Don't worry, no spoilers. I went into Far Cry 3 not having played any of its successor games, but having played it's immediate predecessor (2).

Story: Hell Yeah!

My biggest surprise, was just how worthwhile and adrenaline pumping, the narrative was, and how its themes tied into the sandbox. Madness, people being molded into sociopaths letting go of their inhibitions, drugs, mysticism. Far Cry 3 is a game utterly steeped in theme. Far Cry 2's theme was mostly relegated to a hand full of story segments and audiotapes. There's also plenty of action movie tributes.

Far Cry 2 was a game with a minimal amount of story; Far Cry 3 has a thrilling and lengthy story. The story has a lot of high moments (literally and figuratively), my favorite has to do with a gas depot. The main character goes through a clear character arc, which is something that lacked entirely in the previous game. The 'drugs' sequences are very dazzling and enjoyable to look at.

There are some real stand out memorable characters, and no I'm not just talking about Villains. If you ever watched the show Chuck, and liked John Casey, you are in for quite a few treats!

Game-play: Tough but fair

You start out pretty weak able to carry little ammo and limited weapon slots; when things get hard, hunt animals for upgrades and you'll be right as rain. After upgrades, you can carry any 4 weapons you want. ANY. I'd just like to note here, this games RPG-7 is one of the most satisfying weapons I've ever used in a game: Huge AOE, you get bonus XP for multi-kills, and spreads dynamic fire fast.

If there is one thing that stands out about Far Cry 3's game-play, is that it encourages preparation. Going out of your way to collect herbs to use for a wide variety of power ups, pays off in just about any situation you might run into. Want to use your mini-map? It's up to you to prepare it (climb a tower). Want enemy patrols to go away (enemy patrols were a major source of annoyance in Far Cry 2 for some)? Taking out enemy bases will replace them with friendly ones, also adding fast travel points. If you take the time to stealthily capture enemy bases (which can be quite fun), you get bonus xp. Another form of preparation is using the camera to mark all the enemies, which makes stealth much easier.

If you're not a fan of stealth, you can just drive a technical into an enemy base and rat-tat-tat it down in less than a minute. The 'trials' are quite a fun guns-blazing experience, perfect for relieving the tension of playing stealthily. The stand out was one trial, where, every enemy you kill, changes your weapon randomly. Now that was crazy! I enjoyed them all except the stealth focused trial, which seems to be the hardest despite being near the start location.

Sandbox: It's alive!

Unlike Far Cry 2, the world is full of people. Civilians, allies, enemies. Emergent battles from patrols launched from captured bases, and enemies, are really cool. If civilians die, others will react believably which surprised me. Many sandboxes feel like you and enemies are the only people there. This is quite the exception!

Another stand-out feature, is the animals. One of the things I felt quite missing from Far Cry 2, they are abundant, and behave believably. You can seek them out to hunt for upgrades, but you will run into enough of them as you play normally. Because they aren't 'gamey' in how they're placed. Animals are where you'd think they'd be. For example, large cat species are dispersed thorough the world hunting herbivores.

The landscape is very hilly, and there are many caves and underground rivers that connect areas. Additionally, Gliders are common and I always used one going into a new section of the map, quite thrilling. Fast travel strikes a good balance, letting you experience most of the map's terrain naturally while still being useful. Artifacts, which I recommend you buy a map for to know the general location (Item Map), usually take some actual thought to get to.

A tip/warning:

If you are an absolute completionist, just know, the world has seemingly thousands of money suitcases. They work well if you just pick them up as you run into them (they are a good way to recover ammo and grenades). If you're OCD about picking up everything there is to pick up, and doing every side activity and challenge, you WILL be burnt out. Money is very abundant, and you have a limited wallet size, so take it easy. The wallet limit is another problem people may have with this game; there really isn't that much to spend your money on; herbs are much more useful than money, so if you have the weapons you want, I recommend buying instead of crafting health kits when convenient.

My verdict:

Classic, chaotic fun.

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