Far Cry New Dawn - is now an RPG

[Metro]

... white christian conservatives rather than crazy kultists.

There's a difference?

 

[Life of the Party]

Far Cry New Dawn Gets RPG Update, Goes Beyond Hope County

By Jon Ryan Since its reveal at The Game Awards 2018, we’ve already learned a fair bit about the post-nuclear-fallout superbloomed world of Far Cry New Dawn, including an exclusive look as part of December’s IGN First. Recently, though, we got to sit down and roam around on our own for a few hours, and it’s clear that while this is still very much a Far Cry game, it’s trying to live up to its resurgent title.

All of the staples from Far Cry 5 are still here - taking down outposts, a co-op friendly campaign, recruiting allies (one of whom is an adorable dog, Timber, that can ride in your motorcycle’s sidecar, making this a strong contender for my GotY already), but Ubisoft is also trying to keep its apparent 2018 resolution to change up their formulas - or at least mix and match them in new ways.

The biggest update to Far Cry New Dawn is that, mechanically, it feels more like an RPG than a first-person action game. Enemies boast health bars and difficulty ratings, and all of your attacks now feature hit point counters to show you just how much damage you're dealing. Its systems aren’t as complex or convoluted as most RPGs - even other Ubi games like The Division or AC Odyssey - rather, weapons and enemies gain power in tiers instead of incrementally via levels or component upgrades.

“At first I didn’t want to have the numbers and the gauge onscreen,” says New Dawn’s Creative Director, Jean-Sebastien Decant. “But there’s a game designer who snuck it in during the development, and we tried it one day and I loved it.” These UI options can be disabled if you want to play as pure an FPS experience as possible, but you’ll definitely feel the sponginess of higher-level enemies if you opt to engage them with lower-level gear. “[We asked ourselves] ‘How could we make these encounters in the world, these missions that you have to prepare for, a little more dangerous?’ Decant says. “Something that you can’t just run into screaming,” he laughs, miming something out of First Blood, pt II. “You’d better be prepared, and on the lookout for more resources and on the lookout for partners.”

It’s a less-than-subtle way of making the world seem more deadly, but also coercing us as players to invest in it. Do you want to take down this elite-level outpost? Well, you’re not going to be able do it with that rusty old ACR - you’ll have to get yourself a boatload of Ethanol (the ubiquitous fuel source of New Dawn) and upgrade your stronghold with a variety of amenities that make exploring and surviving this colorful wasteland possible. A healing garden provides better herbs to make medkits more effective, the Cartographer will be able to chart better maps to secrets and treasures around the area, and your workbench will allow you to craft better, more powerful weapons to use against the most dangerous Highwaymen, or any number of monstrous beast you run into out in the mutating wilderness, like irradiated buffalo or mangy albino bears.

You can procure Ethanol in any number of ways: completing missions, taking down outposts - which you can now choose to Scavenge for extra supplies, at the cost of allowing stronger enemies to re-take the abandoned outpost - or you can search for hidden stashes around the map. My favorite source of this precious resource, though, is probably the new Expeditions, which take you outside of Hope County to locations like an abandoned theme park in the Louisiana bayou or the red cliffs of Glen Canyon in Arizona. These short smash-n-grab missions (or “infiltrate, burgle, and escape” depending on how you play) are not only fun diversions from the main gameplay loop, but also provide an interesting look at how The Collapse has affected the rest of the country as well.

Back in Hope County, we didn't get to learn much more about the over-arching story than we already do: you were the head of security for Thomas Rush, a militia leader trying to organize a reconstruction effort who's train was attacked by The Highwaymen, a vicious band of marauders led by Mickey and Lou (aka The Twins), and find yourself trapped in Hope County and needing to organize a resistance against The Twins' gang of bandits. We did learn, however, that there'll be more than a few returning faces from Far Cry 5 - Kim Rye (wife of FC5's hotshot pilot, Nick) along with her now-teenage daughter Carmina are leading the resistance effort inside the fortified settlement Prosperity, while other allies from the previous game like Pastor Jerome, Grace Armstrong and, of course, Hurk, can all be found around the world. According to New Dawn's Narrative Designer Olivia Alexander, "It's about generations, and how those generations respond to change... You are party to this evolution in the community - these three different ways in which people view the end of the world and the beginning of a new one, and how these philosophies come together and clash."

It seems that The Father, Joseph Seed, is also up to his old tricks, and has formed a fervently loyal following of survivalists who treat the Collapse as the dawn of a new stone age. "His family has all been killed, the world has been destroyed, but within that there’s a seed of purity," says Greg Bryk, voice actor behind FC5's charismatic cult leader. "What would happen if we could start again with all the broken pieces, what grace can we find in that? And for the Father, it’s to create a new Eden, in the image of the fantasy of [biblical] perfection - they renounce technology, but the human aspect of life is the calling that they have, to create this little paradise in this bloom of new life." Thankfully, it seems that his goals align with the citizens of prosperity, and he and his flock will be allies in your fight to save the remains of Hope County - at least for now.

2019 is going to be a big year for post-apocalyptic adventures, and while there are plenty to keep track of, Far Cry New Dawn has done a good job catching my eye early on. I’m not sure how the addition of RPG elements will translate into the full game, but its colorful take on the end of the world is one that I’m looking forward to exploring more of - especially when there's a dog in my sidecar.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/01/23/far-cry-new-dawn-gameplay-details-preview

 

[Oracsbox]

Fuck why did they have to add shit rpg elements.It's an action shooter I don't need bullet sponge enemies and crappy levelling.
Of course the leader of the resistance is a "wamen" let's ignore the fact all women would be in rape farms or making me a sandwich after a nuclear apocalypse.

 

[Life of the Party]

 

[Oracsbox]

What a pair of annoying faggots.

 

[orcinator]

Fuck why did they have to add shit rpg elements.It's an action shooter I don't need bullet sponge enemies and crappy levelling.
Of course the leader of the resistance is a "wamen" let's ignore the fact all women would be in rape farms or making me a sandwich after a nuclear apocalypse.

Guess they got annoyed people could just ignore most of the boring content so now you gotta do the copypasted outposts if you want to beat the game without it taking 5 hours to kill one dude.

RPGs were a mistake.

 

[Temenos]

2019 is going to be a big year for post-apocalyptic adventures

Oh yeah. Post-apocalyptic games have been quite the neglected genre recently.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Nice!

 

[Belegarsson]

I liked Far Cry 5 mainly because of its vibe (mostly from the soundtrack) and leasure-ish gameplay, it didn't really overwhelm me with shit that I'm required to do. But this light RPG shit is pure

, it gonna suck hard when I can't throw a shovel straight into an asshole's face because he has higher number than my shovel.

Ubisoft is just incredibly lazy when it comes to design challenges. Enemies in their games are always archetypes like dudes with bigger armor and has more health, some dudes shoot, some other dudes charge at you. When people noticed that formula, they started putting in half ass RPG mechanics in the most barebone fashion possible, because apparently to them numbers = depth.

At least when I played The Division, choosing a set of skills actually did something because they defined your role and there were a certain tie between perks and weapons' traits (like a perk that increases accuracy the moment you enter cover, which helps a lot when you use marksman rifles). AC Odyssey did nothing right and progression/RPG mechanics in that game were more of a time wasting burden rather than something that engages you. For Honor has an entire pointless gear system that nobody takes seriously since stats are disabled in 1v1. South Park The Fractured But Whole's mechanics are way too easy and forgiving, The Crew 2 also has another pointless carPG shtick that boils down to putting parts in shiny color into your vehicle and that's it.

Really wish that they figure out some of their better received games in recent years got success mainly because of their nuance mechanics rather than the joy of grinding. For Watch Dogs 2, it was organic level design that took a lot of inspiration from MGSV's style emergent gameplay. For Rainbow Six Siege, it's the near excellent gunplay strengthed by destructible environment. For GR Wildlands it's the sheer amount of risk/reward ratio that depends on when and where you engage an enemy infested area. Those games aren't perfect by any means, but I really dug them mainly because the devs behind those games clearly had a clear vision of what they should be, and it will suck hard if the next Watch Dogs requires you to grind to level 30 in order to hack an elite soldier's camera. It just feels so damn wrong.

But then again I might be overreacting here, if those light RPG mechanics work then good for them and me, if not then I hope they took lesson from this and figure out which stuff should remain and which one must be removed in the next game.

 

[Doktor Best]

Fuck why did they have to add shit rpg elements.It's an action shooter I don't need bullet sponge enemies and crappy levelling.
Of course the leader of the resistance is a "wamen" let's ignore the fact all women would be in rape farms or making me a sandwich after a nuclear apocalypse.

Why would they be making a sandwich for a corpse?

 

[ADL]

I liked the RPG elements in Origins/Odyssey but this just looks like it's going to be annoying.

 

[GrainWetski]

Oh yeah. Post-apocalyptic games have been quite the neglected genre recently.

But every game released before this one was garbage just like this one will be when the next big release comes around. Listen to gamejournos, they know what's good for you.

 

[Temenos]

I found Far Cry 5 OK at first but rapidly became dull, to the point where I gave up on it after eliminating the first Seed family member. By this point I think the game had shown me all there was to see, and while the gameplay loop was somewhat decent, I just got bored. Pacing was total shit - I don't think there was ever one minute of downtime before at least some gunfire or explosions started up somewhere. The lack of any interesting story or meaningful characters didn't help. I suppose if it was my first entry into the Far Cry series then I'd probably have enjoyed it more, but I've played all of FC games at this point and the formula of FC 3, 4, Primal and 5 is recycled way too much, with minor adjustments along the way. But they never worked into improve the story or characters (hell I felt the characters in 5 were worse than 4).

The other reason I couldn't be bothered to finish it is because the ending makes the entire game pointless. I did get it kinda spoiled to me somewhere, but even if I encountered the ending blind I think I would have been even more pissed off for even giving a shit. Since the nuke ending is canonical, it means that everything you did to improve the lives of the civilians dealing with the cult meant jack shit. How the fuck are you supposed to be invested in the game world when you know the plot is gonna undo everything you accomplished?

Anyways, Ubisoft know they've got a winning formula, good for them. I just know I'm burnt out on the series by now, but maybe they're hoping RPG elements will reinvigorate the game for folks like me. Probably won't do it though.

 

[Oracsbox]

Fuck why did they have to add shit rpg elements.It's an action shooter I don't need bullet sponge enemies and crappy levelling.
Of course the leader of the resistance is a "wamen" let's ignore the fact all women would be in rape farms or making me a sandwich after a nuclear apocalypse.

Why would they be making a sandwich for a corpse?

Why would I be dead ? I post on the codex obviously I have a bunker(basement) I live in just waiting for the day I can stride the world as a post-apocalyptic warrior

 

[RapineDel]

Ubisoft probably realising no one is making AAA RPGs (unless they have a 5 year turn over time like CDPR) right now so they might as well shoe horn a few half assed elements in to draw in that Bethesda crowd. Not to mention they they can design them around micro-transactions while pretending they're making the game more complex.

Far Cry is a putrid series with absolutely no sense of identity. I remember they did a poll a while back asking people what they thought the next Far Cry setting should be, things like a vampire society, Mexico, set on the moon, a lot of crazy things that might've taken a lot of effort. Instead their response was Far Cry 5, a copy and paste of 3 and 4 (didn't play it but I can't see anything different) with the same old tedious outposts, collectibles stuck around the map in such a way that executives pinned them to a board while they had their iPads out screaming market research "there must be a piece of content ever 23 seconds to keep the customer stimulated and be more likely to buy additional content".

Ubisoft have released a few good smaller titles like Mario & Rabbids, Rayman Legends etc. over the last few years but their AAA department is utterly awful and all their games including Watch Dogs and Assassins' Creed run with the same rules. I'm just shocked that it's been over 10 years since Assassin's Creed 2 when this started and people still aren't sick of them. I guess the power of people being addicted to running to a piece of content ever 23 seconds wins out over people looking for an interesting game with variety.

 

[Ovg]

They know their audience well though. They went from a french studio with rayman as it's mascot to a moloch of bad video games for brainwashed or cretins. Of course this makes sense since you don't actually want to pander to us, who like to read shit and get deep into the story, because that requires good writing, it doesn't allow you to just play 15 minutes of it from time to time and still know what the plot is and besides, people are so used to this blend of consolized putrid bullshit with the worst parts of PC games that they will swallow it and pay a good penny for that "pleasure".

The society is dumbed down, games are dumbed down. Lowest common denominator in a land of "your opinion is as good as my opinion" really is the majority. Why would they try to make a game that we think is good? So they sell 2 copies instead of 2000?

 

[Zer0wing]

Still better RPG than Fallout 4.

 

[GrainWetski]

They know their audience well though. They went from a french studio with rayman as it's mascot to a moloch of bad video games for brainwashed or cretins. Of course this makes sense since you don't actually want to pander to us, who like to read shit and get deep into the story, because that requires good writing, it doesn't allow you to just play 15 minutes of it from time to time and still know what the plot is and besides, people are so used to this blend of consolized putrid bullshit with the worst parts of PC games that they will swallow it and pay a good penny for that "pleasure".

The society is dumbed down, games are dumbed down. Lowest common denominator in a land of "your opinion is as good as my opinion" really is the majority. Why would they try to make a game that we think is good? So they sell 2 copies instead of 2000?

It's sad that this post wouldn't be out of place in the Cyberpunk 2077 thread with a few words changed.

 

[Life of the Party]

 

[Hoaxmetal]

Twice as fugly. I mean if they were going for antagonists that look disgusting then they nailed it.

 

[Devoidless]

I like Far Cry 5 enough. It wasn't anything new and that was why I bought it. I got it to be a brainless shooter with something that resembled a story to play when I'm drunk. And, god damn, it did that job well. I got to blow shit up and punch cows and throw fuckin' shovels. All was fine in Far Cry 5.
Then this was announced.
It has that annoying 'pastel but muddy' color scheme. Everything is sort of cartoony. Enemies lose chunks of HP when shot.
I don't want a barely acceptable game to become diluted with forced RPG elements. I already played Fallout 4--it doesn't work very well. I want my stupid action game to play when I don't want to/am unable to think.

 

[Drakron]

Not to mention they they can design them around micro-transactions while pretending they're making the game more complex.

No, thats the purpose as they didnt exactly existed until AssCreed Origins that worked as extra "timer savers" and Origins wasnt as bad as Odyssey as level effectively worked as "grind or pay" to progress in the story missions. Expect the same as Odyssey were unless you XP farm to be within 5 levels of the story mission "recommended" you basically get stuck.

 

[Dodo1610]

What the fuck is going on with Ubi. Far Cry 5 made fun of crazy kultist idjits and pissed off alt-retards, now they went and shat on sjws.

Are they slowly becoming ok?

Far Cry 5 also pissed off SJWs who were hoping that the antagonists would be white christian conservatives rather than crazy kultists.

The funny part is that the Cult is as diverse as possible (man women, white black brown) and most of their idealogy is mostly socailism+ pseudo christanity(though they never even say the name Jesus). The game is as political is an average Simpsons episode.
New Dawn will be the same, even with 2 black girls as antagonists.

 

[rashiakas]

BLACK STRONK WYMIN

pass

 

[Dodo1610]

BLACK STRONK WYMIN

pass

You do realise that they are bad and you have to kill them. Honestly why so some people find them offensive?