GEEK LYFE: Amongst the rebellion lies Far Cry 4's hidden gem

Header image for Interrobang article CREDIT: UBISOFT
It's got a storyline that doesn't make much sense at first but is smart and unexpected. Try playing Ubisoft's Far Cry 4.

It was about 20 hours into my adventure in Kyrat, the fictional country tucked into the Himalayan Mountains in Ubisoft’s Far Cry 4, that a thought crossed my mind that would usually lead me to put down the controller: “This story makes no fucking sense.”

Now, let me clarify that the series has never exactly been known for telling the most elegant stories – the first two entries featured chunky, poorly defined stories – but were products of their time, when narrative took a firm second seat to gameplay.

It was Far Cry 3 that set a new standard for the series, putting players in the role of spoiled kid Jason Brody as he trained in the arts of killing in order to save the rest of his dumb friends from a pirates. A lot of the attention was given to Vaas, the leader of the pirates and the face of the game. And rightly so, as the performance from Orphan Black’s Michael Nando is one of the finest video game performances of the generation. But the game is still Jason’s story through and through.

One of the hardest things a first-person shooter game can do is to give the protagonist a personality that goes beyond a square jawed meathead with years of training in everything war, but Jason Brody’s arc made sense. At the outset he is a scared child, unwilling to pick up a gun and harm a pig let along take a life. But as the story progresses, he finds that he begins to enjoy the killing, becoming better at taking life while simultaneously losing the ability to relate to the friends he arrived with. The loss of control that the protagonist undergoes is a recurring theme throughout the series, and it was one I hoped that Far Cry 4 would take to a more exciting level.

In this installment, players are put into the shoes of Ajay Ghale, raised in America by his Kyrati mother who fled the country under mysterious circumstances, returning to the country of his birth to spread the ashes of his mother as per her dying wish. In true Far Cry fashion, his trip is quickly halted as he falls into the hands of king Pagan Min played to perfection by game voice all-star Troy Baker (The Last of Us, Shadow of Mordor). Pagan finds himself captive at his dinner table before he leaves to do some more of the stabbing and torture that he announced himself with. Before he leaves he tells Ajay, “Stay there, enjoy the crab Rangoon. I’ll be right back.”

In true gamer fashion, I got up, started exploring and progressed in natural fashion, joining the local rebellion and aiding them to liberate the nation. All of that for the purpose of reaching the place where mother wishes to rest.

This is where Far Cry 4’s story started losing me.

Ajay not only willingly joins a rebellion to liberate a country he’s never been to, but he’s fully capable of shooting, stabbing and creating equipment out of animal stomachs, with no explanation or natural progression. Giving players the choice between two potential leaders of the rebellion offers nice opportunities for ideological decisions, but both are extreme in their own ways and wish to create either a drug state or one fuelled by ancient religions. You will direct Ajay to help one, but honestly, they both suck.

That’s where my mindset stayed up until the end, as I stormed Pagan’s castle to kill the corrupt king. When I arrived, there was my target, speaking to me as casually and kindly as he had at the start and inviting me to sit down for the same meal he offered at the beginning.

It was then that Pagan finally allows you to lay your mother to rest, telling you that had you just waited at the start like he asked, he would have led you right to where you needed to go. Right there, the story redeemed itself. There was the dictator I had spent over 20 hours attempting to overthrow, speaking more rationally than any of the fanatical idiots I had been running around with, telling me that every one of the hundreds of lives I took throughout the game was utterly pointless to my overall goal.

It was smart, it was unexpected, and it’s the sort of thing that would be left as is, but Ubisoft took it one step further.

As it turns out, Pagan Min’s “I’ll be right back,” in the opening sequence is entirely truthful. If players don’t leave the room he will return, and he will take you by the arm and lead you to your destination, completing the story of Ajay spreading his mother’s ashes without a single loss of life.

A great little meta-commentary on the industry we all love, but let’s face it, we all bought the game to hunt honey badgers with a flamethrower.