I stopped playing Far Cry 3 because I couldn't stand Jason Brody being a telepathic super soldier

[eggy32]

I was surprised to see how many people said the story in this game was so good when it was so badly told and badly integrated into the gameplay. At the start of most of the missions Jason's only given a vague idea of where to go, and in some cases not told at all. I was doing a mission for someone called Buck who wanted me to find a knife. Nobody knew where it was but he said a researcher had found its and left his research notes on a boat. As soon as he said that the cutscene was over and I got an objective that said, "Infiltrate the Nostalgia."
Apparently Jason knew where the boat was, and even what its name was, despite it having never been said. This wasn't the only time I noticed this. Jason always seems to know exactly where to go to start a mission and who to talk to despite never having met them before.

What else annoyed me was how he was able to do everything from handling any kind of weapon to crafting weapon pouches or making medicine from plants he's probably never even heard of. It really ruined the character for me. I loved it at the start when I had 1 weapon at a time and could barely take a hit because I was just a rich young city kid. A few hours in Jason becomes a survival expert, being more equipped and skilled than anyone on the island.

Normally things like this wouldn't bother me so much because there's a certain level of suspension of disbelief with videogames but Far Cry 3 sets a realistic and serious tone that just doesn't fit the gameplay.
Anybody else agree with me?

 

[Rawne1980]

Anybody else agree with me?

No.

I'd prefer to play a psychic mega man that can do all the things you mentioned over playing an "average" person.

Let's be honest, if it was based in reality it would be a pretty short game.

"Ohh look, a jungle .... did that snake just bite m........"

Or a thousand and one other simple ways your none island dwelling city person would die to, horribly and painfully in the first 30 seconds.

Even if said "average Joe" made it through the jungle without dying and found a gun a local would come up and take it back off him and say "no, just no .. that is an assault rifle and you have never fired one, you are more likely to shoot at the clouds than an actual person. Here, have this stick and stand in a corner while we wait for a psychic super soldier to help us out of this boring as fuck game".

 

[eggy32]

Anybody else agree with me?

No.

I'd prefer to play a psychic mega man that can do all the things you mentioned over playing an "average" person.

Let's be honest, if it was based in reality it would be a pretty short game.

"Ohh look, a jungle .... did that snake just bite m........"

Or a thousand and one other simple ways your none island dwelling city person would die to, horribly and painfully in the first 30 seconds.

Even if said "average Joe" made it through the jungle without dying and found a gun a local would come up and take it back off him and say "no, just no .. that is an assault rifle and you have never fired one, you are more likely to shoot at the clouds than an actual person. Here, have this stick and stand in a corner while we wait for a psychic super soldier to help us out of this boring as fuck game".

I'm not saying it should be totally realistic. What I was getting at is that it stretches my suspension of disbelief way too far since Jason is able to do all these things right from the start. It'd be totally different if he were taught these things along the way by other characters in the game or if he just got better with guns as he used them, like in an RPG. Obviously the game would suck if it were totally realistic.

 

[Rawne1980]

I'm not saying it should be totally realistic. What I was getting at is that it stretches my suspension of disbelief way too far since Jason is able to do all these things right from the start. It'd be totally different if he were taught these things along the way by other characters in the game or if he just got better with guns as he used them, like in an RPG. Obviously the game would suck if it were totally realistic.

In that case I can agree.

Having to learn things along the way is better than "here's a gun, now go get them Rambo the 2nd coming".

Having everything from the start does take away that feeling of "progression".

I haven't played that much of it so don't know how much of a super soldier he is but I do know I had the best guns for what I wanted to do (smg with silencer and mag upgrades .. don't mind if I do) and all the bag upgrades within a couple of hours and had nothing else left to "aim for" apart from more money for the truck load of ammo I was flinging at these pirate types.

Too much Rambo is bad but not enough Rambo is also bad. One is too easy and the other would be boring as frack.

It seems like a fun game but it's hardly a challenge.

 

[mParadox]

I'm not saying it should be totally realistic. What I was getting at is that it stretches my suspension of disbelief way too far since Jason is able to do all these things right from the start. It'd be totally different if he were taught these things along the way by other characters in the game or if he just got better with guns as he used them, like in an RPG. Obviously the game would suck if it were totally realistic.

Aaaaaactually, considering you're at this point of the story, surely you went through the drug sequence in the quest of finding the mountain mushrooms. In the trippy scene, the now deceased Grant does mention that Jason is a natural with a gun. And of course, if you read up the character profile of Jason, you'll see he's an adventure druggie. Sighing up for swimming and what nots. So yeah, physically he's capable of doing that stuff.

 

[ThisGuyLikesNoTacos]

The developers probably tried to avoid too much interception with the gameplay. In that sense, removing exposition (that you can fill in yourself) seems like a smart thing to do: We can imagine that there was some more talk between the characters, but in favor of gameplay, it was removed from the game.

The rest you're just questioning Far Cry 3's realism.

Let's make one thing clear: Game mechanics > Realism. If realism means that I have to learn how to shoot for five hours before I can stand a chance against enemies, then fuck realism. It's a video game: It's supposed to be fun not tedious.

I can understand the part about questioning realism of video games, but what I don't understand is when people act as if sacrificing realism for game mechanics is a bad thing. You just have to get over your own disbelief.

If I were to criticize FC3. I would bring up problems within it's gameplay, not asking why I need to hunt different animal skins instead of just grabbing a ton of pig skin for everything.

 

[eggy32]

I'm not saying it should be totally realistic. What I was getting at is that it stretches my suspension of disbelief way too far since Jason is able to do all these things right from the start. It'd be totally different if he were taught these things along the way by other characters in the game or if he just got better with guns as he used them, like in an RPG. Obviously the game would suck if it were totally realistic.

Aaaaaactually, considering you're at this point of the story, surely you went through the drug sequence in the quest of finding the mountain mushrooms. In the trippy scene, the now deceased Grant does mention that Jason is a natural with a gun. And of course, if you read up the character profile of Jason, you'll see he's an adventure druggie. Sighing up for swimming and what nots. So yeah, physically he's capable of doing that stuff.

I missed that part in the drug sequence. In the description it doesn't mention much about his abilities in herbalism and craftsmanship. Or his ability to instantly know where a character he has yet to meet happens to be.

I'm not saying it should be totally realistic. What I was getting at is that it stretches my suspension of disbelief way too far since Jason is able to do all these things right from the start. It'd be totally different if he were taught these things along the way by other characters in the game or if he just got better with guns as he used them, like in an RPG. Obviously the game would suck if it were totally realistic.

In that case I can agree.

Having to learn things along the way is better than "here's a gun, now go get them Rambo the 2nd coming".

Having everything from the start does take away that feeling of "progression".

I haven't played that much of it so don't know how much of a super soldier he is but I do know I had the best guns for what I wanted to do (smg with silencer and mag upgrades .. don't mind if I do) and all the bag upgrades within a couple of hours and had nothing else left to "aim for" apart from more money for the truck load of ammo I was flinging at these pirate types.

Too much Rambo is bad but not enough Rambo is also bad. One is too easy and the other would be boring as frack.

It seems like a fun game but it's hardly a challenge.

I'm glad you agree. I've not been playing too long but since I did a lot of the radio towers, all the guns in the game are now free so I currently have the strongest guns available to me right now. It's hard not to feel like a super soldier when I have weapons stronger than everybody else in the game.

The developers probably tried to avoid too much interception with the gameplay. In that sense, removing exposition (that you can fill in yourself) seems like a smart thing to do: We can imagine that there was some more talk between the characters, but in favor of gameplay, it was removed from the game.

The rest you're just questioning Far Cry 3's realism.

Let's make one thing clear: Game mechanics > Realism. If realism means that I have to learn how to shoot for five hours before I can stand a chance against enemies, then fuck realism. It's a video game: It's supposed to be fun not tedious.

I can understand the part about questioning realism of video games, but what I don't understand is when people act as if sacrificing realism for game mechanics is a bad thing. You just have to get over your own disbelief.

If I were to criticize FC3. I would bring up problems within it's gameplay, not asking why I need to hunt different animal skins instead of just grabbing a ton of pig skin for everything.

Are you saying they shouldn't be trying to integrate the gameplay into the story?
And I'm not questioning the realism of the game. I'm saying that the gameplay doesn't fit the overall tone of the game's story and the main character. I just can't relate to Jason Brody. I could at the beginning. But at the point when I had the strongest weapons and was carrying around enough ammunition to supply a small army he just became totally urnelatable.

Games don't have to be utterly realistic to be fun though. You know what was fun? Being a weak little soldier at the start of KOTOR and working my way up into an overpowered badass jedi who could blast anyone into oblivion with a thought. Not once did I question the realism of that game but it fit in with the tone of the game and the game's universe. FC3 has a realistic tone and is set in the real world where everyone apart from Jason acts realistically. Do you see what I'm getting at yet?

 

[Weaver]

Brody kind of struck me as an immense douche and put me off the game entirely.

Something about Vass also strikes me as just hilariously unintimidating. I know he's supposed to be "loco" but it sounds like his VA's trying way, way too hard and I can't take the character seriously in any way.

That coupled with the modern dubstep infused action music really put me off this game.
I didn't buy it.

 

[eggy32]

Brody kind of struck me as an immense douche and put me off the game entirely.

Something about Vass also strikes me as just hilariously unintimidating. I know he's supposed to be "loco" but it sounds like his VA's trying way, way too hard and I can't take the character seriously in any way.

That coupled with the modern dubstep infused action music really put me off this game.
I didn't buy it.

How much of it did you play? Jason's supposed to be a douche at the beginning but he changes over time and becomes more insane, or so I've heard. I haven't seen much of that happening yet.
I liked Vaas though. His VA didn't seem to be trying to hard to me because the character is literally insane. I can understand the aversion to dubstep. I normally don't like it but I felt it fit in with the modern setting and it's good for ambiance music if nothing else.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Wow. I didn't know someone can miss the point of playing a fuckin' free roaming FPS to a point where he ruins it for himself. Nice job, man.

 

[Weaver]

Brody kind of struck me as an immense douche and put me off the game entirely.

Something about Vass also strikes me as just hilariously unintimidating. I know he's supposed to be "loco" but it sounds like his VA's trying way, way too hard and I can't take the character seriously in any way.

That coupled with the modern dubstep infused action music really put me off this game.
I didn't buy it.

How much of it did you play? Jason's supposed to be a douche at the beginning but he changes over time and becomes more insane, or so I've heard. I haven't seen much of that happening yet.
I liked Vaas though. His VA didn't seem to be trying to hard to me because the character is literally insane. I can understand the aversion to dubstep. I normally don't like it but I felt it fit in with the modern setting and it's good for ambiance music if nothing else.

Oh, I haven't played it at all! So I won't object to people calling bullshit on all of my claims
Like I said, I didn't buy it; all I did was watch some of a Let's Play to see what all the fuss was about and didn't think I'd enjoy the game.

 

[eggy32]

I was surprised to see how many people said the story in this game was so good when it was so badly told and badly integrated into the gameplay.

You're not the only one to complain, but it seems most of the complaints got drowned out by the fact that if you ignore the story the game play is apparently not bad.

Normally things like this wouldn't bother me so much because there's a certain level of suspension of disbelief with videogames but Far Cry 3 sets a realistic and serious tone that just doesn't fit the gameplay.
Anybody else agree with me?

It sounds to me that the problem isn't the game being unrealistic, but portraying itself with pretensions of realism. It's the same problem with spunkgargleweewee games that bill themselves as "realistic" shooters. I'm sure loads of people are going to reply to you and sarcastically complain and propose you're demanding that all games must be realistic or vociferously argue that realism should never be more important than good game-play, but I think setting up a "fun" versus "realism" dichotomy misses the point. Games that bill themselves as realistic should make a basic attempt to do so. Unfortunately "realism" has become something of a catch-phrase in the triple-A gaming world and they really need to get away from that.

Ah. You're right in the sense that if there were complaints, they got drowned out by talk of the gameplay, which is actually really good. It's just in the wrong game.
I'm glad to see someone else who actually understands that sometimes there's more to a game than just its gameplay and that if it sets a tone, the gameplay has to match that in order for it not to feel out of place.

Wow. I didn't know someone can miss the point of playing a fuckin' free roaming FPS to a point where he ruins it for himself. Nice job, man.

and just what is the point?

 

[crazy_coug99]

I tell this to anyone trying to find logic in games, STOP TRYING TO APPLY LOGIC TO A VIDEO GAME. By doing so, you hamper the ability, and sometimes credibility, of the game. In the case of Far Cry 3, which I do own, it is cool of being able to craft and become a super soldier over time. As Yahtzee put it, it's a character growth, which several games lack in the recent years. Going from barely taking a hit to storming the Compound with nothing more than a SMG. While I can see the arguments being made here, my problem with the game is the lack of replay ability. Once you have crafted every expansion, bought every weapon, and done every quest, what else is there to do? This is the question I have.

 

[Full]

I agree with you, it seems like the plot tries to ground itself in realism, but ends up negating that in the actual plot missions. The second I was playing an average mid 20's guy who's never shot a gun outside a range in his life, but then becomes invulnerable to all bullets, and finds a grenade launcher with an unlimited supply of extra ammo in the back of a truck while escaping from a burning building, is when I start to call bull.

 

[Smolderin]

eh, i got over it, it's just a game after all, a damn fun one at that

 

[eggy32]

I tell this to anyone trying to find logic in games, STOP TRYING TO APPLY LOGIC TO A VIDEO GAME. By doing so, you hamper the ability, and sometimes credibility, of the game. In the case of Far Cry 3, which I do own, it is cool of being able to craft and become a super soldier over time. As Yahtzee put it, it's a character growth, which several games lack in the recent years. Going from barely taking a hit to storming the Compound with nothing more than a SMG. While I can see the arguments being made here, my problem with the game is the lack of replay ability. Once you have crafted every expansion, bought every weapon, and done every quest, what else is there to do? This is the question I have.

I don't think you understand. Normally I don't try to find logic in games. But in FC3 at time the lack of logic was just so jarring it made all the other flaws a lot more noticeable.
As for character progression, I love it. I just didn't like it in FC3. Character progression should be a gradual thing. What happened when I played FC3 was that I managed to get the best guns and gear within a few hours. There was no progression. It was like putting in a cheat code to let me max all my stats at once.

 

[ThisGuyLikesNoTacos]

Are you saying they shouldn't be trying to integrate the gameplay into the story?
And I'm not questioning the realism of the game. I'm saying that the gameplay doesn't fit the overall tone of the game's story and the main character. I just can't relate to Jason Brody. I could at the beginning. But at the point when I had the strongest weapons and was carrying around enough ammunition to supply a small army he just became totally urnelatable.

Games don't have to be utterly realistic to be fun though. You know what was fun? Being a weak little soldier at the start of KOTOR and working my way up into an overpowered badass jedi who could blast anyone into oblivion with a thought. Not once did I question the realism of that game but it fit in with the tone of the game and the game's universe. FC3 has a realistic tone and is set in the real world where everyone apart from Jason acts realistically. Do you see what I'm getting at yet?

Ah. I thought you wanted FC3's gameplay to be realistic for the sake of being realistic (since I found FC3's story rather unrealistic and over-the-top myself). My mistake.

I still can't see the point for criticizing the gameplay because it doesn't add up to the tone set by the story. Shouldn't it be the other way around? Shouldn't you be criticizing the story for setting the wrong kind of tone for the game?

 

[eggy32]

Are you saying they shouldn't be trying to integrate the gameplay into the story?
And I'm not questioning the realism of the game. I'm saying that the gameplay doesn't fit the overall tone of the game's story and the main character. I just can't relate to Jason Brody. I could at the beginning. But at the point when I had the strongest weapons and was carrying around enough ammunition to supply a small army he just became totally urnelatable.

Games don't have to be utterly realistic to be fun though. You know what was fun? Being a weak little soldier at the start of KOTOR and working my way up into an overpowered badass jedi who could blast anyone into oblivion with a thought. Not once did I question the realism of that game but it fit in with the tone of the game and the game's universe. FC3 has a realistic tone and is set in the real world where everyone apart from Jason acts realistically. Do you see what I'm getting at yet?

Ah. I thought you wanted FC3's gameplay to be realistic for the sake of being realistic (since I found FC3's story rather unrealistic and over-the-top myself). My mistake.

I still can't see the point for criticizing the gameplay because it doesn't add up to the tone set by the story. Shouldn't it be the other way around? Shouldn't you be criticizing the story for setting the wrong kind of tone for the game?

I think we should be criticising the developer. Neither the gameplay nor the story are bad. They're just not right for each other. Each has their own merits but would fit better in a different game. Ideally the developers would have made 2 separate games: one with FC3's story that focuses on story and atmosphere. It would even have worked as a linear game, I think. The other being one that has more of a focus on gameplay.
That probably would have been expensive though. Shame we don't live in an ideal world.