Just Cause 3

Just Cause is basically a game series where the story is only a cover for your true purpose: Blow everything up!

The Story

The game takes place in Rico Rodriguez hometown, Medici, where the military power took control over the entire island while you are there to investigate why the leaders of the country cut their connection with the Agency. The game starts as rough as the previous one, meaning your ride to the island don't really touch the ground before the military start their mission to shoot you down.
The story is more linear than complex, and the easiest way to find more about Di Ravello true intentions is to find the journal tapes that are spread all over Medici. You don't need to worry about their order as they are progressive, meaning you will always unlock the next tapes regarding of its location.

Map and progression

Like the previous game in the series, Just Cause 3 comes with a huge map divided by regions that you can totally unlock only if you progress through the main Story, whose progress in also unlocked by destroying the main military bases of the region. The bad part is that Square Enix loves rushed games, making the last part of the game look a little bit incomplete. The small island are packed with locations and stuff to do, making for up to 60-70% of the game of you want to complete it 100%, leaving the biggest island with a lot of empty space, random locations without purpose and a few things to play around with, as well the number of mission is rather small even through the size of the island gives you the impression you're not even at the half of the story when before unlocking it.

Collectibles

Another difference between Just Cause 3 and it's predecessor it's the usage of collectible in game items; In just cause 2 there were only 3 types of collectibles, one for life upgrade, each 5 collected giving you a life boost, car parts and weapon parts with the only purpose to upgrade the available equipment, but here they are more diversified.
You can find them either by using the detector, now placed in the middle of the screen, not in the corner like the previous one, which in my perspective is a big improvement.
The first type are the vintage parts. Every region of an island has up to 14 parts of a weapon or car spread around the place.

The shrines and tombs (for the last island) unlock free fast travel on the island, if you don't collect them, you will still have fast travel based on a flare system, having up to 6 flares that you have to recharge at rebel points.

There are other types of collectibles like daredevil jumps, but most of the items will be unlocked either by conquering military bases, either by bringing cars to the garage.

The upgrade's system I found to be a very interesting idea, every equipment can be upgraded by completing challenges, for example, the wingsuit will be upgraded using gears collected during wingsuit courses and so on. There are also challenges for cars, boats, destruction using different guns or vehicles, etc.

If you want to complete the game 100%, you will have some work to do, as getting all collectible and doing all the challenges with 5 gears, just to take this one achievement. I'm proud to say I finished it in 79.4 hours with all my wandering around play style.

Seems like a lot of fun of getting this achievement until you encounter this wonderful boat, but I think I will leave that for another post.

Some borrowed images: 1 2

Final impression

The story of this game is not really something original, fighting against a Supreme government and an evil corporation, because the essence of it stays in its gameplay, you can enter without knowing anything about Just Cause 1 and 2 and still have a great time. In just cause 3, you're the guy nobody wants to mess with if they don't like bullets in their heads, it really makes you fell powerful while still having ways of challenging you.

Previous Reviews

Just Cause
Just Cause 2

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@cm0isa