JUST CAUSE 3

Just Cause 3 is a game about pulling insane, death-defying stunts while destroying everything in sight with spectacular fireball explosions. The problem is, both the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 versions fail when Rico Rodriguez’s over-the-top action needs them the most.

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After a few hours of that, I found myself afraid of another stint in that load-screen penalty box. I began playing conservatively, avoiding crazy stunts that require precise timing or triggering massive explosions in the heat of battle. And when you’re playing conservatively, Just Cause 3 gets boring and frustrating quickly. The task of liberating dozens of towns and capturing military bases by blowing up anything with red on it, knocking over statues, and taking over fortified police stations is pretty repetitive even when it’s at its best, and if you’re not able to exercise your creativity in this sandbox by doing crazy moves, like using your grapple to fling explosive barrels at enemies or crash helicopters into things to keep it interesting, it’s a pretty dull third-person shooter. Enemies this dumb aren’t much fun to fight in conventional ways.

Six years after the events of Just Cause 2, Rico Rodriguez returns to his homeland of Medici, a fictional Mediterranean island under the brutal control of dictator General Sebastiano Di Ravello, who has set his eyes on world domination. Wanting to stop him, Rico goes on a journey to destroy his evil plans.

When he arrives at Medici, he meets up with his childhood friend Mario Frigo and scientist Dimah al-Masri, who are now serving in the rebellion to overthrow Di Ravello. They proceed to liberate Manaea, Medici’s former capital, and destroy the Vis Electra power plant, which powers a military base. Furious on the rebellion’s success, Di Ravello orders his soldiers to raze the town of Costa del Porto. With Rico’s help, the rebellion turn the tide on the military. They also learn that Di Ravello plans to use Bavarium, an explosive and magnetic mineral, as a means to conquer the world.

Dimah requests Rico to retrieve a Bavarium scanner, only to find out he’s delivering it to Tom Sheldon, Rico’s Agency coordinator. Angered, because he knows of the Agency’s operations in toppling dictatorships, he destroys the scanner before giving it to Tom. Rico and Mario later escort Zeno, a scientist defecting from Di Ravello. Di Ravello’s forces launch a Bavarium missile aimed at a town. Rico prevents the damage by changing its course so that it destroys a military base instead. With the successes of recent operations, Mario steals some casks of wine from Di Ravello’s stash and has Rico drive it to the rebels for celebration.

Some time later, Tom informs Rico that the Di Ravello military are sending frigates after Mario and Dimah, who are out in the sea. He rescues them and they engage in a firefight with Di Ravello’s forces. Rico meets Annika and Teo, two foreign smugglers also fighting against Di Ravello. In the firefight Mario is severely injured, and Annika offers to aid him if Rico is able to help her with favours.

The smugglers ask Rico to steal the Imperator tank, an armoured vehicle with a Bavarium shield. Rico and the smugglers later hit a Bavarium refinery, as well as trying out an electromagnetic pulse device reverse-engineered from the Imperator tank. Rico becomes wary of elements within the rebellion who acts as a mole to Di Ravello, causing him to be able to grasp their every movement. During this time Mario recovers due to the smugglers’ treatment. Di Ravello’s soldiers attack the rebels’ hideout. The rebels repel them and after that, destroy another power plant.

Rico escorts Rosa Manuela, a Medician politician, as she returns to Medici. Rosa recognises Zeno as Di Ravello’s scientist and Rico finds out that Zeno is the mole. Rico stops a train carrying Bavarium out of the country, and help the smugglers free their comrades imprisoned by Di Ravello. Rico, Dimah and Tom stop another transport plane carrying a Bavarium bomb. The military attacks the rebels again, as a ruse to free Zeno. Rico confronts Zeno and destroys his helicopter.

The rebels engage in a final battle with the military, as well as destruction of Di Ravello’s central command. Dimah cannot disable the missiles aimed at the base, so she pushes Rico away as the missiles hit the control tower she is in, killing her. The rebels learn later that Di Ravello has escaped in an advanced helicopter using the same Bavarium shield as the Imperator. Rico confronts him at a volcano island, destroying the helicopter Di Ravello is piloting. The player, as Rico, can choose to execute Di Ravello, or wait until he commits suicide by falling into the lava. After Di Ravello’s death, it is implied that Rosa becomes president of Medici.

At it best Just Cause 3 could be better.It’s a damn shame so many performance problems and punishing load times keep cropping up.Just Cause 3‘s over-the-top action and physics-based mayhem has me laughing out loud on the regular.But for game that’s so heavily dependent on action to run this poorly is no laughing matter.Offers action mayhem and not much of a story.