Romance is stabbing a tiger in the face and skinning it to make a fashionable bag. It’s stalking an enemy, silently, and then shooting it in the head. It’s parachuting off a huge mountain, landing in an enemy base and then burning everyone with a flamethrower.
So I can’t think of a better day than Valentines Day, February 14th, for Far Cry: The Wild Expedition, collecting Far Cry 1 to 3 and Blood Dragon, to launch.
Far Cry 3 was one of my favourite games of 2012, cleverly lampooning colonial adventure tales with Lewis Carroll style absurdity, and it was a brilliant shooter to boot. The guns were fun, the combat was tight, and the islands were a delight to explore on foot, by car, or by flying around. And while I think that was the series’ high point, I’d rather like to go back and replay the earlier games.
Far Cry 2 especially was interesting, mainly thanks to its setting. Africa is rarely the subject of video games, despite it being a vast, diverse continent, and while Far Cry focused on drugs, gun smuggling and civil war, hardly painting the place in a positive light, it was enjoyable to explore an open world that wasn’t terribly generic.
I haven’t actually had the pleasure to play Blood Dragon, though I’m frequently tempted to pick it up because it looks ridiculously bonkers.
Bonkers.
What Far Cry instalment floats your boat the most, chums?
Cheers, Eurogamer.