Farcry 3: This Little Piggy

[Part of the Diary of a Marked One]

After dealing with the traitorous mercs Sam and I were invited to a poker game with Hoyt - the perfect opportunity to kill him, but complicated by the fact that my last comrade Riley was actually still alive and imprisoned in the cells below. To this end Sam had other plans before the poker night involving an assault on Hoyt's main satellite relay as well as his fuel depot. When the two of those were well and truly exploded we both turned up to his compound with our best poker faces on but he saw through it immediately and knifed Sam in the neck. Maybe attacking all those locations gave us away? I wonder.

Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?

What happened next is a blur. One second we were playing poker with his armed guards pointing their guns my way, the next they were all dead and I was knife fighting with Hoyt who actually was a pretty skilled opponent, slicing off one of my fingers in the melee before I pinned him down shoved a few blades through his face. Guess that explains why I only have nine fingers.

Escaping the compound involved a full scale gun fight again while I went to rescue Riley. In the chaos we liberated an empty helicopter and flew off, but not before making one pass of the entire compound while I drilled everything with the 50 cal. Once we had no more pursuers we flew directly to the safety cave only to find a dying Dr. Earnhardt saying he couldn't protect my friends from the jungle people. What the hell? It was time to pay Citra a visit.

Farcry 3: Crazy Monkeys

[Part of the Diary of a Marked One]

Once I was free and clear Sam suggested I go take care of some thieving traitors to put myself in Hoyt's good books, but that could wait. Now that I had the disguise it made it so much easier to annihilate all the mercenary outposts since they let me fully recon their bases first each time. Some put up more of a fight than the others but in the end they all fell, just like their tower jammers.

I also took the opportunity to finish off collecting the relics and odd jobs in the region. Some of the hunting ones were getting absurd though - such as killing leopards with a flame thrower and killing bears with your knife. On top of that I earned the highest rank in all the Rakyat weapon trials scattered around the island and collected all the correspondence from the dead japs, finding Hurk's epic quest against the grenade-pin pulling monkey he called Gilbert most amusing.

At least they weren't trained to use rifles!

Eventually I got a call from Sam again to help him defend a drug plantation from a roving band of pirates who placed time bombs within. I'm not quite sure why the pirates wanted to explode all the plants as that sounds... not financially beneficial, but it was a good bonding experience for the German and I as we charged in there and killed all of them. He's such a happy guy.

As a side note: Here's Belghast's review of the game which highlights some valid points of why it can be annoying at times. Anatoli's Game room has one too! :)

Farcry 3: The South Island

[Part of the Diary of a Marked One]

Since Hoyt was actually based on the next island I arranged with Willis to take a ride on his "private" aircraft (a single propeller thingy) as he was high tailing it out to Russia on another mission. After protecting him from an attack by the now leaderless pirates we took to the skies and he gave me my most favourite form of transportation on the island - a wing suit! Jumping out of a plane was meant to be scary, but it was actually very fun!

Upon landing I made my way to Thurston to meet Willis' agent there named Sam. This was a bit scary since instead of pirates, this entire place was full of mercenaries. Fortunately none of them recognized me so I was free to look around. I found Sam at the local poker game and was surprised that he is actually a german (as a side note, Farcry 3 is a great way to learn the basics of texas hold em poker)!

Iz gud to meet you, ja?

After finding a quiet spot to plot and plan he suggested that I go and "enlist" with the mercenaries. By that he meant go to where the rookies are, kill one and wear his uniform which would cover not just the tattoo but my face as well. This was the most tense mission yet since I couldn't risk detection OR killing any of the guards. Fortunately I can be quite sneaky when I want to be, and with enough patience and good timing I was soon undercover and attending the welcoming speech with the other recruits from Hoyt himself. Too bad killing him right there was akin to commiting suicide.

Farcry 3: Trippin Balls

[Part of the Diary of a Marked One]

Getting "healed" by Citra involved drinking a strong poison that sent me into a dreamlike state where I fought a black giant and some shadow men, followed immediately after by what looked to be the cowgirl position with a topless Citra riding me in front of her tribe. Drugs really do whacked out things to you, huh? When I eventually regained my senses I was staring down at Vaas' island fortress. Bastard would never see me coming.

Or so I thought, for once I snuck into the side building all the TV's within put his face on, laughing as he said he expected me. Did I mention the building was on fire? There was no option left but for a full out attack against his remaining men - I did have some assistance from a trapped tiger though. Once I got into the final building Vaas got the drop on me again, stabbing me with a knife - or hallucinogens, or ... a hallucinogenic knife?

That's a leopard, not a tiger!

Suddenly Vaas was everywhere, I was shooting him - knifing him, running at me from every angle. Somewhere in the mayhem the blade finally found it's mark as I shoved the knife into his gut and twisted it - finally ending the madman's life. I was kind of sad at that because I was beginning to like the guy. His sister Citra on the other hand was pleased, but she wanted his employer Hoyt to be next. Since we were in agreement there I made one last visit to my rescued buddies - telling them to depart on the boat without me as I still had unfinished business on the island. They weren't that happy with the decision but could do nothing to stop me.

Farcry 3: Deals and Devils

[Part of the Diary of a Marked One]

In an appropriately named village called "Bad Town" I met Agent Willis who gave me the scoop about Vaas' employer, a Mr. Hoyt Volker - slave trader, and drug manufacturer. In exchange for getting info about the rest of my allies Willis first sends me to torch one of Hoyt's main drug fields with a flamethrower. After that trippy experience in which for once the pirates had an excuse for not being able to shoot straight, Willis then sent me to defend a different village from a pirate attack.

Yippee ki yay?

Well, not the entire village - just his informant Rongo who not only I had to protect from execution, but all the way uphill through the village to his house to find the coded documents he stole. In the end only Rongo and I were left standing, and I left him there in his burning house and burning town to try rescue another of my allies nearby, the pot smoking party animal who was being transferred via convoy. After intercepting it with explosions and making a quick get away by boat (during which I had to shoot down a chopper among many other pursuers) I finally got him to the cave where I kept my other rescue victims.

Three out of five meant two to go. After checking back in with Willis he said he had a lead on my next buddy who was sold to some boy lover named Buck (Australian from the accent). Conveniently I found Buck at the nearby tavern and he suggested a trade - my friend for some really ancient Chinese dagger which he claimed is on a boat somewhere. Since I had no option to... I dunno, torture him, or follow him, or do anything remotely intelligent I accepted the deal and headed down to the beach where I saw the medium sized cruiser just off shore. Good thing there was a jet ski nearby because I'd be damned if I had to swim through the sharks to get there.