We were recently invited to head to the Ubisoft offices in San Francisco to check out their upcoming title Far Cry New Dawn and to chat with their Creative Director Jean Sebastian Decant. After a couple hours of solo play, we were then allowed to try out some co-op play and take on a new feature to the franchise: Expeditions.
Apocalypse Now
Far Cry New Dawn opens up as the world has finally gone insane and the nuclear apocalypse has happened. Far Cry 5 introduced us to preppers, and those folks were ready for this nuclear annihilation. Seventeen years later and these preppers have emerged from their bunkers, ready to start over again to create a new society in a vast and colorful open world full of life and vigor one might not expect to see after such events have unfolded. The story shows how these folks started building a new world, and as time progressed slowly, their new world progressed with it.
Of course this utopia of peace and prosperity can only last so long, and folks that want all the things you worked for, but don’t want to actually work for them, forcefully come in and start taking things. The Highwaymen are a group of loosely organized bandits led by two twin sisters, who want to take anything and everything that can help them survive, and this includes your fellow survivors. This is where you’ll start your journey in Far Cry New Dawn, and the game will have you choose between a male and female character before setting you on your journey.
Big Beautiful World Full of Useful Plants
The game world is set in Hope County, just like Far Cry 5, but the apocalypse, known as the Collapse, has changed it dramatically. Buildings clearly show the destruction that came with the event, but nature is already reclaiming the land, and the flora is gorgeous. It’s obvious that the developers didn’t want to just create another dead world full of dark and dreary landscapes, but instead created this colorful world full of flowers and plants that aren’t always just for looks. The game has a crafting system that will utilize health mixtures and energy boosts crafted by using special recipes. Some of these beautiful flowers may actually save your life one day.
Weapons can also be crafted and upgraded in this system, and the more I played it, the more it started to feel like a deep RPG. Duct tape and metal items are found throughout the game world, and are both very useful when crafting and upgrading, so always keep an eye out for these. Tasks and enemies had a difficulty rating so it will be interesting to see how much those difficulties will go to determine our path in the game. Where Far Cry 5 let you go pretty much anywhere and take on anyone, the difficulty levels in New Dawn may ultimately decide your path to the end game. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but some folks do like to go their own way, and that might be restricted by these tougher enemies and tasks.
Expeditions
Expeditions is a brand new game mode created just for Far Cry New Dawn. As you upgrade your home base, called Prosperity, you’ll give Roger Cadoret the ability to use his helicopter to fly you around the country and take on raid-like events. These are unique areas that are not available in the open world, which gave the developers the ability to create an environment using more of the in-game resources. In other words, they can create larger, more intense gun battles, in crazy places all over the country. Alcatraz was mentioned in our interview with JS Decant, so that should give you an idea of how far they may go with these Expeditions.
The expedition I took on, with a co-op partner, was the H.M.S. MacCoubrey Expedition, based on a run-aground British air craft carrier. Unlike regular co-op game play, Expeditions allow for both players to record and save their progress upon completing each Expedition. In regular co-op, while your story and quest progress doesn’t save if you aren’t hosting, you’ll at least be able to gather resources and have those save.
Expeditions open up a whole new realm of possibilities for Far Cry New Dawn, and we can’t wait to see where all they take us. The game itself has gone gold, so if it isn’t on your radar, it should be.
Far Cry New Dawn will release on February 15, 2019 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
