Far Cry 5 steers franchise into political fray

Yesterday’s official reveal from Ubisoft for their upcoming instalment in the Far Cry franchise came with much excitement and mystery surrounding the game’s location and most importantly, the narrative.

When the first few images that were released some time ago, it did, however, come with it’s few hints into what to expect of the game.

The symbology and imagery behind Far Cry

As mentioned in the previous article, the box cover image was a reiteration of Leonardo da Vinci’s The Last Supper which led many of us to speculate that there will be an underlying theme of a religious cult running or working against players with the narrative (and this was confirmed too).
A man pictured with the word “sinner” carved into his back (a la Ingloriuos Bastards) further confirms this.

Secondly, weapons are seen at the table which further tells us that a form of war will take place within the game’s narrative and considering that this takes place in a small (fictional) town in Montana, we might blow up the town to smithereens…and the fact that there’s a dogfight evident in the above picture, we might get to control an aircraft.
Sounds like my kind of day…

Quaint town, egomaniac cult leader. What could possibly go wrong?

This cult as mentioned, according to Ubisoft’s blog, is led by Joseph “The Father” Seed, who leads a group of fanatics that have influence over Hope County, Montana. However, upon on your arrival at Eden’s Gate, Seed has deployed fanatics at the Gate and you assist the town’s Deputy Sheriff. Seed hands himself over, but we know this is a video game after all, so these lunatics coming riding to town like bats out of Hell to save their leader and “kidnap” you which, of course, you make an ventual escape. Seed and his followers aggressively acquire land by terrorising the community together with an armed takeover of the town, thus ingredients for a great war (is there such a thing as a great war?).

Previous Far Cry titles have had a cultural and racial undertones that gave the franchise its edge, but this is new grounds for Ubisoft to be treading on. And judging by the addition of a variation of the American flag (the stars are rumoured to have been replaced by the cross used in Scientology), it could potentiality delve into the political arena, is quite a risky move on Ubisoft.

However, this could seemingly work if the plot was for us, the players, to go to war with an egomaniac leader and his organisation (sounds familiar), then this could be the selling point that could lead to its success (or demise if you’re against political-themed games).

With the game scheduled for release on February 27, 2018, the game will fall under the next fiscal year (FY17/18) which could give Ubisoft that final push and considering how Square Enix ended this current fiscal year (FY16/17), it could work in their favour.

All this momentum will continue to build where Far Cry 5 will be at E3, maybe we will find out more behind this darkly, grizzly world of Montana.