Far Cry 4 - Post Mortem - DOES contain SPOILERS

 
What happens when you get a bunch of millennial writers and directors together and tell them to make a story "LIKE" this other story.  THEY - JUST - DON'T - GET - IT.     

I sat there wondering why I was bored in Far Cry 4.  It seemed to defy my perception.  The game, mechanically, had all the aspects I liked.  

After getting you to do its dishes all game.  Padding that shit out with volumes of monotonous side quests (much like the Assassin's Creed series), Amita and Sabal turn into Kony and Isis Respectively.

Back in Far Cry 3, Dennis talks to you like a human being.   He tells you about Vaas.  He guides you and supports you.  You get a sense of who this person is past what they want from you.  Hell...he even gets drunk and tells you about an injustice he suffered as an American immigrant.  So when he tries to stab you at the end after you refusing to kill your friends...it comes as a surprise with the realization you didn't get the whole picture on him.  In FC4, you really don't know much of anything about Amita and Sabal and any information they give just seems like an awkward attempt to manipulate you.  Despite fighting all their battles for them, you never have enough 'pull' to tell them both to grow the fuck up and stop arguing.  It seems logical that if 'Your father' was leader of 'The Golden Path'...and these guys can't stop fighting...that you should assume leadership with both of them as advisers.  Instead, more often that not, you are relegated to being that stupid sycophant from GTA3 that just does anything anyone tells him to.  INCLUDING assassinating the other leader!!! 
 
After King Min tells you the country that you have been tearing up is yours since he is giving you the entire place - Amita and Sabal are just assholes who use people to get their way - that all the killing you have been doing has been absolutely pointless - any remnant of investment that you may have accrued in this game is completely out the window.  Let's face it;  Investment in what happens in this game is inversely related to how much bullets people seem to have.  A game where if there is a civilian outside, it is being attacked by soldiers, eagles, dogs, bears...usually all of those in a row.  This was funny with faceless scientists in Hazmat suits back in FC3 Blood Dragon... because that was the theme...in this game it's just fucking stupid.  After a while you just become jaded to the screams of Townsfolk. 

You are introduced to people like "Go see Longinus...he is friend to the Golden Path".  He is a brain damaged former warlord who thinks he is a preacher.  Hurk shows up as a soulless joke factory complete with a southern drawl to make him look even more like a cartoon character.  There is Rabi who is a wise cracking DJ...and also a joke factory.  Mr. Schifon a gay clothes designer (good thing they're not using stereotypes) who acts as you would expect.  It's pretty sad when the best interpersonal connection you have in the whole game is with a couple of drugged out nesters squatting in your ancestral home.  They're a couple of joke factories as well but at least they show some vulnerability.   The person who did the voice for Noore was the same person who did the voice for Liza Snow back in FC3.  Mylène Dinh-Robic.   The speed at which her emotions seem to superficially change makes her look like a princess that changes her emotions to suit her needs from another person but the background is one of a long-term victim of emotional extortion.  There needed to be a whole lot more thought put into the realization of this character by the director.  None of these characters really establishes a connection with you and it all looks like it was put together by committee. 

I do not blame the voice actors.  Some of those guys are the best of the best.

  Characterization is fine with Amita (Janina Gavankar) and Sabal (Naveen Andrews).  Yet you don't see much in the way of content from them past "Do it my way" and "You're an idiot for not doing it my way".   My idiot light went off with Amita when she told me to "Destroy the temple and melt down the relics".   This is a great actress using great characterization and saying the dumbest shit written by a hack writer.
 
Pagan (Troy Baker) you might recall from Bioshock: Infinite where he played the protagonist: Booker DeWitt (Yeah...it shocked the shit out of me too!!!).  He owned it.
 
Reggie and Yogie were also fun and not completely cartoon-like.
 
Of note...The guy who played Keith Brody in FC3 is the main protagonist in FC4 (James A. Woods).  So that's a tasty bit of trivia.   
 
Mechanically, this game has all the best toys...but the story, (some) characterization and emotional involvement in this game is so counterproductive to that fun that it is almost like having your grandmother look over your shoulder saying 'Buzzkill' shit like: "You probably killed babies with that attack.  Do you like killing babies?" and "You know that guy you killed has a mother who loved him don't you?".
 
FC3 Had a point where you started to realize that the people you had been working with the whole time may not be who you thought they were.  There was an arc that got steeper toward the end.  FC4 was, to contrast, written and directed by far too many idiot millennials that dug around in the FC3 graveyard finding parts to attach to the soulless Frankenstein entitled 'The Story and Characterization of Far Cry 4'.  All 10 (writers and directors) have enough experience to add up to a single competent professional of either category.  But 10 stooges aren't better than 3...and it shows.
 
There are points when you should be shouting "BOOYAH!" as you right the wrongs and put evil assholes in the ground...just about then, the game's 'Grandma' looks over your shoulder and says "You realize you have just killed half the country by choosing that leader, don't you?"  (and choosing the other leader is no better).
 
Fuck it.  I'm subtracting a point from the game.  In the final analysis...the game is how much fun you actually had.  This game hands you a 'Fun' sandwich with all the trimmings and puts a big fat turd on it.  Don't grandma my BOOYAH! idiot Millennial creative staff.  Digging up FC3 and trying to copy it tells me you ARE NOT QUALIFIED.

 
7/10