Far Cry 5 is one of those games that was always bound to be controversial, largely thanks to Ubisoft's decision to set the game in Montana with an extremist cult and its creepy leader as the antagonists.
Hope County, MT has come under the sway of Eden's Gate, a bizarre doomsday cult with a penchant for ultra-violence, vague religiosity and a drug called Bliss. You, the rookie Sheriff's deputy, are the one-man (or woman) army who, with a little help from your friends, is here to take them down and put an end to this reign of terror.
Along the way you'll meet a bear named Cheeseburger, a dog named Boomer, and a whole bunch of good, god-fearing, red-blooded Americans willing to risk it all to help---or just send you on various side missions, from retrieving bull testicles to assisting in the construction of an interplanetary teleportation device.
Far Cry 5 is both a chaos simulator and a dark journey into America's very own heart of darkness. The story is preposterous. The gameplay is brilliant.
As a born-and-bred Montanan, I find the portrayal of Montana beautifully ludicrous. I certainly don't remember quite so many Southern accents up there in the Northwestern mountains and prairies---Montana accents can range from pretty standard West Coast American to something a bit more Midwestern/Great Lakes-ish, but I suppose there's some hillbilly in there, too---and the state is overall much less racially diverse than Far Cry 5, though it has many more Native Americans than are represented in the game.
One must choke down their suspension of disbelief to accept the game's premise. Yes, there have been cults and militias in America and they have presented difficulties to law enforcement and some of these cults have ended in violence and bloodshed. But we're talking about a cult thousands strong, armed with fighter planes and rocket launchers. The cult has taken total control of an entire county, stealing property, murdering or enslaving innocents and running roughshod over this rural American county like the Taliban in Afghanistan.
No, this is not likely to happen in the US. Long before it could ever get this bad the feds would crack down. If it did somehow get this bad, the army would intervene. It's just not at all realistic---but who cares? This is Far Cry.
I played the game imagining this was an alternate version of America, one with even more brittle institutions and a very weak federal government. One without cell phones, for that matter. One in which Eden's Gate could actually take over and nobody would come to help. Nobody but the Rookie, that is. I mean, why not just enjoy the fantasy, however absurd, rather than worry about how unrealistic this game in a deeply unrealistic series is? If I can accept this twisted version of the my home state, so can you...
Fun Times In Babylon
The open-world of Hope County, Montana is a sight to behold. Whatever the game lacks in story it makes up for in adventure, variety and gameplay. When a co-worker emailed me the other day to ask how I was liking the game, I simply wrote back: "I love it to pieces."
This is certainly the best Far Cry since Far Cry 3, but in many ways I'm enjoying it even more. For one thing, it's just a lot of fun. I know that's not a particularly deep observation, but it's the truth. I've been playing the hell out of this game and I've been having a blast the entire time. I'll tell a few stories to help illustrate my point.
During one story mission, I went to steal a plane for one of the main NPC characters, Nick Rye. Completing this mission unlocks Rye as a gun for hire. He'll fly the skies and take out enemy planes for you, freeing you up to wreak havoc on the ground unmolested.
The plane was located at John Seed's ranch. John is one of the top lieutenants of the cult, managing one of three major sections of the map for his brother Joseph Seed, the Father. (The other two sections are controlled by Jacob and Faith Seed.) When I show up, I discover that the ranch is also one of the cult's outposts. Like in past Far Cry games, capturing these bases is one of the main activities in the game. So I decide to forego the plane mission and take the base. I start out pretty sneaky but give up part way through to destroy the final of three alarms with a rocket launcher. All hell breaks loose and I barely manage to take out the remaining bad guys, accidentally lighting myself on fire with my flamethrower. My NPC companion revives me and I finish off the final cultist with a rocket that sends him flying fifty feet into the air. You can watch this all in the video below:
Another time I was running through the forest when I came upon a small campground. A man was seated playing a Bob Dylan song. A man and a woman stood dancing by the fire. It's little moments like this that really make the game feel alive---or at least more alive than many similar games.
Tonal Dissonance
There's also the quest I went on to retrieve bull testicles for the annual Testicle Festival. Or the one where I helped a conspiracy theorist straight out of the X-Files build a teleportation device that actually worked, leaving me with a snazzy new weapon in the process.
These are coupled with missions where we learn about the atrocities of various cult members, including one cultist who made starving children eat their own parents after burning them alive. These tonal pivots are extreme, no doubt about it, but this is what we've come to expect from Far Cry as a series. Extreme violence, madness and cruelty are juxtaposed with humor and bombast. It's a far cry from realistic, but as a game it still somehow works.
I've seen some people complain that the game doesn't send a clear enough political message or that its shifting tone is hard to follow, but I think this is what makes this series tick. Contradictions are at the heart of Far Cry and now those contradictions are just much closer to home.
Many people have also complained that Far Cry 5's political and social commentary is too watered-down and too vague to be of any particular consequence. It's not relevant to modern-day America or strident enough in its condemnation of things certain people feel the need to condemn. The cult's belief system is opaque and barely touches on radical Christianity or radical conservatism or what have you. And it's true: This isn't a condemnation of ultra right-wingers, though I do think it's a critique of radical beliefs in general. The cult may be impossible to pin down due to Ubisoft playing it safe with the religion and politics, but I think the point is that Eden's Gate is emblematic of all kinds of radical, violent extremism. It's not like radical Islam or rightwing terror groups make any sense, either.
But this certainly isn't a condemnation of conservatism. Indeed, most of the good guys are red-blooded Americans wearing flags on their T-shirts. I've never seen so many American flag shirts in my life. But I do think the game has a message, even if it's one that isn't all that applicable to the here and now of US or Montana politics.
Scottish political philosopher Edmund Burke famously wrote that “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
He also wrote, "No man, who is not inflamed by vain-glory into enthusiasm, can flatter himself that his single, unsupported, desultory, unsystematic endeavours, are of power to defeat the subtle designs and united cabals of ambitious citizens. When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."
I think this pretty perfectly sums up what this game is all about. Good citizens stood around and did nothing while bad men and women took control of their home. It may seem silly in the context of modern America with all our checks and balances and power and wealth, but this sort of thing is far from unprecedented. I mentioned the Taliban above. Eden's Gate is like a very generic American Taliban. The citizens of Hope County let them take over and then finally, with the help of one super soldier (young Rookie) fought back. The only thing necessary for Joseph Seed to take over was for good men to do nothing, and in the end "the good must associate; else they will fall, one by one, unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle."
Indeed, one wouldn't have to look all that closely at current happenings in Washington, D.C. to see some parallels. Even our illustrious Republic and its Constitution are not immune to corruption, to 'united cabals of ambitious citizens.' Good people of every political stripe need to stand up to political corruption, warmongering and nepotism at all levels of government. There's even one mission in the game that's all about gerrymandering...
Changes to the Formula
Far Cry 5 makes some solid gameplay and quality of life improvements as well. Gone are the silly towers that you once had to climb in order to unlock portions of the map. "I know what you're thinking," your first quest-giver tells you as he asks you to climb the radio tower. "Don't worry, I'm not going to make you climb towers all over the county." Now you just find maps which you can later sell for cash.
Gone are the multiple health bars, also. Now you just have one. You can use medkits to heal, but over time you'll heal without them. Gone, too, is the constant picking of flowers. The only potions you craft are totally optional. Medkits have to be purchased or found. Pickable flowers are far more rare. And with all these omissions, tedium is also vastly diminished.
Gone, too, is the requirement to hunt and skin animals to progress. You can still do that and earn rewards for it, including useful bait and valuable skins, but you don't need to seek out specific animals in order to level up your pouches and gear. Now everything is based on "perks" which you can earn by doing...well, just about everything. Get ten kills with this weapon, get a perk. Get five kills with that weapon, get a perk. Go base-jumping, get two perks. Crash your plane, get a perk. Then use all these perks to level up your various skills.
If you want to just go out in search of perks, there are myriad 'prepper' stashes dotted across the map. Each one is a mini-puzzle of sorts that requires you to figure out how to get inside and find the treasure---money, goods and three perk magazines that give you one perk each. This means that pretty much no matter how you play, you'll be earning perks as you go. You can even go and see what activities will earn you perks and do those---for instance, changing up which weapons you use is a sure way to earn perks faster and get you trying out different guns.
But really, you can just play and not even think about it. You'll earn perks and level up at a nice pace regardless.
Missions, meanwhile, flow much more organically than in previous games. Pretty much everyone in the game has something to offer. Rescue a citizen on the side of the road, maybe they'll tip you off to some side mission or character you need to meet. Capture a base and you'll almost certainly have a side mission, a prepper stash tip and possibly a story mission open up. You can do these in just about any order you like, though obviously certain story missions need to be done before others open up.
Ubisoft has certainly taken some of what they implemented in Ghost Recon: Wildlands and applied it here. The format of the map is incredibly similar, and as with Wildlands you'll need to keep provoking the boss of each section into action. Poke the bee's nest enough and the cult will stir into action against you, eventually leading you closer and closer to each of your primary targets. The whole thing can play out in any order, and you can spend as much time on side missions and other side content as you like in the process, or just race through the game.
Online/Arcade
The game is fully playable in online co-op which is another nice feature for anyone wanting to delve in with a friend. Meanwhile, the online portion of the game takes place in Far Cry Arcade, where you can play solo, co-op or PvP depending on the maps you choose. The Arcade is also a really full-featured map editor which I haven't played with at all yet. I've played some of the Arcade maps, but mostly spent my time in the sprawling campaign.
One clever twist here is that to access the Arcade you actually have to go to arcade machines dotted about Hope County. It's a nice touch. I'll play around with the map editor and all of this more and write it up in a future post.
Micro-Transactions
Micro-transactions in full-priced video games with paid DLC are bad. Plain and simple. All these big AAA games with loot boxes just smack of greed. But at least in Far Cry 5 the MTX don't have an impact on the game itself. Basically you can use real money to purchase silver bars (which you can find in the game also) which you can then use to buy gear in shops. You can also just spend in-game cash on these same items. None of them have any impact on gameplay. You can also purchase outfits with silver bars or in-game cash. That's it, basically. You can just ignore these altogether or spend some cash on items if you really have to. No loot boxes, nothing on offer that you can't just buy after playing the game.
Verdict
Far Cry 5 isn't a perfect game. Some missions are certainly less fun than others. I encountered a couple difficulty spikes that had me more frustrated than challenged. The sheer scope of content can be a bit bewildering and overwhelming at times. And the lack of a clear message certainly indicates that Ubisoft was not willing, not brave enough perhaps, to take more of a stand.
And yet, for all that, this is some of the most fun I've had gaming all year. The game is gorgeous and rich with content. There's tons to do and you can do it however you like. Scale a mountain and go base-jumping with your squirrel suit. Try to crash your plane into an enemy outpost. Unleash predators on unsuspecting cultists. Blow stuff up with glee and abandon. Pet your adorable dog, Boomer. This freedom, coupled with the game's excellent quality of life changes, make this a wonderful first-person shooter sandbox game that will appeal to anyone who enjoys freedom in gameplay and doesn't mind an outrageous story.
Of course, I have my own biases. I've loved every Far Cry game including the original (though Primal was a bit weaker, and I didn't play that much of Far Cry 2. It's on my list of games to return to and play more thoroughly.) These games just click for me---they don't for everyone. I'm glad to see the series make some changes, also. Far Cry 3 was great, but Far Cry 4 didn't try to differentiate itself enough and that made it feel a bit too repetitive. Far Cry 5 is certainly more of the same thing, but with enough changes that it feels fresh.
I give the game a Buy on my Buy/Hold/Sell scale. I think it's worth the price of admission. If you get the Gold version you get a copy of the remastered version of Far Cry 3 as well, which is a great deal (though I haven't yet played the remaster so I can't comment on its quality.)
I played my copy of the game on a PS4 Pro on both a TV supporting HDR and one without HDR. The game is stunning on my LG OLED screen with HDR but looks quite nice on a regular 4K television as well.
Far Cry 5
TL;DR: Far Cry 5 is a chaos simulator with a preposterous story, tons of quality of life improvements over past games and an enormous amount of content. It's a blast if you let yourself just accept the silly premise and not invest too much in the politics of the game, or lack thereof.
Developer: Ubisoft
Platforms: PS4, Xbox One, PC
Publisher: Ubisoft
Release Date: March 27th, 2018
Price: $59.99 / $30 Season Pass / $89.99 Gold w/Season Pass
Score: 9/10
A review code was provided for the purpose of this review.
And here's some more gameplay footage for your viewing pleasure:
