Far Cry 6 review

By Chris Jarry

I’m not going to pretend to hide that I’ve always been a huge fan of the Far Cry franchise. The games have flaws, but I’ve always enjoyed the gameplay and the stories. When Ubisoft announced Far Cry 6, I was psyched to dive again into this vast open world especially when it was announced that the main villain would be Giancarlo Esposito. Get ready to delve into the violent and often not forgiving island of Yara!

Far Cry 6 Details

  • Platform(s): Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Google Stadia, Amazon Luna and PC
  • Reviewed on: PlayStation 5
  • Developer(s): Ubisoft Toronto
  • Publisher(s): Ubisoft
  • Genre(s): First person shooter
  • Mode(s): Single-player, online multiplayer 
  • ESRB Rating: M (Mature 17+)

Not really Cuba but close enough!

It’s no secret that Yara is modeled after the country Cuba. Set in a modern time, you play as a female or male version of Dani Rojas (I played the female version) who has been dishonorably discharged by the military. Fed up with the dictator Antón Castillo (portrayed by Giancarlo Esposito), you decide it’s time to leave the island and make your way to Miami. 

The plan doesn’t end up the way you think, and you decide to join the Libertad guerilla. They promise you a way out of you if you help them to clean Yara. To do it you’ll have to capture regions, kill local warlords until you can finally take on Antón Castillo himself.

If that sounds similar, you’ll see that Far Cry 6 doesn’t stray far from the usual formula. Don’t fix what isn’t broken they say?

All in all, the story is very satisfying and has plenty of twists and turns that keep the player enthralled. It’s one of the most entertaining stories they’ve had in a few games, and it’s largely in part because of Giancarlo Esposito, Anthony Gonzalez who plays his son Diego and the fact your character finally speaks out. Both Nisa Gunduz as female Dani and Sean Rey as male Dani do a great job providing a much-needed interaction by the protagonist and as such very good cutscenes. Been complaining about this issue for years!

Very familiar for better and for worse

If you’ve played any Far Cry games in the past years, you know full well how Far Cry 6 is designed. You’ll need to capture checkpoints, liberate enemy outputs, and complete a lot of different missions to advance the story. Thankfully, the dreaded towers have been out since the fifth opus! All the while, you’ll encounter plenty of side missions ranging from treasure hunts, to fishing and hunting challenges, races and so many others.

For a lot of people, so many options can be daunting and just too much. If that’s your case, Far Cry 6 isn’t going to change your mind. Nothing forces you to do anything else than the main quest and there’s even a difficulty level that makes the game much easier. So, if you want to enjoy the story and don’t want to bother finding everything, I think Far Cry 6 can still be very enjoyable.

This time around, you don’t have any allies with you other than pets. Chorizo is such a cute addition to the game though he doesn’t honestly help all that much. There are far better companions such as Champagne the superb white puma, but I still use the little guy occasionally. I like having the pets around but sincerely, sometimes they got lost somewhere and I forgot I had them and it didn’t matter much.

Well-rounded mechanics that are fun to play

For me one of the biggest strengths of the Far Cry franchise has always been the gameplay mechanics. All the guns are fun to play with and you’ve got all sorts of weapons for any style of play. You want to go in guns blazing, go ahead with your strongest guns and mow down all your adversaries.

If you’re like me, you’ll end up with a very strong sniper picking up the enemies one by one from afar. The best part is that when you find a weapon (except unique weapons) you like, you can go to any workshop and modify them by installing mods. You’ll need the proper resources to do it but thankfully, they are just lying around you in the vast world. This system encourages you to search everywhere and to take back army settlements to get more resources.

In return, the mods can provide a vast number of bonuses such as armor piercing ammunition against armored troops or more armor when you’re aiming with a sniper gun. You can also equip better scopes, suppressors, and other add-ons to boost your weapons. I would’ve loved to have the same kind of mechanism with the clothing. While you can modify the guns as you wish, you’re stuck with the weird hats, clothes or boots you find in your journey.

Normally, I don’t really care about these kinds of things but Since Far Cry 6 has a lot of cutscenes, you get to witness the silliness of your character’s clothing. No way am I going to drop a jacket that boosts my character so much even if it looks awful.

A new superweapon: the Supremo

Right at the beginning of the game, you’re given a super weapon created by Juan Cortez, an ex-spy who’s now working for Libertad. Think of the Supremo as a backpack that gives you an ultimate super ability.

The first power you get launches rockets in the air that targets the closest opponents that can range from ground troops to a helicopter that’s trying to gun you down. Later, you’ll be able to upgrade it and get even more useful power such as one who can revive you if you get killed.

You’ll also get Supremo weapons that are custom weapons made from various objects. If you’ve played Far Cry New Dawn, you might be familiar with the concept.

My main gripe is that the Supremos transform you into a weapon of mass destruction that can go through enemy outposts without any significant opposition. Sure, it needs to recharge but you can equip mods that make that time a lot shorter.

Though honestly it doesn’t help that the AI is profoundly dumb. I know I’ve read interviews with designers that if they were to make your adversaries stronger, the players couldn’t make it through the game, and I believe that. Still, it’s funny gunning down an officer while the sniper on the rooftop doesn’t notice his boss is dead down below. The debate will be never-ending in the community, but I’d rather have dumb enemies and have fun rather than having to replay the same sequence 100 times.

Yara is a sight to behold

Ubisoft has been using the same game engine for a while now and it’s showing its age. I feel the game managed to make Yara alive with beautiful, luscious forests, quaint little towns, and a beautiful capital that really seems more modern than it’s old countryside, but something felt off.

It runs perfectly at 60 FPS in 4K on the PlayStation 5 without any frame drops. Better yet, I never really encountered any bugs worth mentioning. So, what’s wrong with the graphics?

The characters are what’s wrong. While the faces are mostly well done with Antón Castillo being a standout, most of the characters are a bit lifeless and stiff. It’s especially jarring since there are so many cutscenes that highlight the different characters. They are not bad, but we’ve seen much better character designs at the end of the previous generation that I expected a little more.

Another small disappointment is that Ubisoft didn’t provide a mode to enable ray tracing on consoles. Personally, I don’t mind not having 60 FPS for this kind of game and would’ve loved to have the possibility to enable a quality mode that reduces the FPS but enables ray tracing. They did it with Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla and I hope it’s going to be included in the future.

All in all, the game does look great, but the character models could be better. I confess, I always feel bad complaining about graphics when I look at the games I used to play 30 years ago but it’s fair to keep the designers on their toes to give us even better games going forward.

Finally, voice acting is stellar and yes, Giancarlo Esposito does an incredible job. Props to Ubisoft Toronto for using Latin-American actors to portray all the different roles. 

Far Cry 6 is well worth the time

It’s obvious that I loved my time on Yara. Like always, Far Cry 6 was a wild ride that brought me plenty of likeable villains and fun moments. The open world is big and provides lots of things to discover. 

There’s always a fine balance to find when designing a game in a long-running series. Do you keep the game as it is, or do you change it a lot and run the risk of alienating your core audience? Ubisoft Toronto decided to play it safe, and I think it worked out well. Haters are still going to hate but fans will find plenty to love.

Pros:

  • Well-crafted story that’s a lot more engaging by having a talking protagonist.
  • Beautiful vast island that is a lot of fun to discover.
  • Plenty of guns, mods, vehicles, and activities to do.
  • Still the same formula as previous Far Cry.

Cons:

  • Still the same formula as previous Far Cry (yes it’s both a pro for some and a con for others).
  • Dated character models clash with the scenery in cutscenes.
  • Not a lot of challenge from the enemy AI.


Comments

  1. It’s the first Far Cry game I have played in a long time and so far so have been having a ton of fun with it. I have found a couple of the unique weapons from exploring around and I am looking forward to progressing further into the game. Thanks for the great Review.

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