Far Cry 3 PC
User Score
8.1 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 1689 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,418 out of 1689
  2. Mixed: 116 out of 1689
  3. Negative: 155 out of 1689

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  1. Slater
    Dec 4, 2012
    9
    (Note: I'm in Europe, I've had this game since Nov 29th) I think this is the first game this year to not disappoint me. I was a semi-fan of Far Cry 2 - it was almost a good game, but some unfortunately game-breaking bugs, such as the quickly respawning enemies and broken stealth elements, kept it from reaching its potential and could unfortunately not be modded away. I had high hopes that Far Cry 3 would fix these mistakes while keeping the open gameplay and solid shooter mechanics. It has. Far Cry 3 starts you off as a regular Joe who's never killed anyone before, and forces him to become a killing machine in order to save his friends and two brothers. This story is nice enough, but doesn't explain how Jason - that's you - becomes the world's foremost assassin in a couple of days, so Ubisoft apparently felt the need to add some voodoo magic to explain this. I'm not too sure about this design decisions, which also leads to some, in my opinion, bad story elements, but I suppose it works well enough to keep you interested. The gameplay is absolutely great, letting you freely choose stealth or gung-ho gunning in almost every situation, and particularly the stealth gameplay is some of the best I've seen yet, and it's my favourite genre. Like in Far Cry 2 you are encouraged to scout enemy positions before attacking, and your (admittedly unrealistic and unexplained) zoom-lens camera can tag enemies for you, letting you know their positions in realtime when you move in. If you go the stealth-route you can then choose to dispatch your enemies either with your machete, which will give an XP bonus (yes, the game has RPG elements that also work great), or with any number of silenced weapons, not least of which a bow. If you go with the machete, a skill upgrade will also allow you to drag away the bodies, so your enemies won't find them and raise the alarm. If you clear an enemy outpost silently, you get triple the XP on top of the satisfaction.

    Graphics are of course as excellent as you'd expect from a Far Cry game, and the island is huge (but don't worry, you can fast travel) and looks absolutely stunning, with extreme view range even on the lowest settings. Though I have to say I miss the African savannah setting from FC2, which has now been replaced with a more commonly seen South-east Asian jungle island.

    Unfortunately there are a few things I don't like so much, that prevent it from getting a perfect 10. One of the things, which may seem minor, is that the game constantly reminds you to go to your next main mission with a box on screen and a thumping sound. That's extremely annoying when on a side mission, as even after many hours of gameplay, I think I've been discovered or something when the sound plays. The story has clearly taken quite a few hints from COD, and incidentally they're the parts I like the least. The side missions are still very repetitive and don't feel natural. The hunting gameplay, which starts out very rewarding, becomes completely pointless fairly quickly, when you've upgraded what you want. Why not make pelts worth some decent money at least? I can get more from searching one enemy corpse than by selling a tiger skin. I'm also not too crazy about most of the skills being locked for the first half or so of the game. I think it should be limited by XP levels alone. There are also a few inconsistencies in the gameplay, such as enemies sometimes hearing you throw a knife and sometimes not, and the takedown button (one hit kill with machete) sometimes not working, making you just slash an enemy instead, which alerts the others. Really annoying when you're going for that undetected bonus. But none of this is enough to ruin my enjoyment of what really is a great game.    … Expand
  2. Coeco
    Dec 4, 2012
    3
    As much as I tried to like this game, the extremely dragged out crysis experience ultimately forced me to give up on it. Enemy AI is laughable, stealth is terribly broken with "the enemy must see your face and you must see theirs" logic, gathering materials feels like an MMORPG grind-quest, healing system is dumbed down and becomes laughable as to either spend skill points to have an infinite amount of first aid that fully heals you after some time or constantly run around in the woods, looking for green herbs so you can constantly inject yourself with syringes. If you jump on say, a hill that's going two degrees down-hill, you will stumble and damage yourself, AKA dislocating your thumb for 1 bar of damage. If you shoot a silenced sniper rifle 5000 yards away, enemies will still rush to the exact spot where the weapon was fired. If you get knocked down by an enemy to the ground, struggle with quick time events and get up with low hp left, you will instantly die as the enemy will spam melees, effectively spawn-camping you. Yes, animals as well. I could go on and on and on about the countless amount of flaws and smelly design choices in this game but at the end of the day, it is a polished turd that has been dumbed down version of Far Cry that tries to be a cinematic version of Crysis with graphics with little regard to the original series as it tries to force-feed you a story using a wooden spoon with splinters. Stay away from this title as a fan or get into it with small/no expectations.… Expand
  3. Motasa
    Dec 7, 2012
    4
    The game feels shallow. You earn money to fast, gain hides and plants to fast (for making bags, syringes etc.) and you have access to all weapons you want in nearly 2 hours. That's also how many hours it takes to have the feeling that you've been there and done that. The island, environment, characters etc. look good, forgiving the somewhat outdated graphics. Unfortunately every piece of the island looks the same, as do all camps, cars, trees, bushes, caves, pirates etc. So why should you explore every corner of it? Gameplay is solid; weapons handle very tight, although a bit to tight, wich makes killing foes a piece of cake. Every weapon handles the same. Driving cars is weird, you get the feeling you glide over the road with a immense and unrealistic speed. Story is a bit ridiculous, but finely interwoven in the game with scènes that make you dizzy because the protagonist (your character) shakes his head left and right, up and down like a headbanger from the early '90s. It's a shame the game gets so boring after a while, but climbing towers, getting rid of pirates in camps, going from A to B to continue the story - which is necessarry to continue your leveling progress, which forces you to stop what you want to do and follow the linear storyline - is fun the first few times you do it. But I quit after three hours or so, bored by the forgettable side-quests, story and tropical world. And i think many will not see the end of the game as well or will continue, forced to see the end. A cliche ending which can be found on YouTube; the easy solution. A… Expand
  4. gas
    Dec 4, 2012
    5
    Far Cry 2 was a promising sandbox but it was boring after a little, not a bad game, but nothing exceptional.
    Far Cry 3 is... exactly the same, just bigger and more cod-generation oriented.
    Devs decided that to improve the game the right path was adding long and unskippable cinematics and Tarantino's style npcs, basically following the trend of any recent fps, it seems they all want to ma    ke movies nowadays..
    It was not a bad idea itself, but the exectuion is poor, the story is brainless linear garbage, there is an island, some npcs helping you without any reason, bad guys got red t-shirts, good guys got blue t-shirts, you are a student with no military background who suddenly starts going around with rocket launchers and assault rifles doing rambo, killing dozens of "pirates", primary following a linear main quest arc, helping villagers following mostly terrible side quests, also its really bad imo the fact in this game you basically got unlimited ammo and weapons as there is a dealer every village and you can teleport there in any moment.
    The game mechanic is uber repetitive as side quests and activities, and also its really ruined by the fact this game is made to be played with a joypad.
    Beside the forgettable main quest plot, there are side quests which are all forgettable too, worse if possible then the main quest, usually excessive dramatic illogic situations, then every time the player conquer a camp there are more quests which are always the same 3, one hunting quest, one assassination quest, , and a driving quest (driving is terrible in this game btw), all three quests are very boring and after one day i started to skip them except the hunting which is needed for the in game crafting system so they are a must.
    This game is similar to Dead Island as kind of sandbox game, great presentation, tedious and repetitive gameplay with tons of issues and illogic and poor devs choices.
    The rpg side of the game is not interesting, the abilities you can unlock will be all unlocked going on so there is no sense of developing a specific trait and character.
    This game offers unlimited ammo and weapons as you can fast travel to any camp at any moment and refill with everything, there is no option to change this in game and imo it ruins a lot the basic idea of the plot where the player should be a desperate survivor moving into a dangerous territory.
    The game is also badly ruined by the fact its developed as a console game, it happens quite often but this game is terrible cause this aspect, so its not only the fact its developed with console menu style, but its really developed to be played with a joypad, to a point where playing with keyboard + mouse is a problem, keybinding is not enough customizable, especially the special abilities are impossible to keybind after the first 2, at least using the menu, didnt check if there is an ini to tweak but comon its 2012.
    The inventory and menu system is by far the worse ever seen in gaming hystor, selling and buying stuff is terrible, and overall the menu system is absurd.
    The mouse movement is not totally smooth, tryed with razer and logitech gaming mouses, basically it feels a bit unresponsive compared to any good fps, and it lags badly while in the menus.
    Another great problem is the checkpoint save system, who invented this terrible mechanic should be banned from gaming developing.
    If a console user may be used to this system due to old time console limitations, for a pc player this is something out of any logic, if it happens you need to shut down the pc for any reason in most occasions you will have to see again a long brainless cinematic and redo all the mission from the start, for me its a big issue.
    Graphically its sub-par surely cause the console limits actually are impressive compared to what can do a new pc, I guess Crysis one looks better then this, anyway its not my main concern.
    At the end i find mostly this game irritating me cause the console style menu/inventory and game mechanics developing, anyway even if all those issue would be solved the game is still boring itself and doesnt have the quality that professional reviewers are trying to sell us.    … Expand
  5. MrRPG
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    An amazing game, featuring stunning visuals and gameplay..
    The combat system allows you to play the game your own way, whether it be like rambo or hitman, or a combination of both himbon! and many other play styles..
    The story could be strong, but its easily over looked when there is so much to do and explore..
    This has quickly become one of my top 5 favorite games of all time, I would     rank it up there with the GTA Series, Elderscrolls, dark souls and halflife..

    The co-op adds many more ours of fun and a social immersion into the tropical island paradise/hell..

    Get this game you won't regret it, definitely worth the $70!    … Expand
  6. yogibbear
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    This game was completely off my radar for 2012. [I actually never finished Far Cry 2... hated the lack of reason to explore and terrible storyline. And oh god how bad was malaria?] Well guess what... THIS IS GAME OF THE YEAR 2012 MATERIAL! Single player took approximately 30 hrs (55% completion based on stats). The storyline is intense, amazing, and had me in tears at points throughout the whole journey. They've basically either removed or improved everything in Far Cry 2 that I loathed, and kept everything that I loved. The HUD is absolutely terrible and uPlay is annoying, but after switching uPlay to offline mode I stopped having issues. Gameplay is nice. You start out with nothing, as a scared holiday goer... but you turn into an absolute killing machine with a bow, a knife, suppressed MP5 and flamethrower at your side the enemy doesn't know what beast is after them. Basically you can play this game as an out and out Rambo-fest, or be a bit more predator-type assassin/sneak mode. The sound effects are brilliant. Hunting prey, sneaking up on them... listening to their growls or moans... is thrilling. The music that pumps through my headphones while in the midst of explosions going off everywhere as I trigger my C4 explosives is tight and some brilliant choices. (Die Antwood - I Fink U Freeky, M.I.A., Skrillex etc.). Hmm.... if you liked a combination of Just Cause 2, Far Cry 1, and.... a little Batman Arkham City (Vaas / Joker) / Alice in Wonderland references (oh... some of the dialogue in this game is sooo well delivered!) then this game comes highly recommended. Other notable mechanics are the relics that you find scattered across the island… Expand
  7. Hissatsu
    Dec 5, 2012
    6
    Far Cry 3 is a very good game with very annoying flaws. It's a great experience, but unfortunately you get kicked in the nuts here and there to remind you this game isn't perfect. First of all, this is a medicore console port. Menu is a PITA to navigate with mouse because it wont always register "mouse hover" event. Several lists do not get scrolled with mousewheel. Several times you cannot use enter to activate the "Use" or "Ok" or "Next" option. Several functions are inconsistent - in one interface, you click a button to scroll through inventory sort modes in the bottom of the screen, in other, you click left-right arrows near the top of the screen where current sort option is displayed. Overall, interface is just clunky and not optimised for PC. Controls are awful. You cannot have a hold-to-run or hold-to-crouch option. You cannot really change your mouse look precision (lowest setting is still too high for a shooter). You have to set up controls multiple times - one for your guy, one for your guy in the car, and there are numerous bugs involved (like, car part would let you assign a key that is already used for "map" or "heal" but it wont work because map or healing always takes precedence). If you ever happen to accidentatlly reassign left click to something else than shooting, you'll have to spend a LOT of time to get your shooting with left click back (just binding it back will stop your weapon from shooting, even though you can do everything else you usually do with left click in this game). Worst of all - glider and wingsuit controls are NOT reassignable. You will have to use WASD for that even if you changed your control scheme. Even worst - if you reassign your crouch key, you will NOT be able to use wingsuit at all because parachute won't open! And without it, landing on anything except water is instant death. After you get over the console portedness of the game, you will be greeted with other annoyances. First - game LOVES to take control from you and force you through long and tedious unskippable cutscenes, special interactive cutscene-like corridor levels, unskippable long phone calls that repeat every time you reload a game even if you save after hearing that call. A huge tutorial is unskippable, even if you chose "difficulty level for very experienced FPS players" - yeah sure, teach me how to crouch, run or avoid detection. Second - game isnt really always open worded. A lot of times you'll be "locked" into an area of a mission, being unable to leave (leave = you went out of combat zone mission failed forced reload). Third - game constantly makes you pause for actions like map, skill allocation, crafting... this is even more ridiculous than eating on pause in Skyrim. You can make leatherwares, craft medicine of insane properties (like 30 second invulnerability or quad damage) on PAUSED so you dont really need to stock up on any medicine - just bring the reagents with you. This really breaks immersion and constantly takes you out of the game. They could make it like in FC2 where you take out map to look at it, or you'd sit down to sew/craft syringes, look at your tatau to chose which skill to pick next, anything! But not this. However, when you get past all this, Far Cry 3 is a great experience. Its very fun, it feels like truly open world, you can do a lot of stuff, crafting and minigames and activities ARE involving and addictive, hunting treasure or animals is fun and overall, yes, this game is good. If you can manage the bads...… Expand
  8. Theirlaw
    Dec 4, 2012
    9
    I fail to understand the negative reviews!

    What a game! I have been a gamer now for more than 30 years and there are few games these days which really grab me. Dishonoured was one of the best from 2012. Far Cry 3 very quickly became another.

    I thnk what sums up the brilliance of this game for me is to say that the best set pieces of the game so far, were not set pieces. They were not    hing more than "luck", or is that fate? Running from a group of bad guys in my lovely new shiny jeep only to come face to face with another enemy vehicle coming the other way. Careering off the bridge and baling at the last moment, only to find myself swimming towards an undiscovered underwater tunnel... what lies ahead I wonder?

    Truly amazing.

    Graphics and gameplay are top notch. Amazling level of freedom. I never once felt pushed down a singular route.

    Yes there are some nigles, hence the 9. Occasional texture flickering. Occasional problems grabbing a ledge or activating a switch. Oh and occasionally forcing me to stay up in to the early hours when I should be sleeping!!

    Truly amazing! Best shooter for an age....    … Expand
  9. sean25
    Dec 4, 2012
    2
    I'm giving this game 2 points, and that's for the graphics. I was severely disappointed by the title. Ive long been a Far Cry fan, and loved nothing more than cranking up the difficulty and planning my strategy filled attacks on outposts. Well what this game did was take the things that separated Far Cry 2 from the rest of first-person shooters, and scraped them. The excessive HUD and imbecilic AI turn you into a god, and every element of realism is eliminated. Money is so easy to obtain it's laughable; Dollar bills just laying around on every table in a poverty stricken island nation? Furthermore, the prospect of "Free Weapons" for just climbing a radio tower isn't logical at all. Not only that, but they remove weapon degradation and jamming, field surgery, and actual physical maps? Its obvious the developers noticed that a higher profit could be yielded if they literally dumbed down the title and removed any hint of sophistication as to cater to the 12 year-old COD fanboy demographic. It's as if the last true video game title made by a large developer has been ruined and turned into another over-cinematic arcade shooter (that has been so popular since the 4th Call of Duty) that requires no thought or skill (other than the famed "no-scope" that has grown so popular in the tween circles.) I can at-least be satisfied in that this game is going to bring the community one step closer to noticing the clear capitalistic motives of main stream developers that trump any motivation to create an original, good, game, and one step closer to relying on the indie developers that are creating today's innovative games. Now allow me to step off my soap-box. P.S If you're a 12 year-old console COD fanboy, do us true gamers a favor, and put your parents money toward something of quality (like meth, or cyanide), and stop ruining this industry.… Expand
  10. Phoxulu
    Dec 4, 2012
    3
    What's with all the hype? Although it has some surprisingly good graphics but that's not enough to carry this game along, It's downright bad.
  11. MaDaStar
    Dec 7, 2012
    9
    Just adding my two cents worth. I loved the original Far Cry. There were too many things that I didn't like about Far Cry 2 to keep me playing it. Those things have been fixed and / or changed enough so that I am really enjoying Far Cry 3. The biggest complaint I had about Far Cry 2 was the enemy outposts repopulating after you cleared the area. Ubisoft seems to have taken my (and many others as well) criticism and turned it into an interesting feature in this game. Now when you clear an outpost, it get tagged as a 'safe zone'. Now you can fast travel to it, and resupply your ammo. I also like the fact that you not only have to be on the lookout for bad guys, but while avoiding contact by lurking in the brush, you may end up being attacked by some wild animal. Take the beast out with an arrow or your knife and you remain hidden. Pop a couple of round into the creature, and all of the bad guys now know where you are. There is so much to do besides the main story line. Exploration, hunting and crafting are a big portion of the game, and essential in order to upgrade skills and weapons. Some don't like the activating the towers to reveal more of the map. I like this part as well, though I am now trying to get all 18 towers activated in order to 'get it over with'. Climbing each individual tower is unique enough that you get a level of satisfaction once you flip the switch and see the animation detailing the portion of the map you've just revealed. The health system is similar to Far Cry 2, but now you don't have to deal with malaria all the time. (The other feature of that game I disliked) You can craft heath syringes, but with the appropriate skill, they aren't really required. I've set the graphical settings on ultra with my Phenom II X4 and 6950 with the latest AMD driver with the Far Cry 3 profile. The frame rate is playable enough so that I don't feel the need to lower it. However, I should state that I have vsync disabled. Again, I find Far Cry 3 to be a vast improvement over the previous game.… Expand
  12. talkingears
    Dec 7, 2012
    5
    Disappointing. The pros:
    Great story telling, solid driving and moving mechanics, the tattoo system is fun.

    The cons:
    where to start? The game is way too easy, the enemy spotting system is too lax, especially on hard. If you're more than 50 feet away, cover is irrelevant, I've avoided being spotted in the middle of a clearing or on a beach simply by being crouched. Even though the ene    my was looking dead at me and I had zero cover. Money is way too easy to get. Missions, loot boxes, corpses, selling loot items all give you tons of cash and radio towers unlock expensive weapons for free. I had the best weapons within 1-2 hours of play time. The button to pick up/swap weapons is the same as the loot button, resulting in a ton of time spent dancing around a corpse trying not to swap your FAMAS with his crappy AK just so you can loot a crumpled pack of cigarettes and 10 bucks. The voice acting for people is really inconsistent, half the islanders have a British accent. Hunting is AWFUL, animals have no kill zones, aka: no head shots or heart shots, meaning if you head shot a bear, or pretty much any other animal with a .308, he's just going to run you down and rip you to shreds. This means that the only way to hunt effectively is to bring along an LMG and riddle your prey with hundreds of bullets. Laughable. Not to mention, your character constantly whines "gross" every time you skin a kill. This makes sense the first 50 times or so he skins an animal, but after 30 hours of play time and hundreds of animals skinned, listening to your character whine about skinning gets very, very old. If you fail a mission, it will restart you in a predetermined location. This may not feel like a huge deal at first, but sometimes this method will drop you in an approach to a mission you absolutely would not have taken and probably didn't plan for. There were times I did something stupid and died, carrying a sniper rifle, bow and silenced pistol only to be respawned on the flat side of a map, where I had approached the mission initially from a cliff. The ability to sleep is gone, taking the dynamic of night and day away, which I feel was a real downgrade from far cry 2. This leads me into my next section on the experience. It's simply not as good. It's true that FC2 had its share of issues and frustrations, hyper-aware, laserbeam accurate enemies and checkpoints that respawned in what felt like seconds were huge gripes. But despite these problems, and perhaps because of them, the game had a really brutal, unforgiving feel. Every foray into the world was an event you planned for, you carefully managed your limited ammo supply, you waited for just the right time of day, you knew that your weapons could and would eventually fail you, you learned not to trust crappy, rusted weapons found laying around on the ground. Every mission was an exercise in planning and adaptability. You couldn't carry an LMG, a sniper rifle, an RPG and an assault rifle all at once like you can in FC3, so you had to play to your strengths and cover your weaknesses as best as possible. You had to be patient in stressful situations and fire fights because running around like Rambo was likely to get you killed. Virtually all of these things are GONE in FC3 and it's painfully obvious. Now, the game is just another exercise in sprinting endlessly (you can do that now) around a tropical island (again) and firing curtains of lead until your enemies are dead. And let's face it, we've all played that game before.… Expand
  13. simulant
    Dec 4, 2012
    5
    Far Cry 3's plot is so stupid, irritating, and even offensive, that it's difficult to enjoy the eye candy on display. Immature players only.
  14. W3XC
    Dec 5, 2012
    9
    Im having a hard time reading all the zeros and two's. Really? How can you dislike the game so bad? Some people say that the graphics are bad, i say **** you cause if you are running a 8800GT with an old ass Celeron no wonder (to you Ochetazinco). You say enemy AI sucks? Explain us exactly WHY. Did you hate the other Far Cry games? Why did you get this one? People should stop playing a game for 2 hours and then hating it, give it more time. Also, my guess is people down right hate Ubisoft, and therefor have to give this game a 0.

    Now, i love this game and think its probably one of the best games this year. Sure, multiplayer is not very good but its here right? What can we do about it. The campaign is more than enough in my opinion.    … Expand
  15. oliver1h
    Dec 4, 2012
    8
    Best sandbox-style FPS at the moment. Huge and beautiful open world to explore (Though it feels repetitive after some time.) A nice selection of weapons, which you can customize with different attachments and color patterns. Combat with enemies feels fun (You can kill enemies with ambushes, setting entire areas on fire or killing them one-by-one with your knife.) The main storyline is a little short and it is not very original, but you can stay exploring the islands after you finished the game. You can earn skill points, which you can use to improve your characters abilities, which is a nice addition. Overall I enjoyed the game much more than any other FPS this year.… Expand
  16. FireDagger12
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    An amazing game, featuring stunning visuals and gameplay . It turns out to provide the ultimate first person experience . Amazing story so far and yeah .. i am impressed... Great Pc port and runs fine on my average system. All in all not a disappointing at all...
  17. Jakeyy97
    Dec 4, 2012
    1
    Not one of my all time favourites, it has to be said.. Never been a fan of Far Cry, I find it boring, repetitive, dull and the multiplayer is very mediocre
  18. VeNaH
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    It has been a very long time since I had so much fun with a game without having to play multiplayer (usually all the real content of most games nowadays lies in multiplayer).
    First off it's a splendid and gorgeous game, especially on PC. The amount of detail and polish is very impressive on such a large scale FPS. The best thing about it is that it is consistent - the game looks just as g    ood everywhere, which is a very nice and unexpected thing in a game of this magnitutde. For example in other games of this caliber you will see low quality textures here and there, some glitches and inconsistencies (especially in the Assassin's Creed series) - but not here.
    Another good thing about this game is the amount of freedom you are given to approach said objective. Sure there are a couple of story missions that are kind of linear or restrictive, but other than that it's all up to you. Do you like to make a noisy entrance into the enemy base, without knowing where the enemies are, spray-and-praying Call of Duty style? Go ahead. Do you like to stalk your prey and make a plan and try to keep to it as you silently pick them off with your silenced sniper or trusty bow? You can do that. Or maybe baiting your enemies while you sneak into their base, plant a mine near every alarm and next time they see you BOOM! Or maybe let that leopard trapped in that cage do the job for you. Done! You have so many options it can be overwhelming at times. Most AAA RPGs that are released now and boast with their freedom of choice don't even come close to this game.
    Speaking of RPGs, this game also tries to borrow some elements: you have crafting (but more on this later) and 3 different skill-trees that as you unlock skills in them, tattoos appear on your forearm *or Tataus like they are called here*. But ultimately it isn't that well done as in traditional RPGs.
    Crafting in this game is essential and really makes you want to go hunt or gather ingredients for syringes that beside healing you can grant you some neat abilities (the ability to sense the animals around you or repel predators, etc)
    As for the animals, this is where the game does a VERY good job. There are two types of animals: carnivores and herbivores. Predators and prey. Wherever you go chances are you will see leopards chasing deer, tigers hunting buffalos, sharks eating tortoises, bears assaulting villagers etc. It feels very organic, natural and chaotic as well. These animals can make your life very hard - like surveying an enemy outpost only to find yourself attacked by a tiger, thus drawing enemy attention and realizing there are 4 times more enemy troops now. Or making a run for it and having to cross a river only to be assaulted by a crocodile and dragged underwater as soon you dive into the river. Splendid!
    Now for the story - it is quite interesting as you progress and see Jason slowly changing as a person, lowering himself to Vaas's level. Speaking of Vaas, he is a very good character and a lot of people have compared him to Heath Ledger's joker. You can clearly see the amount of effort Michael Mando (his voice actor) put into him.
    I loved the creepy quotes from Alice in Wonderland appearing between chapters, which to some can seem out of place - but trust me, they fit perfectly.
    Besides the main missions there are plenty of activities ranging from hunting special animals with a specific weapon to races and mini games - Machinima have compared Far Cry 3 to Skyrim and rightfully so.
    There is also a Coop mode and Multiplayer but the real star here is the Singleplayer mode which is both hard and rewarding.
    The one thing that got on my nerves was that your character is supposed to be a town-raised douchebag with no real experience handling weapons - but still he can use a sniper rifle with great accuracy as soon as he touches it. One thing they could have done to fix this would have been to bring back the gun damage from Far Cry 2 - at first guns would jam while you fire them, and as you kill more people you "learn" how to stop this from happening and progressively disappear.
    But they had to cater to the casual players who complained about this mechanic making Far Cry 2 too hard.
    In conclusion my recommendation would be to buy this game, ESPECIALLY if you like first person shooters. It has a solid multiplayer mode and high replay value singleplayer.    … Expand
  19. duffeknol
    Dec 4, 2012
    9
    Game of the year, hands down. Only gave it a 9 because of the horrible, horrible abomination that we all call Uplay. I'm glad you can finally play the game in offline mode, but still, it's a dumb program in the way of your gaming experience. There's server issues galore and I have yet to be able to play a single co op game with my friends.
    Anyway, onto the good: everything else. I've alre    ady read some reviews calling this a 'console port'. Now, this is nothing new. Only this time it's actually false. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a PC game. There's a ton of graphical options, full DX11 support and *drumroll* an FOV slider. When's the last time you saw an FOV slider? Mouse smoothing also isn't a problem since you can simply switch it off.
    The gameplay itself is wonderful. If you like sandbox games, this is for you. You can go anywhere and explore and collect for days on end. I've had this game since the European release date and there's still so much more to see and do. Just walking, driving and flying (yes, flying, you get a wingsuit) around the island is a nice experience. The story is good. If you like an actual story, that is. I know some people just want to skip ahead and shoot things, but thank goodness there's still people who actually care. The characters are well written, interesting, and especially the mocap and voice acting is superb. Also remember those weird Scarecrow scenes from Arkham Asylum? The best part of that game? Well get ready for a whole bunch of stuff just like that. The game doesn't play it straight when it comes to the story missions. It'll always leave you guessing when it comes to your motivations (I think it nicked that idea from Spec Ops The Line, which is a good thing) and when it's not doing that the game simulates you tripping your balls off. There's also the not-so-subtle subtext of Alice in Wonderland, which adds a little mystisism to the story, which is a nice little touch. Tip: don't forget to eat the 'Eat me' pills in the friend-cave!
    Basically, this game is a more interesting Far Cry 2, only without that game's flaws. The world is more interesting and more fun to travel through, and this time you can actually fast travel without having to drive for fifteen minutes to find one of those bus stops. Enemies no longer respawn in camps you've just cleared, instead you conquer them for good. Don't worry, there's still random encounters and certain areas where you can always go looking for a fight if you feel like testing out your newly unlocked machine gun. Speaking of guns: the shooting mechanics are finally a lot better. In Far Cry 2 you just shot at someone, some blood would spurt out, and then they would eventually turn into a ragdoll. The bullets didn't have an impact. If you shot at someone who was running, he wouldn't even notice the bullets in his torso, he'd just drop dead once he hit his 'X shots in this area until I die' quota. Bullets in FC3 have an impact, and the death animations are alright. People also delightfully fly through the air when they're too close to an explosion.
    All in all, I love this game. You will too. If you can put yourself to deal with the annoying Uplay, you'll have dozens of hours of fun.    … Expand
  20. sssfdg
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    This is a GAME OF THE YEAR contender for sure. The first thing I noticed was that the voice acting is top notch. It really brings you into the experience and makes the story more compelling. Of course the graphics and game design are great. But we all expected that from a Far Cry game. Ubisoft has also learned alot from the public and what they asked for. No more DRM!!! On Steam the game starts at $50 instead of $60 for a hard copy on all platforms. The only downside I have heard of is having to launch via uplay.... which frankly isn't that bad. The worst part was trying to remember which email address my uplay account was linked to. So in this jam packed gaming season just before xmas I would say this is still a easy buy and well worth the time and money!!!!… Expand
  21. ariegamerig
    Dec 4, 2012
    5
    the bigger the expectation the bigger is the Disappointment or maby i didnt understand what the game supposed to be? is it FPS or RPG i dont understand it.and what with the climbing the towers
    its so frustrating and so is the action scenes very mediocre.the graphics are not bad but you need to have a strong computer.the sound quality is very bad.maybe if you like exploring open world
    wit    h no purpose then tha game is for you.one thing i am sure this is not a worthy(for the 2012 year) action game.… Expand
  22. Steve85
    Dec 4, 2012
    5
    I was so wanting to like this game. Having invested a few thousand hours in FC1 I thought this might be it's spiritual successor. The island IS beautiful, the art work is great. My biggest criticism are the numerous pop ups telling you of the current quest and warnings. Also (and i find this a weird design decision) all interactive items in the world glow so you know what you can open or take but when you get close enough there is another pop-up telling you which button to press to get the item. The mini-map is too far away from the edge of the screen. There is an enemy detection ring bang in the middle of your field of view; at this point in time this cannot be turned off. Why enemies couldn't be displayed on the mini-map is beyond me. You do not "find" loot as it is marked on the mini-map. The sand-box experience is somewhat broken by having to complete a mission before being allowed to wander off exploring.
    In summary a great let down.    … Expand
  23. violent
    Dec 5, 2012
    2
    Let's start off with the multiplayer-aspect. The guns all feel the same. What I mean by that is that it feels as if they've all got the same recoil and there doesnt seem to be any bulletdrop. You learn that one recoil and then you can adjust your aim to it no matter if you're using the heavy mg or a pistol. Other than that all the maps are basicly the same. There's like a hotzone in the middle and you can run around it - there it is. When a match is over and you're the best player on the winning team you can decide to either punish or spare the best player in the opposing team. That's about the only cool thing with the multiplayer-part. I'd sum it up as a **** clone of Call of duty-multiplayer - and im not even a call of duty fanboy. The single player was pretty fun when I started. The story was compelling enough for me to get interested in the antagonist and the main character (yourself) but once you got out of that first "zone" it all got worse. I thought that the survival-aspect seemed cool in trailers. But that was because I expected that the main character would have to collect eatable plants, hunt animals etc in order to survive. But nope. That's all part of some weird and huge unlock-system. You can make a backpack out of 2 X meat from animal Y. That animal is marked on your minimap so there's no way that you can miss it. The same goes for all the plants. Just look at your minimap and all you need to do is go there. It's an open world but since EVERYTHING is marked on the map it feels as if everything is already explored. You already know where everything is so there's close to no exploring. Sure, you can climb up a radiotower and the hotspots will become even more apparent to you (they actually show you how the place looks from an angle, instead of just the marked spot).

    And if that wasnt enough the AI is beyond stupid. You can throw rocks to distract the AI, you've got an infinite amount of rocks and you can do it a billion times. Each time the AI goes "WHAT WAS THAT?!", each time just as surprised as the previous time you did it. Their reactiontimes also seem to be really slow. They aim at you and after about 5 seconds they start shooting. I guess this is some setting that would help console-players to kill their enemies fast enough but on a PC it's incredibly easy to get the kill before they actually start shooting.

    Eventually the story just spins into a cliché and I totally lost interest. Stopped playing after about two hours of playtime. I doubt I will play it again. The co-op was repetative and easy (on the hardest difficulty). The co-op is not like single player. You're on a rail on one specific "mission" at a time. It's not even a story, you go get a bomb, place it and then you go to spot X. Mission complete and you go back to the lobby. All in all a really crappy game. It gets 2 because the voiceacting was better than average.    … Expand
  24. Ochetazinco
    Dec 4, 2012
    0
    I am going to be honest about this game's graphics, they are terrible. Not only does it look worse that the previous game, Far Cry 2, it looks like they actually did cell shading, after which they added a bunch of DOF, SSAO, Motion Blur, MSAA and DX11 just to attempt to appease computer snobs who like to brag about their systems. These effects do nothing to improve the already mediocre textures, bad cartoonish looking grass...and the water and water effects look like they were done with the Windows paint program. Let's take a look at a game like Dirt Showdown, for example, and compare it to this game. When you max out Dirt Showdown, you can really tell the difference, in Far Cry 3 you can't, but your computer takes a huge performance hit for no reason at all. Another game, The Witcher 2 (which is only directx9) the water effects in the Witcher 2 are absolutely stunning, because it looks like real water and when you step in water, there are ripple effects in the puddles, and that is only DX9! Another prominent example is Skyrim, the new textures they added are absolutely stunning, both The Witcher 2 and Skyrim look like they would be DX11, although they are not. When you are playing Skyrim and walking through Solitude, it feels as though you are actually in a real village, your character model looks impressive and you can see the detail on your armor and weapons. The rocks on the trails in Skyrim are impressive, and the water, though not as impressive as in The Witcher 2, still looks better than the 2D "DX11" water in Far Cry 3. Like I said, compare Far Cry 3 to any of these other games, and you will see what I mean. (P.S. compare it with the 2-3 year old Just Cause 2, and you'll definitely see what I mean).… Expand
  25. Chupwn
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    I wouldn't trust any review here below a 7. Skyrim with guns is an apt description of this game. I like the leveling mechanic, stealth killing a whole base is a good challenge, but it's the chaos of the world that makes the game come alive. I was stalking a base, tagging enemies when a freakin' tiger attacked the base. The enemy panicked and threw molotov's around, forcing me to escape a brush fire and approach the attack from a different angle. I very much enjoyed that moment. Climbing your first tower is awesome because the game looks incredible under ultra settings - my pc is about 2 years old too and the framerate is better than Skyrim on a whole.… Expand
  26. nielsen
    Dec 5, 2012
    0
    It doesn't deserve 0 but the user score is too high for such a game. If we keep the game and the product as 2 separate things, the product is messy and full of bugs. It keeps crashing on me and the DX11 adds nothing to the graphics. The game doesn't give you any real challenge but the multiplayer. All challenges and missions are easy as pie and the hud (that or some npc doing things you don't get to do) does the work for you while exploring pointing out where to go and what to push. Cutscenes, qte's and explosive barrels are everywhere to the point it hurts as if health regen coupled with loads of meds were not enough to break the game to the point fall damage works better than shetloads of bullets. It truly feels like an xbox360 exclusive and unless you like pain and play it with a xbox controller your disappointment will know no bounds. And the quests.....i guess it's a good game if you enjoy killing animals over and over again?… Expand
  27. Jaytheking69
    Dec 4, 2012
    10
    Far Cry 3 has an epic story. What an amazing soundtrack. Far Cry 3 shows exactly how every game should start. This game make you care about the characters and of the story. The voice actors are simply amazing. What a performance! I did enjoy almost everything. There's only two things that I didn't like. One is that secondary quest feels really secondary. In fact, I didn't bother to finish them all. The minigames are cool but that's it, The second one is that I would like to feel the islands more like jungle with less valleys. It's definitely my game of the year! It's worth to be played! 9.5/10… Expand
  28. MastaBlasta
    Dec 4, 2012
    2
    I got this game and at first I was very excited, back to the jungle, finally. I thought at first as I watched the Jack Carver-esque army guy kill guards and escape while my character whined like a little girl about everything, that you would take over the role of said army guy. Then army guy gets shot and I realize I am going to be this whiny 16 year old that after skinning hundreds of animals still says eewee every time he does it. This game has a couple minor issues with the ai and mildly repetitive side missions, but aside from that, the game play is a solid 10. The guns feel really good, they sound amazing, sitting on the couch playing on the TV with a 360 controller and my amazing PC is a huge bonus, unfortunately he story, is downright ABYSMAL and seems to do everything it can to make you not want to play the game. My 2 year old could have written a better story. An easy fix would have been the 16 year old getting shot, and the 30 year old special forces trained bad ass brother going on a murderous rampage would have made a LITTLE more sense, but that's just me. Whoever made the decision on that on should be beaten severely. He constantly complains while effortlessly killing hundreds of people like it is what he was born to do. I just do not see how someone could possibly think that would be a good design decision. Now on to another note, the game does have a co-op mode with actual BELIEVABLE characters. The only reason I gave this game any points was the co-op mode and probably the best looking jungle foliage I have ever seen (the big broad leafed plants look M-azing) and the sandbox elements are somewhat decent, and I still get a little scared every time I hear a tiger growl in the bushes or a bear growl, as they are as you would expect, extremely dangerous. The Breakdown:

    STORY:-20/20:The story in this game is so bad I have to give it negative points, as it just makes no sense and you are reminded of it every time the main character speaks, and I agree with Vaas, hes a little chicken **** How it is Jason, and not the older brother who was chosen as a main character is beyond me. Someone should be fired over that. It is seriously the rotten core to a majestic oak of a game. GRAPHICS:20/20: The plats trees and shrubs look amazing. Light transitions are so wonderfully done I can feel my pupil dilating. Water is superbly done, with ripples on the surface looking and behaving realistically. The sun, sunrays, and reflections are some of the best I have ever seen and it runs wonderfully on a single 560ti and a 3820 @4.6 and 16 gigs ddr3quad 1866 on ultra settings 1920x1080.

    GAMEPLAY: 5/20- Gunplay is fantastic, combat is fun, and enemies are only mildly retarded. The hunting mechanic is a nice diversion tho as soon as you get the extended pouches becomes completely irrelevant as you animal skins are worth less than a crumpled pack of smokes.

    SOUND: 15/20: The sound is really good, and I normally only mention audio if its bad. The gun sounds in particular are extremely realistic and oh so enjoyable, and make me feel like I am shooting a gun and not a string of black cats(firecrackers) Distances are accurate and I get scared hearing a tiger growling in the bush Only points subtracted for the girlish nature of the main characters voice.

    REPLAYABILITY: 0/20: As fun as the combat is, and as pretty as things look, I just do not see myself playing this game again if I even finish my first play-through. Side missions are incredibly repetitive, the story is just BAD, the main character is seriously the worst character ever, they should have just not had him talk at all. He literally killed this game for me and I really don't know if I will finish it once. TOTAL:20 out of 100. Final thoughts:I really have never been more shocked at any single gamplay element of a game more than the choice of a main character in farcry 3 and that is rally just the tip of the iceberg as far as completely illogical unbelievable story issues go. This really would have been an amazing game if it just had a better main character, but as bad as Jason is it ruined the game for me. My girlfriend walked in while I was skinning something and asked why he was saying eew (apparently hes a little chicken **** **** asked if he did that every time(unfortunately), and wrinkled her nose like she smelled something bad and said "really?", its that terrible. I just do not understand why....thank god crysis 3 looks incredibly promising, or I would have sold off every bit of Ubisoft stock I own and invested it in Bohemia Interactive, which I may do anyway, since they still make computer games for adults, rather than take the creative dump that is farcry 3 and try to sell it for 59.99 (ARE YOU KIDDING ME). Pre-packaged DLC should just be called "content", not "bonus material". I will never buy any game that has a pre order bonus that is "extra" ingame content, nor did I buy this one.    … Expand
  29. Ferocit
    Jan 22, 2013
    9
    I really liked the open world of Far Cry 3. Almost felt a bit like a MMORPG, if you didn't want to continue with the story, then you just played some challenges or took over some camps. Really nice.
  30. RzrTrek
    Dec 5, 2012
    0
    Far Cry 3 should be considered yet another epic failure (remake) of the second instalment in the series, all I can say is that I would like my money back (not possible) and please stop screwing us over.
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Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
88 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 43 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 42 out of 43
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 43
  3. Negative: 0 out of 43
  1. PC Master (Greece)
    Feb 6, 2013
    89
    Far Cry 3 is a classic shooter at its core, but there are various RPG mechanics, skills and upgrades under the hood. It’s a fabulous playing ground and one can but marvel at the wondrous ways the various elements interact with each other. [January 2013]
  2. Riot Pixels
    Jan 29, 2013
    75
    Exhilarating, colorful, mindless – that's Far Cry 3 in three words.
    Read full review
  3. Hyper Magazine
    Jan 24, 2013
    90
    Tighter and more accessible than Far Cry 2, the third outing is a master class in open world shooting. [Feb 2013, p.59]
See all critic reviews »