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5 things we had a blast doing in Just Cause 4
Rico Rodriguez is set to zip around blowing up everything in his path in Just Cause 4, and we had a hands-on session with the explosive action game.
There are two constants in the world of the Just Cause games: grappling hooks and explosions. After spending a good few hours with the latest entry in the series, Just Cause 4, we can conclusively confirm that this is still the case.
Impossible to insure action hero Rico Rodriguez returns once again to soar through the skies in a wingsuit or dangle off the underside of helicopters. This time he's doing it all in the name of leading a rebellion against a dictatorial military organisation, and searching for the truth about his father.
However, developers Avalanche Studios have thrown in a few extra tricks this time around to give Rico's mission an even more over-the-top spin. The South American country of Solis is the new playground for chaos, where diverse biomes mean each region has its own unique climate. The land is also beset by some extreme weather effects, and all the while a battle for territory is taking place that you can influence. There's a lot to take in so let's jump into all the things we had a blast with during our latest play session with Just Cause 4.
Where we're going, we don't need roads
The complete freedom to use the grappling hook to simply fly through the air so effortlessly has been a point of pleasure in previous Just Cause games – a feeling we've seen replicated to glorious effect more recently in Insomniac's web-slinging superhero adventure Spider-Man. It's still one of the best pieces of kit in Just Cause 4.
Nowhere should be navigated on foot or by vehicle unless absolutely necessary when you can just attach yourself to any nearby surface, propel yourself forward with a burst of speed and launch far into the air. Rico has access to a parachute and wingsuit to make his midair excursions even easier to control, too. The former is great for gently landing from up high, while the latter is a nimble piece of kit you can use to glide across short distances or weave between obstacles.
You're going to have fun with all the flying options
© Square Enix
You can even use the grappling hook to steal vehicles, too. If Just Cause 4 big bads Black Hand rock up to a place in a helicopter, well, that's your chopper now. Zip up to it, take out the gunners and send the pilot on a journey to the ground. When you're done with it, there's no need to land it gently, either – just let it fall to Earth as you parachute down to whatever location needs Rico's unique set of skills next.
It's fun to play in extreme weather
Video games let us get up to the stupidest things, like, say, driving into a towering tornado. You just wouldn't, would you? Don't worry, though, you can in Just Cause 4, and it's hilarious.
Extreme weather effects are a large part of Solis's peculiar climate, and the team at Avalanche have made it one of their key focuses in Just Cause 4 to create a fully realised weather system. The giant twisters you see on the horizon aren't just there for fancy background decoration, they're fully physical effects that you'll be able to find in the open world, and interact with in whichever reckless ways you see fit.
What did we do when we found one? We drove cars into it, to watch them get swept up and spun around in a dizzying ballet of crunching metal. We flew planes in in order to watch them buckle and shatter under the immense pressure. We straight up dove off a cliff and glided in to watch Rico performing a flailing dance to the gasping onlookers below. Will that ever get boring? Maybe one day, but for now, we just want to frolic in the tornado some more.
Thunderstorms, on the other hand, you'll probably want to steer well clear of if possible. As if he's Link wielding a giant metal sword in Breath of the Wild, Rico seems to serve as a lightning rod to these violent electrical discharges, and that leads to instant death.
You'll believe a tank can fly
The Black Hand will hunt Rico down
© Square Enix
No, we're not talking about that old exploit you used to pull off in Grand Theft Auto to make a tank fly through the air by repeatedly shooting backwards. This is a whole new level of bonkers: a fully-controllable flying tank.
With all the new customisable grappling hook mods introduced in Just Cause 4, you're able to attach balloons, boosters and tethers to anything in the game to set up your own ridiculous stunts or contraptions. We spent a good chunk of our time with the game fiddling around with all the options to create some truly ludicrous contraptions and inventions.
Balloons, for example, can be used to lift objects in the air, and so simplify tasks such as clearing obstacles out of your path. With all the customisation options, though, you can experiment with that further. We've attached balloons to a number of explosive barrels and programmed them to follow our aiming reticule in a simple menu interface so they menacingly hang over a chosen target, and then pop them so the payload is dropped right on someone's head.
Back to that tank. If you really want to make a grand entrance when attacking one of the Black Hand's strongholds, why not try attaching half a dozen balloons onto it, with some boosters on the back that you can control with the press of a button. You now have a legitimately flying tank.
We've also tethered two guards together, pulled them towards each other, and then set off a blast as they collide to send them catapulting across the map. And that's just the start. We're sure there are many other crazy creations to come with mixing and matching different grappling hook mods.
The climate conditions are all over the place
The South American country of Solis, where Just Cause 4 is set, would be some kind of environmental scientist's fantasy to study all its various different biomes. Not only does it have all the bonkers weather conditions we mentioned earlier, but it also has one of the most diverse climates we've ever witnessed.
A brief tour of Solis will show you exotic coastal cities, with sparkling skyscrapers and glistening blue oceans plonked right next to barren expanses of a cracked and dry desert, where all sorts of wildlife roam free. Take a trip just North of that and you'll enter a frozen expanse with snow-capped mountains or you can head West, where there's a warm and rural area that contains the quaint villages many of the locals call home.
The diversity is a little hard to wrap your head around if you think about it for a second, but it does create a far more interesting open world for you to explore. It feels like entering a new region will always offer something a little different, with new conditions to adapt to or exploit in your mission to reclaim the land as Rico.
Meeting the locals
Just Cause 4 appears to have taken some further inspiration from Grand Theft Auto by also peppering Solis with a cast of strange characters ready to hand out missions. Rico's ultimate goal may be to destabilise the Black Hand's control in the region, and access the Illapa research facility at its centre, but there are also many folks who have jobs that need doing in the area.
One question: explosions?
© Square Enix
This strange menagerie of characters wants you to get up to all sorts. There's a hyperactive and eccentric movie director who wants to put Rico's explosive talents to good use in her propaganda films against the Black Hand. There's also curious archaeologist Javi, who Rico helps uncover ancient relics across the island in very pared down yet still somewhat Tomb Raider-esque asides. Even Rico's former commanding officer, Tom Sheldon, shows up to spin his own mischief, much to Rico's distaste.
You don't just want to do jobs for these people because they’re fun to be around, though. Completing many will reward you with the upgrades needed to make the most out of your grappling hook mods. And trust us, these are things that are going to be the most fun to play around with when Just Cause 4 launches on December 4.
