Massive Far Cry 2 Preview Feature and Developer Interview

A Map Editor To Destroy All Map Editors

It’s rather difficult to explain the Far Cry 2 map editor. How do you tell people that it is the most complex and detailed editor to ever grace consoles but at the same time is as easy as playing with a box of Lego, if not easier.

I have included the Gametrailers.com video of the editor, but trust me when I tell you that the live demonstration was a whole lot more impressive. You are able to make maps that are absolutely huge and complex as well as the ability to define a playable area for smaller multiplayer modes much like what is seen in the Battlefield games.

Basically, the tools in the game give you the freedom to create whatever you want, but handles most of the in-between work for you. Let me explain.

You start with a huge flat tile that you can manipulate as you please. Place vehicles, structures and spawn points as much as you want, but that’s the boring stuff. Adding vegetation to your map is as easy as selecting a brush tool, choosing what type of vegetation you want and brushing away as the editor automatically adds in the right density of vegetation according to real life. If you want something specific then you can plant individual objects too.

You want to make some mountains? Easy, just grab the tool and start painting it with a brush until you have the landscape looking like you want it to. The problem with that is that in other editors, the mountains have a very round and unnatural look to them. All you need to do is grab the erosion tool and paint away some more. The erosion tool procedurally erodes the mountain away, making it look realistic. If you want to create a river it is as easy as cutting a path into the ground, eroding it to your liking and then raising the maps water level.

The map editor also allows you to create your own constructions by using existing elements and rotation and placing them as you please. One of the map editor testers at Ubisoft Montreal is French and in a crazy move recreated the entire Eiffel tower as well as the area that surrounds it. The scale and details are just ridiculous and you can actually see that map at the end of the GameTrailers video below.

Due to the fact that consoles have limited memory compared to that of a PC, the developers came up with a very clever scoring system for objects and the amount of memory that they use. In the top left corner there is a bar showing the total amount of memory available for the map. Each object uses a certain amount of memory and is given a score accordingly. This is the only limitation to the editor but from what I have seen from the creations made so far, there is plenty of memory going around. A performance bar is also available, turning red to warn you that something is too complex to run at a decent framerate.

This map editor will hopefully change the way that other developers think about creation tools for their games. It’s a huge achievement for a console game and will bring hours and hours of fun to those who enjoy making their own creations.

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Far Cry 2 releases in South Africa on October 24. From what we have seen it looks like it’s going to be worth getting excited about. Now that the preview trip is over I cannot wait to get the game into my hands again. Keep a look out for our full review in these next weeks leading up to the release.

Here is the link to the Far Cry 2 developer diary videos, as promised earlier in the article.

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Last Updated: October 9, 2008