Far Cry 2

Far Cry 2
Far Cry 2 Logo
Developer(s)	Ubisoft Montreal
Publisher(s)	Ubisoft
Designer(s)	Clint Hocking
Series	Far Cry
Engine	Dunia
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360
Release	Fall 2008
Genre(s)	First-person shooter, Action, Sandbox
Mode(s)	Single-player, Multiplayer

Far Cry 2 is an upcoming first person shooter to be published by Ubisoft and is the sequel to Far Cry. Crytek, developers of the original game, are not involved in the development of Far Cry 2. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions were announced on January 3, 2008, and will ship simultaneously with the Microsoft Windows version.

Setting and Plot

Far Cry 2 abandons the science fiction aspects of its predecesor in favor of a more realistic and relevant setting. The game will take place in a small, fictional, central-African nation that is in a state of civil war. The name of the country may be Port Selao, and/or this may be one of its major cities.

The protagonist of previous Far Cry games, Jack Carver, will not be featured in this game. When Ubisoft interviewed players about the original Far Cry in their research for this game, the interviewees didn't find the character very memorable or likeable. As a result, in the sequel the player will be able to choose from eight different characters to play, each with a unique look and back story. All of the playable characters will be different types of mercenaries. The playable characters the player does not choose to play will become non-player characters who are friends of the player's character and who can be found around the in-game nation.

According to the game's plot, the nation's government has recently collapsed, leaving two major factions vying for control. These two major players are the United Front for Liberation and Labor (UFLL, led by Addi Mbantuwe, a former opposition leader) and the Alliance for Popular Resistance (APR, led by Oliver Tambossa, Chief of Staff for the former government). Both factions have claimed that they have the people's interests at heart, but both have shown signs of ruthlessness, warmongering, greed, and a general disregard for the well-being of the people. Both sides have hired many foreign mercenaries to bolster their strength over the course of the conflict.

Within the game world, it has recently been revealed that the nation's diamond mines have been exhausted, throwing the nation, its people, and the conflict into further turmoil, and possibly leaving the many foreign mercenaries without pay and without a way out, in a country in whose fate they have no real interest.

The goal of the player's character will be to find and assassinate "The Jackal"[1], an arms dealer that has been selling weapons to both sides of the conflict.[2] The player must accomplish this goal by whatever means necessary, perhaps even through actions which are dangerously close to the level of immorality employed by the warring factions and the Jackal himself. This manhunt through an African nation and the simultaneous crisis of morality strongly resemble and were inspired by the 1899 novella Heart of Darkness, and the film it later inspired, Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now.

Gameplay

The player's hunt for The Jackal will be entirely open-ended and non-linear, with the player being able to ally with anyone he/she chooses. Instead of using individual maps, the game will take place in a sprawling nondescript land in Africa, with terrain ranging from savannah to jungle, similar to those seen in Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction, Just Cause and S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Shadow of Chernobyl. The gameplay area will be 50 km² (19.5 sq. miles). Some members of the Ubisoft Montreal team spent 2 weeks in several locations in Africa filming and photographing native wildlife. The team will use the animal footage and environment photos to create an extremely realistic environment.

Various factions and vehicles will be featured; enemies will include human mercenaries, but sci-fi creatures such as the mutants from Far Cry will not be featured.[3] Furthermore, the player's feral abilities introduced in Far Cry Instincts and its expansions will not be returning in Far Cry 2. A dynamic weather system has been added that varies the weather based on the players ability - if the player is doing exceptionally well the sky will be clear and sunny, but if problems arise the sky will become dark and stormy.[4]

A pre-Alpha video of the game, showcasing visuals and 13 minutes of gameplay, with developer commentary, is available in .zip format at GamersLand [5]. The video showcases many dynamic gameplay features which included procedural breakage of vegetation, allowing players to shoot down trees and shoot branches and leaves off of trees, which can eventually re-grow. The developers also showcased dynamic propagation of fire, and volumetric wind effects capable of breaking vegetation and spreading fire. Man-made structures were also shown to be highly destructible.

The game will be much more realistic with features such as the player having to use a map and compass to get around, and more life or death related features such as having to use tools to dig bullets out of the body and pat themselves down when on fire. Weapons will disintegrate over time, adding a grimer look to them, and eventually causing them to jam. Several species of African wildlife can be encountered in the game, and will be able to distract the enemy as well as make them aware of your presence [6]. All the large animals in the game will be grazing herbivores only, such as zebras, wildebeest, gazelle, buffalo, impala, Gemsbok and the like. The reason for this was said by one of the makers "The problem was, if we wanted to put predators into that ecosystem we would have to balance it to make sure the lions didn't eat all the gazelles and then all starve to death."[7]

The game's producer, Louis-Pierre Pharand, says that the single player will "potentially have close to 50 hours of game play."

During a demo at the DreamHack Summer 2008 event, Ubisoft developers also showcased some new game play mechanics, such as weapon jamming, vehicle damage, propagating fire, destructible environments, adaptive enemy artificial intelligence, as well as day and night cycles, and dynamic weather.

The player will also be able to tag certain objects and locations such as cars, sniper towers, ammo pickups and buildings, so that they will be able to monitor them on their map.

Development

Official system requirements

	Minimum	Recommended
Microsoft Windows
Operating system	Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or Windows Vista
CPU	Pentium 4 3.2 GHz, Pentium D 2.66 Ghz, AMD Athlon 64 3500+ or better	Intel Core 2 Duo Family, AMD 64 X2 5200+, AMD Phenom or better
Memory	1 GB	2 GB
Free space	12 GB of free space
Graphics hardware	NVidia 6800 or ATI X1650 or better; must support Pixel Shader 3.0	NVidia 8600 GTS or better, ATI X1900 or better

History

The unveiling of Far Cry 2 took place on July 19th, 2007 in Paris, France, by head company Ubisoft. Ubisoft stated that the game had been in development by the Ubisoft Montreal team, and would be released in Spring 2008.In December of 2007, Ubisoft announced a delay in the release of Far Cry 2, giving the estimate of fiscal 2008-2009.

Research

In July 2007, Ubisoft sent a team of the game's developers to Africa to carry-out research for the game. They reportedly spent two weeks traveling around Kenya and camping out on the savannah. The game's producer, Louis-Pierre Pharand said that following the trip they realized they had gotten the design of the game "so wrong" and made several changes to "make the game feel like you were really there".

Ubidays 2008

During Ubisoft's Ubidays, held in Paris, France on May 28th & 29th, 2008, Ubisoft revealed brand new video footage for Far Cry 2. Along with the new footage, Ubisoft displayed in-game screenshots showing off the photo-realistic visuals rendered by Ubisoft's Dunia Engine (see engine). A video of Ubisoft Montreal's developers talking about the upcoming game's features can be seen on G4TV's website Here

Engine

Ubisoft has developed a new engine specifically for Far Cry 2, called Dunia, meaning "world" or "earth" in many languages including Persian, Turkish, Arabic, Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi, Marathi, Bengali, Swahili, Assyrian, Indonesian and Malay. The engine will take advantage of multi-core processors and support DirectX 9 as well as DirectX 10. Only 2 or 3 percent of the original CryEngine code is being re-used, according to Michiel Verheijdt, Senior Product Manager for Ubisoft Netherlands.

Far Cry 2 will also support the amBX technology from Philips. With the proper hardware, this adds effects like vibrations, ambient coloured lights, and fans that generate wind effects. The agreement will also see an amBX patch being released for the original Far Cry.

External links

• Official website