This is a really sophisticated game with no sign of any crude humour or sexual innuendos
or any foul language of any kind... really?
F@#$ that!
As you guys can probably figure out, Far Cry Primal Review is anything but sophisticated.
It takes players back, way back, to the Mesolithic era.
You play as an ancient man, Takkar, who is on a quest to reunite all his Wenja people
and fight against the oppressive Udam who are literally eating his people.
Far Cry Primal is the latest in a long line of first person shooters that have had fairly
decent commercial success.
The only difference that some people say is in Far Cry Primal is that there is no guns.
I do have to agree with this statement somewhat.
Far Cry Primal has kept the same formula that they have used in the past Far Cry games for
bettor or for worse.
The staples that you do expect out of a Far Cry game do make a good return.
The large amount of content that is at your disposal, the cool exploration through some
rugged and interesting terrain.
Those definitely make a return and they are done very similar to past games but that's
what made those past games good so it is no surprise that the developers decided to return
to this in Far Cry Primal.
The plot in Far Cry Primal is surprisingly week, driven mostly by the lack of an interesting
protagonist or main villain.
The main villain in the game that you fight is really uninteresting.
You don't have that many interactions with him early in the game to really develop that
hate for him like you did with the villains in Far Cry 3 and Far Cry 4.
As well, Takkar the main protagonist, doesn't really speak that much so you don't get to
know the character you are playing as that well so it is hard to really form an emotional
attachment to him.
There are some memorable characters in Far Cry Primal like there is a guy with only one
arm who pees on you at some point, which these are some interesting and funny even moments
but they are so spread out and you don't interact with these characters that much throughout
the game.
I think the weak plot has something to do with setting and the choice to go with the
ancient language and the subtitles.
It is really hard to get invested in the characters when the language they were using back then
was kinda primitive.
They spoke in simple words, simple English, so it is hard for them to really articulate
what they mean so we can really understand them as people, and when you are just reading
off the subtitles you also can't look at their face when they are speaking at the same time
either.
This caused, for me at least, to not really know any of these characters that well because
I was just reading off their dialogue.
The basic gameplay of Far Cry Primal will be really familiar to fans of previous Far
Cry games, but the changes that they have made actually go over really well.
The combat has shifted from guns, obviously because you can't use them in this time period,
to a focus on bows and close quarters combat.
This can sometimes take away from the strategy of engaging in battles because it ends up
devolving into just you bashing the shit out of your enemy right in the head.
But that doesn't mean it's not fun.
Running around and using your animal and beating people over the head can actually be really
fun time.
The addition of being able to throw your club or spear at enemies to kill them also adds
to this feeling of a chaotic battlefield.
Running around bashing peoples heads in with your club or launching your spear at them
from a distance just makes for a really chaotic and hilarious battlefield to fight in.
One of the coolest additions that I have to talk about is the addition of the beast mastery
skill.
This allows you to tame animals and have them follow you as companions.
You can command them to run and attack other people, to go to certain spots, they'll even
sneak around with you when you sneak.
There is a wide range of beasts that you can tame, command and even ride.
Each of them have their own unique skills.
Some are better at sneaking, some are stronger, and some are faster.
This allows you to choose different beasts that would be better for different situations.
The addition of the owl as well to replace the binoculars from past games actually works
much better.
You can call in your owl to swoop in over the battlefield, tagging enemies for you,
makes a lot of sense and works so well in this environment.
While the beast mastery is extremely cool, I think there is a huge missed opportunity
in terms of the pacing.
I had played for about two hours, and I had tamed about ten of the beasts.
That is almost all of them and I had all the good ones.
What a huge missed opportunity for maybe forcing you to climb your way up the food chain and
play with a certain beast for a long time so that you can really get attached to them.
Now I just got the best ones early and I found that I never use the ones that aren't quite
as good.
Where you put all these new skills and combat techniques to use is going and invading the
enemy outposts.
This is probably the most fun part of the game.
Being able to choose between running in headfirst trying to bash everyone's head in with maybe
a big bear behind you taking all the damage, or maybe picking a leopard and sneaking your
way in the back.
Both ways are equally fun and really rewarding even adding bonuses to the sneaking pathway
if you do it without being noticed.
Really, really fun.
And this echoes previous editions of the game as well.
I am so glad that they have managed to capture that same feel that made previous games in
the series great.
The crafting system is very similar to past games.
You will be able to collect all sorts of raw materials throughout the world, wood and slate,
reeds, and all sorts of plants and animal hides that you can use to craft pouches and
bags and weapons for your character to use.
This time around though it felt like it had a bit of a grindy feel though, like I had
to go and find a bunch of these obscure resources that didn't pop up normally just to get one
level up into my club for example.
I found that I didn't even really need increase all these for me to be effective during battles
so i ended up saying forget it all together.
I know some players will really appreciate this system though because the hunting is
really intricate and getting animal hides can be tough so it is a great challenge for
players who are into that sort of thing.
As well most of the new additions of the weapons, for example the bombs or the sling, the new
stuff like that, went unused for me.
Some of them had really cool effects like being able to throw the bomb and have bees
be all over the enemy.
Stuff like that is really cool, but I found it wasn't as effective as using my club and
my spear so I away from it.
A huge theme in the Far Cry series has always been man vs. nature and this does play a role
in Far Cry Primal.
Early in the game, before you have any beasts tamed the nighttime is extremely scary, you'll
often be overcome by packs of wolves trying to get at you, and you'll have to light a
torch and make sure they back off.
This causes the player to feel a real feeling of dread and fear when you're trying to sneak
through at nighttime.
To capture enemy encampments if you are trying to sneak it is way more effective at night
but you have to be careful to watch out for animals.
The only problem with this is, once you have a decent beast it will scare away all the
predators during the nighttime so nothing will attack you.
You can walk through during the night like it is nothing.
Again a huge missed opportunity here.
Imagine the situations you could get in with your animal.
You, you're with your bear and there is a pack of wolves and you've got to fight them
off or else they'll kill you and eat you.
Something like that would have made the game so much more interesting and gotten the player
invested and actually feeling something while playing this game, rather than what it is
now just walking through with your beast feeling like you are a fricken bad-ass.
It is just disappointing a little bit.
Overall, Far Cry Primal is really similar to previous games in the Far Cry series with
the good and with the bad.
The new changes that they've made work well to keep that new fresh feeling in this series
so that it doesn't get boring and stale for long time players of the Far Cry series.
What really holds this game back is the weak plot and the lackluster characters and main
villain, and the missed opportunities for incredible moments.
I was just amazed at all the things they could have done and could have had really epic moments
that I guess they kinda missed or forgot about.
So for that reason, my final verdict for Far Cry Primal is a seven, out of ten.
It is a good game.
I have got to give my respect out to Ubisoft and the developers behind Far Cry Primal for
what they have done to make Far Cry Primal feel fresh and stand out from the rest of
the Far Cry series.
While I am disappointing with the missed opportunities like I said, I am also impressed with how
they have managed to keep that fresh feeling.
I know it's real tough for series' who have had a lot of success on a lot of games to
recreate themselves and still work and I really feel like Far Cry Primal has done this.
Well that is it for Far Cry Primal review, I want to thank you guys for watching.
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