Far Cry is probably one of the most important franchises in Ubisoft’s lineup and this is the reason why we have seen a new Far Cry after every 2 years. The latest title in the franchise is Far Cry 6 and it brings a brand-new island of Yara under the rule of a new tyrant for you to explore and take control of. Bringing tons of new gameplay elements, amazing action sequences, and a brutal yet immersive storyline, Far Cry 6 is probably the biggest title in the series so far with also the most diverse map offered. This is our review of Far Cry 6 on PC in which we explore the beautiful, tropical island of Yara and push back the forces of Anton Castillo with our Sumpremos.
Far Cry by Ubisoft has always been a brutal franchise and we have seen many different tyrants throughout the history of the franchise. Each Far Cry game brings a new tyrant controlling a different region, more brutally than the last one. The latest entry in the game brings us our new tyrant Anton Castillo and his son Diego Castillo. Like every mad president of the past, Anton uses his own brutal ways in order to ‘save’ Yara and bring its formal glory back to itself. What makes Anton different from the previous rulers of Far Cry? Anton has a 13-year-old son Diego who he is teaching to become the next ruler of Yara following his footsteps.
What makes Anton unique is that he is actually empathetic however his brutal ways of keeping everything in line are sparking a new revolution in Yara. Yara used to be a paradise however 50 years ago the country fell to a revolution and has been suffering ever since. Anton was elected El Presidente of Yara and has been running the country in his own way in order to return it back to its formal glory. Everything he does is to teach his son Diego a lesson in order to run the country efficiently even if it requires brutality.
On the other hand, Diego looks at things differently. Partly because he is a teenager and his mind is currently accepting things in their own way happening around him. While he loves his father and his country, he still sees the monster within him and does not always agree to his brutal ways. At the same time, he also wants to give relief to the suffering people of Yara and wants to do it differently as seen early in the game when we find out that Diego tried to escape his father as well. This puts an interesting perspective into the leadership of Yara because Anton wants Diego to follow in his footsteps which requires having a cold heart and doing everything necessary in order to keep things in line.
Anton’s goal for a bright future involves the drug called Viviro which can cure cancer and different pharmaceutical companies are now looking forward to purchasing Viviro from Yara. The drug Viviro can only be made in Yara because it is derived from a tobacco leaf that is only found on Yara. This puts Yara in a very profitable position however creating Viviro is not safe and in doing so, thousands of locals will die until Anton sees his vision come to life. For this deadly process, Antos forces what he calls ‘Fake Yarans’ to work in the fields where they are most exposed to deadly toxins and mutated plants produced in the formation of Viviro. Slowly, Viviro is killing people and eventually Yara.
You jump into the story of Far Cry 6 as Dani (either male or female), as an orphan-turned-guerrilla who joins the revolution group of guerillas called Libertad. Libertad is the biggest guerilla group in Yara working to gain control of the country and get rid of Anton Castillo. Your main goal in the game is to overcome the regime and that requires you to give everything as well. Sticking close to the Far Cry formula, you will be doing various activities in different regions of Yara to minimize the military occupation of Anton and proceed to destroying or stealing military supplies and resources for your own cause. Even the military personal are not always with their own cause giving you an edge as you can bribe them for intel.
The island of Yara is divided into various regions where different factions of guerillas are fighting their own wars against Anton. After joining the Libertad, run by two main people Clara Garcia and Juan Cortez, you must help out the local factions and invite them to join the Libertad in order to grow in all regions and finally overthrow the control of Anton Castillo. While the whole island of Yara is open to you right from the start however regions are locked behind a ranking requirement. You can explore and try your luck fighting with enemies there, but I stuck to lower-ranked areas since the game does not go easy if the region level is too high.
Gameplaywise, Far Cry 6 is not much different than its previous titles and closely resembles Far Cry 5 in most aspects. Right when you arrive on the main island after completing the introductory island of Isla Santuario, you will start having the same issues with the enemy forces where they will easily overpower you as they just keep coming out of nowhere and you have no way to run if you are trapped. Enemy AI fires with amazing accuracy even while driving their vehicles and as soon as you rack up some heat, you will have Anton’s elite squad hunting you down which includes heavies equipped with rocket launchers and flame throwers, helicopters, and even tanks in advanced areas.
Killing enemies grant you XP and you level up eventually giving you access to better gear and items. One thing I liked about Far Cry 6 is that it gives you plenty of options to customize your character. While Far Cry 6 is not an RPG, gaining XP is certainly better in the game and this time around, you have various gear items to look forward to as well. Your character Dani has four slots where you can equip various items found in Yara randomly or earned after certain tasks. These include Head, Body, Legs, and Foot gear. Each item in these four categories come with their own unique perks.
Instead of previous Far Cry titles, this time around, you do not have a perk tree to purchase perks from. Instead, each piece of gear comes with its own unique perk that you can have when you wear that piece of gear. This new gear system gives you the freedom of changing your Dani’s build on the go. For example, if you are coming across enemies that are using one particular type of damage types like fire or poison, you can quickly change your gear items to wear items that protect you against fire or poison the most. Similarly, certain gear items increase your base skills too such as making you stealthier or giving you a better aim with thrown knives.
All this gear is found in Yara randomly or acquired with story progression or side content. Yara is huge and offers tons of side content for you to explore. The main missions in the game are called Operations while Side Missions are called Yaran Stories. Apart from Operations and Yaran Stories, you will also get Military Targets, Treasure Hunts and Special Operations. When you complete the main story of the game, you can also take part in Insurgency Challenges which are similar to Special Operations but are tougher and they give you Spec Ops Key which is used to open Dead Drops during Special Operations.
Apart from these marked missions, there are tons of other things to do in the game as well. There are races to complete, military targets to take out, checkpoints to take over, and do everything in your power to take control of Yara. Every small step you take is one giant kick in Anton’s control over Yara and slowly, you grow to become the biggest Guerilla in Yara. The ending offers a twist as well however this is a spoiler-free review, and I will not be discussing anything about the ending here however it is something that might catch you off guard. While exploring, you can interact with random NPCs who will give you intel and information about hidden military targets around that location and thus marking them as Military Targets for you to take out. Sometimes helping out random NPCs will also mark NDC crates or Guerilla crates on the map which contain special loot for you to find in the world.
Far Cry titles are all about causing as much chaos as possible and Far Cry 6 is no different with its huge range of weapons and arsenal of special equipment made to explode things. There are tons of weapons ranging from shotguns, sniper rifles, assault rifles, and pistols to choose from. Far Cry 6 takes this to another level by introducing Supremos and Resolver weapons into the mix. Resolver weapons are the best of the bunch, made from everyday items combines with various weapons to turn them into absolutely chaotic concoctions. Supremos are ultra-powerful attacks that are not used as your normal weapons but instead they are powerful attack moves that must be charged before using them. These are charged by killing your enemies so the more enemies you kill, the quicker it gets charged and more you can use them to cause devastation.
These Supremos range from firing a barrage of missiles ahead of you to firing poison grenades randomly all around you causing slow but painful death to your enemies. You can easily see some of the weapons inspired by the previously released Far Cry New Dawn and the crafting system in Far Cry 6 also reminds you of the previous title. Tons of Workbenches are littered all around Yara where you can make changes to your weapons by adding mods and new enhancements to your weapons in order to make them more effective. These mods range from changing the ammo types to incendiary ammo or ammo-piercing ammo to adding bigger ammo clips for longer firing sessions.
Your inventory has four main slots. One is your Supremo slot where you purchase and equip your Supremo backpacks. The other three are for your primary weapons. You can choose any type of weapon that you want to use in these three slots. The final and fourth slot is for your sidearm which is either a pistol or a smaller sub-machine gun. Apart from the regular weapons, you will also find plenty of unique weapons in key locations which come with their own mods and attachments. Apart from the weapons, you also have a large variety of throwables that you can use to kill your enemies.
With that said, while the game did not give me any bugs or issues during my review playthrough, there are some mechanics that annoyed me plenty. Two of the most annoying ones are probably how Dani handles the weapons and the driving physics of the title. Starting with the weapons, most of the weapons in the game do not feel meaty and sometimes while shooting, even if you are hitting a target directly, the enemies do not take any damage which feels very weird. I will highly recommend that you adjust your aiming speed accordingly and adjust yourself while shooting enemies because I always had to move around while shooting in order to land hits on the enemies.
Every time a Far Cry title comes out, I am hopeful that Ubisoft will finally pull through and introduce decent driving mechanics in the game but sadly I am still waiting for that day because Far Cry 6 appears to be weaker than Far Cry 5 in this regard probably because Yara is more varied when it comes to terrain and Hope County in Far Cry 5 was much plainer. Vehicles act weirdly no matter how good you try to drive and some of the lighter vehicles feel like they are made of feathers with no weight to their feel whatsoever.
The flight controls and flying are better and improved this time around which is a positive factor for me. I enjoyed flying in Far Cry 6 more than driving around. Apart from driving vehicles, you also have other modes of transportation in the game such as two-wheelers, three-wheelers, boats, jet skis, and even horses. On your outposts, you will have a collection point for each type of transport where you can bring and collect different vehicles for use later. The game offers a large variety of different means of transportation catering to your every need whether it is in the air, on the water, or on the ground. Your personal vehicles are different from the ones stored in various collection points so you can literally collect all of the vehicles and have them available to you at your guerilla camps.
Another new feature in Far Cry 6 is custom rides. These are your rides that you can customize and keep as your own personal vehicles. These vehicles offer you tons of customization options as well apart from just visuals. You can install armor on them to make them tougher, install front bull bars to damage vehicles that you ram into, and even install turrets and automatic guns to take out your enemies. Depending on how much parts you spend on your vehicle, you can turn a sleeper into a full-on battle vehicle and call them anytime from your weapon wheel which is extremely convenient. You can further customize and improve these battle ornaments as well from the workbench. The custom Rides were a much-needed feature in the game, and it certainly improves how you move around the game. In Far Cry 6, you always have an armored vehicle ready anywhere you go in the game.
Apart from the regular side content found in the game, after the completion of the main story, you also gain access to the Insurgency Challenges. These are post-campaign missions and also serve as post-game content. While Ubisoft has DLC and upcoming expansions for Far Cry 6, these missions along with Special Operations and tons of other exploration and extra content will keep you busy for a decent 60 hours and more depending on how much time you take to complete these activities. There is tons of customization to be done in the game ranging from cars to weapons, finding hidden collectibles, collecting resources, hunting, and fishing crafting new gadgets and mods, and many cool side missions that feel like a different game themselves such as the brilliant cockfighting which is an intense minigame where two roosters fight like any other fighting game.
Final Verdict:
While Far Cry 6 features a beautiful world with tons of new mechanics in all aspects of gameplay, it is still the same old Far Cry formula of you starting as a low-life and working your way region-by-region to bring down a tyrant. Yara is a gorgeous setting for the new title and in many ways, I found it prettier and better than Far Cry 5’s Hope County yet the core formula of the game still remains the same yet still for me, the game seems to have improved overall. I loved the voice acting and Antón Castillo is a rememberable villain and the story of the title actually makes sense. It is not just a blind shooter where you just kill everyone that comes in your way. Yara is beautiful and deserves to be explored and there are plenty of new features that are really good making Far Cry 6 an enjoyable and chaotic experience, nonetheless. If you are a Far Cry fan, Far Cry 6 is a must-play title for you however if you are new to the franchise, there is enough action in the game to remind you of any Micheal Bay movie.
