One of the most satisfying open-world power fantasies I've ever played. It doesn't waste any time letting you off the leash either. After a relatively brief opening and quickly customizing your character, you're set free to take out the highest-ranking members of a cult however and in any order you see fit to draw out their leader. The structure is very similar to the Just Cause series in that pulling your targets out of hiding requires you to destabilize their presence in a region by completing missions and destroying their property, among other things.
The whole process is a joy thanks to how great shooting feels and the amount of flexibility you're given in your approach to tackling objectives. There's also a healthy feeling of growth as completing challenges, a lot of which you'll do naturally without even trying, rewards you with "Perk Points" you can use to buy a variety of beneficial abilities and any cash found can be spent at shops on attachments for your arsenal of weapons. All of which have the potential to turn you into a nigh unstoppable killing machine. You can even bring a buddy along for the ride on top of being able to recruit a diverse assortment of AI companions with their own unique skills.
By far the biggest reason this is so much fun though has got to be the map. The Montana countryside setting leads to a lot of distinctive scenery you can't find anywhere else and the world is brought to life by a believable ecosystem that allows for a wide range of naturalistic animal and human NPC behavior for you to notice. It's also a blast to traverse to the point where I often forsook vehicles entirely in favor of reaching my next destination on foot. Did I mention the plethora of activities littered about it to boot?
Not everything is perfect however. Vehicular combat is a drag because driving in first-person is loose and aiming while behind the wheel is unreliable at best. Particularly in anything that leaves the ground. The load times are fairly lengthy as well and you can't skip the splash screens at the startup before the main menu which is annoying.
There is an online component called "Arcade" where you can try out player-created solo experiences and deathmatch arenas, or make your own. The actual multiplayer side of it is dead though. Next to nobody is online anymore so unless you just want to build stuff that's unlikely to be seen by anyone else you can safely ignore this portion of the game.
Based solely on the strength of its single-player (or cooperative) offering alone however, this is still a worthy purchase. It's a massive sandbox filled with enough content to keep you busy for quite a long time and all the toys you'll need to turn it into your very own playground of destruction, that happened to garner a lot of controversy for its story. Which is weird given what a largely inconsequential feature that ended up being. The cutscenes are little more than a minor nuisance that slow you down from getting back to trying to murder the twisted villains talking at you rather than anything to get worked up over. As a result, an interest has been sparked in me for this franchise that I've been entirely content to let pass me by until now. Far Cry 5's commitment to freedom and transforming you into an undeniable force to be reckoned with led to some of the most enjoyable escapist thrills I've found this side of Saint's Row: The Third and IV. I can't recommend it highly enough.
8.5/10
The whole process is a joy thanks to how great shooting feels and the amount of flexibility you're given in your approach to tackling objectives. There's also a healthy feeling of growth as completing challenges, a lot of which you'll do naturally without even trying, rewards you with "Perk Points" you can use to buy a variety of beneficial abilities and any cash found can be spent at shops on attachments for your arsenal of weapons. All of which have the potential to turn you into a nigh unstoppable killing machine. You can even bring a buddy along for the ride on top of being able to recruit a diverse assortment of AI companions with their own unique skills.
By far the biggest reason this is so much fun though has got to be the map. The Montana countryside setting leads to a lot of distinctive scenery you can't find anywhere else and the world is brought to life by a believable ecosystem that allows for a wide range of naturalistic animal and human NPC behavior for you to notice. It's also a blast to traverse to the point where I often forsook vehicles entirely in favor of reaching my next destination on foot. Did I mention the plethora of activities littered about it to boot?
Not everything is perfect however. Vehicular combat is a drag because driving in first-person is loose and aiming while behind the wheel is unreliable at best. Particularly in anything that leaves the ground. The load times are fairly lengthy as well and you can't skip the splash screens at the startup before the main menu which is annoying.
There is an online component called "Arcade" where you can try out player-created solo experiences and deathmatch arenas, or make your own. The actual multiplayer side of it is dead though. Next to nobody is online anymore so unless you just want to build stuff that's unlikely to be seen by anyone else you can safely ignore this portion of the game.
Based solely on the strength of its single-player (or cooperative) offering alone however, this is still a worthy purchase. It's a massive sandbox filled with enough content to keep you busy for quite a long time and all the toys you'll need to turn it into your very own playground of destruction, that happened to garner a lot of controversy for its story. Which is weird given what a largely inconsequential feature that ended up being. The cutscenes are little more than a minor nuisance that slow you down from getting back to trying to murder the twisted villains talking at you rather than anything to get worked up over. As a result, an interest has been sparked in me for this franchise that I've been entirely content to let pass me by until now. Far Cry 5's commitment to freedom and transforming you into an undeniable force to be reckoned with led to some of the most enjoyable escapist thrills I've found this side of Saint's Row: The Third and IV. I can't recommend it highly enough.
8.5/10