Hands-on with the ridiculous Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

I’m serious about the laser-eye-shooting dragons

First drop whatever you’re doing and watch this trailer before reading anything else.

Okay, so yeah. Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon is just ridiculous. I don’t want to get into too much specifics as there’s gameplay video out there already, but I will at least hit on some of the higher-level stuff that I experienced during my hands-on time.

The first few minutes of Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon sees you having to deal with the worst tutorial ever, on purpose. It’s supposed to be horrible, and it’s actually quite funny reading through all the text explaining how things work. Once you’re clear of that, the first couple of missions sees you having to infiltrate a base and stop a missile from launching.

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon (PC, PlayStation Network, Xbox Live Arcade [previewed])
Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
Publisher: Ubisoft
Release: April 30, 2013 (PSN) / May 1, 2013 (PC)
MSRP: $14.99

After the introductory sequence, you’re free to take on this new island, which is just about smaller than the south island in Far Cry 3. There will be a few places that you’ll recognize, but overall a lot of the areas you’ll explore will be new. There’s also a bunch more interior environments, and I was told there’s a nice balance between the indoor and outdoor stuff.

Outposts, now called Garrisons, fill the island as well and they’ve been cranked up to 11. They’re protected by mega shields, and taking them over will give you fast travel options, shops, and scientists that will join your fight against the threat of Omega force. Unfortunately they’re not that great of fighters, and act more like cannon fodder.

Thankfully the island is filled with Blood Dragons. They’re as vicious as the tiger, bear, and goddamn cassowary combined into one. They even have health bars! These giant lizards hunger for cyborgs, and will chomp down on any they can find. You’re going to have to sneak around them if they’re close, and you can throw cyborg hearts (that you pillage from corpses) in order to lure Blood Dragons away from your path or send them towards enemy cyborgs so they can get laser-eye attacked.

All this would be pretty hard to do if you were playing as Jason Brody, but you’re not! You’re a cyborg solider. Your speed is increased, you won’t suffer fall damage, and you can stay underwater indefinitely as you have cyber lungs. The weaponry will be different as well, such as a four-barrel shotgun and a super high-powered sniper rifle. The wingsuit sadly won’t be available, but there will still be hang gliders scattered about the island.

Out of everything though, the most important thing to note is that I laughed out loud multiple times during my hour of hands-on time. Making a real funny game is very hard to pull off, but there was a ton of funny lines and events that happened in the “so bad it’s good” style of comedy.

My experience was great, but I do have a concern that the visuals are too neon-y. I found that it was hard at times to see things off in the distance at times.

Check back a little later today for an interview with the creative director behind Blood Dragon that goes into some of the inspirations behind the project.