So I wound up trading in a bunch of old shit to get this game over the weekend based only on the rabid recommendation of my only friend with a PS3. He claimed that this game was so good, he wasn't even phased by his pre-ordered copy of Little Big Planet and didn't even open it until a couple days after it arrived.
Seeing as how it was an FPS and I had some shitty titles sitting around, I figured I didn't have much to lose.
Leaving gameplay aside for a second, Far Cry 2 has probably some of the most photorealistic and beautiful environments I've ever seen. The scope and scale of your surroundings are on par with games like Morrowind and they leave your jaw hanging open... particularly if you're hooked into an HD set. The trees and grass sway in the wind, cloud cover can obscure your vision (particularly if you're roaming around at night)... this doesn't sound like much, but the brightness of your screen adjusts slowly as your eyes would in real life... so when you go from brightness to darkness or vice versa, there is a small adjustment period. The level of detail in the game is ridiculous.
In addition to the environments being beautiful, you can destroy/blow-up/engulf-in-flames just about anything you lay your eyes on. During one of my first missions to take over an enemy guard post, I was quickly overrun and outnumbered, so as I was retreating I started to lob molotov cocktails in the path behind me. They created some satisfying flames and a bunch of screaming bad guys, but I was kind of amazed as the cocktails began to ignite all of the grass and trees in the surrounding area. After a minute or so passed (and I retreated several hundred feet further), I'd created quite a large brush fire that exploded several cars and engulfed most of the post I'd been ambushing. So much fun. Of course once you figure out you can start brush fires, after that all you want to do for the next 20 minutes is run around and set shit on fire with cocktails.
There are a bunch of other nice detail touches to the game that make it really fun to play as well. The map system they've figured out is really cool. Instead of hitting select and going to a map screen to get your bearings, you press select and your left hand comes up holding a map and your right a GPS. You are free to roam around with these two things out for as long as you want. It makes getting around much easier... if you've got a car, you can also drive around with the map in your lap, looking down at it to make sure you're headed the right way.
If you hear anyone comparing this game to the Grand Theft Auto series, they are most likely referring to the mission structure, because honestly that is where the similarities end. Much like GTA, you find people and places on your map that you travel to whenever you're in need of a mission. Unlike GTA, the missions can sometimes take you upwards of an hour or two to complete simply because the map is so massive and so full of conflict areas that it may take you an hour just to travel to where your mission takes place... undoubtedly on the way, you'll have your vehicle shot or destroyed, your guns will jam and you'll sprint off into the bush to hide at least once or twice.
One of my favorite aspects of this game is the time of day feature. They really nailed it with this game... GTA has a similar feature, but it runs on a much shorter scale and doesn't feel as seamless as Far Cry's. There are various areas called safe houses where you can save your game... these are unlocked by ambushing and killing any guards at a locked safehouse. Once unlocked, you're free to go inside these houses and sleep on the cot to save your game. When you click on the cot, your left wrist comes up with a watch and you set your alarm for when you want to be woken up. It's a great feature because it easily allows you to zoom forward to daybreak, noon, dusk, midnight, etc. If you're having trouble passing a mission, you can try it at night when it's easier to sneak around.
Anyway, I'm by no means very far into this game... maybe 4 or 5 hours max, but I am really enjoying it. It is one of the best looking games I've seen on the PS3 so far and I can't imagine that it looks any worse on a 360 or a PC. If you like involved games and first-person-shooters, you should be all over Far Cry 2. There is also a map editor and level creator included with the game, which is pretty neat... I haven't even come close to fucking around with it yet, but there are some youtube videos of guys creating massive explosions with it. You know... nerdy shit.
