Funnily enough I randomly came across this while trying to determine if there were any alternative endings to the game. As already mentioned above I guess the point is that no matter what you do you arrive at the same ultimate conclusion. I think for the people who played the game and were very disappointed with the ending, this argument (that it was an intentional thing to make one single ending) does not really make up for it.

I agree with the majority of the stuff Tom and others said here, at least in spirit. Yes it’s hard to compare Far Cry 2, a game, to a traditional piece of literature because games as a storying telling medium have so many more elements to them. And in the majority of cases the story telling gets very low priority. Obviously games have a narrative and story. But because they are interactive experiences, not every user is going to experience the same game play or take away from the game the same level of enjoyment.

I agree that on a superficial level Far Cry 2 did not seem to have all that much story going on. Most of your time is spent exploring the world, instead of watching a story being acted out in cinematic cut scenes or being directed in a linear fashion to move from plot point A to plot point B. But then you realize how much story telling went into making a living, breathing world and it should become obvious that the narrative here is a lot less static (i.e. a one-size-fits-all storyline) then novels, or even most other games, and much more dynamic in the sense of choose-you-own-adventure.

I do wish the connections to your buddies and to the missions you do had much more emotional impact/interaction. I wish the missions varied more than just kill this dude or blow that thing up or steal this briefcase. But at the end of the day this game is still a FPS not an RPG.

I think people end up sounding pretentious when they have a view that others do not agree with, so this might sound pretentious as well. Apologies in advance. It’s just that I really, really enjoyed this game as an experience. Sure lot’s of game play mechanics and game design elements annoyed me, but the end result that I took away was very positive. I think as a gamer, that is all we really want, is to have fun while we playing it and then taking something meaningful away from the experience.

I know I’m super-late to the party here but I finally finished FC2 tonight and I’ve been saving this article for when I was done.

Like you, I was very impressed by the narrative in the game. I see that some of the commenters were disappointed by the lack of choice, but I have to say that I think you nailed it here: the way the game compels you into this callous and destructive behavior is the heart of its appeal. It’s not ludonarrative dissonance (in the perjorative sense) every time the mission-structure pushes the player towards some acts they find morally distasteful. For a game that is intended as a mass-market release it makes some pretty audacious moves, and it’s to be lauded for that.

Also, props for discussing the Jackal. You call him the “main character” and I think this is accurate if you’re just talking about how memorable he is as a character. It seems the dialogue and voice acting displeased the commenters here but I thought the scripting and the acting were superb and fit with the character.

Would I rather watch a movie with a wonderful plot that unfolds before me over 2 hours?

or

Would I rather be the protagonist of a story that unfolds over 25 hours of play?

the second is far more appealing. But when gamers get what they have been asking for, many reject it. ON the forums all over, gamers
are trashing the game for some minor poorly chosen game design elements. But this game has done more to push the art form forward
than any major release in recent memory. Including the horrible and linear Gears2 and many others blockbuster games.

This game is in many ways the direction forward in my mind. If Far Cry 3 were able to make the story more compelling 10x and your
decisions as a player have more meaning x10. And correct some minor annoyances, we’d have something close to what a great novel
or great movie can deliver. Something even approaching ‘art’.

One quibble, which I hope might lead to further conversation: I think your distinction (which is of course ultimately the Bakthinian distinction) between epic and novel is too facile. Not that it vitiates any of your most important claims, but the epics could change much more in the telling than the “standard version” gives them credit for, which is why I see games as a possible synthesis of epic and novel that for me tends more towards the epic side.

My 360 RROD’d yesterday, or else I’d be play FC2 right now, but from what I’ve read here and nearly everywhere, we seem to be talking about the same kind of moment in the history of a genre that gave us Achilles’ refusal to go back into battle.

“I couldn’t take the choices any more. They didn’t amount to anything. I saved the bosses I loathed and murdered the ones I liked simply to avoid the strain of extra transport. And, as it matters, it came to nothing: the others died as well, all at my hands. Did that justify my earlier lack of morals, or did it only throw them into greater relief? Who knows.”

EXACTLY. Your choices made no difference at all–the game decided you had to kill everyone, and that’s what yo had to do. The choice was an illusion, just like your buddies, who were merely gameplay mechanics. I didn’t care about my buddies. I did their missions and let them die.

The progression from barely surviving with rusted, jammed weapons to being virtually indestructible with the best guns money can be is poignant. It’s not just game-ish upgrading of weapons, it’s telling a story about foreign involvement in conflict. Listening to the Jackal’s tapes where he discusses this makes is quite clear this progression was deliberate.

There’s a lot going on in FC2 and I applaud Tom and others for drawing these things out. I believe that if FC2 hadn’t come out during the Fall Glut, there would be a lot more conversation about it.