Gaming

Far Cry 4 Game Performance Review

If you were a fan of Far Cry 3’s free roam, hunting and countless side missions, the sequel will be right up your alley. We test a wide array of hardware with this game, and get a good look at how it improves upon its predecessor.

Far Cry 4's protagonist, and your avatar in the game, is Ajay Ghale. He's the offspring of two iconic members of 'The Golden Path’, a rebel group labeled as terrorists by corrupt warlords who govern the land. The Golden Path's chief nemesis is Pagan Min, a man who murdered his way to the top, seizing the throne as a self-styled king of Kyrat (a territory that smacks heavily of Tibetan influence).

As the game begins, you’re forced into a position of opposition against the despotic leader, aligning yourself with the group of natives seeking to free themselves from tyranny. Sound familiar? That's because it's exactly the same basic plot as Far Cry 3. Sure, the details are different. But in many ways, this is more of a reboot than a sequel. Thankfully, that doesn't prevent the game from being wonderful at what it does. If you loved playing Far Cry 3, I can pretty much guarantee you will love Far Cry 4.

The similarities carry some advantages, too. For instance, anyone who played the previous title already knows what to do and how the game’s mechanics work. From travel to hunting to upgrades, vehicles and weapons, it’s all very familiar. Despite this, there's a tangible difference: Far Cry 4 feels more polished. There are a myriad of subtle upgrades that make it the best Far Cry game yet.

Get your bait and gun ready, because you're going hunting. Skinning your catch continues to play a big role in the newest Far Cry installment. Tracking down the various wildlife that inhabits Kyrat can be good fun, and it's also necessary to complete some side missions and craft new, improved gear to help you rise against Pagan Min. The surprise giant bird attacks are irritating beyond belief, though, and I always feel bad when I'm forced to gun down a poor little monkey in order to complete my task. Admittedly, the stylish ammo bag I crafted out of them softened the blow. Two warnings: first, if you’re going rhino hunting, take something bigger than a shotgun, and second, never underestimate a honey badger.

Acer Bakes Nvidia's G-Sync Into 27-inch IPS QHD Monitor With 144 Hz Refresh Rate

Wait, is that a 27" IPS monitor with a QHD resolution, 144 Hz refresh rate, 1 ms response time, and support for Nvidia's G-Sync? Why yes it is!

Nvidia's G-Sync has already been out for well over a year, but it seems that before AMD's alternative launches (FreeSync), Nvidia is already feeling the pressure created by the red team. However, if you wanted a G-Sync enabled monitor with an IPS panel, you were left in the cold, because they didn't exist – until now. Acer announced two new gaming monitors, one of which is that which we've been longing for. The two monitors are called the XB270HU and the XG270HU.

The star of the show is the XB270HU, which is a 27" monitor with an IPS panel and a resolution of 2560 x 1440. On top of that, it has an extremely high refresh rate of 144 Hz, with a response time of just 1 ms, and support for Nvidia's G-Sync. As far as IPS screens go, this is unseen territory, and we're curious how Acer has managed to pull this one off.

Well, when we say Acer, we should really say AU Optronics, because we strongly suspect that this is the AHVA gaming panel that the display manufacturer was rumored to be working on a couple of months ago. An AHVA panel is technically not an IPS panel, but placed side to side, few people will be able to distinguish between the two, as they both offer high viewing angles and better colors than standard TN films.

The XG270HU is also a 27" gaming monitor with a 2560 x 1440 resolution and a 144 Hz refresh rate, but does not feature an IPS panel. Acer boasts that this monitor has a frameless bezel, but in reality the bezel is just very thin, for an "edge-to-edge" viewing experience. It also isn't built with G-Sync support.

Acer did not announce pricing for the monitors, and we're particularly curious about what the XB270HU will cost. The company did mention that both monitors will be shipping globally in March 2015.

Our 2015 gaming resolutions

Contextually-appropriate image by DeviantArt user iKonakona.

The new year is a good excuse to consider how we can be better gamers. These are our promises to ourselves and those we share PC gaming with. Share your resolution with us in the comments.

Tyler Wilde, Executive Editor

I want to become an expert on one game. Due to the nature of the job, I tend to be a game tourist. I need to quickly decide which new games are interesting, and there were /a lot/ of games released last year—I must have jumped in and out of at least a hundred games in 2014 (I’m probably being conservative on that). You can see a bit of my tourism on our YouTube channel, where I posted a few of my excursions.

I don’t think there’s anything intrinsically wrong with playing lots of different games for a short time each, and I did complete a decent number of games last year, but I never became an expert on any of them. Not an expert in the sense that I want to compete with pro players or anything, but in the sense that I’m completely up to date on all the nuances, I know what it means every time a patch is released, and I have an opinion on even the smallest, darkest corners of its design. Tourism is nice, and useful to me when deciding what we cover and how, but in 2014 I really missed the feeling of developing a complex, long-term relationship with a game. This year, I’m searching for a soulmate.

Evan Lahti, Editor-in-Chief

I want to be unfalteringly friendly. I am occasionally a goddamn idiot in CS:GO. Sometimes I drift into a bad mood and start to criticize the mistakes of my teammates (Tyler and anyone else who’s played L4D2 with me can tell you that). But more often I go out of my way to spar with other internet jerks, the tedious sarcastics, griefers, racists, and the other types intent on ruining everyone else’s good time that anyone who plays competitive games knows very well.

A dab of adrenaline and anonymity turns a lot of people into sour, unlikable dumbasses, and I’ve had enough of being one of them. I’m pledging to be unimpeachably pleasant in every competitive game I play. I want to be as understanding, patient, and good humored as the people I enjoy playing with.

Tom Senior, Web Editor

I want to learn how games tick. I’m inspired by the example set by production editor and PC Gamer Loremaster Tony Ellis. Last year he built his own 2D game engine from scratch, and then used it to build Tetris and Asteroids. Now he’s moving onto polygonal 3D and procedurally generated landscapes. I envy his code-fu, and his newfound knowledge of the processes that turn cold machine language into interactive entertainment.

I don't think you have to know how games are made to criticise them. The food critic doesn't have to know how a cake is made to know whether the cake is good, or whether the cake succeeded in making the cultural comment it set out to make. If I was a food critic I'd nonetheless be really curious about how the cake got that way, so I plan to understand games better by learning a programming language and building something simple—maybe a game about eating loads of cake.

Tom Marks, Assistant Editor

I want to play more games with strangers. Unlike Chris, I love multiplayer games. For a large portion of the two and and a half years I played League of Legends, I would only play when I had a friend to queue up with. I love a good, immersive single-player experience, but something has always been more appealing to me about sharing a game world with my friends. Even single-player games like FTL and Civilization are more fun when I’m making the decisions with somebody else.

Unfortunately, not all my friends share my taste in games. What this means is that I’ve missed out on a lot of great multiplayer games because I couldn’t find a friend who wanted to join me, and I barely ever play with strangers. It’s not that I don’t want to, I just never know how to approach someone I don’t know on the internet without feeling creepy. Ironically, I am a pretty outgoing person in the real world and making introductions is no sweat, but I get insecure about making the right impression when I’m not face to face.

This year, I’m going to be more outgoing with online communities that I’m not yet a part of. There are too many fantastic and friendly groups of internet people that I’m passing by, let alone fun games I am depriving myself of. I am going to go join an open Terraria server, turn on my voice chat in TF2, attempt to ally with someone in Elite: Dangerous and inevitably get blown up by them. I may not make lifelong internet friends, but at least I’ll get out of my bubble.

Chris Livingston, Staff Writer

I want to play more games with my friends. Look, I'm an introvert and thus I find people generally exhausting, even my own friends. For this reason I've always been a staunch single-player gamer. Throughout my life, games were always me-time: after a long day of being surrounded by people at work, I had no interest in coming home, starting a game, and being surrounded by people again, even if they were people I liked.

There's nothing wrong with being introverted: that's just how some of us are built, and there's not much sense in forcing ourselves to be people we're not. At the same time, it's worthwhile to step out of our comfort zones from time to time. I've spent rare stretches of time in multiplayer games like Team Fortress 2, Unreal Tournament, Counter-Strike, and a couple of MMOs, and those times have always been rewarding, not just because I was spending time with my friends but because I was often making new ones.

I'll always love single-player games for letting me escape the world, and on my toughest, most stressful days they'll still be my refuge. But, while I'm not the most social guy on the planet, my friends are still important to me, and I've just haven't been making the effort to play games with them recently. I want to change that this year.

Tim Clark, Global Editor-in-Chief

I want to build a new PC. Or, to be more specific, I want to gull our hardware editor Wes into helping me to build one. Or, for fans of even further specificity, I want to have him build it entirely himself and then hand it to me at the end for the crucial ribbon cutting part of the process. Because god knows if I build it myself I’ll end up with the computer equivalent of the car Homer designed. I want something relatively inexpensive that still comfortably outperforms the current consoles, doesn’t require a lot of faffing with, and won’t take up much space in our insult-to-shoebox-sized apartment. Should be easy right Wes? Wes?

Chris Thursten, Deputy Editor

I want to stay on top of new releases. I don't have any illusions about being able to play or finish everything that comes out, but I really struggled to keep up towards the latter half of 2014. I've barely touched Far Cry 4, for example, despite adoring its predecessor. I missed out on Wasteland 2 and Dark Souls 2, and although I've just picked up both in the Steam sale I'm concerned that I'll not get around to playing them for a while. Generally if I'm not reviewing a game I don't have time to play it, and when I do have free time it tends to go on my 'hobby' games - Dota 2, Elite, and, er, Destiny.

I'm nostalgic for the era in my life when I had time to absorb every major new game that came out. To an extent, I'm not going to get that back - the time when I could spend a whole weekend at my desk with nobody needing me to do anything is over. But I think I'd benefit, personally and professionally, by expanding my experience of games in general over the course of the year. In short: I am the opposite of Tyler.

Andy Kelly, Section Editor

I want to finish what I start. If I’m not reviewing a game, it’s increasingly unlikely that I’ll finish it.

How to fix Assassin’s Creed

I love Assassin’s Creed. Yeah, I know. To some of you that’ll be like admitting I'm a serial killer. But I do, even though I’ll be the first to admit that it’s in dire need of a refresh. By committing to a sequel every year, as well as regular spin-offs, Ubisoft have stretched their flagship series way too thin and the strain is beginning to show.

So while I’ve played and enjoyed every game so far—except AC3, which was the abyss—I can’t help but feel that its potential is being wasted. Yearly sequels have bled many a great series dry, and Assassin’s Creed deserves better. So here’s how I would change it. You know those present day bits everyone hates? I actually don’t mind them, which should prove that this is all coming from a place of love.

A smaller teamTen studios worked on Assassin’s Creed Unity. Ten! This is the very definition of too many cooks. The best manager in the world couldn’t get that many people, from all those different time zones, to work efficiently together.

The result is a general feeling of inconsistency. Sidequests like AC3’s homestead and Revelations’ godawful tower defence feel like the were made by a team working alone and then shoehorned into the game—which they probably were.

Assassin’s Creed would benefit from a smaller, more focused team. And I don’t mean small in the indie sense—because you do need huge amounts of people to make blockbuster games like this—but I mean smaller than ten studios.

The series also feels designed by committee, and I think it needs the leadership of a strong auteur. A Ken Levine or a Hideo Kojima who will doggedly pursue their personal creative vision. Just thinking about how many Ubisoft suits the lead on an Assassin’s Creed game has to keep happy is making me feel dizzy.

Longer developmentThe reason so many studios work on these sequels is because they’re massive, and they have to do a new one every year. Ubisoft is a business, and businesses exist to make money. They have shareholders to appease, and making games on this scale costs a fortune. But this is having a negative impact on their quality.

Unity was a mess of bugs and frantic patching. The mission design gets noticeably sloppy towards the end of almost every entry in the series, presumably as deadlines begin to loom. And assets are frequently recycled between games.

Ubisoft should adopt the Rockstar model. They release a new Grand Theft Auto every 3-5 years, taking as long as they think they need. In comparison, Assassin’s Creed games feel increasingly mass produced, like they’re rolling off a conveyor belt.

Look at what Ubisoft achieved with Unity in a couple of years. Now imagine what they could have done if they had another two. I can understand Call of Duty sequels being released every year. They’re dumb, flashy, six-hour action movies. But historical epics like Assassin’s Creed deserve more time to be crafted and polished.

A new templateIt’s fine for sequels to share the DNA of other games in a series, but Assassin’s Creed has taken this to an extreme. It’s utterly formulaic, recycling the same missions over and over—even the ones no one likes, like tailing and eavesdropping. Those ones have even started showing up in Far Cry, which is just baffling to me.

New features may be added, like AC3 and Black Flag’s brilliant ship combat, but the games still largely stick to the set menu: arbitrary collectables, hay carts, sync points, hiring 'dancers', sneaking through bushes, disabling alarm bells. I think it’s time to create a new standard. Sticking to this formula makes churning out yearly sequels easier for the developers, but as I said, that needs to stop too.

Worryingly, the Assassin's Creed Victory shots (well, I say shots, but they're obviously just concept mock-ups) already suggest the new game is recycling some old ideas. We see the new hero atop a sync point and the rope-swinging is straight out of Black Flag. But it's too early to say. Hopefully Ubisoft Québec are using this framework to do something different. It's heartening to hear that they've already been working on it, in Ubi's words, "for the past few years."

Think biggerThere’s a running meta-commentary in recent Assassin’s Creed games about sinister Templar corporation Abstergo using DNA memories to create mainstream entertainment products. The databases are filled with humorous notes about dumbing things down to broaden the appeal.

Assassin’s Creed is mainstream entertainment, but I wish Ubisoft had loftier goals for it. They treat their games like products, which cheapens them. Whether it’s overpriced ‘special editions’ or the microtransactions in Unity, the company makes it clear, constantly, that they want your money. They do, naturally, and that’s fine—but do they have to be so damn shameless about it?

Ubisoft makes Assassin’s Creed games like Michael Bay makes movies. They create blockbusters designed to sell millions, and that’s their primary goal. But imagine they made an Assassin’s Creed like Stanley Kubrick made a film. As a piece of art. Something culturally important. The series has that potential, buried deep somewhere, but it’ll never manifest as long as they’re using it as a gaudy shopfront.

A different perspective
The endless, generation-spanning war between the Assassins and the Templars is the backbone of Assassin's Creed's mythology. But the idea that the Assassins are the good guys and the Templars are the villains is becoming increasingly blurred. Both groups are equally fanatical about their beliefs, to the point where I kind of hate both of them now. So I think it's time to introduce a third party.

In Metal Gear Solid 2, Hideo Kojima famously replaced longtime protagonist Solid Snake with a floppy-haired newcomer, Raiden. This was met, understandably, with a lot of criticism—but it was actually a stroke of genius. Koj's idea was to make players see Snake from a new perspective: as a mythical hero, rather than the character we were comfortable with. This is an interesting way of refreshing an established mythology without completely changing it, and it could work in Assassin's Creed.

I'd love to play as a character who has some other interest in the Animus, and who doesn't give a damn about the Pieces of Eden, the Templars or the Assassins. There are countless other reasons why someone would want to delve into the memories of their ancestors. Ubisoft are so duty-bound to their progressively bloated mythology that they're not taking full advantage of a really powerful storytelling tool.

I must admit, the Victorian London setting of Victory has intrigued me, but I'm remaining cautiously optimistic. I honestly don't think Ubisoft will break away from their established template any time soon, which is a shame. But that's the cold, hard reality of making blockbuster games. Maybe one solution is giving smaller studios with big ideas access to the license, then letting them make interesting spin-offs.

Even if Assassin’s Creed sticks to the same old routine, the sad truth is, I’ll probably still play them. They’re enjoyable fantasy romps set in stunningly realised locations, and I’m fairly invested in the story. But I’ll always have a niggling feeling as I play that the series has the potential to be so much more.

But hey, at least Desmond’s dead!