Far Cry games have never been set up in a chronological order, but this one seems to take place directly after the events of the previous game, which is both very interesting and highly contentious.
Now, before we all go crazy, there’s no certainty that this is actually Far Cry 6. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that actually sounds highly implausible. You know what sounds likely though? Well I hate to say it, but a mobile game does. And yes, I’m making this prediction knowing full well exactly how this will go down if that’s the case and I’ll be watching the Game Awards intently.
That said, whatever this is, it’s certainly interesting. The ending to Far Cry 5 was famously unsatisfying, putting into question the entire journey you’ve undertaken (I’ve written our review of it, you can read it here). And the thing is, there was never really a hint that there could possibly be a follow-up to that story. That ending was dripping with so much quasi-Christian (but not really because they didn’t want to be offensive) symbolism that it was impossible to take it at face value.
There was a big subset of people in the fan-base vehemently convinced that the “true ending” was a fake out, that it was just all a hallucination brought on by the Bliss drug the cultists were using. There was some sub-textual evidence to this idea, but it’s still essentially Far Cry’s version of indoctrination theory, so the answer seems to be that no, that actually totally, literally happened. Nukes and all. So like, where exactly do they even want to go from there?
Well the answer seems to be post-apocalyptic Montana. Which again, incredibly interesting, exceedingly hard to pull off well. Far Cry always had this quasi-realistic veneer to it of mythologizing remote locations of the world and showing just how crazy things get in places removed from civilization. But this is Tom Clancy’s The Division territory, something Far Cry has never done before.
The teaser is, of course, very sparse on the details, seemingly more interested in showing possible gameplay mechanics (a saw-blade shooting crossbow is a fun idea, if my memory of Half Life 2’s Raveholm are anything to go by), than in answering more pertinent questions. Like why and how? Will we be playing as the same faceless, characterless, voiceless protagonist whose name I don’t even remember? What about Joseph Seed in that case, is he still around?
And of course let us not forget that this comes fresh off the heels of Fallout 76’s utter disaster. People are already making jokes that this game is probably going to be a better Fallout than Fallout 76 . And then we also have Id Software’s Rage 2 coming soon so I have to tell you Ubisoft, I don’t know if there’s still this hungry post-apo fanatic niche base waiting to be satisfied. So all in all, incredibly wary about this one.
Still, this is at least enough to make me shake uneasily in my pre-Game Awards slumber that can only truly be broken by prince Hideo Kojima giving me a kiss of Death Stranding.
See you at the Game Awards everyone.
Edit: Sorry, Rage 2 is developed by Avalanche, not Id, the OTHER Bethesda’s partner. Sorry, not to put them down because these guys are awesome, but it gets confusing with publishers progressively devouring more and more studios.