Far Cry 5 first look: Taking on doomsday preppers in backwater Montana

I sat front row while Dan Hay, the creative director for Ubisoft’s Far Cry 5, talked about visiting the place I grew up like it was another planet. And I guess it really is. Montana, the setting for the next Far Cry, is one of the biggest states in the USA with one of the lowest populations. I remember when we broke one million. My dad texted me, saying we’re big time now. 

Big is right. There’s so much empty space in Montana, it doesn’t always feel attached to the rest of the US—a perfect home for the strange, fringe, and fundamental. Montana is where the Church Universal and Triumphant started, a cult that performs eerie mantras to assure the stability of personal and national economies. Pinesdale is fundamentalist Mormon sect that actively practices polygamy, just a short drive from Missoula, one of the more progressive cities in the state. And in recent years Whitefish became the begrudging home to Richard Spencer, an oft-punched figurehead in the resurgence of neo-Nazi sentiment. Montana is an easy place for entire communities to mobilize and hide in plain sight, some harmless, some clearly not. 

That’s the thrust of Far Cry 5, set in the fictional Hope County, where a powerful cult takes root and flourishes. During a tight-lipped preview event last week in Santa Monica, I got to see a bit of the game in action and talk to Dan Hay about how and why Far Cry is making the transition to a more domestic setting...