Far Cry 5: Lost on Mars will pit you against arachnids and their queens while you collect seven new achievements. Back in the day, Ubisoft used to release quirky Far Cry spin-offs like Blood Dragon or Primal as standalone games. This time however, the studio is trying them out as DLC packs for Far Cry 5. After last month’s Vietnam DLC, we’ll be moving ahead with a sci-fi visit to Mars. And if you want to know what to expect Ubisoft has unveiled the official achievement list (via True Achievements). You can see the list below in full, complete with each achievement’s Gamerscore. Welcome to Mars – Reboot the Terminal on top of the Control Center Antenna. 20 Bug Squasher – Perform 10 takedowns on Arachnids using the Power Glove. 20 Mars Second Amendment – Buy 12 weapons. 40 Slimy Death – Hit 10 Arachnids with Crabmones. 20 Nick’s Story – Complete the game (Host Only). 50 The Queen is Dead! – Kill all the Queens (Host Only). 50 Martian Journal – Collect all of Larry’s notes (Host Only). 100 While the Mars DLC release date isn’t confirmed, this reveal likely means it will arrive within a week. Ubisoft also updated the core game with a photo mode in a recent update. Far Cry 5 is available now for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.<doc-sep>Screenshot : Ubisoft ( Far Cry 5 ) The only part of my two-and-a-half-hour jaunt through Far Cry 5’s new Hours of Darkness DLC that really stuck out to me was when a Vietnamese woman taunted me over loudspeakers telling me the jungle was not my friend and would swallow me up whole. Advertisement I was supposed to be destroying the propaganda machines playing her recordings, but in the end couldn’t bring myself to do it. Better to leave that one line on my to-do list incomplete, I thought, than snuff out the only bit of flair throughout an otherwise very forgettable mini-expansion. Hours of Darkness is the first of three pieces of DLC currently planned for Far Cry 5, and I can only pray it’s not sign of what’s to come. I was skeptical when it was revealed, even more so when the teaser trailer showed a North Vietnamese fighter beating a captured soldier during an interrogation. I was worried it would approach the Vietnam War with all the care and precision of an indiscriminate fire-bombing campaign. I had no idea it would actually turn out to just be brutally boring. Far Cry 5's foggy Vietnam can feel stifling but especially at night it can also look beautiful. Screenshot : Ubisoft ( Far Cry 5 ) Hours of Darkness is constructed like a microcosm of the main game, but completely separate from it. Your helicopter has crashed and the survivors have all been captured. Being the first to escape, it’s your job to rescue them and get to an extraction point on the other side of an open-world area slightly smaller than one of the individual three regions from the main game. Unfortunately, and in just about every other way as well, Hours of Darkness feels like a scaled down version of Far Cry 5 that doesn’t fully commit to introducing any new elements.. There’s no real story, which in some ways makes it feel more like a level designed using the game’s map editor and less of a fleshed-out idea. A few notes strewn about the world talk about anti-aircraft gun locations and troop movements, but there’s nothing that gives the fields, jungles, and rivers of Vietnam much of an identity. It lacks even the world-building that someone might be able to superficially glean from watching a montage of Vietnam War film trailers, instead presenting a sort of impersonal view from nowhere that’s pretty but lifeless. Hours of Darkness’s narrative setup doesn’t extend much beyond a short, opening cinematic told in comic book form. Screenshot : Ubisoft ( Far Cry 5 ) Advertisement Far Cry 5 had a sprawling map full of spontaneous-seeming events that would cascade into new story missions and sidequests, but few specific moments that felt compelling or memorable. Despite being smaller and structured more linearly, Hours of Darkness is no different. But where Far Cry 5 at least had named characters asking you to rescue their beloved truck or mountain lion, the game’s first DLC is stuffed only with more tedious chores like destroying artillery cannons or ransacking a handful of enemy outposts. Locating and freeing your buddies ends up not feeling that dramatic either. Despite them having memorable names like Joker and Moses, I could barely tell them apart while they incessantly yelled at me to lay down cover fire while they were reloading. There are also a few allied South Vietnamese POWs to set free and lighters to collect from fallen American soldiers, but no real payoff to completing any of this stuff either. How full the completion meter is by the time you finish the DLC only changes the final photograph you and your squadmates take after getting evacuated. Kill more high-value targets and the gang will get a few extra medals. What that has to do with one of the most disastrous and tragic wars in U.S. history, or the fictional veterans of that war who you encounter in Far Cry 5, is never made clear. Advertisement “Hours of Darkness isn’t all bad.” Hours of Darkness isn’t all bad. Its lush green landscape is eternally shrouded in fog, creating an interesting feeling of anxiety and confusion. It’s easy to get turned around in the small map your exploring, and enemies are constantly coming out of nowhere, forcing you to stay off main roads and spend a lot of time crouching behind bushes. Advertisement Whereas stealth mostly took a backseat in Far Cry 5, Hours of Darkness encourages you to take things more slowly by rewarding you with perks for completing silent takedowns that increase your speed and awareness of other enemies. When you’re discovered, these perks reset and need to be built back up again with more silent takedowns. It creates a fun rhythm that helps break up the usual monotony of shooting enemies as they rush you two or three at a time after triggering an alarm. Also there’s no barrage of armored convoys and cultist helicopters perpetually blowing your cover, giving you more control over when to escalate encounters. The horror of the war is ever present but never seems to be used for more than set decoration. Screenshot : Ubisoft ( Far Cry 5 ) Advertisement Your comrades can also die permanently if you don’t revive them when they’re downed. In classic Far Cry fashion, this can also mean that while driving your truck at 50 miles an hour down a dirt road, one of them might accidentally bite the dust after the game’s complex physics glitch out and send them flying into the hills, as happened to me. For the most part, the threat of permadeath forces you to be more thoughtful about how to engage with large groups of enemies. And then there’s Survivor, an extra difficulty mode that limits your health and inventory and also restricts you from calling occasional air strikes to take out heavily-guarded enemy positions. Higher difficulty options are something the main game has needed since launch, and seeing them in action in Hours of Darkness is proof of why. Freedom is only meaningful when it’s accentuated with occasional limits, and when played with higher stakes and more focused strategies, taking down an outpost in Hours of Darkness feels in many ways more rewarding than doing so in the main game. Advertisement At the same time, the unpredictable sandbox elements that give the main game a sense of spontaneity feel nonexistent in Hours of Darkness. But there’s no interesting tale of brotherhood, international politics, and human psychology to take its place. The DLC is ostensibly about Wendell Redler, a character responsible for stashing weapon caches all around Far Cry 5’s Hope Valley and who asks you to retrieve lighters from his dead war buddies before members of the game’s religious cult do. In practice though, Hours of Darkness just a streamlined simulation of the main game’s combat loop with little to offer anyone who already played it. While it comes free with the game’s $30 season pass, so does Far Cry 3: Classic Edition—which, for all its faults, remains a much more interesting and vibrant jungle to return to.<doc-sep>Far Cry 5’s Title Update 8 introduces Photo Mode, new items in Arcade Editor, and more. Ubisoft has released the patch notes for Far Cry 5’s Title Update 8, and a photo mode is coming to the Solo gameplay modes, while the Arcade Editor is getting a bunch of new items. The update will drop tomorrow, July 5, after maintenance. The patch adds assets from the Vietnam-based Hours of Darkness DLC, and static assets and weapons from the upcoming Lost on Mars DLC to the Arcade Editor. Lost on Mars is set to drop at some point this month, but Ubisoft has yet to announce the release date. Dataminers have discovered some potential details on the content, that suggests a flame thrower and Power Glove might be making their way into the game. Meanwhile players can start snapping away to their heart’s content tomorrow. The new additions coming in the Title Update 8 are listed below. You can find the full list of patch notes right here.<doc-sep>
Lost on Mars will be the second DLC for Far Cry 5, following Hours of Darkness, which released last month. Ubisoft has stated that the DLC will launch sometime in July. However, the studio has yet to reveal an exact release date. The studio certainly seems to be keeping to that release window, as they have now revealed the achievement list for the upcoming DLC. The Lost on Mars achievement list details seven new achievements for Far Cry 5, totaling 300 Gamerscore. Unlike the Hours of Darkness DLC, none of the Lost on Mars achievements appear to require more than a single play-through. Whether that means Lost on Mars is bigger than Hours of Darkness is unknown; some gamers did complain that the last DLC could be completed very quickly. When it comes to release date; Ubisoft announced the release date of Hours of Darkness just under two weeks beforehand. As such, it wouldn’t be surprising at all to see a teaser trailer for Lost on Mars release sometime in the next couple of weeks. For now, players can look through the list of achievements and speculate as to what the sci-fi expansion will be like. The list does confirm the inclusion of a “Power Glove” weapon, for one. There’s only one collectible achievement; Martian Journal. Weapons and static assets will be added to Far Cry 5’s Arcade Editor as part of Title Update 8 tomorrow (July 5th). As such, excited players can get their first look at the new sci-fi armory ahead of schedule. The Lost on Mars Achievement List Welcome to Mars (20 Gamerscore) Reboot the Terminal on top of the Control Center Antenna. Bug Squasher (20 Gamerscore) Perform 10 takedowns on Arachnids using the Power Glove. Mars Second Amendment (40 Gamerscore) Buy 12 weapons. Slimy Death (20 Gamerscore) Hit 10 Arachnids with Crabmones. Nick’s Story (50 Gamerscore) Complete the game (Host Only). The Queen is Dead! (50 Gamerscore) Kill all the Queens (Host Only). Martian Journal (100 Gamerscore) Collect all of Larry’s notes (Host Only).