duty_4_modern_warfare_3601# This preview was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Its format does not match our own but we support its content.

I’m sick of WWII shooters. Aren’t you?

People have been saying that for years now, and I could never really agree with them because I always had a place in my heart for the Call of Duty series. Sure, World War II shooters are tired, but Call of Duty could always surprise and enthrall me.

That is, of course, until Call of Duty 3. That’s another issue, though, and I’ll get back to that later.

“The WW2 market was already well-established when we came in, and we stomped all over those guys,” an Infinity Ward representative told me. “We’re going to do the same thing with this.”

The this he’s talking about is Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, the first CoD title to pull away from war-torn Europe and bring players into the modern age.

That comment made me think, though, about the genre of modern-age military shooters that feature real military units using real weapons against real enemies who also use real weapons: there isn’t one.

The idea seems terribly obvious, so much so that the sheer lack of modern military shooters seems almost insane. Think about it, though; can you name any other popular military shooter that takes place right now?

There’s Tom Clancy games, sure, but those have all gone futuristic. Rainbow Six has gone future-happy with R6: Vegas, Ghost Recon has turned into GRAW which is anything but present-set. Everything else either takes place on Mars or a space station.

How can this be? Perhaps, I surmise, because it’s too hard. Making a game set in the future is easy, you can just invent whatever technologies and conflicts you want. To make a good modern warfare game you would have to get every detail right while still making the game fun to play.
If anybody had to do it, it should be Infinity Ward -- who started working on Call of Duty 4 right after they finished Call of Duty 2, a fantastic game and probably the best Xbox 360 launch title. In the meantime, Activision shoveled Call of Duty 3 onto Treyarch, who many feel was not up to par with previous titles. That’s a weasel-wordy way of saying I hated it, but a proper journalist isn’t supposed to say such things.

Call of Duty 4, which I took a look at this week at E3, puts players in control of a U.S. Marine and a British SAS trooper, much in the way previous CoD titles alternated between US, British, and Russian sides of the same faction. The game features a storyline wherein a fictional group of Chechnyan rebels stage a coup, and players will be fighting in areas near and around Chernobyl.

There is an overarching plot to the game, but the actual character you play as has no story, just as in other CoD titles.

There are over 70 weapons in the game, all of them completely realistic and appropriately represented. Other military hardware shows up in the game, too, such as the high-tech Javelin surface-to-surface missile launcher that auto-targets enemy vehicles and fires a missile (a $75,000 missile, the Infinity Ward developer reminded me) straight up, then straight back down onto the top of the target (where shielding is almost always the weakest). There’s also Cobra helicopters and other gunships to provide air support.

The level I looked at took place in a battle-torn village and featured some of the most frantic combat I’ve ever seen. The enemies all run around with multiple RPG launchers strapped to their backs, darting back and forth from cover to cover. There are hundreds of animations for characters, all of them motion-captured and activated dynamically. AI characters duck for cover naturally, shoot around corners when they need to, and stumble convincingly as they’re shot down.

I also came across a few of the “holy sh-t” moments that made me fall in love with Call of Duty. Certain weapons feature IR-sights, which are like laser sights but only visible with night-vision goggles and appear as airy, ethereal green lines emanating from your gun. Put a few soldiers in the same space and those lines dancing across rooms and through the darkness can be quite breathtaking.

There are also some awesome smoke effects, as when enemy-fired RPGs leave behind dynamic smoke trails that linger like banners in the sky. The game features a new dynamic lighting and shadow system as well, just one of the many additions to the constantly-revised Call of Duty engine.
Also new is a material-penetration system, where every surface and object is given a unique density. Soft materials like plaster walls and wooden fences can simply be shot-through. Fresh bullet holes glow green through night-vision until the heat dissipates.

As for the annoying elements of Call of Duty 3 that won’t be carried over: those stupid little mini-games they threw at you in the console versions, like twisting the analog sticks around to charge demolition explosives, or the little scripted grapple-fights where an enemy would grab your gun and force you to mash buttons or wave your Wii-mote like mad until the game would decide you won -- they’re gone (there won't even be a Wii version), bomb setting and all combat will be straightforward; the pointless scripted cut scenes that did nothing for the actual story, like early in CoD 3 where a teammate threatened to mutiny against his superior -- none of that, anything a character says will be story-oriented and nothing will ever take you out of the game.

And the cool stuff that will be coming back? Frantic, balls-out action sequences that may give you P.T.S.D.? You bet. Slower, stealthy-style sections to even out the pacing? Yeah, there’s a few sniper levels complete with ghille suits. Picking up and throwing back grenades thrown at you? Yes. Cooking off grenades so they’ll blow sooner after throwing? Yes. Tank driving? I couldn’t get an answer out of the guy; that probably means yes.
Infinity Ward seems pretty excited about the multiplayer mode. “It should beat Halo, not in terms of sales, but in terms of fun,” the developer told me. Deathmatch, team deathmatch, capture the flag, domination, all that stuff. What should make it stand out isn’t crazy mode, but rather the ease of control and gameplay. Apparently, multiplayer control should be exactly like single-player.

Like pretty much every other game at E3, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare will be out this holiday season, meaning the game is pretty-much finished and now being polished. It’s unusual, then, that there was no free-play demo at E3; it was entirely “watch somebody who made the game play it,” which often means that the demo will explode if you go anywhere off the beaten path.



Fans of the Call of Duty series who liked it for more than it’s Nazi-blasting WWII setting should rest assured that this isn’t just a modern shooter with “Call of Duty” in the name, this is a Call of Duty game from top to bottom. People who lost hope in the series after Call of Duty 3 should rest assured that CoD3 was just an offshoot, and that the very people responsible for the greatness of the original Call of Duty games are behind Modern Warfare.

Bearing in mind that I still haven’t actually touched the game, I’m obligated not to give an actual gameplay verdict. As a gamer, though, and not a journalist, I’m buying this game.

]]> Sat, 14 Jul 2007 15:20:00 -0500 The Gaming Horizon Archive http://www.gamebump.com/go/sega_announces_crazy_taxi_for_the_psp http://www.gamebump.com/go/sega_announces_crazy_taxi_for_the_psp http://www.gamebump.com/go/sega_announces_crazy_taxi_for_the_psp# SEGA has announced that they are bringing the Crazy Taxi franchise to the PlayStation Portable.

The developer is working on a game in the series entitled Crazy Taxi: Fare Wars by Sniper Studios. The driving title is expected to include online capabilities and release this summer. 

Activision has published its first trailer unveiling Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare currently being developed by Infinity Ward (Call of Duty 2). Few details of the title are known, except that it abandons the World War II theme and skips up to modern war zones for a fresh new look at the franchise.The trailer was broadcast worldwide earlier today on ESPN and even includes a 90-second extended version on a promotional site that also launched today, which you can register for here (mature audiences only, kids). We've got no information as far as platforms go, but as you can tell from the footage, next-generation looks highly likely with probably Xbox 360/PlayStation 3 options included.Enjoy and let us know what you think.

divxMovie('http://files.gaminghorizon.com/ZDNI7179HD_720p_8mbs.divx',true);

]]> Sat, 28 Apr 2007 17:38:00 -0500 Tim Grube http://www.gamebump.com/go/tgs_2006_far_cry_vengeance_screenshots http://www.gamebump.com/go/tgs_2006_far_cry_vengeance_screenshots http://www.gamebump.com/go/tgs_2006_far_cry_vengeance_screenshots# This article was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Certain formatting, imaged, and embedded content may have been lost in the transition process.

Ubisoft Montreal has released two first screenshots Far Cry: Vengeance for the Nintendo Wii. We will have more as the Tokyo Game Show gets closer.

]]> Thu, 21 Sep 2006 16:19:00 -0500 The Gaming Horizon Archive http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_predator_360 http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_predator_360 http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_predator_360# This review was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Its format does not match our own but we support its content. It was written by Brian Mohr.

Since the launch of the Xbox 360 last November, game releases have been few and far between, but one publisher has been getting their product out to the masses. Ubisoft has seen a lot of early success on the next-generation with the release of Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter and even moderately with their flying shooter Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII. The company has one more shooter on the market this spring in Far Cry Instincts Predator.

In the game, players take on the role of Jack Carver, an ex-Navy commando who charters a boat to a stranded island in the Pacific. Players get two separate campaigns to play. In the first campaign, gamers investigate the island and its inhabitants which include human-animal hybrids. Once you delve deeper into the mysteries, Jack eventually becomes a hybrid and gains fearsome animal powers.

The other campaign is a little shorter than the original, but of course keeps Jack on the island. This time he heads there with a woman named Kade who goes missing. He in turn battles through the jungle, fighting militia, hybrids, and more to find her.

The greatest thing about Far Cry Instincts Predator is the inclusion of both the Predator and Evolution storylines. This essentially is like two games in one and really provides gamers with two completely different, but coherent stories. Sadly the Evolution story isn’t available until you beat Predator. Thankfully though Ubisoft pleased fans by providing a cheat code, “GiveMeItAll”, allowing players to choose which story they’d like to follow first.

Though it almost goes without saying, the gameplay in Far Cry for the 360 is still very much intact. Players have the ability to kill their opponents in a variety of ways including the use of traps, knives and dual wielding weapons. The Evolution campaign does include a few new weapons like a blowgun and pipe bomb. Besides the weapons, players will eventually gain feral abilities that allow you to sprint and attack like a cheetah and even sniff out your opposition. Both Predator and Evolution feature a variety of vehicles throughout the game including boats, ATVs, gliders and more. Other gameplay improvements in the series include more save points, meaning there is less repetition if you die, and slightly larger maps.

The controls in Instincts are very easy for anyone to pick up and play. Moving is as easy as utilizing the analog sticks and the trigger buttons allow you to shoot your opponents. The D-pad is utilized to cycle through weaponry, up to three weapons at a time. You also have the ability to crawl and crouch for stealth.

The sound isn’t exceptional in Predator, but it is decent. The soundtrack is more exciting and engaging when you’re in action, but is hardly memorable. Meanwhile, the other sound effects including environmental noises, voice work, and weapon effects are all pretty good and sound realistic. The environmental sounds are particularly good when you hear insects buzzing by and waterfalls flowing.

One last thing that definitely keeps the game exciting for awhile is the multiplayer experience. Gamers can play with up to four people on split-screen or with 16-players through Xbox Live. The online database features five different game modes including chaos, team chaos, predator, steal the sample, and seek and secure. Chaos is simply Far Cry deathmatch while steal the sample is obviously capture the flag. Predator is a mode where one player is an animal-human hybrid and the others aren’t. Finally, seek and secure is essentially a territories mode. Overall the online experience is a lot of fun and includes 23 total maps that are quite varied and appealing.

If that isn’t enough, players are also able to create their own maps, meaning that there are almost an unlimited number of online gaming options available. Maps are much easier to create than on the original Xbox release and feature more options.

First and foremost, the game’s A.I. is moronic at best. Most of the enemies you’ll face don’t make a habit of heading for cover and instead stand still out in the open, guns blazing. Grenades continue the problems as often times the enemies will literally dive towards the bomb. Though the A.I. improves later in the game with some human-animal hybrids you’ll face, overall the competition is very poor in both campaign modes.

Secondly, the graphics in the game are decent, but hardly worthy of mention on a next-generation console. Though the game in general is pretty and stunning - mostly because of water in the tropical environment - the graphics didn’t see much of an upgrade on the 360. Things like trees, grass and even other characters don’t look well defined and are poorly textured. And sadly most of the enemies look pretty blocky and physically don’t move very well.

Just a couple other problems that presented themselves in the game are vehicle controls and repetitiveness. Overall the vehicle controls are pretty poor and you’ll find yourself hitting way too many bumps as you drive. This probably isn’t helped by the fact that you can’t change out of the first-person view while driving.

The other problem that drags Far Cry down is the fact that Far Cry Instincts Predator is just about the same game as Far Cry Instincts Evolution, which came out last year on the original Xbox. If you’ve played that version before, you are not missing anything now.

Far Cry Instincts Predator is a solid first-person shooter for the Xbox 360 that provides gamers with two games in one by including last year’s instincts mode as well as the evolution campaign. If that isn’t enough, there is a very impressive online option along with a map editor that keeps the action going for hours.

Despite all that, Far Cry falls a little short particularly in relation to the A.I. and graphics since both aren’t quite up to next-generation expectations. Even still, first-person shooter fans should definitely check out Far Cry Instincts Predator since it is one of the best shooters to date on the Xbox 360.

The A.I. isn’t tha great, but the controls and gameplay are still intact from the original.

Far Cry’s graphics are for the 360, but aren’t quite what we expect out of a next-gen title.

The sound effects and voice work is decent, but it is not too memorable.

Overall the game is still comfortable and fun to play both in campaign and multiplayer modes.

With a map editor, evolution campaign and multiplayer options, there’s plenty to keep you busy.

]]> Mon, 24 Apr 2006 22:51:00 -0500 Brian Mohr http://www.gamebump.com/go/far_cry_instincts_games_go_gold http://www.gamebump.com/go/far_cry_instincts_games_go_gold http://www.gamebump.com/go/far_cry_instincts_games_go_gold# This article was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Certain formatting, imaged, and embedded content may have been lost in the transition process.

Ubisoft has announced that Far Cry Instincts Predator for the Xbox 360 and Far Cry Instincts Evolution for the Xbox have gone gold.

Evolution gives players a completely new storyline and characters. Meanwhile, Predator features both the Evolution and original Far Cry Instincts game that was released last fall. Both games are scheduled to be in stores on March 30th.]]> Fri, 24 Mar 2006 17:15:00 -0600 The Gaming Horizon Archive http://www.gamebump.com/go/worms_open_warfare_ships http://www.gamebump.com/go/worms_open_warfare_ships http://www.gamebump.com/go/worms_open_warfare_ships# THQ has announced that they have shipped their strategy game, Worms: Open Warfare.

The game will feature a brand new single player as well as multiplayer features that is said to include new wireless modes of play. Mickey Torode, spokesperson at THQ said, "Team 17 has delivered a game that returns to the much-loved 2D Worms gameplay while retaining all of the same humor and the outrageous arsenal of weapons the franchise is best known for."

Worms: Open Warfare has released for the PlayStation Portable and Nintendo DS.

An official response has not yet been issued by Ubisoft. We will keep you update on any further developments. ]]> Fri, 23 Dec 2005 12:35:00 -0600 Aaron Dunlap http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_xbox http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_xbox http://www.gamebump.com/go/gh_review_far_cry_instincts_xbox# This review was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Its format does not match our own but we support its content.

You remember Far Cry. It was one of the best PC games of 2004, with unbelievably beautiful graphics, killer enemy AI, great controls, and a wicked arsenal. The problem with Far Cry, however, is that not many people took it seriously because it came out in March and everybody knows that the really good games only come out in October and November. For that, not as many people experienced Far Cry as should have. 

Fear not, for Far Cry Instincts is here, in October, and on the Xbox. Instincts is unique, in that it is neither a port of or a sequel to 2004’s Far Cry for the PC. Far Cry Instincts is more of a retelling of the story on the console, like how Batman Begins has nothing to do with Batman but tells the same story. Like the original, Far Cry Instincts follows Jack Carver as he escapes a diving/tour boat just as it is blown up off the coast of a beautiful and secluded Pacific island.

Suddenly the target of every mercenary soldier on the island, Jack has to fight his way from the beach to the mountains to the cliffs to sweet escape.

So far, this plot outline applies to both Far Cry and Instincts, and this is where the two games’ stories part ways. In Far Cry Instincts, your main objective is to find and rescue Val, the woman who hired Jack to take her to the island and may - or may not - be the reason that every human being with a gun has been pointing them at you. As is becoming a trend in FPS videogames, you’re contacted over the radio by a stranger (calling himself Doyle) who guides you through the unknown territory and helps you with your objectives.

What follows can be described as nothing else but visceral. The game really puts you in Jack’s shoes, makes you feel his pain, and lets you feel like you’re just as vulnerable as he. Instincts isn’t all about hiding in the brush, though; as you quickly stock up on weapons you’ll start taking more risks and engaging more and more enemies until you throw caution to the wind and trounce down on five to eight armed guards with your twin submachine guns. In that, you feel even more connected with the character for as he progresses from running victim to running vigilante, you progress as well.

The main difference between Far Cry and Far Cry Instincts is that, around two to three hours into the game, your character is captured and the true nature of the mysterious island is revealed. Via an injection from a mad scientist, Jack is given primal animal powers (this is explained in detail on the back of the box, and the front of the box shows Jack with vertical pupils and practically transforming into the Wolfman, so I don’t think I’m spoiling anything). Jack’s new abilities manifest slowly, but boy are they useful.

The first powers you develop are regeneration (lost health will steadily return) and a massive boost of adrenaline. With a full adrenaline meter, you can pound your way through doors and bludgeon enemies with a terrible force. You’ll use these new abilities to escape captivity and later fend your way through the jungle to sweet redemption. New abilities arrive one by one, including an awesome “feral vision” that will allow you to see enemies in the dark and through small obstacles, and the lovely ability to run and jump much faster than anyone could ever rightly want to.

What’s most interesting (and refreshing) about this game is that the gimmick (animal powers) doesn’t take over the gameplay. Jack’s fantastic new abilities only supplement the action instead of becoming it. There aren’t any puzzles where you’ll need to use a certain power to get through an enchanted tomb or anything, it’s just a top-notch action game with a bit of run-really-fast and see-in-the-dark gameplay thrown in to rustle away the been-there-done-that feeling. Also, most games that advertise from the beginning that you’re going to get a major upgrade down the road make it feel like you’re just biding time until you actually get your upgrades so the game can begin. Not so here, as the game takes off from the start with the raw action that swept us away in Far Cry; so for that, the upgrades actually feel like upgrades and not undoing the flaws designed into the character at the start.

Far Cry Instincts uses a pretty simple weapon system that’s somewhat reminiscent of Goldeneye in how tight it feels. Weapons are bound to the Xbox Controller’s D-pad, with binoculars mapped to the up-arrow, giving you the mere capacity for three weapons. It sounds tedious, but it works great. Pistols are bound to the right arrow, assault weapons to the left arrow, and heavy weapons to the down arrow. If you come across a new pistol that you like better than your own, you can drop your current one and pick up the new; same thing applies to the other weapon types, which adds an element of progressively upgrading your arsenal rather than the standard videogame practice of just loading up on new weapons, carrying four pistols and seven machine guns that are useless now because there’s no more ammo distributed for it and your newest weapon is 10 times better than anything previous. Every pistol and assault weapon (submachine gun, assault rifle, etc) can be doubled up when you pick up a second. Any game with a dual-pistols option gets bonus points in my book, but dual-anything is just ecstasy. You can’t wield two sniper rifles at once, which is just an outrage!

Far Cry’s graphics on the PC were just astounding, especially the intensive water effects (much of the game takes place on or near water) and Far Cry Instincts does a pretty impressive job of mirroring these effects. Comparing the graphics between those two games is pretty rough, but comparing the graphics of Far Cry Instincts to any other Xbox game is a sure win. The concept of rampaging throughout a jungle island would be pretty ridiculous without a great graphics engine, and here the illusion is flawless.

The soundtrack also works well to put you into the jungle. The sound effects are so subtle and spot-on that you don’t really notice them, but if they weren’t there it would just feel like you were playing a videogame. At climactic moments the musical score kicks in to raise your heart rate. The voicework, with a lot of Hollywood names attached to the playbill, is also great.

For a game that packs such graphics and production into a console that’s over four years old, you wouldn’t expect the levels to be this expansive. You can trek miles before you’ll see a load screen, and they only come between levels and don’t interrupt the action.

Besides the engaging story mode, which for all purposes would be plenty of awesome for $50, there’s a full online multiplayer mode with all the game types you could ask Santa for. Besides the deathmatch, team deathmatch, and capture-the-flag mode, there is a “predator” mode that pits all the players against a single player, who is granted all of the animal abilities from the story mode – it’s quite like the movie Predator where everybody shoots wildly into the trees while one guy with nasty powers picks them off like tigers stalking a wounded zebra. There’s also a full level editor for multiplayer maps, which is pretty complicated to use, but just shows the level of dedication to the online multiplayer.

Throughout the whole game, the only things to ever cause any annoyances were the loading screens and a few glitches.

The load times between levels can be absolutely brutal at times, and sometimes the revolving circle to indicate that the game is still loading will come to a dead halt – which could easily be mistook as the game freezing by the impatient. A few glitches got in the way of enjoyment at times; there were one or two occasions where random enemies would become invulnerable (stab ‘em 200 times in the head and they just stand there unloading shells into you). The game’s intro movie (which is presented more like a trailer) is about four minutes long and cannot be skipped, which would be all right if it only appeared the first time you played, but in our copy (which was a gold retail version) the blasted thing would play every time you started the game. Four minutes, no ability to skip, before you can even manipulate a menu. There’s chatter on the Internet that this bug is caused when your Xbox’s time and date aren’t correct, but that doesn’t sound right.

Sometimes it feels like too many controls are available and there aren’t enough buttons for them. This only really becomes a problem in scenarios where you would desperately want to hop in a weapon or grab a turret (desperate as in all of creation is shooting at you); to perform these actions you have to hold the X button. If you were to just tap the button, like from reflex as not many action games ask you to hold a button to perform a single action, you would reload your gun. It isn’t fun to stand there in front of a turret while your enemies make Swiss cheese of you and you accidentally tap X, which causes you to wait for a reload animation to finish before you can correctly hold down the button and start slaying. Seems like an obscure complaint, yes, but it became a problem quite a few times.

Finally, this may or may not qualify as a legitimate flaw but this game is a lot harder than you think. Console shooters are classically dumbed-down as far as difficulty goes, to account for the imprecise controls, so many Xbox players might not be prepared or accustomed to how brutal Far Cry Instincts can be. You’ll have to approach each encounter with your brains more than your bullets, and sometimes choose aversion against gunplay.

Whether or not you’re familiar with Far Cry, whether or not you’re convinced Halo is the best Xbox shooter on Earth and nothing can compare, and whether or not you’ve read any other part of this review: you should own this game. Even if you never play it, you should just own it so your friends will have something to do when they come over.

Some of the guys at UbiSoft have really got a handle on how to make a videogame that feels right on almost all levels. Prince of Persia, Splinter Cell – these are some of the best franchises in console gaming. Far Cry Instincts is just another example of how bloody marvelous UbiSoft can be, and how good a console shooter can be without needing to distract us with aliens and shiny green space suits. With the Xbox 360 coming out in mere days, it’s good to see a game of this caliber on the last legs of the Xbox’s lifetime. Let’s look forward to more Far Cry games on the 360. 

All the greatness of the PC’s Far Cry on your TV.

Nobody could ask for more from their Xbox. No complaints, no hiccups.

The sound is crucial in this game, and the only hiccup is an occasional mixing error.

The only thing that isn’t fun here is the tedious nature of some of the more difficult areas.

Great online play, and some fun cheat codes for beating the game. More rewards would be nice.

]]> Mon, 24 Oct 2005 10:56:00 -0500