It is laborious to overstate how good the unique Far Cry was. And influential, too: It is the sport that put developer Crytek on the map and spawned one among Ubisoft’s largest and best-known collection. However it’s additionally 19 years outdated, a veritable eon in videogame phrases, and that passage of time can positively be seen and felt: It is lengthy overdue for a glow-up.
Unexpectedly, it might truly get one sooner or later within the overly-distant future because of a current leak of the unique Far Cry supply code, which appeared “out of nowhere” on the Web Archive.
The leak is for model 1.34 of the sport and purports to be full, though one reviewer stated it is not truly full, “however shut.”
“From my educated guess, that is some supply tree leak for the PC model of the sport so as to add assist for the Ubisoft recreation launcher/DRM,” MobCat wrote. “It does include some exes however no Xbox code and no recreation belongings.” It additionally apparently does not compile with out quite a few errors, though a special reviewer claimed that it compiles “with [a] few modifications in Visible Studio .NET 2003.”
It is not clear precisely the place the code got here from or why somebody would all of a sudden drop the supply for a recreation that is been kicking round for 20 years. No person has taken credit score for the leak at this level, and it is the primary and solely file to be uploaded by Web Archive consumer Llaetha.ro. Members of the Far Cry 1 Group Discord speculated (with unmistakable confidence) {that a} former Crytek worker with a specific curiosity within the recreation shared it with a couple of associates “for learning,” with the intention of creating it public later—however one among them jumped the gun and launched it to the general public first.
What followers are clearly extra focused on at this level is what they’re going to be capable to do with the supply code now that it is of their palms. Far Cry stays accessible for buy (and in reality it is on sale within the Steam Summer time Sale for a whopping $3) however its age is inconceivable to miss: “The stealth feels tremendous janky, automobiles can really feel tremendous janky,” Steam consumer sticky wrote, and the entire thing “wants some TLC within the type of an enormous QoL rework mod” so it does not really feel so—you guessed it—janky.
That is the place the supply code might come into play. Far Cry mods are already accessible because of the long-ago launch of the SDK and stage editor, however the availability of the supply code opens the door to way more in depth reworks as a result of it permits customers to make adjustments and fixes to the sport engine itself.
The prospect of an RTX-capable Far Cry with all of the tough, early-aughts edges smoothed down has the Far Cry modding group excited, however members are additionally treading very cautiously, conscious that Ubisoft might drop the hammer on the entire course of at any time. “We don’t have permission from Ubisoft to make use of [the] leaked supply code,” one Discord consumer wrote. “However there may be [the] Driver franchise that was reverse [engineered] and had many mods and even [updates].” In addition they famous that in some circumstances, modders have been given permission to make use of a recreation’s supply code for non-commercial functions—and that in others, reminiscent of with Grand Theft Auto 3 and Vice Metropolis, publishers can take a really laborious line, together with authorized motion, towards any type of use.
Ubisoft hasn’t but commented on the leak, or given any indication as to the way it will reply to makes an attempt to utilize the supply code. One factor that would work towards keen modders is that the Far Cry collection stays very lively: A rumor in January claimed that Ubisoft presently has two separate Far Cry video games in improvement, a mainline singleplayer shooter—the inevitable Far Cry 7—and a multiplayer spinoff, and it might not be too anticipating a fan mission to steal its thunder.
No matter all that, the prevailing angle among the many Far Cry group for now appears to be very cautiously hopeful. “This recreation simply wants new breath,” one Discord consumer stated. “And we might be very grateful to Ubisoft if they provide modders a inexperienced gentle.”
I’ve reached out to Ubisoft for remark and can replace if I obtain a reply. Oh, and in case you’d forgotten, Uwe Boll as soon as made a Far Cry film. By some means, Anthony Bourdain is in it.
