If you haven’t had a chance to play Ubisoft’s latest, than it might be time to set Black Ops 2 aside for a few days and fight some pirates. Far Cry 3, as I mentioned in my review , is an open world shooter that plays like an adventure game. Very little time is spent grinding levels or suffering through pointless side quests. In fact, Far Cry 3 is the only open world title that I’ve regularly recommended to the open world haters in my life.
But part of what makes FarCry 3 so special is the terrifying overtones in the single-player campaign. Here are a few of my favorites:
1. Vaas
Most of you are probably already familiar with the scene where Vaas crudely paraphrases Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity. And even though that’s a character-defining moment in Far Cry 3, it’s not the only one.
About halfway through the single-player campaign, there’s battle between Jason, the playable protagonist, and Vaas, the game’s poster boy. During the fight, Vaas is screaming at you to ask him for salvation. The entire time he’s trying to end your life, he’s instructing you to accept him into your heart and ask for salvation. It’s disturbing. And incredible.
2. Animals
Every time Far Cry 3 has caused me to scream like a little girl, it’s been animal-related. The first time that I was introduced to a crocodile, it caused me to spill a drink. Komodo dragons are practically invisible in the long grass, and bears are basically bullet-proof.
Plus, whenever I liberate an enemy camp, the sequence typically goes like this: 1. Release caged animal. 2. Watch animal kill most of the enemies. 3. Kill the remaining enemies. 4. Get eaten by the animal.
3. Alice In Wonderland
The chapters in FarCry 3 are separated by selected quotations from Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. The passages underline the game’s overall theme of psychological destabilization and transformation. Jeffrey Yohalem, the lead writer on Far Cry 3, compares Vaas to the Cheshire Cat, and the Rook Islands to Wonderland:
“This island kind of represents his fantasy world, like in Alice in Wonderland,” Yohalem told StuffWeLike, “so he journeys through this island, gets taken through stuff by Vaas, who’s kind of like the Cheshire Cat, and he thinks he understands what’s going on, and then there are a lot of twists and turns, and things that he expects mean one thing actually mean something else.
So it’s really a journey through Jason’s psychology as he becomes this warrior, and the player’s psychology as the player creates the warrior out of Jason.”
The quotes themselves add a new layer to the depth of darkness that Far Cry 3’s storyline exists in, and to the world that Jason Brody has been forced to deal with:
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”
So which Far Cry 3 moments caused you to wet your pants?
 | By Josh Engen News Director Date: December 12, 2012 |