Far Cry (PC)

By PETER ELEY

Herald rating: * * * * *

Things are going well for skipper Jack Carver as he cruises the South Pacific accompanied by a mysterious woman. Then a band of mercenaries attacks his ship, and he regains conciousness on a deserted island, minus his companion.

It sounds like the plot for a mystery movie, and that's just what it is. Far Cry comes close to being the most immersive computer game yet and offers a tantalising hint of what the merging of media might eventually offer.

It has the lot — a fingernail-biting plot, almost cinematic graphics, superb sound and intelligent gameplay in exotic settings. The colours are startlingly clear, the animations are superb and the lighting and shadow effects simply spectacular.

You need a powerful system to run it. The basic specs call for a gigabyte processor and a 64mb Geforce 2 video card, but double these if you want to see the game at its best.

The action follows Carver's attempts to rescue his mystery passenger from the mercenaries' stronghold, deep in a Jurassic Park-type stronghold.

The island is beautifully detailed, with rich jungle settings, rainforests and mountains. You really feel trapped in a dangerous, primordial world, and this escalates into something quite terrifying as the game progresses.

Although Far Cry is an action game in the tradition of Halo and Half Life, it is sophisticated.

Thought as well as firepower is needed to progress and just blasting away usually means a speedy exit and re-load.

Saving is predetermined at checkpoints. While this isn't to everyone's liking, these points are placed at sensible intervals and don't cause too many problems.

The high level of explicit violence has earned Far Cry an R16 rating, and its mature style means that it's probably suited to older players, anyway.

Ubisoft, R16

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