As previously noted, over the Thanksgiving weekend I took advantage of a sale on Steam and bought myself five new (to me) video games, all for less than the price of one brand-new game (it was a good sale). But rather than binge out and play them all at once, I've decided to unwrap my early-season Christmas gifts to myself slowly, and before downloading even the first new game, I finished my replay through Fallout: New Vegas.
The replay was fun, and since it had been almost two years since I had last played the game, it didn't seem at all redundant or overly familiar. But playing through the DLCs began to feel like a chore (how much more before I can finally finish this?), especially considering the five new (to me) games still sitting under my virtual Christmas tree, so I stopped after completing two of the four DLCs, and downloaded the first of my new games.
To start, I chose Far Cry: New Dawn. Unlike some of the others in my 5-game package, New Dawn is a new (2019) game, and I chose it in part to indulge in that new-car smell before it wore off, and also because it's a sort-of sequel to Far Cry 5, which I played earlier this year. Since completing Far Cry 5, I've played The Outer Worlds, some DLCs to Assassin's Creed: Odyssey, and my recent replay through Fallout: New Vegas, and I didn't want to play too many other games and forget the details of 5 before taking on New Dawn.
I'm only about four or so hours in, but I already like the new game. Like Far Cry 5, New Dawn is set in the fictional Hope County, Montana but after the nuclear war that closes out 5 (I noted a while ago that the ending to the game was surprisingly dark). So it's basically another post-apocalypse game, like the Fallout series, but it presents a refreshingly different take on the post-nuclear world. Instead of everything being one big trash-strewn ruin like in Fallout, New Dawn imagines a world reclaimed by nature, where plants and forests have erased the footprints of civilization (which were pretty light in Montana to begin with).
As a result, the scenery and settings of New Dawn are beautiful and quite fun to romp around in. Unlike the gray and brown world of Fallout, full of dilapidated buildings and decay, the buildings in New Dawn, which are few and far apart, are covered by flowering vines,.and the forests are teeming with wildlife. Further, the wildlife in New Dawn are not the ghouls and giant green mutants of Fallout and there are no radscorpions or radroaches scurrying about - the New Dawn wildlife are deer (albeit albino for some reason), boars, and bears. I've already seen enough foreshadowing to know that some of the bears and boars I'll be coming up against later are larger, more aggressive mutated variants, but they're not the slimy, scaly monsters of Outer Worlds. You hunt and fish for your food instead of scavenging old canned food like in Fallout, and instead of the hermits and survivalists of Far Cry 5, your allies are likable settlers and their families. It's a refreshing and different vision of post-apocalyptic sci fi, and I like it.
The video above is the actual first minutes of the game. I love the way it conveys so much story with one long pan shot, and how the background changes with the voice-over narration even as the POV pans to the right. It's a good example of how a video game can employ the virtual tools of CGI for narrative purpose in a way that mere cinema can't, at least not as easily. It's a good example of how a video game can transcend mere entertainment and actually become art.
As a result, the scenery and settings of New Dawn are beautiful and quite fun to romp around in. Unlike the gray and brown world of Fallout, full of dilapidated buildings and decay, the buildings in New Dawn, which are few and far apart, are covered by flowering vines,.and the forests are teeming with wildlife. Further, the wildlife in New Dawn are not the ghouls and giant green mutants of Fallout and there are no radscorpions or radroaches scurrying about - the New Dawn wildlife are deer (albeit albino for some reason), boars, and bears. I've already seen enough foreshadowing to know that some of the bears and boars I'll be coming up against later are larger, more aggressive mutated variants, but they're not the slimy, scaly monsters of Outer Worlds. You hunt and fish for your food instead of scavenging old canned food like in Fallout, and instead of the hermits and survivalists of Far Cry 5, your allies are likable settlers and their families. It's a refreshing and different vision of post-apocalyptic sci fi, and I like it.
The video above is the actual first minutes of the game. I love the way it conveys so much story with one long pan shot, and how the background changes with the voice-over narration even as the POV pans to the right. It's a good example of how a video game can employ the virtual tools of CGI for narrative purpose in a way that mere cinema can't, at least not as easily. It's a good example of how a video game can transcend mere entertainment and actually become art.
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