Just enough causes to get behind

I'll admit it straight out – I've never played any open world game that falls into the “Like GTA” category. I've never really played, at least to any level of actually remembering playing it, GTA games or any of the games that are patterned to be 'like' GTA. “Open world gaming” is actually sort of new to me, other than like morrowind, which isn't new at all.

I picked up Just Cause 2 for at best something along the lines of 'a song'. I think it was on sale for 2.50, but maybe I paid five dollars for it. This is the line where Steam games just get really silly. I paid that much for the Witcher and I'm actually left with the feeling I should pay more for the next game to make up for it. I put off playing it for several months due to lacking an Xbox 360 controller. My teen years I played consoles and then in the next decade played computer games, so suffice to say I'm pretty solid on a keyboard. But years of writing has given my an appreciation for doing something different with my hands, especially if that difference is not developing carpal tunnel syndrome. Gripping a control pad gives you nice solid feel when it comes to platforming and driving, but shooting is another story.

The game has a learning curve and that curve is choppy. Some stuff is instantly obvious, like how bad I am at driving a car being mostly on my end. Some stuff is too hectic to pick up on – I recognize keys mostly based on their position against my hand, so the QTEs trouble me and I sometimes fuck them up. I'm also still not sure which buttons do what in a car, I think one hops out and another shoots or something something, parachute? Oh it's parachute. The weirdest thing is realizing the dodge button, which launches Rico into a roll, is paramount to utterly definitive. Dodging is more effective than basically everything else in the game. Hook shot onto a speeding car? Enemy bullets still home onto you. Hook shot onto a motorcycle and then take off at top speed? Again, dodge works better.

The game has, admittedly, little more than a fondness towards reality. It follows its own rules, and those rules are not sensible. Physics, especially, are just silly. Gatling gun fire launches enemy units into the air, and car crashes are incredible kinetic explosions that reliably launch everything not strapped down hurling through the air. While clownish, it adds a sort of 'action film' element to the game that I appreciate. The game has little interest in realism.

On the other hand, in terms of building a game world the developers wow me. While it's true the game looks basically like an island with some cities and stuff on it – It reminds me immensely of hawaii – The attention to detail is really rewarding. It's visually lush and makes me wonder how bad the developers of fantasy games must be. The game is pretty enough that sometimes you just skydive or drive around, casually sauntering to the next mission with an eye for the scenery. That hasn't happened to me in ages. Dues Ex: Human Revolution and Bulletstorm were better looking games, but lacked the critical drop in tension or raw splendor to really sink it in.

Missions, on the note, have reasonable variety that uses the game itself well. Missions essentially direct you to head somewhere and do something the engine could let you do otherwise, but with some structure to it that adds to the difficulty.

Difficulty is a big component of the stuff I find miserable about the game. Death is no more than an inconvenient occurrence, resulting in needing to taxi yourself back to whatever you might have been doing or back a checkpoint in a mission. The problem here is that since difficulty is “who cares” the game doesn't really seem to care if it throws up on you. The aiming AI, as I've said, is goofy. It's not generally a big deal, but the game is pretty absurd about simply respawning waves of enemies out of your line of sight, even in places where no one could be. Where it gets really annoying is rocket launchers which magically home in on you. Obviously the designers really didn't care, since a bullshit death means so little, but this complete lack of concern leads to some frustrating gameplay.

The correct escort quest: On a motorcycle

One of the other big ones is the whole upgrade system. Running around finding bits allows you to upgrade a narrow selection of vehicles to really no point (since they're never the ones you steal) while also allowing you to upgrade guns. My real issue with the gun upgrade system is weapons absolutely must be upgraded or combat is just irritating, which the game makes no real mention of. For some reason the developers never thought to put in auto switching, so you gleefully attempt to fire an empty gun at people. Suffice to say, unupgraded weapons run out of ammo at the drop of a hat. After upgrading weapons with the parts I'd scrambled together I'm pretty much forced to use those guns, since the other guns are still crap.

The last real irritation is the race system. Flying a plane is not enjoyable in the game, which is probably since flying planes is not exactly the world's easiest task. I tried doing the flying challenges and just found them frustrating, flight unfortunately does not truly convey a sense of speed. On the other hand the car/truck challenges feel fantastic, with many of them being clever or creative usage of the game world. The one where you just drive through a city and plow through civilians was a bit drab, but there's one where you zoom through a military base, and one that is plotted along the wrong lane of a highway. These are neat and exciting to fiddle with.

All in all I think this is definitely one of the more outright concerned with "fun" games I've played in a long time. It's certainly not flawless, but it's pretty and silly much of the time. Given I got it at such a low price, it's impossible to complain though.