Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands

[PZ]

Anyone have knowledge of this game?

The reviews are not that good, but similar to what took place during FC2 reviews back in the day. 

A very large open world shooter, many of the complaints I've read are characteristics that I actually appreciated from FC2.

I love desert scenes like this
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[Art Blade]

it's U*bleep* -- not gonna touch that.

[PZ]

This is a rather good review video - of course, the thoughts of this particular gamer, but he mentions things that I like.

• Fully open world
• No story mission line - you are to kill a cartel boss, but there are no main line missions - you explore the world at your pace doing whatever pleases you
• Very large map - he claims 4-5 times the size of GTA, and all of it open from the beginning - no locked areas like UBI*bleep* normally likes to do
• Specialize in whatever talents you like from electronics expert to marksman
• Slow paced game because you decide how you want to approach it
• Beautiful world - makes you want to just explore and look around

[PZ]

This guy mentions good coop, and says that he thinks this game is a combination of Just Cause, Far Cry, and Socom. I can see the similarities  to the buildings in FC2, some of the game play in FC4, and even the parachute in JC3

[LowPolyOWG]

The driving controls are horrendous and PC port is also "unoptimized", you need a monster PC to run this at high settings...

[PZ]

Yeah, I read that the vehicle controls were not that good - looked like driving in the Far Cry games.

They had it on sale for the PS4, so I couldn't help myself 

[fragger]

The game sounds good, except for two things: poor PC optimization, and Ubisoft. That counts as a double-whammy for me

[PZ]

You're right about that fragger.  I'll see how it goes, but like with quite a few movies I really like - they are rated poorly, so I'm hoping this will be like FC2 - tons of bad ratings, but a game I can appreciate.

[PZ]

Well, the game came in the mail and I popped it into the console fully expecting to spend a day and a half doing a reported 8gb update. However, I was pleasantly surprised to see a message appear on the update download page indicating that I could bypass the update and play the game - I would be missing the online component.

How refreshing to be able to opt out of an update.

[Art Blade]

 

[PZ]

The funny part is that I did not have time to game when it arrived in the mail, but had budgeted the day and a half download time to do the update.  Now I have the game but still have not been able to start it! 

[Art Blade]

you need to w0#k on your scheduling skills, man

[PZ]

 

The problem is that I'm so Pavlovian when it comes to the game companies making the experience increasing worse and obstructive to gamers like me that I automatically assume the first experience when starting a game is going to be a bad one, and plan accordingly 

[Art Blade]

Alright, makes sense. But I hope you're not that Pavlovian that you start to drool when someone rings a bell

[PZ]

   luckily not Pavlovian with that kind of stimulus!

Back on topic - stated the game and I love it! The best game since FC2 as far as UBI*bleep* games go in my book. Certainly not for everyone, but here are a few thoughts:

• You can completely customize your character with clothing hair, face, etc like in the Fallout games
• You have full access to the entire map right from the start, and you also have decent weapons - I already have a couple of suppressed assault rifles and a suppressed pistol. You can go anywhere and do anything - best part is unlike the Far Cry 2 where everyone is hostile, you are left to your own devices on the roads as long as you don't cause any problems.
• Driving to my first mission - plenty of interesting side roads that were really cool to explore
• People are walking along the side of the roads much more like what we saw in the FC2 intro
• You travel as a group of 4 team members - either you can do online coop or the game has rather good AI that knows what to do.
• You can get into a vehicle as either the driver or a passenger - you can hang out the windows to do shooting - the animations are very good
• The world is beautiful - there is so much to explore even if you don't do any of the missions
• Here's one of the best parts: you can stand, crouch, or go prone
• Weapons appear to be fully customizable
• Your drone (which you have from the start) runs out of battery if you go too long, you can target the cartel members
• Your binoculars, which you also have from the start appear to w0#k well

The bottom line at least for my gaming tastes is that UBI*bleep* has taken all the best parts of the Far Cry series and left out the worst.  I hope the game does not disappoint (for instance, with a stupid boss sequence, or drug-induced haze, both of which I detested in FC3, FC4) but so far, it has been nothing short of spectacular.

This is a very short video illustrating sync shots - you target one guy and one of your team mates will acquire him - then you target a second one and take the shot - the two targets die simultaneously - really cool. Best to watch this video full screen.