Release Date: 04/12/2018
Played On: PS4
Available On: PS4 / Win / XBO
Time Played: 31h 59m
Progress: Completed
Developer: Avalanche Studios
Publisher: Square Enix
Sometimes when I sit down to write these blog posts, I wonder to myself what kind of point I might want to make about the game in question. Often I have something I want to say, so I just ramble on until I think I've said it, but then there are those special cases where I don't really feel like I have a lot to say, but I still want to ramble on a bit because I had such a good time after all.
Just Cause 4 is unsurprisingly the fourth game in the Just Cause series, which is one of those series that simply iterates from one game to the next. Although I have yet to play the first game in the series, so my knowledge is currently only filled with the three that came after it. Suffice to say that the differences between Just Cause 2, 3, and 4 can probably be summed up on a single napkin found on the floor of dirty tropical bar by the beach.
It's hard to talk about Just Cause games and conjure up any kind of narrative cohesion that makes any kind of sense, even though there are stories that exist in every title. I can't for the life of me remember what the story was about in Just Cause 4, other than to say that you're once again tasked with defeating all the bad guys in a fictional location full of things to blow up. Once again we play as the Scorpion, who is a mercenary specialising in toppling governments and fuelling revolutions to depose dictators.
Actually, that kind of thing seems like it would be ripe for some excellent lore and a story that could get super political and deep with double takes and espionage type intrigue. Not in Just Cause though, as these games are merely a vehicle for living out your wildest action film fantasies in an open world full of toys that facilitate such chaos. The story is there as a way to provide context, but I doubt there are many hardcore fans of the franchise who are diving deep into the lore of each and every location and regime presented in the series.
Instead, the point is that you are a one man action superstar and everything needs to be blown up for the good of the people. That's basically the extent of everything that can be done in Just Cause 4, so get used to the fact that you'll never find any real direction of motivation for any of it. If you don't like roaming around an open world blowing stuff up and going out of your way to see how creatively you can make chaos happen, this might not be for you.
Interestingly enough, I'm not really that kind of gamer anyway, so perhaps that's an unfair thing to say. After all, when I play an open world game like Grand Theft Auto V, I relish the story and try to stick to the campaign as much as possible until it's done. On the other hand, I have friends who only want to get cut loose from any restrictions and go wreak havoc unfettered in the world they're presented with.
I suppose the difference between Just Cause games and the GTA series, is that the latter actually has some pretty memorable and excellent stories. At the end of the day Just Cause is not a series that worries about story all that much, so it's safe to say that they're leaning much further into the sandbox style of gameplay than something like GTA. With that in mind, and if you can forgive the bad writing and terrible characters that make up what little story there is, you can have a lot of fun in Just Cause 4, as everything is built with fun and chaos in mind.
The map is broken up into towns and sections that are each controlled by different bad-guy influences and camps. It's the same kind of setup that we've seen in Far Cry games and other similar situations like Ghost Recon: Wildlands. Essentially your job is to "liberate" each area by destroying government propaganda and taking out enemy camps full of soldiers who are up to no good. The whole thing feel very much like a bad 70s Bond film where you're sent to a tropical paradise to depose the evil dictator. It's fun.
It's fun because every moment that you're playing Just Cause 4, you're doing something cool. Whether it's flying around with your parachute or wingsuit, or grappling around enemy bases, blowing stuff up. In fact, much like Just Cause 2 and 3, movement is a large part of what makes this game fun and it really feels like the world is built and carefully crafted to enhance all the ways in which you can get around.
If you've ever watched any Just Cause gameplay, you'll have seen the Scorpion grappling to surfaces and being launched in every direction possible. Physics are a bit of a suggestion here, rather than a constant set of rules and forces. After all, one of the safest ways to land after falling from a great height, is to grapple yourself directly to the ground below and reel yourself in at great speed.
Then there are all the interesting ways that you can mess with the bad guys and their "stuff" on the island. The grappling hook also acts as a tether, which has the ability to tie multiple items together. A classic of the series is to tether an unsuspecting bad guy to a large gas canister. Followed by shooting the canister just enough that it takes off into the sky with bad guy in tow, before exploding spectacularly for all to see.
The entire world is made up of objects and vehicles that have been specifically placed to facilitate this kind of creative chaos. It's what makes attacking your hundredth enemy base interesting, as they might have a fresh setup that can be tackled in a whole new way. It's what ends up making most of the ground vehicles relatively useless, as you stop treating the open world like GTA where you steal a car to get where you're going, and instead use the constant traffic as grapple points to fling yourself great distances.
It's all par for the course when it comes to Just Cause games and all of this is merely an iteration on everything that already existed in Just Cause 2. In this way, a game like Just Cause 4 is kind of a hard sell, as you could probably have just as much fun with an older tile that's no doubt cheaper to pick up and try. The upside is that if you enjoy the unique kind of sandbox action that Just Cause provides, you'll be right at home in Just Cause 4.
I said at the top that I don't have a lot to say about this game, so let's just say that Just Cause 4's greatest achievement is that it's more of what you want from a Just Cause game. At the same time, it's greatest flaw is that it's nothing more than more Just Cause. I'd like to see Just Cause 5 bring in some meaningful plot line or context, but at the end of the day I think I'll be happy with a big map full of creative ways to explode things. It's a great way to escape to a tropical paradise every now and then.