Just Cause 2

If the first Just Cause was a dry run for testing out ideas on what an open world game about causing a revolution in a small exotic country might be, its sequel is definitely the full realization of those concepts. It's also sort of the game Mercenaries 2: World in Flames should have been; it doesn't have some of that game's best assets, like its co-op, its arsenal of hugely explosive airstrikes, and its strong motivation for the lead character, but it does execute on its central premise a lot better. It's a huge game, one that will still have things you haven't done long after you've lost interesting in doing them, but well worth the many hours it will take to reach the point.

Just Cause 2 is all about destruction and creating chaos. In fact, the main currency in the game is actually called "chaos". Building up your chaos meter can be done in several ways, mostly involving making various objects in the world explore. The simplest way to increase chaos is to complete side missions for three different armed factions that inhabit the country of Panau, which range from fairly simple tasks like assassinating a certain official to more elaborate jobs involving a lot more firepower. The game missed an opportunity by never having the factions interact, despite a lot of your actions generally working to expand their various territories. Their beefs all seem to be with Panau's government though and not each other, so you can do whatever you like without worrying that it will bother them. Gaining chaos unlocks further missions for the factions, weapons and vehicles that you can buy and upgrade from the black market, and most importantly, gives you access to agency missions, which progress the story.

If course, that "importantly" is up for debate. The story itself is mostly inconsequential, consisting of a lot of national stereotypes yelling at each other and trying to take over the country. You're really only the good guys because the player is usually the good guy in games like this. I didn't even realize that you were playing the same character as in the first game until I met another character that I recognized, which shows of how little significance the plot is. I think you can ignore the story completely if you want, as the entire archipelago that the country consists of is unlocked from the start, and there's nothing really blocking you from doing what you want. Most things you do will earn you money as well as chaos, but it's kind of a laughable commodity, as there was almost never a situation where I felt the need to pay for a specific weapon or vehicle when so many are just there for the taking.

You can run, jump shoot, throw explosives, and control a huge variety of vehicles, all of which are pretty fun. The key to the gameplay is the grappling hook, though, which lets you winch two objects together for whatever reason you can dream up, as well as zip yourself quickly across the world, cling to walls and ceilings, and even fall from any distance without taking damage. Combine it with your backpack which has an infinite supply of parachutes, and the freedom of movement you have in the game is immense. It helps make up for the fact that your arsenal never gets much more impressive than it is in the beginning. It's fun just to use the two items to fling yourself around the country, stumble upon a military base you've never seen before, and just lay waste to the delicate equipment and soldiers inside with the agility of an Hispanic Batman. It does seem a bit limiting when you can only blow up things the game wants you to blow up, like tanks full of gas, water towers, oil pipelines, and construction cranes. But there's just so many of them that it's rare to go too long without seeing something you can destroy. The problem with the game's scope is that it might actually be too vast, as I found myself frequently skipping to new locations using the extraction feature rather than traveling myself, because unless you have a plane or a helicopter, the distance between significant locations can be prohibitive.

The game is very impressive technically, never stopping to load an area, and having a nice level of detail on all the objects despite their being hundreds of them in any direction you look. The geographical diversity of this small cluster of islands is pretty incredible, and all the different environments look really nice. I starting having some slowdown and hangups with the frame rate when I was getting closer to the end of my time with the game, but they never seriously affected gameplay. Reflecting on some aspects of the game, there were definitely issues. Voice acting was generally bad and repetitive, too much of the optional content like the race challenges and tracking down hundreds of meaningless collectibles just wasn't interesting, and fighting off enemy guards and soldiers never felt like more than a distraction from blowing up everything in sight. The game really took a dive in quality whenever you were tasked with fighting a particularly tough bad guy rather than something that played to its strengths. Still, it featured over fifty unique missions that ranged from decent to pretty damn fun, which is a lot more than the first game can say, and experimenting with the grappling hook and your other gear never stopped being enjoyable. The good parts are definitely worth the small design issues.

Just Cause

It's a bit late to be playing this game, although I did it for a few reasons. Its sequel, which is coming out in a couple days, has a really fun demo out that got my appetite for some open world destruction up, and my free copy of Red Faction: Guerrilla still hasn't arrived yet. Over a weekend the first Just Cause was less than eight bucks on Steam, so I decided to give it a shot. It turned out to be a functional if unremarkable open world game, not great but probably worth the price I paid.

It shows its age for the most part, the huge environment that never has to load is nice, but most of what you see in it is unimpressive. It's pretty obviously from that transition period between this generation and the last one, and the shooting definitely feels like it came from an earlier era. Enemies pop in and out of cover like they're in a whack-a-mole, the driving is rudimentary and the PC port doesn't support a widescreen mode. There was something weird about the in-game cut scenes, they were rare but happened once in a while, and I couldn't tell if they were intentionally miming to each other or if some voice acting just wasn't playing. More important moments are given the CGI treatment, although the scenes look really cartoony and did little to interest me in the game's very vague plot. Some of the music when you're driving around is pretty good, although that's really the most I can say about the sound. The barely existent story would have benefited from a likable cast, but your support team always has that generic cocky tone and the main guy is one of the worst protagonists I've ever played as. He hasn't a single interesting detail to him, his voice is a boring Antonio Banderas-type thing and I think through the entire game he literally has no lines of dialogue that aren't stupid action movie tough guy quips.

The basic gameplay might have been more exciting a few years ago, but especially after its sequel's demo it's not much to write home about. Not that I'm usually writing letters to people about games I'm playing. It's got the traditional open world shooting and driving, with the additions of a "stunt position" that lets you jump on top of any vehicle, and a parachute and grappling hook to facilitate your transportation through its tropical landscape. It's not easy to get good momentum going with the parachute and the hook is only useful for hitching to moving vehicles, but the ability to jack a vehicle while it's still flying down the highway takes a lot of frustration out of the experience. The straight path through the story missions was a bit surprisingly short, packed with a variety of explosive opportunities but completable in about six hours. There's a ton of side missions you can do to help friendly factions take over territory from other gangs or the government, though the rewards for doing so aren't necessary to beat the game and they weren't really interesting enough on their own to entice me to do many of them. It's really not a very hard game, as you can take a lot of punishment before dying and even the strongest resistance isn't that difficult to circumvent. I had a bit of trouble in the last few missions because helicopters were blowing crap up all around me, but you're always one good shot with the hook away from taking it for yourself and turning the tables.

And that sort of sums up the whole game. There are a few elements that cause frustration and eye rolling, but there were few moments while I was playing where I wasn't at least mildly enjoying myself. It makes you feel pretty invincible for a guy with no real superhuman abilities, and anything bothering you isn't that difficult to find a way to turn the tables on. It's definitely the kind of game that's not great but tolerable if you don't have to spend a ton on it. Just Cause 2 on the other hand might be playable right away.