Far Cry 5

Far Cry 5 is an action-adventure first-person shooter video game developed by Ubisoft Montreal and Ubisoft Toronto and published by Ubisoft for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. It is the successor to the 2014 video game Far Cry 4, and the fifth main installment in the Far Cry series. The game was released on March 27, 2018.

Plot
The main story revolves around the Project at Eden's Gate, a doomsday cult that rules the land under the guise of its charismatic leader, Joseph Seed.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) This entry makes some improvements over the other Far Cry games.
 * 2) *Just like Watch Dogs 2, you don't have to go from tower to tower in order to unblur the map. It functions similar to an automap, meaning all you have to do is explore the world. The game even makes fun of the "tower scenarios" in the prologue.
 * 3) *The player can now fish. After liberating Dutch's Island, players will be able to explore further and locate areas to fish. Unfortunately though, players will not be able to just fish anywhere there's water. They will need to locate (or purchase) a fishing rod, and fish in designated areas. Much like hunting, players can sell the fish they catch. There are also different lures for catching specific fish and you can even acquire better rods to make catching much easier either by completing all of Skylar's missions or by beating the records for heaviest fish.
 * 4) *There are now flying vehicles like helicopters and planes for the player to use.
 * 5) The Seed family make very interesting antagonists.
 * 6) Great story about a group of police trying to stop a doomsday cult that has taken over a town in Montana.
 * 7) Great graphics.
 * 8) You can now acquire specialist and fighters for the Guns/Fangs for Hire.
 * 9) *There are a total of nine specialist including, Cheeseburger, Boomer, Nick Ryes and many others that you can acquire after completing their side missions.
 * 10) *Fighters on the other hand, are randomly-generated Hope County residents that can fight with the Deputy. There are five different kind of fighters: Melee, Soldier, Long range, RPG, and Heavy.
 * 11) The game brings up interesting commentary on the modern world.
 * 12) Good voice acting especially Greg Bryk who is giving it his all as Joseph Seed.
 * 13) There are now garages and hangers in the game where you can get any vehicle and even acquire unique ones.
 * 14) For the first time in the series, you can customize your character's appearance and you can unlock more clothing as you play.
 * 15) There are two seemly different endings, with a secret one in the intro.
 * 16) The optimization is much better compared to Far Cry 3 and 4, as now the game will work on a much older PC without any problem.
 * 17) Excellent soundtrack with tracks ranging from gospel-like music to fit the cult side while also having some country to fit the world it's set in.
 * 18) There's also a new game mode called "Far Cry Arcade", where you can make your own maps and publish them

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Missed Opportunity: The Resist ending can be hard to stomach, seeming to validate Joseph's belief that the biblical God willed him to kidnap and murder people and the Deputy's resistance literally causes nuclear war to break out. Until New Dawn confirmed otherwise, a valid reading of the ending was that Joseph has acquired nukes (Montana is in real life home to some of the US's deprecated nuclear silos) and sets off the nukes just within Montana when the Deputy refuses to leave. This even helps explain why the deputies and Whitehorse take him with them instead of just killing him, as for all they know his death will cause more nukes to go off. And it still has the same underlying moral of not rushing headstrong into a volatile situation, while not being a downer ending where the whole world literally dies as the murderous, brainwashing cult preached.
 * 2) Plot Holes:
 * 3) * The Peggie assault on the jail is greatly assisted by the brainwashed Marshall Burke, who kills Virgil and disables the security before going the gun-in-mouth route. He is only able to do this because he, a recently rescued brainwashing victim, was not only given free run of the jail, but also allowed to keep his loaded gun. Making this inexcusable is that by this point in the plot, the effects of Bliss exposure and Faith's ability to manipulate her victims are well known to all involved.
 * 4) * The entirety of the Jacob's Territory plot is even worse: While working with the Whitetail Militia against Jacob's regime, you are kidnapped numerous times by him and brainwashed into a human weapon against the Whitetails right under their noses. The Militia is aware of your disappearing on them, and of the fact that Jacob regularly kidnaps and brainwashes people, and yet they never, at any point, seem to make the connection or suspect you of being under Jacob's control.
 * 5) The multiplayer is a mess. Unlike majority of multiplayer components, this multiplayer doesn't have any developer-made maps, instead it relies mainly around user-made maps which leads to a chaotic mess that makes the multiplayer of Modern Warfare 2 look balanced.
 * 6) The two similarly but different endings, while delivers it's message as quoted in the caption of the picture, can be unsatisfying and infuriating, as it basically rendered the actions of the player "all for nothing", all to set up Far Cry: New Dawn, thus making the latter ending non-canonical.
 * 7) *While the other one, is just a repeated from the intro, but it's heavily implied now the player character is brainwashed, and presumably killed the Deputy's co-workers after they leave the Project of Eden's Gates' compound for the last time, and no resolution.
 * 8) *Spoiler: Also during the ending, Hope County (and likely the rest of the United States) getting nuked came out of nowhere since that event had no signs of it eventually happening, nor there's an explanation of who dropped the nukes and why they dropped the nukes. While there is notes and records in the world to read about and is hinted by some characters and by the radio, they aren't made clear enough that ended up being a cop-out for Joseph Seed. Even Far Cry: New Dawn rectify this lack of information if the player didn't read the hints of the nuclear war.
 * 9) **This was rectified in Far Cry 6 Control DLC, where it confirmed that the nukes aimed at Hope County were Kyrat origin, though it still doesn't explain the motive for the Kyrati government feeling the need to nuke the US.
 * 10) *To top off the problem of this ending, Far Cry 6 (Which is confirmed to take place in 2021, three years after Far Cry 5) completely retcons the nuclear crisis and by extension, Far Cry: New Dawn. Aforementioned crisis is never mentioned at all. It can be implied that even Ubisoft themselves realized how truly destructive a crisis is and needed to split off the ending of the previous game in its own timeline to continue the loosely connected timeline.
 * 11) Where the Secret ending in 4 made sense in the context of the story, the one in this entry is less of an ending and more like something to check off of a check box to satisfy the expectations it would have one just like the 4th game since the characters decide to abandon their mission for no reason.
 * 12) Some iconic weapons, notably the Desert Eagle, weren't available in the game launch day, being released in a later date post-launch.
 * 13) The game is noticeably easier in compared to its predecessors due to the sheer number of broken weapons and mechanics that are at your disposal.
 * 14) * Attacking anything fortified above ground (outposts in particular) becomes a cakewalk while Nick Rye is in the sky. His four bombs alone can wipe out half or more of most bases' garrison and give you ample opportunity to snipe the frantic survivors without being detected. As long as you keep neutralizing all Peggies that attempt to man a mounted gun, there's little that can threaten him during his subsequent strafing runs. To put icing on the cake, he's also reasonably effective against the Chosen warplanes that begin to show up in advanced game stages.
 * 15) * The special cluster ammo for the rocket launcher. The guided version in particular is heinous, if the enemies are in the right spots you can take down an entire outpost with only one or two launches. The rocket flies up into the air before dropping a huge area of effect attack with either shrapnel or fire bombs that will blanket the area in flames.
 * 16) * The M60 LMG, the game's entry-level machine gun, can be unlocked within minutes of entering the open world by looting it from the lone Heavy in the back of Merle's trailer park. Take it, slap on an extended magazine, the competition scope and a silencer, and you just got yourself a peerless stealth weapon with high per-shot damage, a massive 200 round belt box, and the precision and zoom of a sniper rifle that can take down absolutely anything with contemptuous ease. LMG ammo is among the more expensive ammo types, but it's still fairly easy to keep this beast fed for continuous use.
 * 17) * A stealthy playstyle in general breaks most of the game's difficulty into little pieces, especially now that every single firearm (with the exception of the D50) regardless of type can be outfitted with a silencer. Even end-game missions can be finished without ever being shot at this way, and you don't even need any perks to become the ultimate ninja. If you do take them, it just gets more ridiculous.
 * 18) * Cheeseburger is a throat-ripping bullet-sponge bear, and Peaches is a throat-ripping super-stealth cougar. With the right perk you can have both of them with you at the same time, and they can clear out most outposts with very little help.
 * 19) * Thrown shovels, for whatever reason, will kill any human enemy in one hit. They are also significantly more accurate than an aimed arrow shot.
 * 20) There are a few unpatched glitches that are also in Far Cry: New Dawn, like a glitch where the player can fall through the ground.

Reception
Far Cry 5 received "generally favorable" reviews, according to review aggregator Metacritic.

Daemon Hatfield of IGN gave it an 8.9 rating, saying "Far Cry 5 is another wide-open playground with all the necessary ingredients for causing a real ruckus: loads of enemies and allies, temperamental wildlife, and plenty of explosions." Polygon gave the game 6.5 of 10 possible points, stating "It’s a shame that Far Cry 5 is propped up by a weak story with bland characters, because behind the plot is an open world filled with what Far Cry as a series does best."

The game's ending polarized critical opinion. Should the player choose "resist" when prompted—an ending regarded by Ubisoft to be canonical—the game depicts a series of nuclear explosions that destroy civilization. Critics argued that this ending invalidated the player's actions by rendering them meaningless.

Sales
Far Cry 5 became the fastest-selling title in the history of the franchise, more than doubling the sales of Far Cry 4. It was the second-biggest launch of an Ubisoft title, behind Tom Clancy's The Division, grossing $310 million in its first week of sales. The PlayStation 4 version sold 75,474 copies within its first week on sale in Japan, placing it at number two on the all format sales chart.

The tourism board of the state of Montana partnered with Ubisoft after Far Cry 5 's release to use some of the setting imagery for the game to promote tourism to the southwestern part of Montana, the setting that inspired the game's fictional Hope County.

Controversy
Many journalists opined that Far Cry 5 's setting and narrative concept, involving themes of religious fanaticism and the emergence of far-right political movements within the borders of the United States—as opposed to the more exotic locales depicted in other Far Cry titles—would likely make the game highly controversial. These journalists noted that due to the long development cycle, it was unlikely that Ubisoft intentionally designed the game's narrative around the political climate at the time of the announcement, adding that Ubisoft had been careful to downplay any perceived connections to then-current real world events. Responding to the criticism, game director Dan Hay revealed that the story was written to discuss the consequences of beliefs and ideologies being taken to their most extreme form rather than as a response to a particular political event. Hay stated they had come to setting the game around a cult in Montana as they felt Montana reflected a remote frontier most people were not aware of, comparable to their other Far Cry game settings, and that after visiting the state, found that Montana was a place "where people go to be alone, where they don't want to be messed with", further resonating with past Far Cry themes. However, after three years of development, Hay said: "we could have never imagined, and to be honest I wouldn't have wanted to... that in some ways, it's echoing out in the real world."

Following its announcement, Far Cry 5 was the subject of an online petition lodged at Change.org by individuals objecting to what they called the portrayal of American Christians as villains and calling for the game's antagonists to be recast. The petition suggested Muslims, inner-city gang members, and other non-white antagonists as possible replacements. The petition also suggested changing the game's setting to Canada. The petition itself was criticized by industry commentators who highlighted the game's exploration of its themes as being necessary in the contemporary social and political climate, and pointed to video gaming as a medium for social commentary. Some publications also questioned the authenticity of the petition, suggesting that it may have been intended as satire.

Conversely, after the game's release, some outlets criticized it in the other way around, for trying to be inoffensive and apolitical rather than directly engaging with contemporary political issues. Polygon 's Ben Kuchera described the game as a "defiantly inoffensive mess" which "wants to appeal to everyone, but ultimately says nothing." William Hughes writing for The A.V. Club disparagingly described the villains as an "easily digestible evil" deliberately crafted so as not to offend gamers of any political persuasion. Andrew Webster's The Verge says that the game "creates the illusion that it has something to say, then stubbornly refuses to say anything."

Game Tips

 * 1) Keep an RPG with you in case planes try to shoot you from the sky.
 * 2) Always use suppressed guns.
 * 3) Complete prepper stashes to get Perk Magazines quicker.
 * 4) When fighting John Seed, always pick Nick Rye to fight with you and/or have a friend help you.