Far Cry: New Dawn is a direct sequel to Far Cry 5, but fans of the first game will notice a lot of things have changed in New Dawn. Far Cry 5 ended with (spoiler alert) a nuclear war on Earth that devastated the planet, and New Dawn picks up 17 years later in a post-apocalyptic version of Hope County. Along with alterations to the story and characters because of those events, Far Cry: New Dawn also has several new systems that are going to be unfamiliar to Far Cry 5 players.
For one thing, Far Cry: New Dawn puts a big emphasis on building up Prosperity, your home base in Hope County. You'll need to upgrade your base to fight the Highwaymen, a faction of Mad Max-like bandits who are trying to conquer the area and take anything that's not nailed down. You'll also spend a lot of time gathering materials from all over Hope County to craft new weapons, so you can take down the tougher bad guys you'll face along the way.
With all the post-apocalyptic changes making their way into the Far Cry 5 foundation, jumping into New Dawn can be disorienting. We've run down all the new systems and changes to help you acclimate to the super bloom, fight the Highwaymen, and rebuild Hope County from the ground up.
We've got plenty more coverage coming--read our full Far Cry: New Dawn review, and check out our guide to the best guns in the game.
It's All About The Ethanol
There are lots of things you need to gather in Far Cry: New Dawn to keep yourself going, including crafting materials of all sorts, but probably the most important thing is Ethanol. It's the currency you'll use to upgrade Prosperity, your base of operations. That makes it necessary for advancing the story, which is tied to your base enhancements. Upgrading different areas of your base is also how you unlock better guns, cars, and medkits, among other things. So Ethanol is a big deal, and you're going to want to get it any time you can.
The trouble is, Ethanol sources are actually somewhat scarce. The main way you can get it is by attacking and liberating outposts. As in most Far Cry games, once you've cleared these locations of enemies, Prosperity will send your people there. You'll claim whatever Ethanol is in the base for later. You can also "salvage" outposts to gain more Ethanol and the opportunity to retake them--more on that in a bit.
The second place to get Ethanol is in Highwaymen tanker trucks that you'll encounter out in Hope County. Destroying them is good for the cause, but hijacking them and returning them to Prosperity or a captured outpost is even better.
Finally, you can get Ethanol from supply drops. You'll see these in your area every now and again as a plane flies over, dropping a crate by parachute for the Highwaymen to pick up. Get there first, and you can loot the drop and steal the Ethanol and crafting materials inside. Be warned, though, that supply drops always attract enemies for you to dispatch. Should you fail to loot the drop, look for Highwaymen scavengers to reclaim it. These guys wander around the world looting bodies and drops and carrying the goods back to Highwaymen bases. They're marked by red wolf icons. Approach them carefully, though--they can be tough to bring down, and if they spot you, they'll drop smoke grenades to guard their getaways.
Upgrade Outposts For Better Rewards
A big emphasis in Far Cry: New Dawn is on teamwork and cooperative play. Areas in the game are meant to be replayable, with increasingly tougher challenges yielding bigger rewards. The new outpost system is one of these replayable parts: after you capture an outpost, you can turn it into a tougher fight that'll earn you better stuff and, somewhat crucially, more Ethanol.
After you capture an outpost, look for a bench with a wrench icon inside it. This is where you can access the menu to "Salvage" the base, which means you basically steal everything from it and leave it for the Highwaymen to retake. You'll get a boost on supplies and Ethanol, but you'll lose the safety of having the base for fast travel, restocking ammo and supplies, and delivering Ethanol trucks. Salvaged outposts also get repopulated by tougher enemies, but if you manage to recapture them, the rewards in materials and Ethanol are increased. You can salvage outposts multiple times to up the difficulty and get more rewards, but you might eventually want to bring a friend along to help.
Certain outposts have specific kinds of gear associated with them, which you'll find out about after you've taken them. To unlock that special stuff, you'll need to salvage the outposts and retake them at higher difficulties.
Pick Up Everything Because Crafting Is Everything
You can call up just about anything you want, in terms of weapons and vehicles, from Prosperity or the benches at outposts; you just have to craft it all first. Crafting weapons requires a variety of stuff, including duct tape, components, titanium, and other things you can find in the world--make sure you pick up everything you find at all times so you have plenty of junk on-hand. It also pays to attack outposts and complete missions, as well as to investigate Treasure Hunts you'll find out in the world. These are small, puzzle-based encounters where you'll find your way into some kind of bunker or shelter previously occupied by someone waiting out the apocalypse, and they always have rarer materials.
Once you've crafted an item, you can re-access it any time for free, but you'll need lots of different, rarer components to craft higher-tier stuff. You'll also need to upgrade your Weapons area at Prosperity to get to Level 2, 3, and 4 guns, which are significantly stronger than Level 1 guns. The same is true of vehicles, which you'll also need to craft. All that means is you should constantly be looting everything you can when out in the world--look for boxes and bins marked in yellow. You should also get the Lockpicking perk early so you can pop open safes. They usually hold titanium, an essential crafting material for a lot of weapons.
You don't really need to do any hunting in Far Cry: New Dawn, but if you feel like it, it can be worthwhile. Any animal pelts and meat you gather can be traded for crafting materials with any trader out in the world (they have a special green icon) or back at a Weapons bench at Prosperity or an outpost. The tougher the animal, the better the material. Hunting isn't the easiest or most efficient way of getting stuff, but if you're fighting a bear anyway, looting it for a pelt you can turn into titanium is definitely worth it.
Build A More Prosperous Prosperity
Get familiar with your home base, because it's a very useful location. Prosperity has a ton of areas within it that all can be upgraded, and also offers a handy place to pick things up whenever you're between activities. The Weapons area lets you craft new guns, the Garage has all your crafted cars, and the Infirmary lets you upgrade your health and medkits. You can also gather materials you'll need if you upgrade different areas, like ammo or Yucca plants growing in the base, which you'll need to revive your Guns For Hire if they should fall in battle. Stopping back by Prosperity every now and then can be a lot easier than trying to gather everything you need out in the field, so prioritize the upgrades that will make your life easiest earlier on--like the Expeditions area (which allows for fast travel) and the Training Grounds, which help boost your Guns For Hire teammates' effectiveness.
The story will also have you finding and rescuing five Specialist characters who make your base better for getting them. You only need two to advance the story early, but it's not a bad idea to try to get them all pretty quickly if you can, to open up new base capabilities. Grace is good to recruit right away in order to increase the capabilities of your Guns For Hire buds. Bean is also a good choice thanks to his proximity to Prosperity, and his intel network will help you find outposts, story missions, and other Guns For Hire to recruit.
Watch For Anyone With Intel
As you'll be told early in the game, the best way to find places to go and things to do is to talk to the residents of Hope County. It's a similar system to what was found in Far Cry 5, but a little more widespread. Look for scouts with blue icons over their heads and initiate conversations--these folks will tell you about missions and locations, opening up the opportunity to find outposts, Treasure Hunts, and even the Guns For Hire characters you can recruit to fight alongside you. These folks also fill in your map for you, which can be very helpful as you progress through the game.
Speaking of maps, once you recruit the Specialist named Bean, you can buy new maps in the Cartography area of the base when you upgrade it. These mark the locations of crafting materials you can find out in the world, which can save you a lot of time if you're hurting for something in particular
Earn Perk Points From Treasure Hunts And Rescues
Like in Far Cry 5, you can upgrade yourself by earning Perk Points and using them to purchase Perks. These include things like extra weapon holsters, the ability to throw and use grapple hooks, binoculars that let you mark enemies, and a lot more. There are three primary ways to get Perk Points: completing challenges, finding magazines, and rescuing hostages. Far Cry 5 players will recognize the first two methods from that game. Things like using a specific weapon to rack up kills allows you to complete various challenges, which is an easy way to nab Perks, while Perk Magazines can be found reliably in Treasure Hunt missions.
The third way to get Perks is by rescuing hostages from the Highwaymen. You'll find these folks in the backs of trucks that have cages over their beds, roaming around Hope County. Saving the hostages generally means intercepting the trucks and killing their drivers and soldier escorts, but they're not too terribly difficult. Once you let a hostage out, you'll get a Perk Point--just be careful not to accidentally kill the civilians during the battle to save them.
Follow Animals To Their Dens
You don't really need to hunt animals, but sometimes you can find the loot they've scrounged up in their foraging. To do that, you'll need to locate their dens. Look for signs out in the world that mark the areas where certain animals live, then try to track one down. As tooltips will note, animals with dens nearby can lead you back to them, but you'll need to be careful about it so as not to get in a fight with any defensive beast. Find your way back to an animal den and you'll be able to sneak inside it, likely to find several critters who are not so happy to see you. But make your way to the deepest depths and you'll find lots of loot to snag in these special locations.
Take An Expedition
Upgrading the Expeditions area of Prosperity opens up special missions you can take on that are located across the United States, not just in Hope County. These smash-and-grab missions are similar to invading outposts, except bigger and often more difficult. Expedition locations have special loot bags you need to grab and bring to an extraction point, where you'll be picked up by helicopter. Trouble is, those loot bags have GPS trackers--they're easy to find, but once you grab them and start moving, the Highwaymen will know where you are and come at you in force.
You can run Expeditions several times at various difficulties, and even bring your Guns For Hire or co-op teammates with you. They yield lots of rewards and all take place in interesting environments you won't see elsewhere in the game, so they're definitely worth checking out.
Rank Up Your Guns For Hire
Use your AI teammates and let them get in on the action. Your Guns For Hire will rank up based on how many kills they earn once you start upgrading the Training Grounds. The quicker you get them into the fight, the faster you can upgrade them, which will make them markedly more effective. Your teammates also all have special perks and abilities that get unlocked as they level up, and unlike in Far Cry 5, they're fixed for each character. They're all different, so spend some time in the Roster menu to find out which characters you like best and what abilities they have, then spend some time mixing it up with the Highwaymen to upgrade them. You'll be glad you did when things get hairy.
Use Autodrive To Open Fire
Once you set a location on your map for a place you want to drive to, a line will appear on your screen to show you how to get there. You can also set your vehicle to autodrive, following the route for you without your input. This is great for getting into vehicular combat with the Highwaymen. The buttons that call up your weapon wheel let you pull out and fire your guns while driving, so you can fire away without having to watch where you're going. That's especially useful when trying to take down Highwaymen trucks filled with hostages or Ethanol.
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