Since its release in 2008, Far Cry 2 has been called many things: “immersive,” a “rugged recreation of Africa,” coercive, pessimistic, “unusually punitive,” and an offering with “comprehensive moral unease.” ([1]) One of the things it has never been called is “simple.” The brainchild of Ubisoft Montreal, Far Cry 2 is complicated: the game is fairly unforgiving but rewards second and third play-throughs, the ending and story seem thin but it is engaging enough to make one view morally repugnant choices as ordinary, and the characters are largely interchangeable except for a select few that are more skillfully drawn than either Vaas or Pagan Min in the sequels. Taking its inspiration from Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness and set in an unnamed African country that is quickly spiraling into bloody chaos, the game also has a complex relationship with Africa. Only rarely does the more troublesome aspect of imperialism ([2]) or cultural hegemony enter into the discussion. In fact, to my knowledge the only close analysis of Far Cry 2 from a postcolonial viewpoint has been undertaken by Jorge Albor (2010) in the pages of this journal’s sister publication. Concluding that the game “dismantles popular notions of foreign actors in conflict zones...while simultaneously bolstering a contentious political ideology” that can best be described as “a doomed Africa, collapsing under incessant violence,” Albor focuses on the political depiction of Africa (2010, pp. 206, 205).
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