Like Smiffy mentioned, it feels like a reskin of FC3, at least it did initially. Granted the structure's nigh on identical, but the side missions are far more interesting, the sandbox encourages more exploring, something I found a tad tedious in 3. The story, inasmuch as I've completed, is better written with more fleshed out characters and doesn't take itself as seriously as in the previous. I liked the conversation you have with the radio host about bidets. :)

While some weapons pique the interest, a lot of them are a bit meh, but maybe that's a lack of creativity on my part, going for my default loadout of a sniper rifle, shotgun, automatic rifle and/or bow. I do like the grenade launcher and have used that in chasing down the 3 truck convoys, slinging it one handed as a side arm from a quad bike.

Is it me or do the vehicles handle a bit more wildly when only steering with one hand while wheelding a weapon with the other?

The geography of the world map was obviously lazy, though it's always going to have a waist if they want to prevent players from opening up the whole map too soon. I agree about the side missions, some of which are self-contained campaigns in themselves.  And yes, the characterisation is stronger (especially Pagan Min, who I regard as one of the great fictional media baddies of recent years).

I don't know Nepal, which I think Kyrat must loosely be based on, but I know Himalayan Pakistan well (I grew up there), and they've got the geography, architecture and atmosphere spot-on (at least in the rare moments when the shit isn't hitting the Punka).

My typical loadout's not a million miles from yours: silenced sniper rifle, LMG with expanded clip, grenade launcher & bow. Shotgun replacing the bow when I know there's going to be a shedload of close combat as in, for instance, a skirmish in a large building.

I hadn't noticed the vehicle handling thing, which would obviously make sense; but then, my in-game driving's lousy at the best of times.

What age did you leave Pakistan and did you come to England from there or go elsewhere first? Having the Himalaya on your doorstep must have pretty damned awesome.

FC3 constantly nags you to carry on the missions with a tedious phone call from your handler each time you launch it, until you have 'finished' the game [missions]. FC4 doesn't, and I'm at a loss how to resume, though I've been engrossed in side missions to this point. I don't consider this bad, it's just a radical departure in focus.

I'm finding I can easily make >50% of my enemy kills with the bow, by methodically sneaking around the periphery of the action. The fire arrows make taking out heavies very easy (haven't tried the explosive ones yet except on rhinos, where they had no discernible effect) My loadout is generally all suppressed/silent (sniper rifle, "warrior" assault rifle, "stinger" smg + bow). I have used the "D2" (double-barrel sawed off shotgun) and "cannon" (magnum revolver with optical sight) sidearms, they can be effective in CQB, though the "stinger" surpasses both and is often undetected, unlike the two loud bangers. I've also used the suppressed m4 battle rifle, it is much more accurate than the assault rifle though of course less useful in panic situations.

There's considerable variety in the side missions and most are easy enough to complete two or three during an hour session. I suppose that means they aren't very challenging.

There are ample surprise challenges though, ranging from wandering wildlife to enemy counter-attacks on captured outposts, which can be a real challenge with the wrong loadout (must remember to make better use of exploding & fire arrows, and replenish body armour).

Steering vehicles is dicey on a good day.

Scenery is still awesome. Now I've done all the outposts and bell towers in the first part, I'm itching to move on to the second (haven't essayed any forts as yet).

Isn't the current campaign mission marked on the map? With a letter in the symbol? Or am I confusing FC4 and Skyrim, which is perfectly possible.

I never much bothered with explosive arrows, but fire arrows are very handy.

Graphitone: my folks did a sort of early Voluntary Service in Pakistan, firstly in the mid-late 60s up in the garrison town of Murree (about 30 miles from where the US finally caught up with bin Laden), and then two years later in Lahore.  This is where we lived.

I reviewed a walk-through, apparently I've done more than I realized, because there's not a whole lot of difference from outpost captures and side-missions (go to a place, kill everything in sight, rinse, repeat).

I'm up to the first Longinus mission (I think). I keep seeing an "L" in the heads-up display (among arrows pointing every which way), so I reckon I should go towards it (?)

They're fun missions, with weapon rewards.

I did the second Sabal mission last night, along with my first Yogi & Reggi mission, the one where they drug you and send you into an arena to do battle unarmed against assorted hordes of dangerous animals and well-armed enemies (charming).

The two Sabal missions are tightly-scripted, race against the clock affairs, so share what I consider a deep flaw in FC3 main mission design. The second one involved racing back and forth across a temple complex to shoot mostly undefended bomb-planters in the back (often with seconds to spare), or simply run up and do a knife takedown. The enemy attackers were not at all coordinated in support of the bomb-planters, but arrived in waves, ran about, and directed fire at me opportunistically, mostly missing (though I did use several health shots). If just two or three planted themselves behind cover and laid down a raking fire, they could have had a perfect kill zone and prevented me from criss-crossing the complex to attack their bombers.

FC3 showed a progression in enemy tactical sophistication, and I'm hoping that will be the case with 4.

I've just done the temple defense mission, I took a slightly different tack. I mined the two road entrances then loaded up on grenades for the launcher and had a huge amount of fun lobbing explosives at trucks and people. I even took out the helicopter when it arrived with two grenades to the engines. Pretty much everything set on fire and the game lets you fire grenades at the people setting the bombs next to the sculptures you're defending. I guess friendly grenade splash damage is turned off... :J

I brought the RPG and took out a few trucks with it. I shot it at the helicopter but it had no effect (maybe I missed, I was too busy shooting the guys who got off it)

I did my first Longinus mission last night, the one where you to the himalayas and hunt for a) oxygen to keep you alive and b) shipment(s) of armaments which turned out to be a small box of large, uncut diamonds for that crazy lying bastard Longinus.

I did that one the other day - I liked the snow buggy-skidoo vehicles. I skinned some of the snow leopards that attacked as the crafting menu showed I needed some of their pelts I could then use for a holster upgrade - but it didn't save them in my inventory. I'm assuming at some point you're able to return to the mountains as that's the only place I've seen the snow leopards...

I used the snowmobile until I nearly went over a cliff. I didn't pause to skin any animals for fear of running out of oxygen. It seems there are three different kinds of leopards (not counting exotic) used in crafting, only one of which is in abundance. I'm hoping the others live on the other side. It turns out the fork isn't really a fork, because my next golden path mission I had to choose again between Amita and Sabal, on whether to defend or burn an opium farm (I went with the former).

I did careen over a precipice in the snow buggy, it was a long way down!

On this play through I'm going to keep choosing the Amita missions. I wonder if there's a route the game elects for you depending on the majority of choices you make, a bit like the star wars games where the more dark side powers you take on the more likely you are to become a sith at the end...

You misspelled "shit". Yeah, the mission structure in FC4 seems pretty loose compared to FC3. I may keep switching sides to see what happens. Not a huge difference between defending a base and defending an opium farm, except sprinklers.

Had my first decent firefight when I attacked a fort surrounded by "mine fields" (actually I encountered only three or four actual mines). I meant to just check it out, but found a way in, got up on a roof and by judicious use of arrows, fire arrows, meat bait and grenades managed to clear out a lot of the defenders before they spotted me and set off the alarm. Then I ran up into another building, did a heavy takedown and used his LMG to take down a couple of choppers. But choppers kept coming, I ran out of ammo and they got me in the end. Best combat I've seen in FC4 though.

The best use of mines is late-ish in the game, where you have to rescue a prisoner held captive in the middle of a series of mined paddy fields, with very little cover.

I really enjoyed the forts. You're going about it the right way: do as much damage as you can by stealth and avoid the choppers completely if possible, because they are bastards. If you do trip them, get to a securable building and snipe at them with the grenade launcher or a rocket launcher.  When secured, the forts often (if not always?) have a buzzer, so they're great bases from which to launch missions.

That sounds very similar to a FC3 mission, rescue prisoner from mine field. I 'm going back at the fortress, pondering whether to go in with the RPG for the choppers, or focus on killing the alarms instead.

Maybe I'm conflating the two. I haev teh olds.

Aye, you're right. That was in 3. You had to snipe the kidnappers on the edge of the mine field, then lead the prisoner through the mines and protect a village on the other side. I'm not saying there's not an analogous one in 4 though.

The forts sound fun, haven't tried one yet, but it sounds as though a rocket launcher will be an asset. That'll be the next purchase.